At ten that night, George put his hand over Carly’s. “You might as well try to get a good night’s sleep. I’ll let you know the minute I hear anything.”

  Carly’s answer was an abrupt shake of her head. “No. I won’t leave. Not until I know.”

  George didn’t try to persuade her further. But she noticed that he didn’t leave. Both were determined to see this through, no matter what the outcome.

  At some point during the long night, Carly fell asleep. With her head leaning against the wall, she’d meant to rest her eyes for only a few minutes, but the next thing she knew, it was light outside and the sun was over the horizon. Immediately, she straightened and sought out George, who shook his head grimly.

  Two hours later, with her nerves stretched taut, Carly forced herself to eat something for the first time since breakfast the day before. She ran a comb through her dark hair and brushed her teeth.

  George was staring into the empty coffee cup he was holding when she approached him.

  “I don’t know when I’ll be back.”

  He looked at her blankly. “Where are you going?”

  “To the main terminal. Shawn and Sara are arriving in a half hour. I don’t want them to know Brand’s missing. If you hear anything, I’ll be at the house.” She let out a tired breath. “I’ll phone as often as I can.”

  Squeezing her numb fingers, George offered Carly a smile and nodded.

  It didn’t seem possible that a day could be so full of sunshine and happiness—and that Carly’s whole world could be dark with an unimaginable gloom.

  As the Alaska Airlines flight with Shawn and Sara aboard touched down against the concrete runway, Carly felt an unreasonable surge of anger. Maybe Brand had planned this so she would be forced to deal with his children. If he’d wanted to find a way to punish her, he’d been highly successful.

  As the flight attendant ushered Shawn and Sara out from the jetway, Carly straightened her shoulders and forced a smile. Her composure was eggshell fragile. She hadn’t yet figured out what she was going to say to the children.

  “Mom.” A brilliant smile lit Sara’s sky-blue eyes. She broke free from the young attendant and hurried toward Carly.

  Scooting down, Carly was the wary recipient of a fierce hug from the little girl. Shawn was more restrained, but there was a happy light in his eyes she hadn’t noticed during her visit to Oregon.

  “Where’s Dad?” Shawn was the first to notice that his father was missing.

  Not quite meeting his inquisitive eyes, Carly managed a smile. “He told me to tell you how sorry he is that he couldn’t meet the two of you today. But he’s hoping you like the surprise he has waiting for you at the house.”

  “Can we go there now?” Sara asked. Her blond hair had been plaited into long pigtails that danced with the action of her head. The doll Carly had given her was clutched under her arm.

  “I’ll take you there now. Are you hungry?”

  Both children bobbed their heads enthusiastically. Rather than find something to cook, Carly located a McDonald’s. Shawn and Sara were delighted with the fact that their first meal in Alaska was to be a hamburger and milkshake.

  When they reached the house, Shawn helped Carly unload the suitcases from the back of the car. “Grandma sent you a long letter. She said it was instructions.”

  “Then I should read it right away.”

  “Don’t,” Shawn returned soberly. “You can, if you want,” he added, after a momentary lapse in conviction. “But you don’t have to do everything she says.”

  “At least not the nap part. Right?” She gave him a conspiratorial wink.

  “Right,” Shawn confirmed with a nod.

  “Mom, Mom.” Sara rushed from her bedroom. “I’ve got a loose tooth. Look.” She started pushing one of her front teeth back and forth. “Does the Tooth Fairy live in Alaska, too?”

  “You bet,” Carly answered, wiggling the tooth to satisfy Sara.

  While Shawn and Sara investigated their new swing set, Carly unpacked their clothes. A quickly placed call to George confirmed that there hadn’t been any word. A glance out of the window revealed that both Shawn and Sara had discovered neighborhood children their age.

  “This is Lisa.” Sara had brought her newfound friend into the house. “Can I show her my bedroom?”

  “Go ahead.”

  Sara looked surprised, as though she’d expected Carly to refuse. “We won’t make a mess.”

