The house sounded promising. "How much?"

Lindsay sipped her wine.

"Ten thousand under your minimum price."

Kari's eyes lit up. "That's fabulous."

"Where is it?" Lindsay asked.

"Chatsworth."

"Oh." Kari sipped her wine.

Lindsay narrowed her eyes at Richard. "Isn't that close to where you live?"

He loosened his tie. "A few miles away."

"I really don't want to commute," Kari reminded him.

"At least take a look at it. How about tomorrow morning?"

"I don't know."

"She's working very closely with a client these days," Lindsay said.

Kari thought about Max with his black eye and bloody nose. Would his family blame her for his injuries? She already felt as if she'd intruded on their visit. Joey hated her guts and his mother hadn't exactly greeted her with open arms. It would probably be best if she stopped working with Max until his family left. She met Richard's gaze. "What time do you want to pick us up?"

"Doesn't your daughter have school?"

Kari was beginning to see that Lindsay might be right about Richard wanting more than just a sale. "Unfortunately, she's been suspended from school."

"She was caught making out with a boy," Lindsay told him.

Kari tapped Lindsay on the knee. "I'm sure Richard isn't interested in the details."

The next hour turned out to be informative and fun. Despite Lindsay's best attempt to scare Richard off, he'd entertained them both with interesting stories about real estate. But Kari didn't want to give Richard the wrong idea, so she didn't bother walking him to his car when he got up to leave. They all said goodbye and Kari shut the door after he left, leaning against it until she heard his car pull away.

Lindsay finished the last of her wine. "I was wrong. He is a nice guy. I'll give him that much."

Kari nodded, but her thoughts were a million miles away, or maybe only thirty miles away, on a man with a black eye and a broken nose. Richard may be a nice guy, but he was no Mad Max.

"What happened to your face, Uncle Max?"

"A little beach volleyball with the guys." Max ruffled the top of his niece's head and continued on toward the living room where he could hear everyone talking at once.

"Oh, my God," one of his sister's cried. "Your eye!"

"Look at his nose," somebody said.

"We better get you to the hospital."

"No need," Max said. "I just got back from the emergency room. Nothing's broken."

His mother reached for his face. He jerked back. "Please," he said. "No touching. Just because it's not broken, that doesn't mean it doesn't hurt."

"Who did this to you?" she asked.

"One of the guys."

"Which guy?"

"Derek Hoffman."

"Which one is Derek?" Jill asked.

"He's the new hot one," Sally told her.

"He is hot," Nicole agreed.

They all turned to stare at Nicole, since they were pretty sure she hadn't looked at a man since Jake passed away.

She shrugged her shoulders.

"He's not that great," Max told them as he rustled around in the refrigerator for a cold beer.

Dan saw Max open a cold one and said over his shoulder, "I thought you weren't supposed to drink beer."

Max pointed at his beat up face. "I think I deserve one damn beer, don't you?"

Dan shrugged. "I just assumed, since you have a nutritionist and everything, that you shouldn't be drinking alcohol."

"Well, you know what happens when you assume, Dan."

Fred smiled. "Man, you're in a fighting mood, aren't you?"

"Yeah," Max said. "You wanna step outside?"

Everybody laughed except Max.

"What were you and Derek fighting about?" Nicole asked.

Max didn't want to go into it. "It was nothing. Stupid actually."

Breanne's eyes lit up. "It had something to do with Kari, didn't it?"

"He wouldn't fight over someone like Kari," his mother said.

Max gave his mother a long hard look. "What do you mean by that, Mom?"

She lifted her slender shoulders and gave him an innocent look. "Nothing."

Sally sighed. "Mom doesn't like you getting too attached to anyone, Max. You know that."

"I don't know that. What are you talking about?"

"Oh, come on," Nicole said. "You're her only son. You've taken care of most of us since the day Dad passed away. The thought of you having a long term relationship with anyone scares Mom to death."

"She would have heart palpitations," Sally agreed, "if you ever asked anyone to be your wife."

"Stop that. Both of you," their mother said. "You girls have no idea what you're talking about."

"She doesn't care who you sleep with," Nicole added, ignoring their mother, "she just doesn't want you falling in love."

This was all news to Max. His eyes were still focused on his mom. "Is that true?"

"Of course not. I want you to be happy. I'm just not sure settling down would be the right thing for you."

He raised his hands in the air. "Okay, that's it. I don't want to talk about this right now. My head is throbbing." He sat in an empty recliner and took another swallow of his Corona. "Let's change the subject."

"Okay," Jill agreed. "I want to know why Derek slugged you in the face and mutilated your nose."

"He wouldn't stop ogling Kari," Max said. "I found his actions to be disrespectful."

"Ah," Dan said. "So you were fighting over Kari...the woman who is not your girlfriend."

