As Lola embraced each girl she loved desperately, she sniffed and her eyes filled with tears. "You're all the best. And I want you to remember that. Also remember this doesn't mean I'm leaving you. I'll always be just a phone call away," she promised them.

Lola never wanted to lose touch with these wonderful young women, even if seeing them would arouse painful memories and thoughts of things she should have done differently. And she suspected that it wouldn't be easy to see the girls and avoid the subject of their uncle. Still she intended to stick by her decision.

Now she had one other thing to address with them. "I know I'm leaving The Hot Zone in capable hands but there's something you girls need to know. About your uncle." She eyed each of them, wondering how they'd take the news.

She wished she could protect them the way she had when they were little, monitoring their choice of television shows and playmates, bandaging their cuts and kissing away their pain. Adult reality wasn't as simple.

She'd struggled with this revelation. Perhaps it was Yank's information to divulge, but darned if she'd leave the girls in the dark. The Hot Zone was their business and Yank was their only real family. They deserved to make informed choices.

Each would react in their own way, of course. Sophie would analyze but hold her feelings inside. Micki would hover and try to make things better! And Annabelle would internalize the situation; equate Lola's leaving with her parents' deaths, and do everything she could to make peace within their little unit.

Lola shook her head sadly, knowing Annabelle would probably hurt the most. No, that was wrong. All the girls would be in pain. Only Annabelle would also suffer the accompanying fear.

"Lola?" Micki asked. "What's wrong?"

"Tell us," Sophie encouraged her.

Annabelle remained strangely silent.

Lola drew a deep breath. "Your uncle's been keeping some important information from you and I've decided it's time to come clean."

"The hell you will," Yank bellowed from the doorway.

Lola tensed. She hadn't counted on him joining them but she should have anticipated it anyway.

"Who let you in, you old coot? You have no right to sneak around and listen to other people's conversations." Lola forced herself to meet his gaze. "Why don't you just turn around and take your gyrating hips out the door?" With that, she pivoted around, turning her back on him.

He deserved her cold shoulder. His actions today had merely cemented her resolve to leave and she didn't mind telling him off now. She certainly wasn't worried about holding on to her pride. In an hour, she'd be gone and Yank wouldn't care whether she'd bared her soul or not. But at least she'd leave with the knowledge that she'd done all she could to be upfront and honest and to try to save the life she loved.

"I'm talking to my family," she added for good measure.

"Family?" Yank snorted. "This is my family."

His words cut deep, but she held on to her resolve. "Well these girls are mine, too, and I can have a private talk with them if I choose. Unless you'd like to be the one to tell them everything?" Lola challenged him.

Yank Morgan could bluster and storm around. He could resist her charms and her body if he wanted, but no way could he ever resist a challenge.

Silence reigned. The girls had stepped back toward the wall, giving them their own private arena to play this out. Even Brandon, who'd come in behind Yank, stayed in the shadows. But he met her gaze and gave her a silent nod of encouragement. Brandon was such a good, decent man.

But he'd never known trust and understanding. Would he ever realize Yank considered him family? Always had and always would. And then there was Vaughn and Annabelle. What a couple they could be. Lola shook her head, knowing she didn't have time to dwell on them now.

She faced Yank, possibly for the last time. "You're as scared to tell them the news as you are to face the truth," Lola goaded him. "And you're just as scared to make a commitment and I've had enough. Of everything." All the frustration she'd held inside, all her fear for him, all the love he'd never let her show- she'd kept everything bottled up inside and now the cork came loose and her emotions spilled out in mean-spirited accusations.

She hated how she'd been reduced to this level, and that was yet another reason she was finished with this man who didn't love her back.

"Girls," she began, "your uncle-"

"Is going blind," Yank said, rising to the occasion as she'd predicted. "I'm gonna be blind as a bat one day and there ain't nothing you can do about it."

Stunned silence filled the air around them as the girls digested Yank's version of his situation. Which wasn't completely accurate, but that had been Yank's attitude since they'd gotten the diagnosis. Defiant and angry. And hopeless. Unwilling to do anything the doctor suggested to help his situation.

