He opened it to find Angie huddling into her thick jacket, a fresh young beauty wearing a smile sent to earth by the angels. Her hair was thick and soft, her eyes large and dark, her cheeks flushed and lips full and pink. Had he warned her not to get mixed up with the likes of him? What a damn fool he was—the mere sight of her made him forget Marie and long to hold her. She tempted him beyond sanity. A young woman like this would be his downfall for certain. He needed maturity; he wanted the kind of woman he knew he could count on. What did a woman know at twenty-three?

“Your directions were fine, but because of the dark I missed the turnoff three times.”

“Sorry,” he said lamely, standing in the open door.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

He shook himself. “Sorry,” he said again. “I just hung up from talking to Marie, my friend’s widow. I’ll shake it off in a second. Come on in.”

“Listen, if you need to cancel, if this turned out to be a bad night, after all…”

“Nah, come in.”

She stepped into the cabin uncertainly. “It probably puts you in a kind of sad, grieving place.”

“Not usually,” he said. “I try to talk to her for a few minutes every day. Can I get you a beer? I saw you have a beer at Jack’s so I bought a six-pack. Sam Adams okay?”

She laughed softly. “You bought it just for tonight? You might be the only guy I know who doesn’t stock beer. Sam Adams is great, thanks.”

“Chili’s ready and keeping warm, but take off your jacket and relax by the fire for a while first.”

“Wow—this place is awesome,” she said, looking around the great room. “No wonder you wanted to take a little R and R here.”

He fetched a couple of beers and joined her on the couch. “My brother’s wife practically rebuilt the place out of a shack a couple of years ago.” He handed her a beer.

“You’re a good friend, you know. It’s too bad your friend, Marie’s husband, doesn’t get a chance to see what an excellent friend you are, calling her every day.”

Oh, he’d be very surprised, Patrick thought. What would Jake think of Patrick nurturing the idea of picking up where he’d left off? But he said, “He’d expect nothing less. And if I’d left a wife and child, he’d do the same. We’ve been tight since the Academy. Almost fifteen years. We haven’t always been stationed together, but it never mattered.” He couldn’t help it, he looked down. “I wish we hadn’t been assigned together a couple of months ago.”

“I’m sure it wasn’t your fault.”

“What if it was?” he shot back. He wiped a hand over his face. “Okay, we shouldn’t go there. The investigation showed it was hostile, but I was responsible for him. If I’m still a little scarred, it’s probably reasonable. Quick, use your young, nubile, med student mind to change the subject to safer territory.”

She grinned suddenly. “You find my mind nubile?”

Right, he thought, like every other part of you. Then he remembered that while she might look quite young, she was brilliant. She’d catch everything.

“All right,” she said. “Tell me about what you were like growing up and how it was with four older brothers, all very close in age.”

“On one condition,” he said. “You have to promise not to ask any of them the same question.”

“And why is that?”

“Because they will tell stories.”

“I’m not sure I can promise that,” she said with a laugh. “Come on.”

“Well, being the youngest, they protected me all my life, but the price was very high. They’d always be there for me, but they’d never let me forget a single slip or embarrassing moment. I’m thirty-three and I’m still hearing about the night I got caught making out at my girlfriend’s house. By her mom and dad.”

She looked a little nonplussed. “That’s not exactly original. Everyone’s been caught kissing.”

“Her sweater was in my hand and her bra was draped over the lampshade. They came home early....”

She laughed happily. “More,” she demanded.

“I peed on the side of a highway patrolman’s car.”

“Awww, well, little boys sometimes have lapses in judgment like that.”

“I was twenty-five. And had been out with my brothers. I blame them.”

“It sounds like they taught you everything you know. I was wondering about when you were much younger.”

“It’s not good stuff. I was the last one to give up a binky, the slowest to potty train, was lost several times—once requiring police intervention—and my mother thought I’d be taking my blanket with me to football camp. It suggests I liked being the baby. I didn’t pay attention in school until my football and basketball careers were on the line, which started in junior high. But I was always very nice.”

“What do you mean by that? Nice?”

“As my mother said, I knew where to butter my bread. Luke said I was a little con artist, Colin called me the family phony, Sean said I was an ass kisser, but Aiden always liked me and found me sincere. Aiden was the only one who was wrong. I was definitely a kiss ass.”

This made her laugh and, since he liked the sound, he went on. “By the time I was ten, Luke had enlisted. When I was twelve, Colin went in, both of them Army warrant officers who flew helicopters. When I was fourteen Sean had an Air Force Academy slot with a pipeline to a flying job—you can only get jets if you go to an Academy these days, you can’t enlist and sign up for flight school. Then Aiden headed for college on a Navy scholarship—he’s a doctor. It was down to me. In my mind, the only choice left was deciding which branch of the military I’d join. I got an appointment to the Naval Academy. I went to the same senator Sean had gotten his recommendation from—you can’t get into an Academy without serious political juice.”

