"I'm sorry," Claire signed.

Amy shrugged, then looked at the list, as if it didn't matter.

They continued their shopping. Claire found herself wondering about Amy's mom. Who could have left this child behind? Who could have left family?

That's what Claire wanted while she was here-to reconnect with Nicole and Jesse. To belong somewhere. She also wanted-hoped-she could find someone of her own to love. A man who would care about her, love her, want to marry her. What she couldn't decide was whether or not she had a manageable goal or a stupid dream that was never going to come true.

THEY MADE IT BACK to the house by four-thirty. Amy helped Claire unload the car, then she dashed up the stairs to visit with Nicole. Claire set all the food they'd bought on the counter, turned on the oven and opened the recipe book. As the meat loaf took nearly an hour to cook, she would start with that.

She combined and measured and stirred until she had everything mixed together, then dumped it into a loaf pan and smoothed the top. She slid the meat loaf into the preheated oven and set the timer.

The potatoes were next, she thought as she pulled out the bottle of red wine she'd bought. Then the carrots. She'd even bought a little bag of brown gravy mix.

She was making dinner by herself. Something she'd never done in her life. This, after working at the bakery nearly eight hours, babysitting Amy, hitting the mall and going grocery shopping. It had been a regular day. Totally normal.

She found a corkscrew and opened the bottle. After pouring herself a glass, she held it up, as if toasting herself.

"To fitting in," she whispered. "And being just like everyone else."

CHAPTER SEVEN.

WYATT LET HIMSELF into the house. He was later than he'd expected to be, having spent the last two hours explaining why adding a window at this point in the construction wasn't going to be as easy as they made it look on the home improvement channel. He was tired, he was pissed off and the last thing he wanted was to see Claire.

It wasn't that he didn't appreciate her help with Amy. He did. Nicole's unexpected surgery had illustrated that he depended on his friend too much for babysitting. He needed a couple of backup plans. Claire had filled in during an emergency, which was great, but now he had to see her. And seeing her meant wanting her.

He didn't know what combination of her chemistry and his made him so attracted to her, but there it was. An annoying need to claim her whenever they were together and way too much time spent fantasizing about her naked, wet and begging when they weren't. It was worse than being a teenager again. Back then, his desire had been vague, due to his lack of experience. But now he was very specific with what he wanted and he could imagine it in high-definition detail.

He walked into the living room and saw Claire and Amy sitting next to each other on the sofa. Claire signed something and Amy laughed, then shook her head. Claire finger spelled mutant. Amy laughed again, then looked up and saw him.

She jumped to her feet and ran toward him. He caught her and pulled her up into his arms.

"Hey, baby girl," he said. "How's the best part of my day?"

They hugged, then he put her down and she began signing frantically. He watched carefully to follow the conversation.

"You got an A on your math test? Good for you. Uh-huh. Tacos for lunch sound good. The mall?" He glanced at Claire, then back at his daughter. "Yes, we can talk about new jeans."

He signed as he spoke, watching the light in his daughter's eyes, both pleased and grateful that she was so happy, so normal. He'd been terrified to be a single parent-sure he was going to screw up completely. But maybe not.

He watched as she told about meat loaf and cookbooks and how Nicole had moved to a chair, then Amy dashed off to tell Nicole that he was here. Which left him alone with Claire and unable to ignore her much longer.

"Thanks for looking after her," he said.

She smiled. "She's wonderful. I had a great time. She's a lot of fun to be with. So sweet and friendly. She's very patient with my lousy signing."

Claire moved her head as she spoke. Her long, blond hair fell over her shoulders, catching the light, making him think about burying his hands in that hair, of feeling the silky strands against his skin as she bent over him, took him in her mouth and-He swore silently and pushed the erotic image from his mind.

"You're getting better at signing," he said, hoping she didn't notice his sudden erection. He took a couple of steps to the left so he was partially concealed by a club chair. "What is mutant?"

