Chapter One

      JESS

      Jessica Turner stood just inside the wide-open French doors of the sprawling seaside home and looked out over the crowd of beautiful, laughing people, all intent on having fun. West family Christmas Eve parties were legendary. Invite only, and Jess had been invited. By Trig Sinclair who she’d seen down the street that morning, and after Trig had hugged the breath straight out of her and asked her what she was doing tonight, he’d said come to the party. Plenty of people from the old school crowd were going to be there, he’d said, and the Wests wouldn’t mind. Given that Jess had been planning to spend Christmas Eve watching movies in her hotel room, she’d said yes.

      So here she was.

      Distinctly overdressed amongst a sea of bathers and board shorts, skimpy sarongs and glistening, beach-bronzed skin.

      She hadn’t asked about the dress code and she’d got it emphatically wrong. Nothing she could do about her pale pearly skin. Plenty she could have done about wearing something a little less formal. Even though her crimson chiffon shift fell to mid-thigh in gentle swishes, it still wasn’t quite right. She felt out of place, a half step out of sync with everyone else.

      Some things never changed.

      The house was huge, the deck a luxurious extravagance. The garden and beach beyond promised space for the party to spread.

      Jess looked for a familiar face, any familiar face in the crowd, and came up empty. Watching movies in her hotel room was sounding like a good option for her right about now. She studied the faces in the crowd a little more closely the second time around. She hadn’t been home in four years. People changed in four years. Surely there was someone here she knew?

      And then she did see a face she knew, a profile she had no hope of ever forgetting. The sharp cheekbones and the stubborn jaw. The nose that had been broken more than once—she’d reset it herself at least twice. The owner of that face had patched her up plenty, too. He’d sewn two ragged stitches into the curve of her eyebrow once, and though the gash had knit together straight and true, no hair had ever grown over that thin silver line.

      Boyd Webber.

      The one and only.

      Boyd had been her childhood confidant and her refuge when her father’s fists got rough. He’d been her cheer squad when she’d started pulling good grades, studying with her even though his own grades had never amounted to much. He’d been her first dance, first kiss, first love. First and only man to ever break her heart.

      She’d figured he might be here this evening, figured she’d take her chances.

      Now all she wanted to do was turn and run.

      Jess turned to leave and made it two steps toward the door before a hand caught her by the arm. Jess turned and found Lena West regarding her warily. Lena, with her wild gypsy tresses, stunning blue-grey eyes and in-your-face boldness. Lena had been a year behind Jess in school. They hadn’t been more than casual acquaintances.

      ‘Jess? Jess Turner, right? Trig’s—’

      Lena couldn’t seem to find the right word for what Trig was to Jessica.

      ‘Trig’s old school friend, yes. I saw him down the street this morning and he asked me what I was doing tonight and said come, because some of the old crowd would be here, but I don’t think—I mean—it wasn’t a date or anything. I didn’t take it as such. Trig’s just friendly. And maybe a little too free with invitations that aren’t his to make,’ Jess added hesitantly under the weight of those sharply assessing eyes.

      ‘Oh, the invitation was his to make,’ Lena assured her, and blithely swept away one of the concerns Jess had about being here tonight. ‘This is a Sinclair-West party. Trig’s folks are here somewhere, if you know them. His older brother?’

      Jessica shook her head. She didn’t know Trig’s family, not really. She’d met them only once, when they’d taken pictures of her and Trig