"One more night," Luke haggled once the ink was drying on their divorce papers and Laura was trying to knead the tension out of her shoulders. "Do it for Junior. This way, he can have one last hurrah with his special lady Scorpio and Rick can try his hand at shackling you to the nearest potted plant before you make off to parts unknown with his grandson."

Laura scrubbed her face. She felt twenty years older than she had five minutes ago.

"Don't do this."

"I said I'd let you go, I didn't say I'd play fair." He sounded just sorry enough to plead a little more.

Laura put the holster into her shoulder bag, resigned. "You keep conning me into staying one more day."

"And you keep staying. What's that say about you?" His grin was too damned devious to be borne.

She let it pass for want of a response. "I guess that's me up for dinner again. Any idea who'll be joining us?"

"The Scorpio-Devane bunch should just about do it. The Baldwins are keeping Scotty boy under lock and key. Mary Mae sends her regards. She's up to her neck dealing with the insurance adjusters."

She hugged her carpet bag. "They aren't going to give her a hard time, are they?"

"Not on my watch. My cousin Bill knows some people who can get her up and running again before summer. She'll be all right."

"I feel awful."

"This wasn't you. This was that jackass of a husband you've got after you. Jerks like that'll break you down by targeting the people you care about. That's how they get you and keep you crawling back, hoping to limit the fallout. Trust me, it won't do a bit of good; you can take that to the bank."

Laura was quietly reminded that Luke hadn't come up in a house with two parents and heaps of affection to go around. He'd seen some of the worst of so-called love there was.

"I want to help her, Luke. She was good to me, she took care of my son and me when we had nowhere to go and look how her kindness has been repaid."

"She doesn't mind."

"I mind. Give her the money you've set aside for me. Help her get back on her feet."

"I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm doing all right these days."

"It has come to my attention, yes."

"I'll do both. I'll help her and help you. Everybody gets enough to keep bellies full and the roof patched up in the rain. We'll call it even."

"It's not nearly even."

"Them's the breaks. Most of the time, you never even the score; you just give until you can sleep at night. Let me do the giving."

I'm letting this go. I can't repay every favor done for me, but soon as I can, I'll make this up to her.

"Will anybody else be eating with us tonight?"

"Dear old dad probably. I think he might be moving in. I haven't been able to chase him away yet."

"I'm just sure you tried so hard."

"You know me, I'm a man of much persuasive capability." He wiggled his brows in suggestive reminiscence.

Laura's eye roll verged on audible.

"Don't be a spoilsport. I really did say you might need a night, but he misses you, and the guy's just found out he's got a grandson, expect some excitement. He's got a lot of years to make up for—we all do."

"You don't. I was dead." The words were becoming easier to believe all the time.

His effervescent smile was dead on arrival. "You were running and you needed me. I should have been there."

She pulled her bag higher on her shoulder. "It doesn't matter. I've gotta prep for dinner if you want anything for your guests to eat."

"If you keep this fancy cuisine up, you'll put poor Lionel out of business. As it was, he was blubbering into those stuffed eggplants you made for lunch. Nearly broke my heart to see him like that."

"Would you prefer hot dogs?"

Luke sprung out of his brass and leather chair to saunter to the front of his desk.

"Not a chance, I say bring on the haute cuisine! Spoil me. My waistline won't like it, but you won't hear a peep of complaint from my stomach."

She followed Luke out of his office to parlor below.

"How about lamb kebabs? Simple, straight forward, sprinkled in garam masala with some grilled vegetables. Nothing too highfalutin about that, I don't think."

"Sounds like a dream to me. Maybe I should hire you to cater my wedding. We'll have to turn wedding crashers away at the door with you in the kitchen."

"Don't push your luck, Mr. Mayor. I'm nobody's hired help."

Not in this town, anyway.

"You oughta go into business for yourself. You'd make a killing catering."

Laura lit up. "You really think so?"

"Would I say it if it wasn't so?"

"You might."

"You wound me."

"I might."

Luke hopped onto the ground floor landing from four steps up. Laura hopped down from two. "Damn, girl, you still got it."

"And don't you forget it." Laura sidled past him to the sitting room where Nik and her father and Holly were involved in an intense scrabble match.

