Once a person hit bottom, the only way to go was up.

Not sure if she felt encouraged or depressed by that thought, Jenny Baker absently rubbed beside the sore abrasion on her forehead and unpacked another dish from the cardboard box. The house she would now call home was practically falling down around her. Paint peeled from the cabinets. A crack in the window over the chipped porcelain sink distorted the rain-grayed view of a weed-choked garden. But at least she had a roof over her head.

A pot on the floor caught drips from the ceiling.

Even the weather had turned on her.

Mid-August in northern Vermont was usually warm and sunny, a lovely respite between the harsh winters and the brilliance of the autumn to come. This far north the leaves were always the first to change, and that change would soon begin. In a few weeks, lush green would turn to shades of crimson and burnished gold. The leaf-peepers would arrive in droves. The loons and crows would fly south. But, for now, late summer reigned.

Jenny had always loved Vermont this time of year. The velvet green of the meadows, the farms and the rolling hills, the way the birch and maple leaves shimmered in the sunlight. It had all been exactly as she'd remembered, too, as she'd left the interstate for the slower, winding drive deeper into the country, heading toward Maple Mountain and home.

Unfortunately, the little black cloud that had hovered over her life for the past month had apparently followed her from Boston. Within an hour of prying off boards from a few downstairs windows and unloading her car — the latter of which had taken less than fifteen minutes now that her possessions had been reduced to little more than her luggage and four cardboard boxes — clouds had rolled in, dusk had descended and a summer thunderstorm had put a major damper on her new beginning.

Despite the rain, the optimist in her struggled to surface. Bemoaning her fate wouldn't change it, so she focused on the good news — which was that the two oil lamps she'd found in the pantry provided plenty of light to see.

The not-so-encouraging part was that the storm had nothing to do with the lack of electricity. She wouldn't have power even after the clouds passed. The house had sat vacant for years.

One of the lamps glowed from a beige Formica countertop. The other cast its circle of light from the pot-bellied stove that provided heat during the long, snow-bound winters. Not wanting to think about winter any more than she did the rain, Jenny set her bright-red cereal bowls on a fresh sheet of shelf liner and ignored the rhythmic plink of water into the pot. She had bigger problems than no electricity, no phone and a roof that leaked.

Until a little after ten o'clock that morning, she had lived in a charming brownstone in a trendy little neighborhood in Boston. She'd been within walking distance of a fabulous Italian deli, chic restaurants and great bars she and her girlfriends sometimes frequented during happy hour so they could fill up on free appetizers for dinner. She'd become acquainted with the woman at the corner news kiosk where she'd bought the newspaper for an elderly neighbor who sometimes didn't feel like navigating her stairs. She'd come to know the guy who worked the flower cart during the summer and who slipped a few extra tulips into the bouquets she occasionally bought, just because he liked her smile.

She'd had good neighbors. She'd had a good life.

Until a month ago, she'd even had a good job.

Armed with her associate's degree and the same dogged determination that had gotten her out of Maple Mountain, she'd worked her way up from the general secretarial pool of a major brokerage house to administrative assistant to a senior vice president. The man had depended on her for everything from keeping him supplied with antacids to handling the confidential correspondence, paperwork and computer accounts of clients with more money than some small third-world countries. Her job had been exciting, interesting and filled with all the opportunities Maple Mountain had lacked.

She had also been dating an up-and-coming broker with a brilliant future who had started hinting heavily at marriage and babies.

She reached into the box, her stomach knotting as she unwrapped a bowl.

She had honestly believed that Brent Collier cared about her. She had wanted to marry him, to have his children, to do his laundry — or, at least, send it out — and to live the rest of her life growing old with him.

But Brent had turned out to be the world's biggest louse. And she, the biggest fool. He'd used her, used her feelings for him and ruined every ounce of credibility she'd had. Because she'd believed in him, because she'd trusted him, she'd been arrested, fired from the brokerage, questioned, her home searched, her possessions confiscated and her reputation ruined. Now her only prospect for employment was at the diner where, years ago, she'd worked her way through community college.

Taking a deep breath, she set the bowl in place, reached for another. It was still tourist season in the section ofVermont known as the Northern Kingdom, and the little town and surrounding villages would only get busier when the leaves changed. Because of that, there was at least a chance that the local diner could use another waitress. She was in debt up to the scrape on her forehead to the attorney who'd kept her out of jail. She still had a year's worth of car payments to make. She had a roof to repair.

She was trying to imagine how she could possibly afford the latter when a sharp bang on the door sent her heart to her throat and the bowl in her hand to floor.

Chips of red ceramic flew in an arc across scarred beige linoleum.

"I know someone's in there. I can see light. Open up, will you?" The deep, distinctly male voice faltered. "I need some help."

Jenny didn't budge. She'd already had one unpleasant encounter with a strange male today and she wasn't at all inter-ested in pushing her lousy luck with another. Her nearest neighbor was half a mile away.

The door rattled with another heavy bang. "Come on. Please? I'm hurt."

Short of telling her the house was on fire and seeing sparks herself, she couldn't have imagined anything he could have said that would change her mind about moving. Saying he was hurt did it, though. Even then, it wasn't the claim that had her hand sliding slowly from her throat. It was the plea in his voice and the strain behind it.

Her heart pounding, she slipped through the dim and empty living room and peeked through the oval of etched glass on the front door.

The window needed cleaning. Between its film of dust and frosted etching, she could only see a blur of the dark-haired man on the other side. What she could see looked tall, broad-shouldered and built. From the way he held his left arm, she also suspected that he hadn't knocked on the door. He'd kicked it. He looked as if he was about to do it again, when he saw her and took a step back.

Apparently sensing the door wouldn't open until he was farther from it, he took another step and backed up as far as the sagging porch railing.

She'd used the lug-nut wrench for her tire jack to pry the boards from the kitchen windows. It still lay where she'd left it three feet away.

With her fingers wrapped around the long piece of metal, she cautiously eased open the door.

Thunder rumbled, rattling the panes of the old house as she peeked around the door frame. It was barely seven o'clock, but the rain robbed the evening of much of its light. Still, she could see easily enough as her glance skimmed his broad brow and lean, even features.