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Excerpt from Chapter One

Julie Donavan, the new kindergarten teacher, was on her knees consoling a little boy named Chuck on the first day of school when she noticed movement coming in the door. She gasped when she looked up. Her eyes widened and high color filled her cheeks. The most striking cowboy she'd ever laid eyes on had just walked through the door. Well, she had laid eyes on him one time before, but that time they'd been two-point-five sheets to the wind. One less drink that night and they'd have stopped before they got to the motel. Two more and neither would have remembered a damn thing. But the combination had been just right and now he was there in her kindergarten classroom in Saint Jo, Texas.

Her first thought was, "Damn, he looks even better with hair."

Her second was, "What in the hell is he doing in Saint Jo, Texas?"

Her third was, "Oh, shit, what do I do now?"

The man stopped in front of her and looked down. "Hello, we are the Luckadeaus. This is
my daughter, Lizzy; she's in your class this year."

And I'm the woman you met in Dallas six years ago, she wanted to shout at him. Remember me? I'm Red.

Griffin waited for her to finish with the little boy, his pulse racing and his heart thumping. God Almighty, he'd never been this attracted to a redhead before. That was his brother's choice of women. No one had told him the new kindergarten teacher was knock-down-gorgeous or that she had eyes that could see straight into his soul. Desire shot through his body—or was it plain old lust? Either one was something he hadn't allowed in a very long time and he was determined he would get control of it before he spoke again.

Julie's daughter, Annie, came running from across the room, her jet-black pigtails bouncing on her shoulders, the white poliosis streak in her hair parted so that the majority of it was on the left side. She stopped dead in her tracks in front of the other little girl.

They eyed each other for several moments, mirror images of each other, doubles in almost every sense of the word. Jet-black hair with a white streak from the forehead back several inches, crystal clear blue eyes, a slight dent in their chins.

Finally Annie grabbed Lizzy's hand and said, "Come sit by me. My momma is the teacher; she won't mind."

Lizzy let go of her father's hand and ran off with Annie, her jet-black ponytail waving from side to side, the white streak in her hair slicked straight back.

Neither of their parents could peel their eyes away from the two little girls giggling together. Julie felt the world tilt backwards on its axis and the concrete floor of the Saint Jo, Texas, elementary school tremor as if Texas was having a rare earthquake.

"Who are you?" Griffin whispered. Desire took a backseat to shock. His blue eyes narrowed into slits. Who was the redhead and where had that child come from?

"I'm going to be your child's teacher, but we knew each other a long time ago. You don't remember?"

He shook his head. "I've never met you before in my life but that little girl could be my Lizzy's sister, with that white forelock."

"It's time for school to start. We'll have to discuss this later. Guess they each just met their double," Julie said. If he wanted to play dumb as a box of rocks, then she could do the same thing.

He spun around and marched out the door without a backward glance.

Julie would have liked nothing better than to follow him screaming like a fish wife, but she had a classroom of kindergarteners waiting. However if G. Luckadeau thought he'd gotten off easy, then he'd best think again—and this time with the head on his shoulders instead of the one behind his zipper. That visual sent her staggering backward to hold onto her desk and look out over more than a dozen little children, all looking to her with a bit of fear in their eyes. She had to get her raw nerves under control and teach a class. She had to put aside the multitude of sinful thoughts— the foremost of which was homicide at that point. Not far behind it was anger and running a close race was the urge to pick up Annie and run as fast and far as she could.