"He's exaggerating as usual," Lola explained to the girls. "But there are issues that will need to be dealt with and since I won't be here, you all need to know everything."

"Harrumph."

"The diagnosis?" Annabelle was the one to ask, ignoring her uncle's grumblings.

"Macular degeneration," Lola said.

Sophie narrowed her gaze. "It's the leading cause of blindness in people over age fifty-five, right? I watched a segment on the Science Channel."

"That's right. But there is help when it's caught early. The reason you girls need to know this is you need to make sure the business doesn't suffer." And she'd taken steps to make sure The Hot Zone stayed as strong as ever. Lola might be leaving physically but her heart would always be here. "I have a plan."

Annabelle stepped in closer as did Micki and Sophie. Yank merely continued to scowl. He probably still didn't believe she was going anywhere. But he'd know as soon as he returned to the office and saw her empty desk.

"What do you have in mind, Lola?" Annabelle asked.

"A merger with Spencer Atkins and Associates, Spencer's already agreed."

"Over my dead body," Yank shouted and stormed out the door without looking back.

VAUGHN SLIPPED OUT of the office where Annabelle’s family was arguing like crazy. He'd listened to their dynamics with mixed feelings. On the one hand, he recognized the sounds of arguing. Lola and Yank bluster resembled the fights he'd had with his father every year. The reason never mattered. The lack harmony did. His own family never quite connected and the bickering was something he could relate to.

But on a stronger, deeper level, Vaughn felt Annabelle and her sisters' pain on hearing about their uncle's illness. He felt for Lola and understood the hurt she was suffering by being excluded from a family she considered her own. He could empathize so well. Even more, he envied their closeness and caring despite Yank's gruff, obstinate exterior. Even when they weren't getting along, Vaughn knew their love overrode everything else.

And that's when Vaughn had suddenly experienced a sharp, knifelike pain that made him feel like an outsider, much as he did in his own family.

So he slipped back into the hall.

He caught up with Mara and Nick just as Nick was placing his cell phone back into his pocket.

Vaughn knew at first glance something was wrong. "What is it?"

Nick glanced at Mara. Mara looked at Nick. Neither met Vaughn's gaze.

"Fire," Nick said at last, his face pale. He didn't have to say it was at the lodge.

The implication was obvious and Vaughn's stomach plummeted. "How bad?"

"The firefighters are working now, but it doesn't look good for the north end. We need to get back right away," Nick said.

Vaughn gaze shot to the closed office door where Annabelle remained with her sisters and Lola. Yank, he noticed, had found the nearest bar and was nursing a drink. "Yeah. Let me just leave a message and we're out of here." He headed for the old man.

"Don't you want to tell Annabelle yourself?" Mara asked.

Vaughn shook his head. "I'll let Yank know." He couldn't allow himself to see her right now. Because as far as Vaughn was concerned, his obsession with Annabelle had caused him to leave the lodge at a crucial time. With dire consequences.

He'd abandoned his lodge when he knew somebody was out to get him and destroy his dream. And he'd left for a goddamn party to be with a woman who represented everything he wanted but would never have. No. He couldn't let her stand in the way of the one dream that just might come true.

Mara followed him and placed a hand on his shoulder. "You couldn't have prevented the fire, you know," she said, reading his mind.

"But I could have been there when it happened."

And he should have been.

SINCE ANNABELLE had had private time with Lola while she'd stayed at Vaughn's house, Annabelle let her sisters talk with her now, while Annabelle headed straight for her bullheaded uncle.

She found him at the bar, talking to the same bartender who'd served at their party. She glanced at his half empty glass. "Scotch?" she asked.

"Is there anything else?" He downed the glass and pounded it on the table.

The bartender complied by pouring him more. "Miss?" he asked Annabelle.

"Club soda with a wedge of lime, please."

"Sissy drink," Uncle Yank muttered.

"Yeah well I'm a girl so what do you expect?"

He shrugged. "I raised you girls to have balls."

"And thanks to Lola we have feminine sides, too. And because of you both we have big hearts. So what happened to yours?" she asked, not disguising her real feelings.

He slid the unfinished drink across the bar, then turned to face her. "It takes more heart to let someone go than to make them stick around and suffer."