  “Good,” Carly said, with a short laugh. “I’d hate to think of you spending your first day in Alaska cleaning your room.”

  “Sara’s never messy,” Shawn said, with a soft snicker. “At least, that’s what Grandma says.”

  With a superior air, Sara led her friend down the hall to her bedroom. Lisa gave an appropriate sigh of appreciation at the beauty of the room, which immediately endeared her to Carly.

  After the children had settled in, and Sara had taken a short nap, Carly drove them over to the apartment. Every night after work, she’d dreaded coming home. Now she understood the reason. She didn’t belong here.

  While she packed her things, Carly thought through the sober facts that faced her. Reality said that Brand could be dead. Her heart throbbed painfully at the thought, but it was a fact she couldn’t ignore. If so, the question she had to deal with was what would happen to Shawn and Sara. Brand’s mother was traveling. Her long vacation was well deserved. Kay St. Clair had done her best for these children, but she’d more than earned a life of her own. The state could remand Shawn and Sara as they had Carly. She’d been five when she’d gone to her first foster home. Sara’s tender age.

  Carly’s fist tightened at the ferocity of her emotion. No matter what it took, she wouldn’t allow that to happen. Not to Shawn and Sara. They would be hers, just as if she’d given them life. Nothing would separate the three of them. The path of her thoughts brought another realization. All these weeks that she’d battled within herself, she’d been fighting the even flow of her life’s rhythm.

  It wasn’t that she couldn’t give Brand something he didn’t already have. It was what Brand, Shawn, and Sara could give her. Borrowed dreams were irrelevant. What they shared was new and vital. Brand had tried to tell her that in so many ways, and she hadn’t understood.

  “Mom.” Sara stood in the open doorway, giving Carly a puzzled look. “I was talking to you.”

  Holding out her arms, Carly gave the small child a loving squeeze. “I’m sorry. I was thinking.”

  “Does thinking make you cry?”

  Carly’s fingers investigated her own face, unaware that tears had formed. She wiped the moisture from her cheeks and tried to laugh, but the sound couldn’t be described as one of mirth. “Sometimes,” she said with a sniffle. “Hey, you know what I really need? A big hug.” Sweet Sara was eager to comply.

  Both children wanted to listen to their favorite story once they returned to the house. Carly promised them a special dinner to go with the book. Somehow, she’d find a way to cook “green eggs and ham.” Luckily, neither child seemed to find it out of the ordinary to see Carly move her clothes from one house to another. At least, they didn’t mention it. But Carly wouldn’t be moving again. Her place was here.

  The book was Shawn’s favorite Dr. Seuss story. The boy sat beside her while Sara occupied Carly’s lap. The thought slid through her mind as she opened the book that, although Shawn and Sara resembled their mother, they were amazingly like their father. The curious tilt of Shawn’s head was all Brand.

  Carly was only a few pages into the book when a movement caught her attention. The front door was open and George stood just outside the closed screen.

  A myriad of sensations assaulted Carly. Their eyes met and Carly’s clouded with emotion, begging him to tell her everything was all right. Tears blurred his expression. But in her heart she knew the news wasn’t good. If Brand had been found alive, George would have phoned.

  “You weren’t here when I phoned,” George said. “But what I have has to be seen.”

  Carly’s arms tightened around the children, drawing them protectively close to her. Again she confirmed the thought that nothing would separate Shawn and Sara from her.

  The screen door opened and Carly braced herself.

  “Dad.” Shawn flew off the love seat.

  Carly jerked her head up to find Brand framed in the doorway. He scooped Shawn into his arms and reached down for Sara. Carly remained frozen.

  “Mom said she didn’t know what time you’d be home.”

  “Is that right?” Brand said, hugging his children close. “We’ll have to make sure Mom knows from now on, won’t we?” His eyes sought Carly’s, bright with promise. “Isn’t that right, Mom?”

