All of Me by Lori Wilde

about Jillian and then he told him about Blake.
    “Blake died?”
    “Yeah. Explains why he deeded me the lake house out of the blue. Guess he knew he was dying. What I can’t figure out is why
     he left the house to the temptress in his will.”
    “The temptress has claims on your house?”
    “Looks like it. But my deed postdates her will.”
    Ridley splayed a palm to the back of his neck and looked worried. “For real?”
    “For real.”
    “No shit.” Ridley whistled.
    “No shit.”
    “How come you were sleeping on the couch?” Ridley took another hit off his cigarette. “You’ve got a king-sized bed.”
    Tuck threaded his hand through his hair. “I can’t sleep in there. It’s too big. Too empty.”
    “Without Aimee.”
    “Yeah,” he admitted. “So I had a vision about this temptress woman, and now she shows up at my house claiming it’s her house.
     I’m thinking it means something important. What does it mean, Rid?”
    “Um …” His brother-in-law avoided his eyes. “I better get back in there. Evie’s gonna come looking for me.” He crushed the
     cigarette butt under his boot and turned to leave.
    Tuck put out a hand to stop him. “Tell me.”
    “Tell you what?”
    “The prophecy.”
    Ridley laughed, but it was a hollow sound. “You don’t believe in any of that stuff, remember?”
    “Having her show up has made a serious believer out of me. What does it mean?”
    Ridley looked uneasy.
    “Is it bad?”
    His brother-in-law shrugged, but he looked alarmed. “I’m no expert.”
    “You can tell me. I can handle it. How much worse can it be than losing your wife to ovarian cancer when she’s only twenty-five?”
    “I guess there’s going to be a legal battle over the lake house.”
    “Looks that way.”
    “But you’ve got the deed, right?”
    Tuck swallowed. “Sutter Godfrey’s got it. He was supposed to file the damned thing, but then he broke his hip… .”
    “Sutter never filed the deed?”
    “I don’t think so. I wasn’t paying that much attention.”
    “That sucks. You could lose your house.”
    “Tell me. In the meantime, I think she’s planning on moving in. She’s pulling a U-Haul.”
    Ridley hissed in a breath. “Where you gonna go? This time of year there’s not a lot of places for lease in Salvation.”
    “I don’t know. This whole thing caught me off guard.”
    “You could come stay with me and Evie.”
    Tuck shook his head. “You guys are trying for a baby. I’d cramp your style.”
    “Family’s family. We’d make do.”
    “Why should I be the one to leave? She’s the interloper.” Tuck stuck his fingers through his belt loops. “So are you going
     to tell me what it means to have a vision about a temptress?”
    Ridley swallowed audibly. “Having a vision about a temptress is bad luck.”
    “I’d already sort of figured that out.”
    “The temptress signifies broken plans, broken hearts, broken dreams. But seeing a temptress in real life that you’ve already
     had a vision about …” He shook his head. “Out of my sphere of expertise, but I’m betting it ain’t good. The woman is bad luck.
     A jinx.”
    Tuck looked him squarely in the eyes. “You’re telling me.”
    A FTER J ILLIAN got off the phone with Delaney, she decided to take inventory of the house. She was the executor of Blake’s will, after all.
     It was her job. She had the right.
    By lunchtime, Jillian had a list as long as her arm of things that needed repairing in the house, and she’d only made it through
     the downstairs kitchen, living area, and bathroom. She hadn’t even ventured into the bedrooms upstairs.
    Feeling overwhelmed, she plunked down onto the couch and stared glumly at her surroundings. What had she gotten herself into?
    This behavior wasn’t like her. She wasn’t impulsive or spontaneous. So why had she thrown everything away and just moved up
     here on a whim? In retrospect, it was quite stupid. Especially since she might not even have a legal