“I felt badly because I'd been nasty. After your behavior tonight, I only wish I'd been nastier. I can be," she added on a threat.Alan only smiled as Mario brought the wine to the table. Watching Shelby, Alan tasted it, then nodded. "Very good. It's the sort of flavor that stays with you for hours. Later, when I kiss you,the taste will still be there."The blood began to hum in her ears. "I'm only here because you dragged me."To his credit, Mario didn't spill a drop of the wine he poured as he listened.Her eyes heated as Alan continued to smile. "And since you refuse to give me my keys,I'll simply walk to the nearest phone and call a locksmith. You'll get the bill.""After dinner," Alan suggested. "How do you like the wine?"Scowling, Shelby lifted the glass and drained half the contents. "It's fine." Her eyes, insolent now, stayed level with his. "This isn't a date, you know.""It's becoming more of a filibuster, isn't it? More wine?”

“You sell your own wares,then.Are you clever at it?"Shelby lifted her wine. "I like to think so." Tossing her hangs out of her eyes, she turned to Alan. "Would you say I was clever at it, Senator?""Amazingly so," he returned. "For someone without any sense of organization, you manage to work at your craft,run a shop,and live precisely as you choose.""I like odd compliments," Shelby decided after a moment. "Alan's accustomed to a more structured routine. He'd never run out of gas in the freeway.""I like odd insults," Alan murmured into his wine."Makes a good balance.”

“You'll make a good First Lady, Shelby Campbell."Shelby's fingers tightened on her wineglass, an involuntary gesture noticed only by Alan and his mother. "Perhaps," she returned calmly. "if it were one of my ambitions.""Ambitions or not,it's fate when you're paired with this one," Daniel stabbed his fork toward Alan."You're a little premature." Alan cut cleanly through his meat, swearing fluidly in his mind only. "I haven't decided to run for president, and Shelby hasn't agreed to marry me.""Haven't decided? Hah!" Daniel silled down wine. "Hasn't agreed?" He set down the glass with a bang. "The girl doesn't look like a fool to me, Campbell or no," he continued. "She's good Scottish stock,no matter what her clan.This one'll breed true MacGregors.""He'd still like me to change my name," Justin commented, deliberately trying to shift the attention onto himself."It's been done to ensure the line before," Daniel told him. "but Rena's babe'll be as much MacGregor as not. As will Caine's when he's a mind to remember his duty and start making one." He sent his younger son a lowered-brow look that was met with an insolent grin. "But Alan's the firstborn, duty-bound to marry and produce and sire..."Alan turned, intending on putting an end to the topic,when he caught Shelby's grin. She'd folded her arms on the table,forgetting her dinner in the pure enjoyment of watching Daniel MacGregor on a roll. "Having fun?" Alan muttered near her ear."Wouldn't miss it.Is he always like this?"Alan glanced over, watching his father gesture with his lecture. "Yes."Shelby sighed. "I think I'm in love. Daniel..." She interrupted his flow of words by tugging sharply on his sleeve. "No offense to Alan,or to your wife,but I think if I were going to marry a MacGregor,he'd have to be you."Still caught up in his own diatribe, Daniel stared at her.Abruptly his features shifted and his laugh rang out. "You're a pistol,you are, Shelby Campbell.Here..." He lifted a bottle of wine. "Your glass is empty.”

“He works fast," Alan commented as he lifted his wine."David?" Shelby sent him a puzzled look. "Actually his fastest sped is crawl unless he's got a guitar in his hands.""Really?" Alan's eyes met hers as he sipped, but she didn't understand the amusement in them. "You only stood him up tonight, and already he's planning his wedding to someone else.""Stood him-" she began on a laugh, then remembered. "Oh." Torn between annoyance and her own sense of te ridiculous, Shelby toyed with the stem of her glass. "Men are fickle creatures," she decided."Apparently." Reaching over, he lifted her chin with a fingertip. "You're holding up well.""I don't like to wear my heart on my sleeve" Exasperated, amused, she muffled a laugh. "Dammit, he would have to pick tonight to show up here.""Of all the gin joints in all the towns..."This time the laugh escaped fully. "Well done," Shelby told him. "I should've thought of that line myself; I heard the movie not long ago.""Heard it?""Mmm-hmmm. Well..." She lifted her glass in a toast. "To broken hearts?""Or foolish lies?" Alan countered.Shelby wrinkled her nose as she tapped her glass against his. "I usually tell very good ones. Besides, I did date David.Once.Tree years ago." She finished off her wine. "Maybe four.You can stop grinning in that smug, masculine way any time, Senator.""Was I?" Rising, he offered Shelby her damp jacket. "How rude of me.""It would've been more polite not to acknowledge that you'd caught me in a lie," she commented as they worked their way through the crowd and back into the rain. "Which you wouldn't have done if you hadn't made me so mad that I couldn't think of a handier name to give you in the first place.""If I work my way through the morass of that sentence it seems to be my fault." Alan slipped an arm around her shoulders in so casually friendly a manner she didn't protest. "Suppose I apologize for not giving you time to think of a lie that would hold up?""It seems fair.”

“You look beautiful, Rena." Gently he laid a hand on the mound of her belly. His sister, he thought as wonder and pride mixed together. His baby sister. "I can't get used to it," he murmured.Serena put her hand on his. "You don't have a great deal more time to get used to it." She felt the baby move under their joined hands and grinned as Alan's gaze dropped to them. "He or she is impatient to begin." Tilting her head, she studied Alan's face. "Dad's suddenly gotten it into his head there might be two...I wonder who might have planted that seed?"His eyes smiled as he lifted them to his sister's. "It was purely a defensive maneuver.""Mmm-hmm." Turning, she held out both hands. "You must be Shelby. I'm glad you could come."Shelby felt the warmth, more carefres than Alan's, the welcome, less curious than Caine's. "So am I.I've been wanting to meet the woman who broke Alan's nose."With a muffled chuckle, Serena jerked her head toward Caine. "It was supposed to be his." She narrowed her eyes a moment as Caine dipped his hands into his pockets and grinned. "It should have been his. Come on in and meet the rest of the family," she continued as she tucked her arm through Shelby's. "God,I hope Alan prepared you.""In his own way.""If you start to feel overwhelmed, just shoot me a look. These days all I have to do is sigh to distract Dad's attention for an hour and a half.”

“Alan: "I had terrible stage fright."Sin: "I'm not familiar with the concept of 'stage fright.'"A: "It's pretty awful. You end up having to picture the entire audience in their underwear. Phyllis was in that audience, you know."S: "Why, Alan, I had no idea your tastes ran that way."A: "Phyllis is a very nice lady. And I do not consider her so much aged as matured, like a fine wine. But I still think you owe me an archery lesson.”