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their
table struck up a conversation with her.
    Katrina tuned out
and picked at the shrimp Alfredo in front of her.
    During a lull in
conversation, Rachel gestured to Katrina’s left. "Looks like your man
might be hooking up with some old buddies."
    "He’s not my
man." But she looked anyway and saw Rachel was right. Alec was smiling,
looking almost relaxed. Not for long. Not if someone told him before she could.
    Katrina tried to
swallow past the lump in her throat and failed. Where would she be now if she
hadn’t kept Joey from him?
    There were so
many curves in life, so many twists and turns that it was impossible to tell
what led where, but of one thing she was certain. Had she never let fear goad
her into leaving Alec at the altar, Joey might still be alive.

CHAPTER
THREE
    The reunion
dragged slower than a senior citizen driving through Manatee Bay. Alec shifted
in the restaurant chair.
    "Man, buddy,
it’s been a long time since I’ve seen you. Did well for yourself, huh? Better
than Katrina has." After that odd comment, Mike Weston shook his head and
gulped down more wine.
    His fifth glass, by
Alec’s count. Talking with Mike was tedious, especially since he insisted on
calling Alec "buddy" even though they hadn’t spoken since graduation.
    Too bad Grant Harkness
was a year younger than Alec. Grant would’ve made this reunion more fun. Alec
hadn’t talked to anyone besides Grant since graduation. Now he remembered why.
With the exception of Mike, Alec’s former classmates were giving him a wide
berth. It bothered him more than he’d like to admit, this aloofness from the
people he’d grown up with.
    All because of
Mr. Carmichael.
    Alec stifled a
groan. The plush chair in his hotel room and his most recent issue of Forbes
would be more relaxing than this farce of a reunion.
    He'd thought with
the passage of time he might possibly be welcome in his hometown. Apparently
not.
    But trying to
make friends wasn’t on the agenda, he reminded himself.
    Business was.
    He sipped his
soda thoughtfully. Despite Mike’s laidback exterior, the president of Manatee
Bay National Bank had a shrewd mind that worked beneath the easy-going surface
he presented to the world. Alec had been trying to pry about the financial
status of businesses in town without tickling Mike’s business feelers.
    Unfortunately,
Mike kept turning the conversation to Katrina.
    Alec tapped his
fingers against the table. She wasn’t the focus of this trip. Despite his
earlier prying, he had no intention of buying Kat’s Korner. Why would he, when
the building was practically his? All he had to do was refuse to renew her
lease when the time came. Still, some inner demon prodded him to ask her about
selling. The look on her face had been extreme, almost bordering on anxiety.
Her reaction only reinforced his initial assessment of her yesterday.
    Something bad had
happened.
    He shouldn’t get
involved. He was here to verify financial soundness and possibilities of
profit, then sign on the dotted line for the building. That’s all he needed to
do before returning to New York.
    "She banks
with us, you know." Mike shoveled peas into his mouth as he spoke. "Good
customer, nice lady. Everyone thinks it’s so sad what happened and all. Now
she’s on her own."
    Alec kept his
face blank, though curiosity stirred. "What happened?"
    Mike squinted at
him, his expression almost resembling a glare. "Two deaths in the family,
same time. For a while some speculated she'd die from the grief."
    A sharp pain
spiked through Alec’s chest. Did this explain her strained face? "That’s
horrible."
    Mike’s head
cocked. "Her church helped her out some. With bills and stuff."
    "Katrina
goes to church?" Alec couldn’t keep the surprise from his voice. Believing
in God was something she’d always been real self-righteous about, but going to
church was a whole different matter. The Katrina he'd known was too
self-absorbed to care about mingling with others of "like