A Soldier's Secret. RaeAnne Thayne

crash, since what he had always considered a relatively healthy libido seemed to have dried up like a wadi in a sandstorm.

      He had even swallowed his pride and asked one of the doctors about it just before his discharge and had been told not to worry about it. He’d been assured that his body had only been a little busy trying to heal, just as his mind had been struggling with his guilt over the deaths of two members of his flight crew.

      When the time was right, he’d been told, all the plumbing would probably work just as it had before.

      It might be inconvenient that he was attracted to Anna Galvez, inconvenient and more than a little odd, since he had never been attracted to the prim, focused sort of woman before, but he couldn’t truly say he was sorry about it.

      And if he needed a reminder of why he couldn’t pursue the attraction, he only needed to look around him at the familiar walls of Brambleberry House.

      For all he knew, Anna Galvez was the sneaky, conniving swindler his mother believed her to be, working her wiles to gull his elderly aunt out of this house and its contents, all the valuable antiques and keepsakes that had been in his father’s family for generations.

      He wouldn’t know until he had run a little reconnaissance here to see where things stood.

      His father had been the only child of Abigail’s solitary sibling, her sister Suzanna, which made Max Abigail’s only living relative.

      Though he hadn’t really given it much thought—mostly because he didn’t like thinking about his beloved greataunt’s inevitable passing—he supposed he had always expected to inherit Brambleberry House someday.

      Finding out she had left the house to two strangers had been more than a little bit surprising.

      She must not have loved you enough.

      The thought slithered through his mind, cold and mean, but he pushed it away. Abigail had loved him. He could never doubt that. For some inexplicable reason, she had decided to give the house to two strangers and he was determined to find out why.

      And this morning provided a perfect opportunity to give Anna Galvez a little closer scrutiny, so he’d better get on with things.

      Buttoning a shirt with one good hand genuinely sucked, he had discovered over the last six months, but it wasn’t nearly as tough as trying to maneuver an arm that didn’t want to cooperate through the unwieldy holes in a T-shirt or, heaven forbid, a long-sleeved sweater, so he persevered.

      When he finished, he put the blasted sling on again, ran a comb through his hair awkwardly with his left hand, then headed for the stairs, his hand on the banister he remembered Abigail waxing to a lustrous sheen just so he could slide down it when he was a boy.

      Delicious smells greeted him the moment he headed downstairs—coffee, bacon, hash browns and something sweet and yeasty. His stomach rumbled but he reminded himself he was a soldier, trained to withstand temptation.

      No matter how seemingly irresistible.

      He paused outside Abigail’s door, a little astounded at the sudden nerves zinging through him.

      It was one thing to inhabit the top floor of Brambleberry House. It was quite another, he discovered, to return to Abigail’s private sanctuary, the place he had loved so dearly.

      The rooms beyond this door had been his haven when he was a kid. The one safe anchor in a tumultuous, unstable childhood—not the house, he supposed, as much as the woman who had been so much a part of it.

      No matter what might be happening in his regular life—whether his mother was between husbands or flushed with the glow of new love that made her forget his existence or at the bitter, ugly end of another marriage—Abigail had always represented safety and security to him.

      She had been fun and kind and loving and he had craved his visits here like a drunk needed rotgut. He had looked forward to the two weeks his mother allowed him with fierce anticipation the other fifty weeks of the year. Whenever he walked through this door, he had felt instantly wrapped in warm, loving arms.

      And now a stranger lived here. A woman who had somehow managed to convince an old woman to leave her this house.

      No matter how lovely Anna Galvez might be, he couldn’t forget that she had usurped Abigail’s place in this house.

      It was hers now and he damn well intended to find out why.

      He drew in a deep breath, adjusted his sling one more time, then reached out to knock on Abigail’s door.

      Chapter Three

      She opened the door wearing one of his aunt’s old ruffled bib aprons.

      He recognized it instantly, pink flowers and all, and had a sudden image of Abigail in the kitchen, bedecked with jewels as always, grinning and telling jokes as she cooked up a batch of her famous French toast that dripped with caramel and brown sugar and pralines.

      He had to admit he found the dichotomy a little disconcerting. Whether Anna was a con artist or simply a modern businesswoman, he wouldn’t have expected her to be wearing something so softly worn and old-fashioned.

      He doubted Abigail had ever looked quite as appealing in that apron. Anna Galvez’s skin had a rosy glow to it and the friendly pink flowers made her look exotically beautiful in contrast.

      “Good morning again,” she said, her smile polite, perhaps even a little distant.

      Maybe he ought to forget this whole thing, he thought. Just head back out the door and up the stairs. He could always grab a granola bar and a cola for breakfast.

      He wasn’t sure he was ready to face Abigail’s apartment just yet, and especially not with this woman looking on.

      “Something smells delicious in here, like you’ve gone to a whole lot of work. I hope this isn’t a big inconvenience for you.”

      Her smile seemed a little warmer. “Not at all. I enjoy cooking, I just don’t get the chance very often. Come in.”

      She held the door open for him and he couldn’t figure out a gracious way to back out. Doing his best to hide his sudden reluctance, he stepped through the threshold.

      He shouldn’t have worried.

      Nothing was as he remembered. When Abigail was alive, these rooms had been funky and cluttered, much like his aunt, with shelves piled high with everything from pieces of driftwood to beautifully crafted art pottery to cheap plastic garage-sale trinkets.

      Abigail had possessed her own sense of style. If she liked something, she had no compunction about displaying it. And she had liked a wide variety of things.

      The fussy wallpaper he remembered was gone and the room had been painted a crisp, clean white. Even more significant, a few of the major walls had been removed to open up the space. The thick, dramatic trim around the windows and ceiling was still there and nothing jarred with the historic tone of the house but he had to admit the space looked much brighter. Cleaner.

      Elegant, even.

      He had only a moment to absorb the changes before a plaintive whine echoed through the space. He followed the sound and discovered Conan just on the other side of the long sofa that was canted across the living room.

      The dog gazed at him with longing in his eyes and though he practically knocked the sofa cushions off with his quivering, he made no move to lunge at him.

      Max blinked at the canine. “All right. What’s with the dog? Did somebody glue his haunches to the sofa?”

      She made a face. “No. We’re working on obedience. I gave him a strict sit-stay command before I opened the door. I’m afraid it’s not going to last, as much as he wants to be good. I’m sorry.”

      “I don’t mind. I like dogs.”

      He particularly liked this one and had since Conan was a pup Abigail had rescued from the pound, though he certainly couldn’t tell her