Plain Jane Macallister. Joan Elliott Pickart

of honor on her dressing table because my father had given it to her. Now? I want you to have it, Emily, for a very specific reason.

      Emily looked at her grandfather questioningly.

      My mother taught me, Robert went on, with that mirror, to see past the outer trappings of myself and understand, get to know who I was becoming within, to never lose track of the real Robert MacAllister.

      Emily nodded.

      That’s what I want you to do with the mirror, darling Emily. Gaze at your image in a private place when you’re alone. Discover who you really are behind that smile you keep so firmly in place and beneath those extra pounds you’ve put on to put distance between you and the world around you.

      Oh, Grandpa, Emily had said, her eyes filling with tears, it’s…it’s safe being fat and unattractive and… I hide in here, just keep smiling as I’ve always done and say that I’m doing fine and… She shook her head as tears choked off her words.

      I know, Robert said gently. You’re also hiding in your house by running your business from there. It’s time to step forward, Emily. The mirror will help give you the courage you need to accomplish what you must do. I love you, my sweet Emily. Come out of the shadows and walk in the sunshine.

      You’re so wise, Grandpa. This is a wonderful gift that I’ll always cherish and I promise you that I’ll try to do what you’re asking of me. I will.

      And she was, Emily thought, lifting the mirror so she could see her reflection. Right after the new year holidays, she’d gone to her Aunt Kara, who was a semi-retired physician, had a complete physical, then asked Kara to outline a healthy diet and regiment of exercise. Kara had agreed that Emily had fifty pounds to shed, a fact that Emily knew embarrassed her son when his fat mother was seen by his friends.

      Slowly but surely the pounds had melted away, one after another. Thirty gone; twenty left to go.

      “You still look like Porky Pig’s sister,” Emily said to her reflection. “Mark must have been thoroughly disgusted when he saw how you’ve let yourself become a blimp.” She paused and sighed. “No, forget that. Mark doesn’t give a rip about what I look like. He’s too busy hating me because I…”

      Emily got to her feet and replaced the mirror in the drawer.

      There was no purpose to be served by tormenting herself with the long list of Mark’s accusations. He believed that she had never loved him at all, which wasn’t true. It wasn’t.

      She had never stopped loving the Mark Maxwell she had known when they were teenagers. She’d hidden in her cocoon of fat and inside her house, and when she became too lonely she’d reach within herself for that love, wrap it around her like a warm, fuzzy blanket as she relived the memories of what she’d shared with Mark.

      But those days of hiding were over. She’d rented an office downtown two months ago and was a successful businesswoman who greeted the public with new confidence and self-worth.

      And Trevor, her sweet, darling son, took his dessert to his room each night so Emily wouldn’t have to watch him eat it while she wasn’t having any of the calorie-laden treat. She was, indeed, stepping out of the gloomy shadows into the brilliant sunshine, just as her grandfather had wished her to do. If she didn’t feel like smiling, by golly, she didn’t smile.

      Everything had been going so well, Emily thought, as she swept back the blankets on the bed. Until now. Until Mark had reappeared in her life and turned it upside down. An angry Mark. A handsome and self-assured Mark, who was so intimidating and made her feel fat and sloppy, vulnerable and…

      It was as though, Emily mused, taking her nightie from beneath the pillow and starting toward the bathroom, Mark had somehow pricked her with an invisible pin, creating a tiny hole where the self-confidence and self-esteem that she’d struggled so terribly hard to achieve were slowly escaping, and she didn’t know how to keep it from happening.

      Emily stopped at the bedroom door, then went to the dresser and took out the mirror again, staring at her frowning reflection.

      “Get a grip, Emily MacAllister,” she ordered herself.

      She would not, she vowed, allow Mark to destroy the Emily she had become. No. She’d square her shoulders, lift her…darn it, her double chin, and decide with him how best to reveal his identity to her…their son.

      There would be no more begging, pleading, acting like the child she had been when she had loved him. She didn’t love him now, for heaven’s sake, so her emotions, her heart, would not get in the way of making the proper decisions for Trevor.

      No, she had no feelings whatsoever for the Mark Maxwell who had returned to Ventura after so many years.

      None at all.

      Did she?