“Down court!” he yelled now in the smooth tone she remembered so well. He leaped into the air and whooped with abandon when Sara passed off the ball to another girl, who pivoted and made a basket.

The stands, full of parents and siblings, erupted as the game ended.

Pride nearly overwhelmed Jenna. She’d had no idea she could feel such a thrill, such joy, from watching a game she didn’t even understand. But it was her daughter down there. Her daughter.

On the court every girl on the team threw herself at the coach. Stone tossed back his head and laughed, hugging each of them back.

There’d been a time in Jenna’s life when seeing Stone smile and laugh like that had caused every productive thought to fly right out of her head, and she discovered with little surprise that hadn’t changed.

Watching Stone live as she’d only been able to dream about suddenly felt like a knife to her chest. She nearly staggered with the pain of it, with the gut-wrenching regret.

How had this happened? How had she allowed so much time to go by without a word? And what would happen now that she’d come back?

Knowing she deserved nothing, not even a fraction of the warmth she was experiencing now, didn’t help. With that dismal thought, the gates of her mind opened and flooded her with unwanted memories of her past.

Her absent father.

The mother she could never please, so she’d finally stopped trying. Instead Jenna had depended on her wild behavior to get attention.

Her perfect sister, the one Jenna’s mother constantly wished was her only child.

Everything had always seemed to be Jenna’s fault back then, even when she’d been merely a victim of circumstances. And a victim she’d been. Yet she’d been blamed and, unable to accept it, had rebelled.

She’d been wild, even before then. Hopelessly, pathetically out of control. Moody. It was all she knew how to do, for she could never get her mother to care unless she was furious about something Jenna had done. Without the bad-girl image Jenna had cultivated, she had no identity. No worth.