  “Yes.” Carly nodded eagerly and walked into Brand’s embrace. “Oh, Brand, tell me, tell me what happened? I was worried sick…I thought I’d lost you forever.” She wept into his shoulder, knowing he probably couldn’t understand anything she was saying. It didn’t matter now that he was here. Not when he was holding her as if his very life depended on it. Later, when the children were in bed, he could fill in the details.

  “Mom unpacked all the suitcases,” Sara said happily. “Even hers.”

  Brand relaxed his hold so that he could lift Carly’s chin and brush the wet strands of hair from her face. “Are you staying?” The husky question was so low Carly could barely hear him.

  “Hey, kids,” George said, clearing his throat. “Why don’t you two show me your bedrooms? And wasn’t that a swing set I saw outside?”

  A grateful smile touched Carly’s lips as George led the children from the living room.

  “I’m never leaving. Oh, Brand, I know it all sounds crazy, but I realize I belong with you. Shawn and Sara are our children.” She couldn’t hide the breathlessness in her voice. “Everything’s clear now…. I’m not borrowing anyone else’s dreams, but living my own.”

  Sara skipped excitedly back into the room and squeezed her small body between Brand and Carly. Brand reached down and lifted her up. Two small arms shot out. One went around Carly and the other around Brand. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

  “I’m home now,” Brand murmured in a raw, husky voice and his eyes found Carly’s. “We’re all home.”

  The Trouble with Caasi

  Chapter One

  The majestic beauty of white-capped Mount Hood was unobstructed from the twentieth floor of the Empress Hotel in downtown Portland. Caasi Crane stood in front of the huge floor-to-ceiling window, her arms hugging her slim waist. Blake Sherrill’s letter of resignation was clenched tightly in one hand.

  Blake was the best general manager she’d ever hope to find. His resignation had caught her off guard. As far as Caasi knew, he had been perfectly content. His employee file was open on her computer, and Caasi moved across the plush office to study the information.

  His salary was generous, she noted, but Caasi believed in paying her employees what they were worth. And Blake earned every cent. Maybe he’d reconsider if she offered him a raise. But according to the file, he’d received a healthy increase only three months earlier.

  Scrolling down through the information, Caasi paused to read over the original employment application that included his photograph. He was six-three and at her guess around a hundred and eighty pounds. Dark hair and brown eyes. None of that had changed. At the time he was hired he was single and thirty. Certainly she would know if he’d married since then. He hadn’t; she was sure of it. Had Blake been with Crane Enterprises that long? Six years?

  Caasi pushed her wide-rimmed glasses up from the tip of her nose and sat in her cushioned white leather chair.

  Her assistant buzzed, interrupting her thoughts. “Mr. Sherrill’s here to see you.”

  Caasi pushed the intercom lever. “Please send him in.” Mentally she prepared herself. Her father had groomed her well for this position. If Blake was displeased about something, she’d soon discover what it was. Employee performance and customer satisfaction were the name of the game. But an employee, even one as good as Blake, couldn’t perform if he was unhappy. If so, Caasi wanted to know the reason. She pretended an interest in his computer file when the door opened. Looking up, she smiled brightly. “Sit down, Blake.” Her hand indicated a chair on the other side of her desk.

  He wasn’t a handsome man. His features were rough and rugged, too craggy to be considered attractive. His chin projected stubbornly and the shadow of his beard was heavy. Caasi didn’t doubt that he had to shave twice a day. He wore a dark business suit and silk tie, and his hair was coal dark. Could he be Italian with a name like Sherrill? Funny how she’d never really noticed Blake. At least, not the toughness in the lean, hard figure that stood in front of her.

  “If you don’t mind, I’d rather stand.” With feet braced slightly apart, he joined his hands.

  “Honestly,” Caasi admonished with a soft smile, “you look like a recruit standing at attention.”

  “Sometimes I feel that way.” The words were hardly above a whisper.

  “Pardon?” Caasi looked up again.

  “Nothing.” The small lines about his eyes and mouth creased in a mirthless smile. “You’re right. I’ll sit down.”