"Oh." She looked at the floor, then back at him. "We were talking about my hands. They're large, with long fingers. Freak hands, really. It's good for playing the piano, though. I have a great range. Years ago, serious pianists would cut the tendons between their fingers to give themselves a greater range."

"Nothing is worth that."

"You'd be amazed what some people will do to be the best. It's a serious business with a lot on the line."

It was just playing the piano, he thought. How serious could it be?

"I bought a cookbook," Claire said, changing the subject. "My very first meat loaf is in the oven. I'm not much of a cook, so this is a big deal for me."

"Cooking isn't that hard. You'll get it."

"We'll see. When I went to use the oven, it was pretty complicated. There were three choices. Regular bake, convection bake and pure convection."

"When Nicole remodeled, she had a convection oven put in. It cooks faster and hotter, with a fan circulating the heat. You get more even results. In a regular oven, you can't stack cookie sheets and expect everything to cook evenly. In a convection oven, you can. You have to change the temperature and the cooking time if you're using a conventional recipe and a convection oven."

"How?"

"I don't have a clue. Our oven is regular, so I bake the old-fashioned way. There are cookbooks that can help with that."

"Maybe I'll give it another week of practice before I head into that world. It's a little complicated for me." She tilted her head slightly. "You really use the oven?"

His arousal had eased, so he moved around the chair and sat down. "I bake a mean brownie. My chocolate cookies are okay, but that's because there's a recipe on the chocolate chip bag. I can bake a cake, although I usually order them from Nicole and I've never tried pie."

"Impressive," she said. "A renaissance man."

"A single father. Shanna left when Amy was three months old."

He'd been beyond terrified. Being a dad had been scary enough, but being both parents had been unimaginable. He'd barely slept the first year. Between reading everything he could get his hands on, dragging Amy to the pediatrician if she so much as sighed too heavily and grilling mothers for information, he'd driven everyone crazy. But they'd survived and once Amy started walking and signing, things had gotten easier. At least she could tell him what was wrong.

"How could your wife do that?" Claire asked, her eyes darkening with confusion. "Leave her child? A baby is a miracle and Amy is so amazing."

"It was Shanna's choice to go," he said, not trying to hide his anger. He'd never missed the woman, but Amy needed her mother. "She doesn't come back and visit. Amy deals." Because she had to.

"I'm sorry," Claire said. "She's missing out. Amy is a wonder. I can't believe how well she talks."

"She goes to a special school for deaf children. In addition to signing, they focus on speech and lipreading. It was hard for her at first, but she's getting it. But there's some controversy in the deaf community about the practice."

"Lipreading?"

"And speaking. A large portion of the deaf community believes they have a viable culture that should be respected. That they aren't handicapped, just different, and that they shouldn't have to learn to communicate the way hearing people do. But I worry about Amy's life when she's older. All her family is from the hearing world, so she's going to have to fit into it some way. I want to make that as easy for her as possible. Learning to speak so people outside the deaf community can understand her is part of that."

He stopped talking. "Sorry. I get carried away."

"Don't apologize. She's your daughter. Of course you care. It's just all so interesting. Thank you for trusting me with her."

"I'm the one who should be thanking you."

They stared at each other. Tension filled the room. The wanting returned and with it, Wyatt's temper. Rather than walk around with a hard-on, or snap at someone who didn't deserve it, he stood.

"I'm going to grab Amy so we can get home."

"I'll go get her."

He watched Claire walk out of the room.

She moved with an easy, graceful stride, he thought, then wanted to hit himself in the head. He had it bad. More than bad. He was also going to have to find a way to get over it and her. She might not be as awful as he'd first thought, but there was no way he was getting involved with her. She was a complication he didn't need, even if she was a woman he desperately wanted.

NICOLE SHIFTED in the chair. Sitting up was the next step in her healing. She had muscles that had to be retrained. So far she was making excellent progress, although it felt incredibly slow to her. The pain was less, she wasn't as tired and the doctor had pulled out the stitches the day before-a wildly painful moment she didn't want to have repeated. She should be pleased.

