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staples. He scowled at the worn jeans and the rough Irish-knit sweater. Dr. Metcalf, infectious disease specialist, didn’t own jeans or bulky sweaters. But he’d grown up in them. Shrugging, he scooped the warm clothes off the floor near the stairs and set his foot on the lowest tread.
    With the motion, his blood buzzed, and emotions, those things he so often avoided, threatened to swamp him. He’d never needed Tansy’s quiet strength more than he did right now. And he had no right to it.
    Did he dare go up? If he paused outside the bathroom door and heard her singing in the low contralto that never failed to set his body afire, would he have the strength to keep walking?
    Dr. Metcalf would have the strength to walk by,just as he’d had the nobility to push her away. But Dale Metcalf, lobsterman’s brat, knew nothing of nobility. He knew nothing of honor or civility, but he knew about desire. About the want that had chased through his veins ever since he’d held Tansy in his lap on the drive over and remembered how she smelled. How she tasted.
    How she felt wrapped around him. Needing him. Loving him.
    Oh, yes. He knew about those things. And the memory burned in his lungs. Fighting for strength, for sanity, he turned away from temptation.
    And heard Tansy scream.
     
     

 
    Chapter Three
     
    “Dale! Dale, get up here! Hurry! ” The terror in her voice kicked him up the stairs at a dead run. He’d never heard Tansy scream before. Ever.
    Moving fast, he shouldered open the door and slid to a halt at the sight of her perfect, round derriere. She was leaning out the bathroom window, dripping on the floor.
    “Tans?” He plunged into the small, steamy room, slapped the shower off and heard rustling thumps down below.
    There was someone outside.
    “Dale!” She turned, clutching a towel to her chest. “There was a man looking in the window. He was watching me! What the hell is going on here?”
    The tree.
    “Damn it!” He brushed her aside and threw a leg out the window. It had been fifteen years since the last time he’d snuck away from Trask and broken into his old house, but the tree still stood outside the bathroom window. And the sounds of running footsteps below told him it was still strong enough for climbing.
    “Omigod, what are you doing?” Her voice bordered on shrill, but he didn’t pause.
    He grabbed the gutter and swung a leg over to the thickest limb. The motions came back easily, and within seconds he was halfway down the tree. A shadow of movement from the garden gate caught his eye. “Stay put,” he yelled to her. “I’ll be right back.” He dropped to the ground and sprinted for the lane that ran behind his mother’s overgrown garden.
    There were two sets of footsteps and a frantic shout of, “Hurry! Jeez, here he comes!” from the running shadows.
    Dale chose the one on the left and made a leaping tackle. He and his quarry went down in the lane amidst a flurry of arms and legs. A pointy elbow cracked Dale under the chin and he swore, realizing he’d landed on maybe fifty pounds of skinny kid.
    “Quit!” he barked, and the squirming subsided. A nearby rustle told him the other boy hadn’t gone far, so he rolled off his captive. Sitting in the dirt, Dale shook his head. “What do you think you’re doing, looking in while a lady’s showering? Does your ma know about this?”
    Blue eyes widened beneath tousled white-blond hair. Moonlight washed the kid to ghost-pale. “You’re not going to tell her, are you, mister? I swear we didn’t mean nothing by it. We climb up that old tree sometimes and peek in the window of thehaunted house. We didn’t think there was anyone in there, honest!”
    “And the lights didn’t give you a clue?” Dale asked sternly, wondering when his boyhood home had gained a ghost.
    The blond head shook vigorously. “It’s haunted. I told you. Sometimes there are lights in there but nobody’s home. We thought it was the ghosts, and I dared Eddie to