That first time had been on a blanket in her back garden, with the warm summer darkness draping over them. She’d been afraid and eager and then uncaring about whether it was right or wrong or the right or wrong time for them to become lovers. He’d already made himself familiar with that mysterious territory between her thighs, a frequent traveler of all the hills and valleys and every little bump in between. Before, he had always touched her there with his lean fingers, his eyes on her face, watching for her reaction.

And she, being a dumb girl, had thought it was important to show no reaction at all. Good girls-even good girls who played on the wild side with their bad-boy boyfriend-wouldn’t gasp or cry out or show the pleasure that was shooting from his stroking fingers to run in rippling trails of tingling heat up her spine and down the backs of her legs. She wanted to arch into his hand, but wouldn’t that look slutty? So she would close her eyes and bite her bottom lip, tensing her body against the tremors of bliss.

That night, he’d done more. He’d bent his head to touch her with his mouth. In half agony, half excitement, she’d screwed her eyes shut tighter. How could he? Why would he? It felt so incredible. So good! Don’t let him know!

And so she’d yanked him up by the shoulders. The unexpected movement had caused him to collapse on top of her, his erection pressing against that wonderful wet place that he’d set to pulsing. He’d groaned-no concern about sluttishness from him, weren’t boys so lucky?-and she’d loved the sound of it, and she’d so loved him, and she was so afraid of letting him know that she wanted his mouth back right there, that she’d whispered, “Oh, Finn,” and shifted the tiny bit that took him to the entrance to her body.

And bad-boy Finn had surprised the heck out of her by practically leaping into the air. “Condom,” he’d gasped and dived for his pants. That’s when she’d figured out that like Boy Scouts, even bad boys were always prepared.

She was still pulsing, still loving, still battling her body and its responses so that when he’d come back to her, latex-protected, and uttered a breathy “Are you sure?”-that she was. In part to hide from Finn all that he could do to her with a simple touch.

“Earth to Bailey, Earth to Bailey.”

Landing back in the present, she jerked her gaze down to Trin. “Sorry, I was drifting.”

Trin snorted. Amazing how such an indelicate sound could come out of such a delicate-looking woman.

“What?”

“Dreaming, more like. I’d love to pursue what about, but I have to get going. Adam hasn’t been sleeping more than a couple of hours without waking up, and he’s due for another dose of kiddie cold stuff in twenty minutes. Sick babies make Drew panic.”

Bailey frowned. “I thought I heard he was a pediatrician.”

Her friend waved a slender hand. “Like I said, sick babies make Drew panic.” She started up the aisle, hurrying in the direction of the checkout stands.

Hurrying off with the answers that could put all Bailey’s questions to rest…and then maybe Bailey herself. It had to be close to one in the morning and she’d been up since before seven. With all these questions about Finn still clamoring in her mind, she’d never get any sleep. She trotted after her. “Trin, wait!”

The other woman turned around, but continued to pedal backward. “What?”

“Finn.”

“Finn? What about Finn?”

The smile on Trin’s face told Bailey she was enjoying making her beg. Some things never changed. “I’ll tell Drew what you did on your seventeenth birthday,” she threatened.

Trin had a dimple when she grinned and she was still moving toward the stands. “Unless what?”

Bailey hustled to keep up. “Unless you tell me everything. What he does, how long he’s done it, who he’s with, who he was with. The works, Trin.”

“The 411 on the F-I-N-N?”

It was cruel to treat an old friend so. “Yes,” Bailey hissed, then her voice rose. “I want to know what’s up with his eye, and what he…”

Her voice trailed off as Trin’s shoulder blades bumped into someone. Someone with muscles, an eye patch, and a wide manly chest. Trin squeaked, spun around, then shot Bailey an apologetic look.

“Hey there, Finn,” she said. “What an, uh, coinky-dinky.”

Coinky-dinky? Bailey stared at her friend.

Trin made a wild gesture in her direction, so wild that her arm whapped Bailey in the stomach. “Here’s, uh, Bailey. You remember her. Bailey Sullivan.”

Make that breathless Bailey. Speechless Bailey. But a Bailey who could still hear perfectly well. And see that cold stare that Finn leveled at her.

“If you’re interested in knowing everything about me, GND,” he said, “you’re about ten years too late.”