Yet what she felt was restless. She hated that the bakery was doing so well without her. Logically she knew her business could survive without her for a couple of weeks, but emotionally she hated that everything hadn't fallen apart.

The phone rang and she grabbed it. "Hello?"

"It's me."

Nicole recognized Jesse's voice and hung up.

The phone rang again. Nicole picked it up. "Go to hell," she said, her voice low and angry.

"Wait. You have to talk to me."

"Actually, I don't."

Jesse began to cry. "I want to know how you're doing."

Nicole was unmoved by the tears. Jesse could turn it on like a faucet when it suited her.

"I'm recovering from the surgery, if that's what you're asking. Of course, having my heart ripped out by my sister and my husband is going to take longer to fix, so I don't have an update on that."

Jesse winced. "You're still mad."

"Um, yes. You must be stunned to realize I haven't gotten over the fact that after everything I've done for you, how I've supported you, taken care of you, tried to do everything I could to make your life better, you still wanted to stab me in the back. I'll give you credit, you did a hell of a job."

She refused to actually feel any of the emotions swirling inside her. Better to stay in her head, be sarcastic, because anything else would rip her open so far, she would never recover.

"You hate me," Jesse said with a sob.

"With every fiber of my being." Nicole hung up.

Her heart pounded in her chest and she hurt all over.

She hated this...all of this. Hated what Jesse had done, hated Drew, hated her body for betraying her and hated herself for giving a damn about her baby sister.

Nicole turned her attention back to her book. She wasn't actually reading the words, but she was willing to pretend. It was better than facing the emotional devastation of her life.

The house was silent and she was alone. Solitude pressed down on her, stealing her breath. She closed her eyes against the pain, but that didn't stop the tears from running down her cheeks.

CLAIRE PARKED in front of Wyatt's house. As she took in the two-story building, the big windows and wraparound porch, she tried to tell herself she was excited about spending time with Amy, nothing more. That the weird sensations flitting in and out of her body didn't have anything to do with seeing Wyatt.

He'd called an hour ago and asked her if she could watch Amy while he ran off to an unexpected meeting. She'd agreed, then had been surprised to find herself looking forward to seeing him.

"It's only for a few minutes," she told herself as she locked the car and walked up the path. "Then he'll be gone and I won't have to think about him."

She wasn't sure why he was on her mind at all. Okay, yeah, he was good-looking, in a rough, manly sort of way. She liked how he was with his daughter and how he'd gotten over judging her based on all the stuff Nicole had said. But it was more than that.

Right now, standing on his porch, she felt a flutter in her stomach. It was almost like the nerves she felt before she performed, but different. There was a different level of excitement. Something that- The front door opened and Wyatt motioned for her to enter.

"That was fast," he said. "Thanks for doing this. I would have dropped Amy off, but it's her bedtime in an hour and I don't like to mess up her schedule on a school night. I have this client who's driving me crazy. I'd tell her to forget it, but I took the job, so I'm going to get it done right. Damn work ethic. It gets me in trouble every time."

He was smiling as he spoke. There was humor in his dark brown eyes. She found herself staring into them, as if she could...What? Get lost there? How weird was that?

"She's fed and she doesn't get much homework yet, so that's not anything you have to deal with." He glanced at his watch. "Let her watch TV another thirty minutes, then she can get ready for bed. She'll get changed and brush her teeth by herself. Maybe you could read a story with her, if that's not too much trouble."

"I would love to," she said honestly. Spending time with Amy was easy. She'd always wanted kids and being around Wyatt's daughter helped fill that empty part of her.

"Great. Thanks. I really owe you."

He was smiling again. Had he always been so tall? He was much taller than her, and more muscled than most of the men she knew. He also dressed differently, wearing jeans and a plaid shirt rather than a suit or anything designer.

"Claire?"

"Hmm?"

"You okay?"