Blind Promises Read Online Free PDF Page B

easing toward the coffee
     
    Diana Palmer41
    cup, and picked it up while she told him what was located where on his plate.
    “Why can’t I call you honey?” he asked when she started to go back into the house.
    She stopped, staring down at him. “Well, because it isn’t professional,” she said finally.
    He laughed mirthlessly. “No, it isn’t. But if you’re blond, I imagine your hair looks like honey, doesn’t it? Or is it pale?”
    “It’s quite pale,” she said involuntarily.
    “Long?”
    “Yes, but I keep it put up.”
    “Afraid some man might mistake loosened hair for loosened morals, Joan?” he mocked.
    “Don’t make fun of morality, if you please,” she said starchily. “Some of us are old-fashioned enough to take offense.”
    With that she marched back into the house, while he made a sound like muffled laughter.
    That afternoon he told her he wanted to walk along the beach, a pronouncement so profound that his stepmother caught her breath when she overheard it. Dana only grinned as she took his arm to lead him down the steps to the water. She was just beginning to enjoy this job.
    “What changed your mind?” she asked as she guided him along the beach by his sleeve.
    “I decided that I might as well take advantage of your expertise before you desert me,” he said.
    She glanced up at him curiously. “Why would I desert you?”
    “I might not give you the choice.” He stuck his free hand in his pocket and the muscles in his arm clenched.
     
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    Blind Promises
     
    Diana Palmer
     
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    “I’m not an easy man. I don’t take to blindness, and my temper isn’t good at its best.”
    “How long have you had this problem?” she asked, doing her impression of a Viennese psychiatrist.
    He chuckled at the mock accent. “My temper isn’t my problem. It’s the way. people react to it.” .
    “Oh, you mean those embarrassing things they do, like diving under heavy furniture and running for the hills when you walk through the door?”
    “Such a sweet voice to be so sarcastic,” he chided. His hand suddenly slid down and caught hers, holding it even when she instinctively jerked back. “No, no, Nurse; you’re suppose to be guiding me, aren’t you? Soft little hand, and strong for one so small.”
    “Yours is enormous,” she replied. The feel of those strong, warm fingers was doing something odd to her breathing, to her balance. She wanted to pull free, but he was strong.
    “A legacy from my Dutch father,” he told her. “He was a big man.”
    “You aren’t exactly a dwarf yourself,” she mused.
    He chuckled softly at that comment. “I stand six foot •three in my socks.”
    “Did you ever play basketball?” she asked conversationally.
    “No. I hated it. 1 didn’t care for group sports so much, you see. I liked to ski, and I liked fast cars. Racing. I went to Europe every year for the Grand Prix. Until this year,” he added coldly. “I will never go again, now.”
    “You have to stop thinking of your blindness as permanent,” she said quietly.
    “Has my mother handed you that fairy tale, too, about the blindness being hysterical?” he demanded.
     
    He stopped to face her, his hands moving up to find her upper arms. “Do I seem to you to be prone to hysterics, Nurse?”
    “It has nothing to do with that, Mr. van der Vere, as I’m sure your doctor explained to you. It was simply a great shock to the optic nerve….”
    “I am blind,” he said, each word cutting and deliberate. “That is not hysteria; it is a fact. I am blind!”
    “Yes, temporarily.” She stood passively in his bruising grasp, watching his scowling face intently, determined not to show fear. She sensed that he might like that, making her afraid. “It isn’t unheard of for the brain to play tricks on us, you know. You saw the splinters coming straight for your eyes, and you were knocked unconscious. It’s possible that your…”
    “It is not possible,” he said curtly, and his grip