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  “Thank you for dinner,” she said, taking her dessert bowl to the sink.

  “Welcome.” Mathis still wouldn’t look at her. He was rubbing the back of his neck and staring out the window. The moon was out now and nearly full. Sadie wondered if that was what he was staring at.

  “Okay. Well . . . I guess I’ll see you around.”

  “Sure,” he said gruffly. “Uh, thanks for bringing my pills. In fact, I think it’s time for me to take one now.”

  “All right.” Sadie didn’t know what else to say. “I’ll show myself out.”

  “No need.” He got up from the table and walked with her to the door. On the little table right beside it, Sadie saw the familiar bottle of green-and-brown pills.

  Mathis opened the heavy wood door, letting in a swirling gust of icy wind. Sadie shivered and wrapped her arms around herself but he didn’t offer to loan her a jacket or say anything about going straight home so she wouldn’t be cold. Instead, he seemed completely focused on the bottle of pills.

  “Thank you again,” she said.

  Mathis’s only answer was a grunt. He had already pried off the top of the bottle. As Sadie watched, he shook three of the pills out onto the broad palm of his hand, stopped to consider, then shook out another two.

  As she left the house, he dry swallowed all five of the mysterious caplets with a grimace and then slammed the door behind her, without even saying goodbye.

  That had been close—damn close. Mathis leaned against the sturdy oak door, waiting for the anti-rut pills to take effect. Having the little Juvie in his house hadn’t been too bad at first. Her being unconscious had muted her scent and the fact that she appeared to be sick or injured had damped his own mating urges considerably.

  In other words, he’d been too worried about her to get horny.

  But then she’d woken up and they’d talked—really talked—the way he hadn’t talked to anyone since Kathleen had died. Talked and eaten and laughed and he had held her and kissed her and . . .

  Damn it—why had he talked to her in the first place? Why had he let her in and shared a meal with her? And most of all why had he kissed her? If he closed his eyes he could almost relive that kiss—the sweet, hot taste of her mouth, the feeling of her soft little tongue invading him, teasing him, making him want her. Making him need her.

  No! He didn’t need anyone—he couldn’t. He’d sworn he would never love another woman after Kathleen, never let himself have those feelings again. It was just the rut talking, telling him he had to find some female and mate with her. Well, he didn’t have to listen—wouldn’t listen. But damn it, having Sadie so close didn’t make it easy.

  Never should have done it, he told himself grimly. Never should have held her, never should have kissed her. He should have sent her packing the moment she woke up.

  But it was too late. Now that he knew her—knew her sense of humor and her sweet nature—he couldn’t hate her anymore. Which meant it was going to be a hell of a lot harder to keep her at an arm’s length.

  “It’s okay,” Mathis told himself aloud. “It’ll be okay as soon as these damn pills take effect.”

  But though he waited for over an hour, he didn’t feel even a speck of relief. His symptoms were as strong as ever.

  The rut was coming on, whether he wanted it to or not.

  Eight

  Sadie sighed and closed the door of her cabin behind her. Her new little home seemed dark and quiet after the warmth and conversation she’d had over at Mathis’s place. Looking out her window, she could still see the glow of firelight flickering through the woods that separated their property.

  His cabin was so warm—just like he was. Warm and big and strong . . . the memory of being held in his arms was still with her and the sweet taste of blueberries still lingered on her lips.

  Why did I do that? she asked herself, putting a hand to her mouth, as though to wipe away the kiss they’d shared. Why did I kiss him? It was stupid and impulsive—something she would have done back in college. It wasn’t the act of a middle-aged woman who had two kids in college and twenty years of marriage behind her. As she’d aged, she’d gotten more careful, more wary. But tonight she’d thrown all caution to the wind and kissed a man at least ten years younger than herself.

  No wonder he kicked you out—you were acting like a horny college kid, Sadie lectured herself, going to the thermostat to turn up the heat. She knew she needed to learn how to use the stone fireplace in the living room—it would be a much cheaper way to heat her cabin in the winter. But growing up in Florida, she had never lived anywhere where she needed to make a fire and she was a little skittish of it. What if she burned the place down around her ears?

  For now, at least, turning up the thermostat seemed safer. Although God knew how she was going to pay the bill if she couldn’t find more than one client for her accounting firm. She’d gotten a good settlement when Jeff divorced her but not enough to live on indefinitely and moving up here had cost a lot.

  Sighing, she hung her navy peacoat in the closet nearest the front door. If only—

  Her thoughts were cut off when something in the closet caught her eye. It was a cardboard box on the top shelf—something she hadn’t noticed in the hustle and bustle of moving in.

  Reaching up on tiptoes, she fumbled for the box. If Mathis was here he could get it for me without even reaching, she thought and then tried to banish the mental image. Stop it, stop thinking of him, Sadie. He practically shoved you out of his house and said he doesn’t want to see you again and who can blame him after the way you mauled him at the dinner table? So just stop.

  But what was written on the top flap of the dusty cardboard box banished all thoughts of her neighbor—or at least drove them to the back of her mind.

  Wedding pictures, yearbooks, and prom, 1953, read the words, written in her mother’s lovely, flowing script. Sadie hadn’t seen her mother’s handwriting in years but she still recognized it immediately and a rush of longing for her mom washed over her. She had lived here, in this very cabin, at one time. If she was still alive, she could give Sadie advice—she had always known the right thing to do in any given situation.

  But her mother was gone and the mystery remained—what were these pictures she’d been saving?

  “Nineteen fifty-three?” Sadie muttered under her breath, staring at the box. “Whose prom pictures? Grandma’s?”

  She hadn’t known her maternal grandmother, who had died before she and Samantha had been born. In fact, all of Sadie’s grandparents had died before she and her twin had come along. As for her father, well, Sadie had a vague memory of a huge man with a mane of golden hair laughing as he swung her up into the air and caught her while her mother stood nervously by. But he too had died before she and Samantha were four, so the memory was dim, though no less sweet for the passage of time.

  Sadie took the box over to the couch and sat down. Switching on a lamp for extra light, she reached in and brought out a slim black photo album with the words PROM 1953 embossed in gold on its front cover.

  She opened it and found black-and-white pictures of people in classic fifties clothes. The boys all looked uncomfortable in baggy gray and black suits with high-waisted pants and the girls were wearing dresses with huge puffy skirts and tiny waists. There were a lot of pictures of couples dancing and standing around the punch bowl, talking. Everything looked extremely wholesome.

  She was just losing interest when she found a picture that was signed. It showed a girl who looked remarkably like her mother wearing a lovely dress that belled out around her. She was holding hands with a boy who had dark hair and horn-rimmed glasses. Over the base of the photo, in looping, girlish script, someone had written, Patty, you’re the absolute most! I’m so thrilled you asked me to be your maid of honor! Can’t wait for the wedding!

  Sadie frowned. Maid of honor? Wedding? And who was this girl who looked so much like her mother? She might have been tempted to think it was her maternal grandmother, only he