Home At Last

“I know you.”

She said it so simply, so certainly, that he felt as if she’d just touched him. Touched his face, his hands, his heart, with the same achingly graceful innocence he remembered from their last and only summer together. “Well…thanks,” he mumbled. If she was willing to give him the gift of such trust, there was no way he could refuse it. “But I’ll call you from the photo place before I come back here, because I can always stay at the Hyatt. Stock up on those little shampoos.”

Looking both amused and impatient, Kirsten straightened her shoulders. “We’re going to be traveling together, anyway,” she told him. “And your staying here is no different than us staying at the same hotel.”

Caught by surprise at her practical turn of thought, he nodded in acceptance. “Okay, good point.” He’d never worried about sharing a roof with anyone else on a job, and Kirsten obviously saw this as nothing but a business arrangement. Which proved he’d made the right decision eight years ago. “See you in about an hour.”

He still hadn’t opened the door before she interrupted with another offer. “I can have some dinner ready by the time you’re finished with the pictures.”

“No, that’s okay,” J.D. said. He couldn’t expect her to take him in and cook dinner besides, as if he were an invited guest. “Thanks, anyway.”

“Oh, well, if you ate on the way down here…” she conceded, as if there could be no other reason for his refusal. “I just didn’t want you going hungry.”

The mixture of embarrassment and concern in her voice struck him with vivid clarity. He’d heard that tone before, eight years ago, nine, ten…. In spite of all the polish Kirsten had acquired, all the trappings of a custom home and vacations with Brad in Europe, she was still a nurturer at heart. And even though he didn’t need it, had never needed it, the realization touched him.

“You’re still looking out for me,” he said softly. “Aren’t you?”

“I guess so,” she admitted, looking a little shy. Then, with a glance at the keys in his hand, she gave him a flicker of the teasing smile he remembered. “And you’re still looking out for me, too. Some things never change.”

He supposed that was true, although—except for his last, silent sacrifice—she’d done far more of the nurturing than he had. Even back in tenth grade, he and Brad had recognized that Kirsten took pleasure in helping them with their English essays, their forgotten lunches or whatever else she could offer.

“Well, of course,” she’d said when Brad had commented on it. “I like helping people. And you guys are my best friends.”

It had amazed J.D. the way she and Brad had seemed to take their trio’s friendship for granted. The easy connection, the genuine interest, the kind of caring he’d never before witnessed firsthand, were nothing extraordinary to either one of them.

But then, they both came from a world he’d never imagined could exist in real life. He’d heard of things like birthday cards, Thanksgiving dinners and invitations from grandparents…but those were the stuff of TV shows, which everyone knew were created by the same writers who created space aliens. To know people who took such traditions for granted was startling, intriguing and—to his shame—irresistible.

He suspected, though, that no one had ever resisted an offer of friendship from Brad Laurence. Even at age fifteen, the future class president had possessed a gift for drawing people into his high-spirited vision of good times for all. It was Brad who had nicknamed the three of them Tubac’s Terrific Trio, back on the first day of tenth grade when they’d shared a lengthy bus ride. “Everybody else lives a lot closer to town,” the football captain had announced upon boarding the school bus and seeing J.D. alone in the back. “Except Kirsten Taylor—she’s only a few minutes from here. You’re new, right? Where you from?”

By the time Kirsten joined them, Brad had decided that the three of them were a team, and the curious friendship had endured…in spite of the innumerable differences between an outgoing prom king, a sheltered princess and a loner who knew they would never comprehend his gritty kind of life. But J.D. had been accepted as part of their team with an ease that baffled him…and had gladly contributed his skill in math toward the task of getting them all through school, while Kirsten contributed the caretaking and Brad the exuberant sense of adventure that labeled everyone he met a lifetime friend.

They had been friends, all three of them, and they’d stayed friends even after Brad and Kirsten started dating in their senior year. J.D. had known he couldn’t expect anything different, not with the two of them so well matched—even he could see, in spite of his fantasies that someday Kirsten would look at him with new eyes, like those two belonged together.

