"No. No, I don't."

Natasha glanced outside again, and her gaze rested on her husband, who was currently wrestling both Freddie and Brandon on the grass. Not so many years before, she thought, she'd been afraid to hope for such things.

"Does he frighten you?"

Sydney started to deny it, then found herself speaking slowly, thoughtfully. "The hugeness of his emotions sometimes frightens me. He has so many, and he finds it so easy to feel them, understand them, express them. I've never been the type to be led by mine, or swept away by them. Sometimes he just overwhelms me, and that's unnerving."

"He is what he feels," Natasha said simply. "Would you like to see some of it?" Without waiting for an answer, she walked over to a wall of shelves.

Lovely carved and painted figures danced across the shelves, some of them so tiny and exquisite it seemed impossible that any hand could have created them.

A miniature house with a gingerbread roof and candy-cane shutters, a high silver tower where a beautiful woman's golden hair streamed from the topmost window, a palm-sized canopy bed where a handsome prince knelt beside a lovely, sleeping princess.

"He brought me this one yesterday." Natasha picked up the painted figure of a woman at a spinning wheel. It sat on a tiny platform scattered with wisps of straw and specks of gold. "The miller's daughter from Rumpelstiltskin." She smiled, tracing the delicate fingertips that rode the spindle.

"They're lovely, all of them. Like a magical world of their own."

"Mikhail has magic," Natasha said. "For me, he carves fairy tales, because I learned English by reading them. Some of his work is more powerful, tragic, erotic, bold, even frightening. But it's always real, because it comes from inside him as much as from the wood or stone."

"I know. What you're trying to show me here is his sensitivity. It's not necessary. I've never known anyone more capable of kindness or compassion."

"I thought perhaps you were afraid he would hurt you."

"No," Sydney said quietly. She thought of the richness of heart it would take to create something as beautiful, as fanciful as the diminutive woman spinning straw into gold. "I'm afraid I'll hurt him."

"Sydney—" But the back door slammed and feet clambered down the hall.

The interruption relieved Sydney. Confiding her feelings was new and far from comfortable. It amazed her that she had done so with a woman she'd known less than a day.

There was something about this family, she realized. Something as magical as the fairy-tale figures Mikhail carved for his sister. Perhaps the magic was as simple as happiness.

As the afternoon wore on, they ebbed and flowed out of the house, noisy, demanding and very often dirty. Nadia eventually cleared the decks by ordering all of the men outside.

"How come they get to go out and sit in the shade with a bottle of beer while we do the cooking," Rachel grumbled as her hands worked quickly, expertly with potatoes and a peeler.

"Because…" Nadia put two dozen eggs on boil. "In here they will pick at the food, get big feet in my way and make a mess."

"Good point. Still—"

"They'll have to clean the mess we make," Natasha told her.

Satisfied, Rachel attacked another potato. Her complaints were only tokens. She was a woman who loved to cook as much as she loved trying a case. "If Vera was here, they wouldn't even do that."

"Our housekeeper," Natasha explained to Sydney while she sliced and chopped a mountain of vegetables. "She's been with us for years. We gave her the month off to take a trip with her sister. Could you wash those grapes?"

Obediently Sydney followed instructions, scrubbing fruit, fetching ingredients, stirring the occasional pot. But she knew very well that three efficient women were working around her.

"You can make deviled eggs," Nadia said kindly when she noted Sydney was at a loss. "They will be cool soon."

"I, ah…" She stared, marginally horrified, at the shiny white orbs she'd rinsed in the sink. "I don't know how."

"Your mama didn't teach you to cook?" It wasn't annoyance in Nadia's voice, just disbelief. Nadia had considered it her duty to teach every one of her children—whether they'd wanted to learn or not.

As far as Sydney knew, Margerite had never boiled an egg much less deviled one. Sydney offered a weak smile. "No, she taught me how to order in restaurants."

Nadia patted her cheek. "When they cool, I show you how to make them the way Mikhail likes best." She murmured in Ukrainian when Katie's waking wail came through the kitchen intercom. On impulse, Natasha shook her head before Nadia could dry her hands and go up to fetch her granddaughter.

"Sydney, would you mind?" With a guileless smile, Natasha turned to her. "My hands are full."

Sydney blinked and stared. "You want me to go get the baby?"

"Please."

More than a little uneasy, Sydney started out of the kitchen.

"What are you up to, Tash?" Rachel wanted to know.

"She wants family."

With a hoot of laughter, Rachel swung an arm around her sister and mother. "She'll get more than her share with this one."

The baby sounded very upset, Sydney thought as she hurried down the hall. She might be sick. What in the world had Natasha been thinking of not coming up to get Katie herself? Maybe when you were the mother of three, you became casual about such things. Taking a deep breath, she walked into the nursery.

Katie, her hair curling damply around her face, was hanging on to the side of the crib and howling. Unsteady legs dipped and straightened as she struggled to keep her balance. One look at Sydney had her tear-drenched face crumpling. She flung out her arms, tilted and landed on her bottom on the bright pink sheet.

"Oh, poor baby," Sydney crooned, too touched to be nervous. "Did you think no one was coming?" She picked the sniffling baby up, and Katie compensated for Sydney's awkwardness by cuddling trustingly against her body. "You're so little. Such a pretty little thing." On a shuddering sigh, Katie tipped her head back. "You look like your uncle, don't you? He got embarrassed when I said he was gorgeous, but you are."

Downstairs, three women chuckled as Sydney's voice came clearly through the intercom.