Big, burly CEO Abe Behr is furious to discover someone -- probably a relative -- is embezzling from Behr Construction, a family-run business in the Sierra Nevada foothills outside Lake Tahoe. To confirm his suspicions, Abe takes the unprecedented step of hiring a non-family accountant, handsome Jeff Mason, to go over the books and help find the culprit. As they talk to Behr relatives and visit construction sites, Abe and Jeff are drawn to each other, bringing out new, softer emotions in workaholic Abe. Since he has sacrificed romance all his life to build the construction business, Abe’s surprised by his feelings for the handsome Jeff. He’s even more shocked when they come face to face with homophobia in the small foothills community where generations of Behrs have called home. Abe had always thought Stone Acres was a live-and-let-live kind of town. As he and Jeff get closer, he finds out how wrong he is when he comes out to both family and a community who think he’s making a big mistake. Will being the head of a large, powerful family and a pillar of the community be enough to win Abe his happily ever after with Jeff?

Behr Facts

“It’s about Junior.” My head snapped back to look at her.


“What about him?” Junior was their son, and as far as I knew was as stand-up as his parents. That something could be going on with him was more than upsetting. It was just wrong.


She was shaking her head. “We don’t know what’s happening. He won’t tell us.” She looked away from me, then back again. “He asked Bud if he thought he could talk to you. Junior talk to you, I mean.”


“Sure. No problem. I’d be happy to talk to him.” I didn’t ask if she had any clues because she would have said.


I didn’t know what I’d say to the kid, but whatever the problem was, I was sure we could work it out.  8


Bud, Lorraine, and I go way back, practically to birth. Even though this is a small community, I didn’t really get to know either of them until we were all in high school.


Chapter 17