Together in a world he would never fit into. Which was why, when he’d run into Brad shortly after returning from his tour of duty, he’d resolutely refused his buddy’s repeated invitations to “stop by the house, see Kirsten and the kids” and confined their infrequent meetings to sports bars.

But those meetings had cost him. They’d kept him asking about Kirsten with the same perverse sensation he would get from exploring a sore tooth with his tongue. He’d spent eight years wondering about her, hoping he’d made the right decision, and knowing all the while that he couldn’t have done anything else. Even though Brad had been completely wrong in pursuing Miss Scottsdale, J.D. knew that his friend—with his shining heritage of family traditions and love—came from the only kind of world Kirsten deserved.

Which reminded him of something he should have told her before now.

“By the way,” he said, hesitating with his hand on the doorknob, “I’m sorry things didn’t work out with Brad.”

She looked a little embarrassed, but gave him a polite smile. “Thank you.”

No, he needed to explain it better than that. To let her know he was on her side, in spite of the fact that he’d let her down so badly. “I was gonna call you when Brad said you were getting divorced,” J.D. continued. “Just to let you know…well…I mean, he and I stayed in touch, but I always thought you—” There was no good way of saying this, but he had to make sure she knew where his loyalties lay. “What Brad did was wrong, okay? I don’t want you thinking I’d ever take his side over yours.”

Although by convincing himself there was no reason to call her, back in January, he’d done exactly that.

“You mean, when it comes to finding the kids?” Even though she still looked embarrassed, her smile grew warmer. “I never thought that.”

He could look at her smile for weeks, J.D. realized, feeling a clutch of uneasiness in his chest. “Just so you know….”

“I do know,” she murmured, meeting his gaze with such luminous intensity that he instinctively tightened his grip on his keys to keep himself from reaching for her. “J.D….thank you.”

This was business, Kirsten reminded herself the next morning, pinning her French braid into place with the gold-colored hairpins Lindsay loved. All her uneasiness about phoning J.D. Ryder yesterday had been completely pointless…because this was business, and nothing more.

He’d made that very clear last night, when he returned from the photo place with a take-out bag of burgers and fries and offered her a choice of regular or diet soda. “I thought you’d already had dinner!” she protested, setting a woven placemat on the kitchen table where she’d choked down a carton of yogurt half an hour ago. “J.D., I would’ve been happy to make you something.”

“I know you would’ve,” he answered, putting the bag on the granite-topped counter and fixing her with a steady, steely gaze. “But that’s not your job, Kirsten. Your job is to help me find the kids…and that’s all.”

He couldn’t have made it any clearer if he’d drawn a line across the table between them, she thought now, dropping some extra hairpins into her travel bag and zipping it shut as the last step toward departure. And it was silly of her to feel hurt by his deliberate distance, since she didn’t need an old friend searching for her children. She needed a professional.

But it seemed the long-ago wound still hadn’t healed as well as she’d like. Not that she had ever noticed it before, not when she’d been so wrapped up in caring for her family. It was only seeing J.D. Ryder again, only the realization of how he hadn’t changed at all, that was making her wish things had ended differently.

If they’d ended differently, though, you wouldn’t have the family you’ve got.

She needed to remember that, Kirsten told herself, taking her travel bag down the hall toward the kitchen, where she’d laid out coffee and whole wheat bagels shortly after dawn. All she cared about was finding her children, and a detective who knew Brad’s way of thinking would be her best possible choice for such a mission. As long as they both stayed focused on the task, there would be no worry about old memories getting in the way.

But when she found J.D. studying her refrigerator-door snapshots and cradling a stoneware mug in the palm of his left hand, exactly the way he’d done eight years ago with the Snack-n-Go cups, she felt a visceral flood of memory rising so swiftly that she had to tilt her head back against the tide of warmth in her chest.

“Morning,” he greeted her, glancing away from the photos of Halloween costumes, the twins’ soccer party and Lindsay’s graduation from kindergarten…photos she should have removed yesterday, even though he evidently hadn’t noticed anything worth commenting on. Maybe because such scenes were completely foreign to him. He’d mentioned last night, while describing his new job in Chicago, that he’d never come close to—or even wanted—a family life of his own. “Thanks for the coffee.”