"I don't think that counts, son. It's not in the dictionary."

"It's a foreign borrow word. I think that counts for something. I say we split the difference, what say you?"

Rick made a show of grumbling, as if Holly was driving the hardest bargain there was. "All right, for the lady, I will. Remember that, Rex, ladies are just about always right."

Nikolas pursed his lips, committing it to memory as he did all his mother's rules.

"Ten points for gratis," Holly noted. "Well done, Rex."

Luke bent over her shoulder to whisper in her ear, the heat of his breath sending a shiver through her. "He'll be a lady killer in no time."

Laura pulled closed the folds of her coat. "He's got plenty of examples to follow around here. Don't put too many ideas in his head."

Luke's ensuing wink made her especially nervous.

A symphony of admiring noises filled the dining room as Laura's second meal of the day was enjoyed by Luke and Holly's guests. Holly radiated satiety at every bite. Luke's groans of satisfaction were thanks enough. Robin and Nikolas toasted to the meal with their skewers whilst Robert stole a glistening cherry tomato from Anna's plate to dip in his sauce. Her father munched on olive oil-drenched pita bread and kissed his fingers in compliments to the cook. The only people missing from this picture were her sister and mother. Laura suppressed a wince at those familiar pangs of longing.

"Mr. Mayor, does the meal meet with your approval?"

Luke guffawed and elbowed Holly. "English, you gotta help me talk her into catering the big day. The woman's a marvel, we can't let her escape."

Holly hummed her agreement, mouth too full for words.

Once everyone had downed their first helpings, just about everyone was on to seconds, much to Laura's bemusement.

Holly dabbed her mouth. "So, Laura, I'm dying to know, and I'm sure everyone else is as well: where have you been all this time?"

Laura shrugged, bashful for a change instead of reticent. "Just about anywhere you can think of."

"I'm putting up a map on the wall and I'm sticking pins everywhere you say you've been."

"Come on, it's no great conspiracy. My son and I are nomads. There's nowhere we can't go, huh, honey?"

Nik kicked his feet under the table, humming beatifically between bites of ground lamb and grape leaf.

"That's a yes."

"Funny, that," Robert remarked, "I never took you for a rolling stone."

"Considering the amount of running off I did as a girl, I'm shocked you thought I'd ever sit still. My mother was convinced I never would." Laura's smile faded somewhat as she remembered her mother's unyielding patience with Laura's selfish indecision at that age. "In some ways, she was right. I never settled down. I guess that life just isn't the life for me."

"Having a family means settling, Laura," Rick interjected.

"It also means making difficult decisions, Dad." She battled to keep her tone steady lest Nik realize the conversation had taken a turn. "I've done nothing but make hard calls. I will do that for as long as I have to. The alternative is unacceptable."

"The alternative being what?"

Nik was fixing his mother and grandfather with puzzled glances. Laura was sure he understood more than any of them knew. Her son might have been young, but he could not be mistaken for ignorant in the ways of the world.

"I'm doing the best I can. I would hope that would be enough to gain your approval."

Rick shot her a wounded look Laura couldn't help but to return. This was their stalemate; reality would not yield. Nor would she.

"Can you blame a man for wanting to keep what remains of his family in arm's reach?"

"I can't blame you for anything. Nothing about this is your fault." Laura took small bites of pita to quiet her own tongue. She fought enough not to want to fight anymore tonight.

"Or yours," Luke said, out of turn. "The only person making your life a living hell isn't here and he isn't getting in here, no way, no how. You crossed the world without finding a place you could feel safe and I'm telling you, this is it. Leave what's-his-name outside. You're home for now and that's what matters. We'll deal with tomorrow, tomorrow."

Rick lowered his gaze in chastisement, and then lifted his glass of ayran. "To tomorrow."

Laura took the peace offering for what it was and raised her own. "To tomorrow."

The toast reverberated around the table until even Robin and Nik had turned it into a mantra to be heeded.

Dinner after that, Laura found, was a much funnier affair once Holly and Anna started telling stories about their men, and each returned the favor. Laura had forgotten how easily laughter came when she wasn't afraid of what lay around the corner. For one evening, Laura gave up keeping watch, and lived.