GND. If he wanted to slice her through with anything more than his chilly look and those flat words, then that was it. It was the nickname he’d given her before she’d left him, before they were lovers, before they’d ever even kissed. It reminded her that first he’d been the sulking boy she’d made smile and that once she’d been his pesky Girl Next Door.

The one who had grown older, fallen in love, then run away from him. The one who was perfectly willing to run again, leaving behind the Merlot and the cheese straws, as well as her oldest best friend and her very first boyfriend.

Not to mention any chance she’d get a decent rest that night.

Ten minutes after his favorite bar closed and kicked his reluctant ass out, Finn pulled slowly up to his grandmother’s. Thank God it was legal in California to drive with only one 20/20 eye. Losing his license after losing so much else would have flattened him. Gram had left the icicle lights on for him, and he checked over his surroundings in their silvery glow. It was dark next door, and Bailey’s Passat looked as if it was as long asleep as the rest of the neighborhood.

With grocery bag in hand, he opened his door, climbed out of the SUV to come around the front of his car, then froze. In Finn’s business, the goal was to thwart an assault before it ignited. To that end, the men and women he worked with talked openly about their sixth sense-that combination of instinct and training that made them aware when something was out of sync. Hours of drills coupled with innate self-confidence taught them to rely on their ability to foresee danger in order to take quick preventive action.

While Finn had good reason to doubt the strength of his own sixth sense, he couldn’t deny that it was screaming at him now. He gripped the bag tighter, but kept his back turned.

“What do you want, Bailey?” Every hair on the nape of his neck said she was standing directly behind him.

“Well…I…”

He was going to turn right, he decided, walking past her to head straight into the house. Trading old times with Bailey would be like pulling a thin scab off a new wound. Though the hurt she’d given him was ten years gone, he had recent injuries he was doing his damnedest to heal.

“I’m not-” he started, turning.

It was the glitter that did him in. With it dusted across her cheekbones and sparkling in her hair, she looked like something that had been dipped in the Milky Way before landing on the driveway beside him. That had always been the way of it between them. Finn with his feet in the gutter, Bailey looking as if she hovered above the ground.

With his willpower weakened by two whiskeys and a chaser of beer, how could he walk away?

Still, this was going to be her show. Drawing the liquor bottles in their brown paper wrapping closer to his side, he leaned his hips against the car and said nothing.

She didn’t either, not at first. But he doubted she possessed the deep well of patience he’d developed over the years that he’d stood post.

To prove him right, she cracked in less that sixty seconds. “Hey, look,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For tonight, at the store, of course.”

Well, of course. She wasn’t apologizing for stamping her size sixes all over his heart and soul ten years ago, and he’d be dead before he let her know he cared about that. Before he let her know anything, damn it.

Be cool, Finn. Ice.

“I was naturally curious,” Bailey went on. She’d put on a parka over her sweater and jeans, but the very tip of her nose was pink with the cold.

He lifted his free hand to his eye patch. “Everyone is.”

“Oh.” Her hand reached out, as if she would touch him, but then it dropped. “I’m sorry for that too.”

The glitter in her hair framed her fine-etched features as she continued to study his face. She’d been petite as a child, and though she’d grown taller during adolescence, it hadn’t been much. He’d been endlessly fascinated by all the femininity contained in that small body of hers. “I…lost the original and fake eyes aren’t that comfortable,” he heard himself offer.

Damn. He hadn’t meant to volunteer a scrap.

Though instead of the pity he dreaded, his admission caused her to aim a cheeky little grin his way. It curved up the pink fullness of her baby-doll mouth. “Oh, be honest, Finn Jacobson. Admit you also like the whole Jack Sparrow pirate look-alike thing.”

“I’m taller than Johnny Depp.” And no one had been cheeky with Finn since his injury. Hell, since years before that.

“Oh yeah.” She was still razzing him. “And you have lots more muscles too.”

“What? So you ambushed me to issue compliments?”

Her teasing smile died, as did the sparkle in her eyes. “Finn…”

He wouldn’t regret his refusal to play. “What is it you want, Bailey?”

She gave a shrug. “I’m trying to be sensible, okay? I’m guessing we’re both here for the holidays.”

He nodded.

“My mother said your grandmother’s been sick.”

Finn tightened his grip on the bottles again. “She’s on the road to recovery. I’m here to see to that.”