“I’ve had mine,” she said hastily, trying not to notice the fit of his well-worn jeans and slate-blue polo shirt any more than she’d notice her tax accountant’s wardrobe. “We can leave anytime…unless you were waiting for raspberry jam on the bagels.”

J.D. gave her a startled glance, as if wondering how she knew what he used to order at the Snack-n-Go. “You remembered that?”

She remembered virtually everything about that summer, but she wasn’t about to tell him so. She wasn’t even going to think that way, not with all the risks involved. Instead she said lightly, in the tone of voice she’d perfected during her years with Brad, “It’s funny, the things that stick with you.”

“Yeah…funny.” From the edge in his voice, it appeared he didn’t want to discuss old memories any more than she did. “Anything you need to take care of before we leave? Mail pickup, someone to water the plants, changing the phone message?”

She’d recorded a new answering-machine message last night, hoping the phone company would fix her call-forwarding system before another week passed. It was a long shot, Kirsten knew, but if either Brad or the children phoned they would hear her plea for a swift return.

If only she’d taught them the new number before they’d left….

“Everything’s taken care of,” she told J.D., cutting off the self-reproach before she could start choking up again. Crying wouldn’t do the children any good, and she needed to stay in control of herself all the more with this man so close. “My friend Cheri’s coming around eight, and she offered to house-sit until we get back. So if Brad shows up with the kids, there’ll be somebody here.”

“Okay, then.” Moving with his usual quick, controlled grace, he dumped the last of his coffee down the sink, deposited the mug in the empty dishwasher, then picked up her travel bag as well as his own from beside the kitchen door. “Shampoo all packed? Let’s get going.”

He hadn’t lost the knack, she realized, of throwing out those little side comments that always made her smile. Usually after he’d turned away, because J.D. never waited to see whether anyone reacted to his remarks. But she found herself smiling, anyway, as she locked the door behind her and slid the key for Cheri under a terracotta pot.

When she turned to watch him stowing their bags in the back seat, Kirsten noticed with a flicker of fascination that, at least on the surface, this man’s car was a lot like him. A dark exterior, windows that revealed nothing of the inside, any damage carefully hidden—and probably capable of meeting any demand that might arise.

Yes, she had been right in calling J.D. Ryder.

“I know you can’t say how long it’ll take us to find Lindsay and the boys,” she told him as they drove to the airport, “but I’m hoping it’s a good sign that you didn’t bring a week’s worth of clothes.”

He gave her a slight smile, and in the early morning light she saw the faint relaxing of his hard shoulders. “With any luck,” he said, “we’ll have them back today.”

Please, God…

“I hope so.” While there was no excuse for having allowed this disaster to happen, she could forgive herself more easily if all it cost the children was one more day of junk food, indifferent supervision and unbrushed teeth. One more day for Lindsay to fall asleep without her bedtime story, for Adam and Eric to be called by each other’s names, for them to wake up in a strange place not knowing—

You see what happens when you lose control?

She should have known better, especially where her children were concerned. She had vowed two years ago, when Brad had shattered their marriage, that never again would she let someone else control her life. First her parents, then her husband, had shaped her into exactly what they wanted…and always with her silent cooperation. But as of age twenty-four, Kirsten had decided, she was finally going to take charge of her own and her children’s lives.

And she’d done it for the past two years. She’d maintained her independence, shielded her daughter and sons from seeing their father’s breezy irresponsibility, and spent virtually every waking moment creating the kind of world they deserved. But for the past two weeks, hoping Brad’s recent interest in family would grow stronger without her interference, she’d forgone the phone calls that would have alerted her to his latest impulse…and now her children were paying the price.

“I really, really hope,” she said, tucking her peach linen shirt more neatly into her khaki slacks, “we’ll find them right away.”

“Yeah, so do I.” The gruff intensity in J.D.’s voice touched her—it was sweet of him to care so much about Lindsay and Adam and Eric—until she realized that he had his own reasons for wanting to finish the search quickly. After all, he had another life to get back to.

She needed to remember that.

