She made a grab, giving him enough time to yelp and run for cover. She played dodge and dart for a few minutes, surprising Brody at how easily she avoided trampling on toys. Jack squealed for help, obviously having a great time.

She caught him, wrestled him to the couch, pinned him while he laughed and screamed for mercy.

"Now… the ultimate punishment." She dashed kisses over his cheeks, punctuating them with loud smacks. "Say yummy," she ordered.

"Nuh-uh!" He was breathless and his belly was wild with laughter and delight.

"Say yummy, yummy, yummy or I'll never stop."

"Yummy!" he shouted, choking on giggles. "Yummy, yummy."

"There." She sat back, whistled out a breath. "My work is done." Jack crawled right into her lap. She wasn't soft like Grandma, or hard like Dad. She was different, and her hair was soft and tickly. "Are you going to stay till midnight when it's new year?"

"I'd love to." She glanced over her shoulder at Brody. "If your dad says it's okay." Some battles, he thought, were lost before they were waged. "I'll get your beer."

Chapter Five

"Now." Frederica Kimball LeBeck dragged her sister into Kate's bedroom, firmly closed the door. That would, she calculated, insure them approximately five minutes of quiet and privacy. "Tell me everything—from the beginning."

"Okay. According to scientific evidence, there was a great explosion in space."

"Ha ha. About Brody O'Connell." Eight years Kate's senior—light where Kate was dark, petite where Kate was willowy, Freddie flopped on the bed. "Mama told me you've got him in your crosshairs."

"He's not a rabbit." Kate flopped on the bed in turn. "Gorgeous, though, huh?"

"Oh, yeah. Excellent shoulders. So what's the deal?"

"The deal is he's a widower, doing a bang up job raising a terrific boy. You saw Jack right?"

"Can't miss him. He's giving my Max a run for his money," she added, speaking of her own six-year-old son. "They're bonding over video games."

"Great, that'll push Brody into the social mix. I don't think he's given himself much chance to play."

"He's getting one now, whether he wants it or not. Grandpa and Uncle Mik shanghaied him. I saw them shoving him out the door so they could all go look at your building and make manly carpenter-guy noises over it."

"Perfect."

"So, is it just glands, or is it more?"

"Well, it started with glands. My glands are very susceptible to big, strong men—and their tool belts." While Freddie snorted with laughter, Kate rolled over on her back, studied the ceiling. "Could be more. He seems like—I don't know, just a very nice man—solid, responsible, loving. The kind of man I haven't seen much of. Gun-shy, too, in a really sweet way, which makes him a wonderful challenge."

"And nobody likes a challenge more than you."

"True. Unless it's you. And I wouldn't mind pursuing the whole thing at that level. But every time I see him with Jack, there's this little… tug inside. You know?"

"Yeah." Freddie had started experiencing those tugs where her own husband Nick was concerned at approximately the age of thirteen. "Are you falling for him?"

"Too soon to know. But I really like him on all the important levels, which balances out nicely with all this wild lust."

She lifted her leg, pointed her toe at the ceiling. "I really want to get him alone somewhere and rip his clothes off. But I know I can also have a good conversation with him. Last night we watched the last part of that movie about the giant eye from space."

"Yeah. I love that movie."

"Me, too. That's what I mean. It was really comfortable and easy." And sweet, she thought with a long, lazy stretch. Absolutely sweet. "Even though he gives me that zing in the blood, it's nice to just sit on the couch and watch an old movie. Most of the guys I dated, it was either dancing, partying, dancing, art shows, dancing. There was never any let's just stay home for a night and relax. I'm really ready to do that."

"Small town, ballet school, a romance with a carpenter. It suits you, Katie."

"Yeah." Delighted Freddie could think so, she rolled over again. "It really does." Yuri Stanislaski, a bull of a man with a fringe of stone-gray hair, stood in the center of the room destined to be a dance studio.

"So, this is good space. My granddaughter, she knows the value of space. Strong foundation." He walked over, gave the wall a punch with the side of his fist. "Good bones." Mikhail, Yuri's oldest son, stood at the front windows. "She'll relive her childhood out here. It's good for her. And—" he turned, flashed a smile "—people look in, see the dancers. Advertisement. My niece is a clever girl."

There were pounding feet on the steps. Brody had no idea how many of the young people had come down with them. He thought most of them belonged to Mik, but it was impossible to keep track when there were so many of them, and all almost ridiculously good-looking.

He wasn't used to large families, all the byplay and interaction. And he had a feeling the Stanislaskis were about as big as a family could get without just bursting at the seams.

"Papa! Come on up. You gotta see this place. It's ancient. It's great!"

"My son, Griff," Mik said with a twinkle. "He likes old things."

"So, we go up." Yuri gave Brody a pat on the back that could have toppled an elephant. "We see what it is you do with this ancient great place to make my little girl safe and happy. She is a beauty, my Katie. Yes?"

"Yes," Brody said, cautiously.

"And strong."

"Ah." Unsure of his ground, he glanced toward Mikhail for help and got only that thousand-watt grin.

"Sure."

"Also good bones." Yuri let out another hearty laugh, and twinkling at his son in what was an unmistakable inside joke, started up the stairs.

Brody didn't know how it happened. He'd meant to do no more than drop in on the Kimballs. To be polite, to thank Natasha for thinking of him and Jack.

He'd gotten swept in. Swallowed was more like it, he decided. He wasn't sure he'd ever seen that many people in one place at one time before. And most of them were related in one way or the other. Since his own family consisted of himself and Jack, his parents—with three aunts and uncles and six cousins scattered down south—the sheer number of Stanislaskis had been an eye-opener. Frankly he didn't see how they kept track of each other.