Free A Simple Twist of Fate by Helenkay Dimon

charming about her. And she sure was easy on the eyes.
    Leah tapped her finger on the side of her mug as she hesitated between each word. “I’ve watched her. It’s like she thinks there’s something hidden here and she needs to find it. With all of us walking in and out and checking on her, she’s not getting the job done all that quickly, and her guilt seems to be mounting as the days go by.”
    Callen picked up on the same change. The Sophie he met originally stayed quiet and slipped from room to room. The more time around the house and Beck, the more she’d opened up, even joked and smiled . . . except for those times when the burdens of the world showed in her frown. “But what does she really want?”
    “That’s just it. She’s looking through your grandmother’s stuff, which makes me think this goes back to when Sophie worked for her. For whatever reason, she doesn’t trust us enough to tell us, but I think she’s close to telling Beck.”
    Cal knew the real answer. “She’s close to sleeping with him.”
    “And I’m betting she’s someone who will want the truth out there before they take that step.” Leah sighed. “Trust me, I understand that part. Declan knew about my anger over Charlie but the enormity of my vendetta was much harder to disclose and I messed up the timing.”
    A pretty big understatement, but Callen understood her need to move on. “It worked out.”
    “Bottom line is I’m not picking up a danger or revenge vibe from Sophie.”
    “Me either, which is the only reason I’ve agreed to let Beck handle this his way, but the chance of his brain abdicating to his d—” Callen cleared his throat. “Let’s just say he may not be thinking straight.”
    “I don’t believe whatever is driving Sophie will hurt Beck. I think she’s really attracted to him and it’s throwing her common sense off.”
    No way was Callen taking women’s intuition or whatever Leah relied on as gospel. “I wish I could be sure about that.”
    “The sparks between them are pretty intense, even though they appear a tad clueless about what the rest of us can see without strain.”
    Callen would have used other words and probably pointed out their idiocy, but he decided to go with Leah’s G-rated version instead. “Yeah, I know.”
    “Look, I don’t want him hurt either. I don’t want any of you hurt.” Leah reached across the table and put her hand over Callen’s.
    The warmth of her palm seeped into his skin. The touching. She did it automatically. It was one of the many things he liked about her. The openness and acceptance. Once she’d decided Declan was hers, she adopted the entire family. She coddled and pushed them around. For Callen it was like having a sister for the first time.
    Not that it had been a smooth ride. They had a bumpy start, Callen’s suspicions of her being more finely tuned than Declan’s, but they worked through it. In many ways, she knew more about Callen than his brothers did. For years he’d separated himself from Declan and Beck, convinced they needed a better influence. Behind the scenes he’d watched, ready to step in and help.
    But Leah, with her investigating and the stacks of files she and her father collected on the Hanover family over the years—she knew a part of Callen’s life he didn’t want told. And a month ago she’d handed him a sealed file that contained paperwork about that life. Information that he knew from the pleading in her eyes held a secret. Without words, she told him not to open it because it contained a death blow of sorts.
    To this day, he hadn’t done more than move the envelope around. It remained closed and he had no immediate plans to change that. Not when he’d finally found Declan and Beck again. Not when the good times had finally started to make inroads into all the bad.
    Callen couldn’t lose them a second time.
    Declan needed a house and security and a place to call his own, so Cal was prepared to deliver Shadow Hill