And to think, just three days ago, over a two-hundred-dollar bottle of champagne in the Four Seasons bar, this had all sounded like such a good idea. /Why now?/ That's all Riley could think on the drive home. He cranked down the window of the old pickup, hoping that a blast of autumn air would smack some sense into him, but all it did was make him shiver. He was obviously nowhere near sensible, because he felt alive in a way he hadn't in years. All he could think about was Kat's shiny strawberry blonde hair, those big golden eyes, her sweet pink mouth. All he could hear was that raspy girl voice that cut him to the quick with the weight of memory. God help him, but he'd wanted to touch her. It took everything in him not to walk over to her, grab her, and kiss the bejesus out of her before he told how much he hated her.

Because he did hate her. There was no doubt about it. And he'd once loved her with everything he had in him. He couldn't figure out why the hell she decided to pick this particular moment to rise from the dead and throw his life into chaosyet again. What did she want? Did she want to apologize for denying him his right to be a father to his own child?

She sure didn't look apologetic.

Did she want money for the boy's college? God knew he'd gladly hand over everything he had left, but Kat didn't appear to be hurting for cash.

She'd come rollin' through the holler in a brand-new Jaguar, for God's sake, posing in a getup that belonged on a Paris runway. Was that really fringe on those boots that went way up past her knees? She looked like a slutty fur trapper!

Riley laughed out loud, remembering that the last time he'd seen Kat, she'd been in Kmart jeans and Converse sneakers. She'd looked normal.

She'd looked cute and sweet and perfect, and his sixteen-year-old hormones told him he should lay her down in the backseat of the Nova and devour her.