Hooked

and don’t bother to tell anyone?” tall, lanky, second-born Laurie chided. “I have to hear it from Suki Greenfield?”
    “Who the heck is Suki Greenfield?” Steph snatched up her plate of pancakes and strawberries and pushed a forkful into her mouth to buy time.
    “Suki-the-former-model-Greenfield.” Laurie leaned in. “Who has gourmet taste in men and says you were with a major hunk at McKendrick’s last night…all cozy and handsy and clearly romantic . She called me on her cell the minute she left the restaurant.”
    “Holding out on us,” curvy, blonde Beth accused. “That’s low. So, who is he? And why haven’t you come clean about him before now?”
    “He’s just an old friend,” Steph said, filling her mouth again.
    “Yeah? You don’t get all handsy with old friends, Steph. You don’t get handsy with anybody. Spill!” When Steph reached for the can of whipping cream to top her strawberries, Laurie snatched it away and held it hostage. “You don’t get whipped cream until we get a name.”
    Steph reached for her coffee mug on the counter, and when Beth would have taken it from her she smacked her youngest sister’s hand.
    “Back off, buttercup,” she snarled for effect. “You want a name, I have to have my coffee.” When Beth relented, she took a drink and told herself that revealing this was probably a bad idea. “Finn Hartley.”
    “Finn who?” Laurie looked to Beth, confused.
    “Phoenix Finn?” Beth giggled and pulled Steph to a seat at the island counter. “I knew it! I knew something had happened when you came back from that wedding all moody. You saw him out there, didn’t you!”
    It would all come out, one way or another.
    “Yes, I saw him there.” She tiptoed through the facts. “He was at the resort volunteering for some kind of fishing retreat. We talked briefly, and when he came to Atlanta for Damon’s fishing clinic, he called. We went out for dinner. That’s all there is to it.”
    Laurie examined her with an eye honed by ten years of motherhood. “I don’t believe that for a second. Did he spent the night?”
    “No!” Steph reddened at the emphatic way she answered. “We just had dinner and walked Mickey afterward. Then Finn went back to his hotel.”
    “But you had a great time, right?” Beth tried to prime the pump.
    “Who is this again?” Laurie asked Beth, who rolled her eyes.
    “Finn Hartley. The big, outdoorsy hunk she dated in Phoenix and has mooned over ever since.” Beth turned back to her. “When are you going to see him again?” Annoyed by the way Steph continued eating to avoid talking, she grabbed her sister’s fork. “You are seeing him again, right?”
    “I doubt it,” Steph answered, shoving her plate away and taking a deep breath. “I’m not in the market, and I think he got the idea.”
    “Not in the market?” Laurie shot Beth a look, then they both turned on her with gathering suspicion. “So, you told him about the big C and he ran screaming for the nearest exit?”
    Stephanie’s silence and the sag of her shoulders told more than she would have liked. “Look, I’m not ready for the kind of stuff…for being with a man that way.”
    “So, how did he react when you told him why you’re not ready?” “I didn’t.”
    That ignited a firestorm of sisterly concern and advice. She had to get over the idea that she was damaged and undesirable, they told her. She was wonderful and fun and beautiful and talented, and if he was worth anything as a man, he’d count himself lucky just to know her, they said. If he had any idea what she’d been through, he’d realize what a brilliant, courageous woman she was. She ought to tell him. She ought to tell everybody—business image be damned! She’d had breast cancer and survived it. That was something to be proud of, just as they were proud of her.
    Half an hour later, the tears had dried and a second pot of coffee was brewing, and Steph was trying not to give in to the temptation to dish details like a thirteen-year-old at a slumber party. Brothers-in-law Griff and Rich entered to raid the fridge, and demanded to know the occasion for the estrogen-fest.
    “Steph’s got a boyfriend,” Beth declared, beaming.
    “Now rea—” Steph started to protest.
    “Finn Hartley. A guy she dated in Phoenix.” Laurie talked over her.
    “Finn?” Griff brightened and looked at Beth. “Hartley? Isn’t that the guy we met that time we flew out to see her?”
    As Beth nodded,