Thunder Canyon Homecoming / A Thunder Canyon Christmas. RaeAnne Thayne

right now.”

      “I invited you to lunch, darlin’, not to shop for an engagement ring,” he said.

      The heat in her cheeks intensified. He was right—she was overreacting. But even an invitation to lunch was dangerous when she wasn’t sure she could control her instinctive response to the man issuing the invitation.

      “I know,” she said. “But I still don’t think lunch is a good idea.”

      “Because you’re philosophically opposed to eating in the middle of the day?”

      She had to smile. “Because you’re far too charming for your own good.”

      “You think I’m charming?”

      “I’m going to say goodbye now,” she told him.

      “Wait, Erin.”

      But she couldn’t wait, because she knew that if she let him say anything else, she might very well give in—not only to his invitation but to the desire stirring again in her blood. “Goodbye, Corey.”

      Corey continued to hold the receiver to his ear, as if he didn’t quite believe that he was hearing a dial tone instead of Erin’s voice. He didn’t think any woman had ever hung up on him before but, for some inexplicable reason, the realization made him smile.

      As a management consultant, his professional reputation had been made on the basis of identifying a problem and determining the best solutions. He would simply analyze Erin’s resistance in the same way. And if she thought he was the type of man to be dissuaded by one terminated phone call, well then, she was very soon going to learn differently.

      But thinking of his business objectives made him remember that he had other reasons for being in Thunder Canyon than his brother’s wedding and more reasons for staying than a pretty blue-eyed bridesmaid.

      Pushing all thoughts of Erin Castro from his mind, at least for the time being, he pulled out his laptop and got to work reviewing the reports he needed for his meetings on Wednesday. The information he’d seen so far had been in complete and often contradictory, warning him that the evaluation he’d expected to finish within a couple of weeks might take a lot longer than that.

      At first, he’d been frustrated by this realization, but now—thinking of Erin—the idea of extending his stay in Thunder Canyon didn’t bother him at all.

      Erin called home on Sunday and spoke to both of her parents. Betty and Jack still didn’t know her real reasons for going to Thunder Canyon, but they tried to be supportive of her decision. They asked about her new job and her friends and, as usual, when she would be coming home for a visit.

      She had originally planned to go back to San Diego for Thanksgiving, certain she would have all of the answers she sought by then, but she warned her parents now that a trip at that time might not be possible. The holiday was the start of one of the busiest seasons at the resort and she wasn’t sure that she would be able to get any time off. But she had another reason for changing her plans—she didn’t want to leave Thunder Canyon just when Grant Clifton’s sister would be arriving.

      She continued to battle against the guilt she felt for not sharing her suspicions with them. She’d never really kept secrets from them before, and certainly never anything of this magnitude—if there could be anything else of such magnitude. Although she’d always felt a little disconnected from her parents and her brothers—as if they shared a deeper bond that somehow eluded her—she’d never been deceitful or dishonest, and the lie that she’d been living for the past several months was weighing heavily on her conscience.

      When her mother said, “I love you, Erin,” as she always did at the end of a conversation, Erin’s eyes filled with tears.

      They had always loved her. She didn’t doubt that. And she wondered now if the feeling that there was something missing in their relationship was actually indicative of some thing missing within herself. Maybe she was chasing after something that didn’t exist except inside her own imagination.

      The original seed had been planted by Erma, but her aunt was gone now and Erin was starting to wonder what purpose could possibly be served by continuing to nurture the old woman’s suspicions. And if there was no purpose, then maybe it was time for her to forget everything Erma had said and just go home.

      As she readied herself for bed, Erin realized the doubting and confusion had become as much a part of her Sunday night ritual as her call to her parents. Because talking to them inevitably made her realize how much she missed them, and missing them made her question why she was willing to upset the status quo.

      Her family wasn’t perfect, but they were hers.

      Weren’t they?

      With a sigh, she pulled back the covers and crawled into bed.

      As she settled back against her pillows, she acknowledged that it was entirely possible that her birthday being on the same day as Elise Clifton’s was nothing more than a coincidence. And both of them being born in the same hospital was probably just another coincidence. But the physical resemblance she’d noticed in Elise’s photo and her own brothers was a little harder to ignore.

      Or maybe she’d just been looking for answers for so long that she was grasping at straws.

      Determined to push these thoughts out of her mind, she picked up the Stephanie Plum novel she’d just started reading. But she was too distracted to focus on the story and she set the book down again after reading only a few pages.

      It took her a long time after that to fall asleep, and when she finally did, she had the strangest dream.

      She was in the hospital, and the cry of a baby slowly penetrated the thick fog of pain that surrounded her.

      No, not a baby. Her baby.

      She struggled to sit up but felt as if she was strapped to the bed, unable to move.

      “My baby.” She tried to shout, but the words were barely a whisper.

      “Your baby is fine. We’re going to take her to the nursery so that you can rest.”

      She couldn’t see the speaker, but the gentle tone both soothed and reassured her.

      A short while later, after she’d rested, she wanted to see her baby. But the hall that led to the nursery seemed to stretch ahead of her forever. She walked faster but made no progress. So she started to run. She ran until her legs were weak and her lungs ached, and still she hadn’t reached the end of the long, narrow corridor.

      Then suddenly she was there, standing in the middle of the nursery, and her baby was crying again. But there were dozens of bassinets, dozens of crying babies, and she didn’t know which one was hers. She ran from one to the next, desperately hoping for some sense of recognition, but they were all the same, all strangers to her.

      But then another woman came into the room, and she went directly to one of the bassinets and picked up the crying baby and carried it away. Then another, and another, and another. Until it seemed as if a whole parade of women had come into the room and, one by one, taken away the crying babies until there was only one left.

      She tried to rationalize that the one remaining had to be her own, but she wasn’t certain. She didn’t know how each of the other new mothers had been sure that the baby she was taking belonged to her. What if someone had taken her baby?

      She lifted the last infant from its bed, yearning for some sense of connection. But there was nothing. Her eyes scanned the room frantically, searching for someone, anyone, to help her. But she was alone. And when she looked at the baby again, it was gone, too.

      Erin awoke with a start. She struggled to sit up and pushed her hair away from her face. Her hands were shaking, her heart was pounding. It was easy to tell herself that it was only a dream. It wasn’t so easy to shake the feelings of helplessness and fear that lingered.

      There was no reason to believe that the scenario played out by her imagination had any foundation in reality, but she