She sat back on his sofa, shock on her face. She took a drink of her Sam Adams and then continued to stare.

“What?” he asked.

“How’d you do in the Academy?” She wanted to know.

“I did fine.”

“How fine?”

“Well. I did well. I graduated second in the class. Got a couple of awards.”

“And flight school?”

He narrowed his eyes. First in his class. Every class. “Well,” he said.

“You little pisser, teasing me about my nubile brain. You were an overachiever.”

“Who spent about four years in diapers…”

“With a binky in your mouth. There isn’t a single prescription for brainiacs, except it sounds like growing up with four older brothers might have put you in want of a brotherhood and the Academy. Flight school and a military career would fit right into your pattern. And apparently you were a lot more social than I was.”

“Do you know everything?”

“I read.”

“I read, too. But not about stuff like that.”

“I know. You’re reading weapons systems, math, aerospace, combat strategy, et cetera. I’m a science major who loves psychology. My degrees are in biology and chemistry with a minor in psych. I’m kind of drawn to the study of genetics, statistics, environmental science, DNA studies, that sort of thing.” She shrugged and said, “That’s how I relax. Reading that stuff.”

She was scary! “Your childhood,” he said. “Come on.”

“I’m the oldest, a completely different dynamic. I had slaves—two younger sisters who did whatever I told them to. And apparently I was a real load to raise, but I like to think I was only curious. I liked to take things apart. You know.”

“Toys?”

“Well…when I was two. When I was ten I took apart a VCR, an old jukebox, a pool table and a computer.”

“A pool table?”

“At my grandpa’s house. I got the legs to fall off. It took my dad and grandpa all day to stand it back up because they wouldn’t let me help. But I also liked to mix things for taste and to see the chemical reactions—like the time I figured out that baking soda in cola could make a volcano. This wasn’t a problem all the time—I came up with some interesting concoctions out of the refrigerator. But when I got under the sink, we sometimes had trouble. My sister had to be rushed to the hospital because she got a whiff of the fumes from one of my experiments and it burned all the cilia in her nose, throat and lungs. She wheezed for hours. I was grounded forever.”

“Jesus,” he said. “You’re not planning to reproduce, are you?”

“Actually, I hope to one day.” Then she smiled and said, “You know what cilia is.”

“It’s a commonly known word.”

“It isn’t,” she argued. “Do you have a Scrabble game around here?”

“I hope not. Why?”

“You could actually give me some trouble.” Then she laughed.

Something told Patrick he’d be wise to spoon some chili into her and get her out of here, but that was far from what happened. Instead, they took their time with lots of talking and laughing before they even got to the chili. They went through the teenage and college years, jobs they’d had, trouble they’d been in, glorious moments, disappointments, dates—the good and the terrible. He’d had many more dates than she. Instead of sitting at the table, they finally ate in front of the fire and, afterward, Angie found them a Scrabble game online to play on his laptop.

And she beat him.

It was getting very late when he asked her, “Where are you spending Christmas? With your uncle Jack?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I’ll probably go home to Sacramento. I just needed a break from Mom and Dad. My mom and I have really been at each other and Jack suggested I come up here for a while. Dropping out of school really took its toll.”

“Angie, are you a poor little rich girl?”

She roared with laughter. “My parents are teachers! Well, they’re professors—an honorable profession, but not exactly the top of the economic heap. I grew up in the smallish four-bedroom house they will always live in. They don’t have a boat or a lake house, but we always traveled a lot while I was growing up—I guess giving us an education in foreign countries was a priority to them. Now I realize they just added us in to every conference opportunity they had. They’re middle class. Very smart, intellectually ambitious middle class without much money. I get a break on tuition because they’re professors in a state university and I have some scholarship money for other expenses. And there’s help from Grandpa, that sort of thing. So what about you? Where are you spending Christmas?”

“I was supposed to be on a ship, but I have some leave. I’m planning to stop in Oklahoma City to check on Marie and Daniel on my way back to Charleston. I’ll have Christmas with them. A few days, that’s all.”

“Ah. And then? Back on the ship?”

“I’m not sure. I’m still thinking. Back to med school for you?”

“Um, it’s not looking that way. But, please, don’t say anything. I don’t need my uncle all worked up or my parents running up here to deprogram me. The more I’ve been thinking about it, the more I just don’t know if med school’s going to do it for me. I had almost a year under my belt before the accident, but I’m losing interest.”

“What do you mean, do it for you?” he asked.

She scooted forward on the sofa. “Can I trust you? I mean, trust you? Because I haven’t talked about this with anyone. And I’d like to, but I’ve been kind of afraid.”

He edged closer to her. He wanted to touch her, but didn’t. He’d like to smooth her hair or grab her hand. All he said was, “I’m your friend. You can trust me.”