“When do you leave for Chicago?” she asked him, adjusting her sun visor against the early-morning glare.

“Soon as my assignment comes through.” He braked for a red light, his work-roughened hands at rest on the steering wheel. “Shouldn’t be much longer.”

She couldn’t think of many people who would enjoy battling a whole new city full of drug dealers, but this man wasn’t like anyone else she knew. “And you’re excited about it,” Kirsten said.

“Yeah.” With the edgy light of anticipation in his eyes, he looked suddenly younger. “It’s a brand-new task force, a whole different setup. Getting things done without a bunch of layers to work through… I like that kind of freedom.”

“Freedom,” she repeated slowly, gazing at the road ahead and wondering why the word sounded so lyrical coming from him. “I know. That’s always mattered to you.”

When it came to such things as freedom, J.D. Ryder had never made any secret of his ambition to “get the hell out of Tubac.” Everyone in town had known he planned to enlist in the army as soon as he turned eighteen, same as they’d known that Kirsten would become a kindergarten teacher and that Brad would tour the east Coast with his parents to select the college he preferred.

Both the boys’ ambitions had come to pass, exactly as Kirsten had expected. What she hadn’t expected was that on the night before Brad left for his college tour, he would ask her to return his class ring. “We’ve had a lot of fun, don’t get me wrong,” he’d told her in the driveway outside her house. “But we’re both moving on, and neither one of us ought to be tied down.” Shaken, she had given him back the ring she’d worn all year and spent the next few days at her new summer job wondering why the breakup had damaged her pride more than her heart.

Her parents and her girlfriends, all of whom wholeheartedly approved of Brad, had offered as much sympathy as anyone could want…but she moved through the first week of vacation feeling curiously detached from their efforts at consolation. Detached from the whole world, in fact, no matter how hard she concentrated on the new job—she had the sensation that all the while she was learning to make coffee, ringing up orders and counting out packets of raspberry jam, her real life was somewhere beyond reach. It wasn’t until J.D. stopped by the Snack-n-Go for bagels one morning that she felt herself flickering back to a state of awareness.

No point in remembering that now.

“Looks like we’ve got time to spare,” J.D. observed, turning into the airport parking lane and—to her relief—opting for short-term rather than long-term parking. It was reassuring that he seemed so confident, Kirsten thought as they moved swiftly through the routine of checking in, boarding the plane and settling down for the four-hour flight to Seattle.

It went faster than she’d expected, and the conversation was remarkably easy. In spite of his admitted indifference to the pleasures of family life, J.D. seemed to enjoy her stories about the children. Their first day of soccer practice, Lindsay’s beloved panda, the twins’ upcoming birthday party…. And when she saved the morning’s first packet of airline peanuts for Adam and Eric, he contributed his own as well.

“For a good cause, right?” he teased as she slid the bright blue packages into her purse.

“Right,” she agreed, tucking the peanuts beside Lindsay’s favorite bubble gum. “Now the boys won’t start arguing over who gets first pick. I used to hate it when Brad would bring home two different-size robots and expect them to work it out.”

“Your kids are building robots?”

He sounded so impressed, she hated to admit that they were only playing with them under the dining-room table. “Building robots shouldn’t impress somebody like you, though,” Kirsten told him. “You’ve always done mechanical-type things.”

He gave her a rueful grin. “Not anymore. I got enough of that at Manny’s.”

Manny’s Garage had hired him part-time during their junior year, and he’d started working there full-time the day after graduation. She hadn’t known that until the morning he came by the Snack-n-Go with an order from the entire crew, and she still remembered the jolt of recognition that had shot through her the moment she saw him across the counter.

J.D. hadn’t looked surprised at seeing her, but then, she’d started bragging about her summer job long before graduation. The chance to practice her independence before starting her freshman year at the University of Arizona—thanks to her friend Debbie, who’d gotten them matching shifts at the Snack-n-Go—had filled Kirsten with a wonderfully grown-up pride.

