Mother, Please! - By Brenda Novak & Jill Shalvis & Alison Kent Page 0,40

who would soon disappear from her life. So Melissa had closed up for self-protection, and had done too good a job of it.

She hadn’t seen Rose more than a handful of times her entire life—again, her own fault because in the past years Rose had sincerely made an effort—the last time being when Melissa had first moved here. Rose had shown up on her doorstep with a basket full of homemade brownies and a nervous offer to go to lunch. Startled, Mel had declined.

She wasn’t ready. What if Rose expected something from her that she couldn’t give? Mel had gone too long without a mother to want a doting one now. And yet… Mel had moved here. No one had asked or coerced her; she’d come on her own to Martis Hills.

The why of that would have to be faced sometime, she supposed, but not now. She picked up the letter again.

Dear Melissa,

I want you to know, I’m not giving up. Out of all the towns in the world, you moved here, near me. I’m taking that as a good sign.

Call me when you’re ready. I hope that’s soon.

Love, Rose Anders (still your mom)

A good sign? Ha! After all those years of wishing she’d had a mother to braid her hair before school, hold her hand at the dentist, or simply hug her after the end of a long day, it was too late. Way too late.

Wasn’t it? Yes, Mel decided, refolding the letter. Long ago she’d outgrown the need for a mom. All the hard work of growing up was over, and she was quite content on her own.

Setting aside the letter, she got into bed. The light from the stars shone through her wide window in a way it could never have in Los Angeles. There the city lights had always blocked them out. She lay there, blinking up at the constellations that were so incredibly beautiful. Unmoved, she figured she’d trade in this view in a heartbeat for a Starbucks run.

“PSST!”

No, he wasn’t ready to leave blessed slumber land. Jason Lawrence turned over.

“Psst.”

Damn it, he closed his eyes tighter and yanked the covers over his head.

“Jason, please. Please can you try again?”

It wasn’t the soft feminine plea that got him, but the squawk of a parrot.

He cracked open an eye. His bedroom was lit with the early-summer morning sun that slanted in through the windows, one of which held the face of…Dr. Melissa Anders?

Now he knew he was still dreaming. Dr. Melissa Anders was petite, with a dark cap of hair that accented her expressive jade eyes and a kissable mouth.

And a serious back-off attitude.

Eyes closed again, he grinned, because she probably had no idea how much he loved a feisty woman, and how her go-to-hell expression had only egged him on.

“Jason!”

He blinked. Nope. It wasn’t Melissa Anders standing outside his bedroom window, but Rose Anders.

Rose Anders holding a parrot. “Ah, hell,” he said.

Smiling sweetly, her short dark hair falling into her green eyes, she knocked on the window again and lifted the arm on which the parrot sat.

“No.” He sat up against the headboard. In order to beat back the nightmares, he’d written, pounding out the pages of the thriller he was working on until four in the morning, and it was…he squinted at the clock…just barely seven now.

He couldn’t function on so little sleep, he just couldn’t. If he wasn’t so stubborn, he might have taken one of the sleeping pills his doctor had given him after his accident, but he had a healthy fear of drugs, so he suffered the nightmares and the lack of sleep, and reminded himself that at least he was alive.

“Morning,” Rose said cheerfully. “You awake?”

Yes, because of her.

Just as he was alive because of her. And in return, all she wanted was this favor…. “Ah, hell,” he said again.

Rose just smiled. “Don’t worry. The parrot’s easier to handle than Bob. I’ll meet you at the front door.”

JASON SAT in Dr. Melissa Anders’s waiting room, squeezed between an old man holding an even older looking dog, and a teenage girl cradling a hamster. The old man and dog were napping, heads back, mouths open. The teenage girl was chomping a big wad of purple gum and staring at the scar down the side of his face.

In the six months since the accident, he’d gotten used to the stares, sort of. “What’s the matter with your hamster?”

“She has an abscess.” She stroked the little rodent, who in return, wriggled its nose