Faith wrapped her arms around him and held him tight, riding out the storm of passion with him and praying there would be something left of her heart when it was all over.

“Mama, I want toast,” Lindy announced, kneeling on her chair at the kitchen table, her place setting overrun with tiny plastic dinosaurs.

“Yes, sweetie, I know,” Faith said. She was trying simultaneously to handle the coffee maker and the toaster while keeping one eye on the eggs that were cooking on the stove.

“I’ll do the coffee,” Alaina volunteered as she and Jayne entered the room. She took the pot from Faith’s slightly trembling hand, giving her friend a sharp, speculative glance. “You look tired. Did you get any sleep last night?”

Faith felt her cheeks flush instantly. She’d hardly slept a wink, but the reason had nothing to do with insomnia. “Um-I’m all right,” she mumbled.

Blast it, couldn’t she be a little more sophisticated? Did she have to blush as if Alaina had come right out and asked if she’d just spent the last six hours between the sheets with Shane Callan? And for heaven’s sake, she was a grown woman. It wasn’t as if Shane was the first man she’d ever gone to bed with.

He was the second.

He was the only man she’d ever made love with in the truest sense of the term-whether he admitted his heart was involved or not. She had to believe it was. Nothing that beautiful had ever come from simple physical need.

“Mama, can I have my toast now?”

“Yes, Lindy, I’m coming.” She put her daughter’s breakfast on a plate and dropped it off at the table on her way to check the eggs.

Lindy made a face and lifted one square of bread by the corner. “I don’t want this kind.”

“It’s the only kind we have.”

“I want the kind with raisins.”

“We’re all out of the raisin kind.”

“Can we go to the beach today?”

“No, honey, not today,” Faith said, sighing, putting the teakettle on to heat. “Mama’s got work to do.”

“Work, work, work,” Lindy grumbled, folding her toast in half and mushing it with her fist. “All grown-ups ever do is work.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that, sugar plum,” Jayne said, pausing in her task of pouring orange juice to lean across the table and tweak Lindy’s nose. “Grown-ups have fun sometimes too, don’t we, Faith?”

Faith couldn’t have looked more guilty had she been wearing a sign around her neck that spelled out “strumpet” in big glossy red letters. “Who, me?”

Alaina’s mouth lifted in a wry smile as she leaned back against the counter and crossed her arms. “I believe the question was rhetorical, not accusatory. At any rate, most kinds of fun aren’t against the law, are they, Mr. Callan?”

If Faith’s cheeks had been red before, they were fuchsia now as she looked up and her gaze collided with Shane’s. He strolled into the kitchen looking impossibly handsome in black jeans and a gray polo shirt, his black hair glistening, wet from his shower. It seemed to Faith the look in his eyes was blatantly male and possessive as he came toward her. He didn’t even glance at Alaina when he answered her.

“Like you said, counselor, a rhetorical question.”

He stopped within inches of Faith-too close for his own sanity-and lifted a hand to brush his knuckles against her cheek. He had told himself in the shower that he was going to take a step back from her, cool things off a little so she could get some perspective. But his stern, cold dictates had vaporized the instant he’d walked into the kitchen. It seemed his knack for detachment couldn’t hold a candle to Faith’s appeal. Looking at her now, all he wanted to do was wrap her up in his arms and carry her back to bed. If he hadn’t been dimly aware of their captive audience, he would have done just that.

Dammit, she brought every primitive feeling he had rushing to the surface. Every time he got within three feet of her he felt more like a caveman than a man with an Ivy League education. When Faith looked up at him the way she was doing now, her big brown eyes all soft and shining, he felt as if he were going to go up in smoke-not unlike the pan of scrambled eggs on the stove.

“Faith?”

“Hmmm?” she asked as the air seeped out of her lungs. During the long night her body had become very well acquainted with Shane’s, to the point that the slightest signal from him could set off every sensual alarm she had. At the moment her whole body was humming. It was a wonder she even heard him.

“Your eggs are burning,” he said with a devastatingly soft, sexy smile.

“They’re not the only thing,” Jayne mumbled from her ringside seat. Alaina shushed her as she slid down on a chair.

Faith’s eyes rounded in shock as she turned back to her smoking pan. She yanked it off the burner and tossed the contents with a spatula to see if the food was salvageable.

“I don’t want any eggs, Mama,” Lindy announced as she toddled across the floor to take Shane by the hand. She sent him her sunny smile. “Come and have some toast, Shane. I’m sorry it’s not the kind with raisins.”

Faith managed to sit through a half hour of breakfast conversation without finishing a single piece of raisinless toast. While her friends discussed the errands they had to run and Lindy lobbied Shane for another day at the beach, Faith sipped her tea and fidgeted.

She wasn’t quite certain how she was supposed to act. She’d never had a lover before. Including her husband, she added ruefully. One night with Shane made twelve years with William Gerrard pale in comparison.

“Earth to Faith. Earth to Faith,” Jayne called across the table, waving a hand back and forth in front of her.

Faith jerked to attention, blushing furiously. “What? I’m sorry.”

“And I thought I was the flake of the Fearsome Foursome!” Jayne drawled, shaking her head. She stared into Faith’s eyes and spoke very distinctly, as if English were Faith’s second language. “Honey, what are your plans for the day?”

“Oh, um, I’ve got book work to do, then I thought I’d put the finishing touches on the captain’s suite and some of the other guest rooms.”

“We could go to the beach,” Lindy suggested hopefully.

“Not today, Lindy,” Faith said firmly, pinning her daughter with a stern look. “Now I don’t want to hear another word about it. If you’re finished with your breakfast, go brush your teeth.”

Sullen, Lindy gathered up her herd of plastic dinosaurs and slid down off her chair. She made the most of her exit, giving her mother a disappointed, teary-eyed glare. “When I’m a mama, I’m gonna take my babies to the beach every day!”

Faith heaved a sigh, propping her chin in one hand and letting the other fall to the tabletop. “Great. Now I’m Attila the Mom.”

Shane reached over and gave her hand a squeeze, a move that drew not only Faith’s surprised gaze but Jayne’s and Alaina’s as well. They all stared at him, slack-jawed. Hell, Shane thought, he was shocked himself, but the action had been automatic. It felt like the right thing to do, and he was a man who usually trusted his instincts. Swallowing down his confusion, he said, “She’ll get over it.”

The smile of appreciation Faith sent him hit him like a hammer between the eyes. Lord, what was the matter with him? All this woman had to do was glance at him and he damn near forgot who he was and what he was doing. And who was he to offer sage advice? What the hell did he know about kids, anyway? Nothing. He had no business offering advice. He had no business getting involved with Faith and her daughter at all. He was there to do a job.

Abruptly he pushed his chair back from the table and stood. “I’ve got rounds to make,” he said, suddenly all businesslike. “I have to check with my men on the perimeter.”

“You might want to look in on Mr. Matthews in the caretaker’s cottage,” Alaina suggested dryly. “I think he and Mr. Fitz are on the brink of divorce.”

“I think their karmas clash,” Jayne said.