Belonging Read Online Free PDF Page A

Neither one found it very easy to display her inner
feelings, though Georgia admitted her own were a little more
volatile and vocal. And like Angie, she, too, had cherished hopes
and dreams and aspirations. Unlike Angie, Georgia hadn't had the
education to build those dreams, and as the years passed, they
faded. These days they surfaced only seldom.
    Neither one had the support of a husband.
Georgia had never even had a husband. As for Angie... well, Georgia
sometimes thought she'd have been better off without him.
    Oh, Angie had never said so in so many words,
but Georgia had known. She'd recognized the signs, but even if she
hadn't, her intuition would have told her. There had been days when
Angie's smile had been too bright, her laughter a little too
forced. As her career had taken off and thrived, the situation at
home had disintegrated.
    It was, Georgia had long ago decided, the
reason Angie was so determined to keep her professional life
separate from her home life. Mayor Angela Hall was a far cry from
mother Angie Hall. Even Georgia wondered how Angie managed to
balance both career and home.
    Secrets of the heart? Yes, Angie had a few.
But Georgia, like Angie, had learned her own lesson from life and
knew when not to pry.
    After all this time she also knew what she
could get away with and what she couldn't. She'd seen the furious
glint in her boss's eyes after her meeting with the new police
chief the other day. She'd also heard a few drawers being rattled
and slammed. She'd held her peace until today, though.
    "Don't see how you could forget about
tonight," Georgia commented. Getting up, she pulled a cloth from
Angie's bottom drawer and began to idly swipe at the desktop. "Not
when it's in honor of our illustrious new police chief," she
continued. A rare smile lit her face. "Now there's a man not many
women could forget."
    Angie darted her a sharp look. It wasn't so
much a matter of forgetting as simply not wanting to remember.
Instead of replying to Georgia's statement she asked, "Since when
have you started taking inventory of every man who walks in and out
of this office?"
    "I'd do it a little more if they all looked
like him," Georgia told her brashly. "To tell you the truth, if I
were twenty years younger . . ."
    Angie snorted. Matt Richardson might be
passably good-looking...well, perhaps more than passable. There
were probably some women who would find his roughly hewn features
quite compelling. But Georgia? Angie had never known her assistant
to look twice at any man since she'd known her.
    "Who are you trying to kid!" she exclaimed.
"Why, you're no more interested in having a man in your life than I
am."
    Georgia's grin faded, and her hand stilled
for a second. "Maybe you should be. When you get to be my age,
things start looking pretty lonely," she said slowly. She stood in
front of Angie, her arms akimbo on her hips. "Maybe you should be,"
she repeated.
    Angie said the first thing that popped into
her mind. "If I did ever want a man in my life again, it wouldn't
be Matthew Richardson!"
    This time it was Georgia's turn to snort.
"Who, then? That smart-aleck Todd Austin who's always sniffing
around your heels?" The way she rolled her eyes heavenward
expressed her feelings more clearly than words.
    Angie sighed. Todd Austin was the Westridge
city manager. She'd met him shortly before Evan's death when she
had served as a member of the district school board, and it had
been at Todd's urging that she had decided to run for city council
a year later. Since that time Todd had accompanied her to various
official functions, and she'd always appreciated that Todd
respected her for her intellect. Of late, however, he'd made it
clear he would like to deepen their relationship, a desire she
didn't share.
    Her body cramped from the long hours in her
chair, she got up and stretched, then walked to the window nearby.
She stood for a moment, looking down at the deep pink rhododendrons
and leafy foliage that edged the