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first.”
    “Very true,” he said. “So we could avoid any pain down the road and not see each other again. Or we can take the risk and go with how really, really good this feels.”
    I wasn’t much of a risk taker. I wished I could talk to Rebecca. I had other friends I could call for advice and commiseration, but it was Rebecca who had my heart, and Rebecca was in China, where her cell phone didn’t work. I would, for a change, have to be my own counsel.
    “Let’s go for it,” I said, and I lifted my glass of lemonade for a toast.

4
Rebecca
    “W HAT’S WRONG ?” B RENT FROWNED AS R EBECCA WALKED into his hotel room.
    “Maya lost another baby.” She flopped onto the edge of his bed. She could usually shrug off bad news. Compartmentalize it and move on. She had to be able to do that in order to work for DIDA and maintain her sanity. But for some reason, this latest miscarriage was really getting to her.
    “She was pregnant again?” Brent sat down next to her. “Did you know?”
    “I knew, but no one else did. They were afraid to tell anyone after the last miscarriage. She made it sixteen weeks this time.”
    “Man, that sucks.” Brent nuzzled her neck. “Let me make you feel better.”
    She jerked her head away. “I can’t shift gears that fast, Brent,” she said. “All I can think about is Maya and Adam. I feel like a crappy sister. Like maybe I should go home and be with her.”
    “Do I need to remind you you’re the speaker at lunchtomorrow? And the presenter at the…that afternoon seminar, whatever it is?”
    “I know.”
    “It’s not like someone died,” he said.
    She looked at him sharply. “It’s exactly like someone died.”
    The night table lamp picked up two sharp lines between his eyebrows. “How can you be pro choice and say that?” he asked.
    “Oh, stop it. This is different. This was a sixteen-week-old much wanted baby with a perfectly healthy mother. It’s a death to Maya and Adam.”
    “And apparently to you, too.”
    “Because of how it hurts Maya.” Even as she said the words, she knew it was more than that. She’d wanted that niece or nephew. She wanted to be the cool aunt who’d bring gifts from all over the world. The aunt her niece or nephew could confide in, knowing nothing would ever make her blush. She’d wanted to hold Maya’s baby in her arms.
    Brent sighed and got to his feet, slipping his hands into his pockets. He looked through the sliding glass doors to the small balcony and the view of San Diego harbor. “You infantilize Maya,” he said.
    She could see his reflection in the sliding glass door. “What do you mean?”
    “I mean, you still think of her as your baby sister who needs your protection. She’s a grown woman.” He turned to face her, the lines still carved into the skin between his eyebrows. “She’s a physician, for Christ’s sake.”
    “Don’t you ever feel protective of Brian or Kristin?” she asked. Brent was the oldest of three.
    He laughed. “Hell, no. They were a pain in the ass when we were growing up and they’re still a pain in the ass now.”
    “But you love them.”
    “Of course. I just don’t dwell on them. They’re adults who can stand on their own two feet.”
    She wished she could feel as relaxed about Maya as Brent did about his siblings, but Maya was needy and it was Rebecca’s fault. As simple as that.
    “If I marry you,” Brent said, “I’m marrying Maya, too.”
    “Don’t be so dramatic.”
    “ You’re the one who’s being dramatic.” Brent walked over to the mini-refrigerator, opened the door and pulled out a beer. “Want one?” he asked.
    “Uh-uh.”
    Brent uncapped the beer. “You want to go over your speech for tomorrow?”
    She ran her hand over the fern pattern on the bedspread, smoothing the already smooth fabric. “I could do it in my sleep.”
    “All right.” He took a swallow from the bottle. “I get that you’re annoyed with me. Let’s just forget about sex tonight and