  “How long have you been with us now, Blake?”

  “Six years, six months, and five days,” he replied drily.

  “You counted the days?”

  He shrugged. “Maybe I was hoping to gain your attention.”

  Caasi gave him a troubled look. Clearly something was wrong. Not in the five years since she’d taken over the company had Blake behaved like this.

  “You have my attention now.” She held up the resignation letter. “What’s the problem?”

  He looked away. “There’s no problem. The time has come to move on, that’s all.”

  “Is it the money?”

  “No.”

  “Have you got another job offer?” That was the scenario that made the most sense.

  “Not yet.”

  This wasn’t going well, and she was fast losing her grip on the situation.

  “All right, Blake, tell me what’s up.”

  “Do you want a full report submitted? There’s one due at the end of the month, as usual.”

  “I don’t mean that and you know it.” Angrily she glared at him.

  “I thought you read every report,” he muttered with an edge of sarcasm.

  “I’ve never known you to be cynical,” Caasi cut in.

  “But then, you’ve never known me, have you?”

  Caasi didn’t know how to answer him. Maybe if she’d dated more often she’d be able to deal with men more effectively. That was one area in which her father had failed to instruct her. Sometimes she felt like a bungling teenager, and just as naïve.

  “Take the rest of the week off, Blake. I would like you to reconsider this letter.”

  “I’m not going to change my mind.” There was a determined look about him, unyielding and confident.

  She didn’t want to lose Blake. “Take it anyway, and let’s talk again the first of the week.”

  He gave her a mocking salute. “As you wish.”

  Blake’s resignation weighed heavily on Caasi the rest of the day. By the time her assistant left, she was in a rotten mood. It was due to far more than Blake, she realized. That night was the monthly get-together with Edie and June, her two BFFs.

  The months passed so quickly that sometimes it seemed that they were meeting much too often—and at other times it wasn’t nearly enough. Yet the two were her best friends…her only friends, Caasi admitted grudgingly, as she slid the key into the lock of her apartment door.

  The penthouse suite on the twenty-first floor had been Caasi’s home for as long as she could remember. She must have been eight before she realized that milk came from a cow and not the busboy who delivered all of the family’s meals.

  Daddy’s little girl from the beginning, Caasi had known from the time she could walk that someday she would be president of Crane Enterprises and the string of hotels that ran down Oregon’s coast and into California. Isaac Crane had tutored her for the position until his death five years earlier.

  Daddy’s little girl…The thought ran through her mind as Caasi opened her closet and took out a striped dress of teal, plum, and black. Everything about her reflected her father. A thousand times in her twenty-eight years Caasi had explained that her name hadn’t been misspelled but was Isaac spelled backward.

  Soaking in a bubble bath a few minutes later, Caasi lifted the sponge and drained the soothing water over her full breasts and flat stomach. Her big toe idly played with the faucet spout. Her medium-length chestnut hair was piled on top of her head as she lay back and let the hot water refresh her.

  Steam swirled around the huge bathroom as Caasi got out of the tub, wrapped a thick cotton towel around herself, and moved into her bedroom. She didn’t feel like going out tonight. A quiet dinner and television would be more to her liking, but she knew Edie and June well enough to realize they wouldn’t easily let her forgo their monthly dinner.

  An hour later, Caasi entered Brasserie Montmartre, a French restaurant Edie had raved about the previous month. Caasi didn’t mind checking out the competition. The Empress’s own small French restaurant served—in her opinion—some of the best food in town.

  Edie waved when she saw Caasi. June apparently hadn’t arrived yet, and Caasi wondered if she would, since June’s baby was due any time.

  “Greetings, fair one,” the pert brunette said, as Caasi pulled out a chair and sat down. It was a standard joke among them that, of the three, Caasi was the most attractive. She accepted their good-natured teasing as part of the give-and-take in any friendship. They were her friends, and heaven knew she had few enough of those.