“I’ll give Mom your love. And don’t worry. I know you love me, too. Say hi to Dad for me sometime if you can. Let him know that I’m okay and I’ve forgiven him long ago.” Her brother lifted his ghostly hand. “Bye, Grier. Oh, and Daniel would be great. You know, if it’s a boy?”

Grier recoiled as her brother disappeared into thin air.

In his absence, she stood there, struck stupid, wondering what in God’s name—

Her feet started moving without her giving them an order, and a split second later, she found herself in the bathroom. Ripping open the drawer where she kept her makeup and her . . .

Birth control pills.

With a shaking hand, she picked up the square bubble pack and started to count.

But it wasn’t like she hadn’t remembered what she’d forgotten . . . to take.

The last pill she’d swallowed had been the night before Isaac had come into her life. And they’d had sex two . . . maybe two and a half times without protection.

Grier stumbled out of her bathroom and promptly realized she had nowhere to go. Falling onto the foot of her bed, she sat there in the dimness and stared at the packet as rain started to fall outside.

Pregnant? Was it possible she was . . . pregnant? Was she . . .

The knock was so quiet that at first she thought it was just a function of her heart pounding, but when it came again, she looked to the French door of the terrace.

On the other side of the glass, a huge shape loomed, and for a split second she nearly went for the security system fob. But then she saw there was something other than a gun in the man’s hand.

A rose.

It sure looked like a single rose.

“Isaac,” she all but yelled.

Bursting up, she raced for the door and yanked it open.

Her MIA soldier was standing in the drizzle, his hair getting damp, his black muscle shirt leaving his shoulders bare to the droplets.

“Hi,” he said in a small voice. Like he was unsure of the reception he was going to get.

Grier tucked the birth control pills behind her back. “Hello . . .”

Her mind whirled into a frenzy as she wondered whether he’d come to tell her that there had been a problem with the cleanup . . . or was he here to warn her that someone else was after them all? But then why would he bring her a—

“It’s nothing bad,” he said, as if maybe she’d spoken out loud. “I’m just here to give you this.” He lifted up the white rose awkwardly. “It’s . . . ah, something men do. When they . . . ah . . .”

As his voice seemed to desert him, Grier stared at the perfect petals of the flower and, as she breathed in, she caught the scent—and then she realized she was making him stand out in the rain.