Although she hadn’t sounded all that grown-up when she greeted J.D., she remembered. Yet he hadn’t seemed to mind her lack of poise. Instead he’d given her the slow smile that Debbie always said “would make anybody weak who wasn’t dating Mr. Perfect weak in the knees” and asked what she’d heard from Brad lately.

“Nothing,” Kirsten had stammered. “He and I…we…”

“They broke up,” Debbie announced over her shoulder while filling the orange juice machine. “Where’ve you been, J.D.? I thought everyone in town knew.”

He hadn’t seemed to notice Debbie at all. His dark eyes stayed fixed on Kirsten’s, and then he said very softly, “Hey. I’m sorry, Kirs.”

“It’s okay,” she murmured, feeling strangely shy. She should have called J.D. with the news, but once the school bus rides ended there had been little chance for contact. “Anyway, I’m working here until the middle of August, unless my uncle invites us to his house in Mexico. So what can I get you?”

He’d placed his order with no further conversation, but he’d come again the next morning, and the next, and it seemed his visits always coincided with her time at the take-out counter. It seemed, too, that it took longer each day for his order to be filled…so that by Friday, when Debbie had to work late, it felt perfectly natural for J.D. to offer Kirsten a ride home.

She’d accepted without hesitation, even though her parents had told her to phone them if ever Debbie couldn’t drive her. J.D. was a friend, he was going her way, and there was really no reason she couldn’t ride on the back of his motorcycle. It was only common sense to suggest that he drop her off a short distance from home, just in case her mother might start lecturing about the importance of choosing the right friends…and although J.D. protested that he didn’t mind taking her right to her door, he didn’t press the point.

Which relieved her, because she didn’t want to explain her parents’ belief that there was a world of difference between Kirsten’s two closest friends. Brad had been welcome at her house anytime, always greeted with genuine warmth. By contrast, while J.D. was never turned away, it was understood that the Taylors would prefer not to see much of him.

Still, they’d never specifically told her to avoid him…and it was silly to take Debbie or her parents out of their way when J.D. was heading home right when she got off work.

She explained that to Debbie the next day, and although her friend raised her eyebrows she agreed that Kirsten might as well “enjoy it, since Mr. Rebel’s going your way.” So the ride home became a daily pattern, which she found herself looking forward to more and more.

It got so the trip lasted longer each day, as their afternoon conversations moved from friendly chat to intriguing discussion to something more thoughtful, more intimate and more appealing. She had never spent this kind of time alone with J.D. before, and she had the feeling they were both discovering unexplored depths within each other…even though they still would have defined themselves, if anyone had asked, as nothing more than friends.

Friendship, though, didn’t quite explain how the feel of his body stayed with her for hours after he dropped her off at the side street near her house. How the sound of his voice and the memory of his silences stayed with her, keeping her awake late at night. How the evocative scent of him reached her with such vivid clarity that, no matter what she was busy with when he walked into the Snack-n-Go, she would know within an instant that J.D. had arrived.

She couldn’t tell him that—J.D. probably heard such things all the time, from girls far more experienced than herself—but she couldn’t help wondering if those other girls had ever felt the kind of tantalizing awareness she felt growing between them as they shared more and more stories, more and more closeness, more and more time together. And after the third week of rides home, when she reminded him not to wait for her tomorrow because that was her day off, he looked at her for a long moment and said slowly, “I’m off, too. Want to do something together?”

Yes! was her first thought, but she’d already arranged to go shopping in Tucson with her mother. “I wish I could,” Kirsten told him, handing him back the motorcycle helmet he always insisted she wear. “I really wish I could. Only Mom’s been planning to do this college-wardrobe thing for a long time.”

“Ah.” He gazed at her for a moment longer, then clicked into first gear. “Well, have a good time.”

But she wouldn’t, Kirsten knew. Not when she’d spend the whole day missing J.D. Ryder. “Thanks,” she replied. “But I’d rather be with you.”

For one pulsing instant he stared at her, as if frozen in astonishment. Then, with what looked like a single, effortless move, he cut the ignition, hit the kickstand and drew her into his arms.

There was no time to think, and nothing to think about. All she knew was instinct, feeling, heat…the warmth of his embrace, of his hands caressing her face, his lips on hers—