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you hungry for me.”
    He already had, but she wouldn’t indulge herself. Not with icy water lapping at a hole in a floor of ice in a rickety shack in the middle of a frozen lake in the middle of absolutely nowhere. Lord!
    Her hands trembled as she pushed against him. “Please don’t do this, Gideon.”
    She slid off his lap awkwardly. His hand shot out, but only to keep her from stumbling into the hole in the ice. “Watch your step, little girl.”
    â€œI’m not a little girl.”
    â€œMy mistake,” he muttered, eyeing the breasts that were only partially curtained by her open shirt.
    â€œBut I’m certainly not…” Not what? She felt foolish. He was fully dressed. She was the one totally disheveled, panting, on the verge of screaming and moaning at the same time.
    â€œCheck your other line, honey.” He nodded toward the hole in the ice. “The name of the game is catch and release.”
    â€œI’m not playing a game,” she said.
    â€œNeither am I.”
    Â 
    That was all it took with Gideon Defender. “Please don’t.” The words seemed to drive him back into the woods.
    They had run into each other at a party a few weeks later, and he had introduced her to his brother. Then he’d stepped aside and quietly watched, as though he were testing for her reaction. It was a move she’d resented, and she’d told him so, the same night she’d told him that Jared had asked her out and she’d accepted. He’d expressed no surprise, offered no objections, mentioned no regrets. Not that it would have mattered, since she’d made up her mind. But it had hurt. Just a little.
    Jared had never asked her how she’d felt about his brother. Other than a certain physical resemblance, the two brothers had little in common. Jared had a different brand of charm. More practiced, perhaps. More polished. He had gone to the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, while Gideon had, for the most part, preferred to stay in the north country among the people he’d grown up with, in touch with the life he knew. In the end, Jared had chosen Raina’s world. And Raina had chosen Jared.
    They’d both wanted children, and when a pregnancy hadn’t occurred soon enough to suit Jared, they had adopted Peter. Raina hadn’t questioned the decision when Jared announced that the opportunity for a baby had unexpectedly presented itself. His low sperm count was an issue he neither wanted to discuss nor fret about. He’d had some childhood health problems that he didn’t care to discuss, either. They had been blessed with a perfectly beautiful son, and all was well.
    For a time after that they had been a fairly typical suburban family. Raina had quit her job to stay home with Peter until he started school, and then she’d only worked outside their home part-time, while Jared had worked too hard. He’d found less and less time to be at home as his time, unbeknownst to him, slipped away quickly. Eventually there had been no chance for visits to Pine Lake, and then suddenly, irrevocably, the time was gone. At least, his time was gone. At first Raina had had to remind herself that hers was not. But not lately. Ever since adolescence had overtaken her son and transformed him like some kind of fairy-tale curse, she had no trouble remembering that she had miles to go and challenges to meet.
    Like another fishing trip with Gideon.
    â€œAre you ready, Peter?” He’d been in the bathroom forever. A year ago, sixty seconds in the shower and he was out. “Youknow, your hair doesn’t have to be perfect. We’re going out fishing. Uncle Gideon said he’d pick us up at the dock in—”
    The door finally opened, and her son deigned to emerge. His beautiful black hair was still wet, so she assumed that the new pimple on his chin was the reason for the stormy look in his eyes. He was hoping for hair on his