Max answered with a tight smile, then took another long swig of his beer. "Happy everyone?"

"If you look like this," Fred said, "I can't wait to see what Hoffman looks like."

"It's not pretty," Max lied.

"Is Kari coming to the house tomorrow?" Breanne asked.

"After today? Who knows. Although I doubt it."

"That's too bad. We wanted to invite her to the barbeque on Sunday."

"She left her shoes in the back of my bike. I'll invite her when I take them to her tomorrow."

Jill smiled. "Wonderful."

Not even a second of silence stretched between them before Sally said, "I was thinking about Kari today."

They all patiently waited for her to continue.

"I was thinking about the day Kari picked me up on the side of the road when I ran out of gas. It was a day or two before my graduation party. Remember the party I had?"

Max nodded, more interested in the taste of cold beer running down his parched throat than anything else.

"Mom and Dad were gone and you came home from college unexpectedly?"

Max nodded again. "I remember."

"You found your girlfriend, Alyssa Anderson, making out with Scott Vance. You were furious."

"He wasn't that furious," Jill reminded Sally, "because the next day he kept talking about some new girl he'd met. But nobody could figure out who he was talking about."

Jill looked at Max. "Did you ever figure out who the mystery girl was?"

Breanne jumped out of her seat as if she'd just spilled hot coffee on her lap. "What if it was Kari!"

The only thing Max wanted to know was when all these people in his house were going to pack up and head back to Santa Barbara where they came from. He should have bought a smaller house. "What are you babbling about now?" he asked Breanne in hopes of calming her, since she was still hopping around like a bunny gone mad.

Breanne started pacing instead. "The mystery girl could have been Kari. One," Breanne said, holding up a finger. "She's from Roseville. Two," she said as she lifted a second finger, "Kari told me she went to Sally's party. And three," she said with way too much enthusiasm, forgetting about her finger count, "Kari said that the two of you had met before."

Something rumbled and swirled within Max's gut as images of Kari floated through his mind; her eyes, her mouth, her smile.

Dream girl?

How could that be? This was crazy talk. And yet a nagging pain deep inside his chest made him wonder why he hadn't connected the dots before now.

Breanne was right.

That's where he and Kari had met...at Sally's graduation party. He had been watching Alyssa and Scott when he knocked into Kari accidentally, spilling a glass of punch onto her blouse. He had led her upstairs, intending only to give her a clean shirt to change into, but she'd stood in his room and shivered, and she had mesmerized him with those big green eyes of hers. He shut his eyes, remembering. Some girls were giggling in the hallway that night, which had prompted him to shut the door and lock it. Kari was trembling. "What do you want me to do?" he'd asked.

"Hold me."

He did as she asked, wrapped his arms around her and held her close to his chest until she stopped shaking. He couldn't remember how long exactly they had stood there in the middle of his bedroom, but he'd finally drawn back to look at her. The heated interest he saw beneath heavy-lidded eyes had urged him onward. Next thing he knew, she was helping him remove his jacket and his shirt. The tips of her fingers slid over his chest, and that's when he noticed she was no longer trembling. His lips slid across her cheek and over her mouth, his tongue circling the tip of her tongue. She had tasted like fruit punch and pure sweet bliss. The kiss had grown in intensity, her mouth sending a rush of heated excitement through his body. His palm covered her breast and his insides exploded, crazy tingles like he'd never felt before shooting through every part of him. He wanted her, and he knew she felt the same way when she pulled her mouth from his and helped him slide his pants down over his hips.

"What about birth control," he'd asked.

As if it had all happened last night, the memories came flooding back. She had drawn her gaze to his and said, "It's okay." That's all the assurance he had needed. They moved to the bed, and he could still recall how his meticulously calm movements had contrasted with her semi-reckless pace as they removed each other's clothing and moved toward the bed. As they made love, he'd watched her. She had looked content, satisfied, happy...as if she had never wanted anything more. He'd never forgotten that look.

Instinctively, she had arched her hips, her hands kneading his flesh as he pressed deeper, seeming to want him more with each thrust until she exploded and said into his ear, "I love you."

That particular declaration had gotten his full attention. His shoulder muscles tightened. For a long moment he remained still. But she covered his chest with feathery kisses, her hands soft against him, and he had closed his eyes and gave one final thrust. And that's when he shattered too.

He hadn't realized it was her first time until the next morning when he'd found blood on the sheets.

Why hadn't he put it all together before now?

Max looked up. He wasn't too surprised to see most of his family watching him. "Kari Murphy is Dream Girl," he told them. Then he stood and walked out of the room.

"What girl?" Fred asked.

"I think he's talking about Marlo Thomas from the hit show That Girl back in the sixties?" their mother said.