Come Fly With Me Read Online Free PDF Page B

life. The doctor had an incredibly appealing competence and underlying strength.
    Maybe there really was something in the Alaska air.
    Or, she acknowledged to herself, maybe it was that people had different priorities than she was used to.
    In Indigo, friendships didn’t depend on how much money you made or who your friends were or whether you kept your mouth shut after watching your fiancé humiliate you.
    Grier took a thoughtful sip of her wine as she allowed her gaze to continue to roam around the room. People she recognized—townsfolk she’d gotten to know over the last few months—sat in small conversation areas while a waitress worked the room, taking care of everyone.
    She’d nearly turned back in her seat—more than ready to hear all of Avery’s good gossip—when the front door of the Indigo Blue opened.
    And her half sister, Kate, walked through the door.

Chapter Three
     
    K ate Winston tugged at the neckline of her heavy sweater as she walked into the warm lobby of the Indigo Blue. She hadn’t wanted to come out tonight, but Trina had insisted she make some attempt to be social. The holidays had been about as interesting as a root canal—and about as painful, too—and she hadn’t done much socializing.
    She certainly hadn’t
felt
very social. Her father was gone and the holidays had been just as difficult as she’d known they would be.
    But at least she’d made it through the first Christmas without him.
    That now made Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas she’d passed, not to mention New Year’s Day. If she took out the birthdays to come in January—hers and her father’s—she could almost believe she was halfway through the first year of grieving.
    Almost.
    “Oh shit.” Kate heard Trina’s not so lightly whispered curse. “I didn’t know.”
    Kate didn’t need to look across the room to knowwhat had brought on the sudden wash of silence that had hushed every patron in the bar.
    Her half sister, Grier, was back in town.
    On a soft sigh, Kate crossed the room toward an empty set of chairs that formed a small conversation area. “Come on, Trina. Let’s grab a seat.”
    She’d be damned if she’d run away. This was
her
home.
    “We can leave if you want and go to Maguire’s.”
    Kate didn’t miss Grier’s gaze as it caught her from across the room before the woman turned back around on her barstool. A quick spark fired in her blood as the low hum of conversation started up again. “No.”
    “Look at her over there,” Trina added, warming up to the subtle battle of wills. “Thick as thieves. You’d think Avery would have more respect for the locals instead of taking the side of an interloper.”
    “Are we really going to have this conversation again?”
    “Yes, because you refuse to have it for the first time, let alone again. Why won’t you talk about this?”
    Kate knew exactly why she wasn’t talking about it—because whatever she said would not only be quoted across town faster than she could walk the four blocks home, but it would be twisted beyond all recognition as it traveled. She knew not everyone thought of Grier in the same way Trina did.
    As an interloper.
    In fact, she knew a lot of people were starting to think Grier had a rather decent claim to a place in town. And they had also begun to think of Grier Thompson as their own.
    Just like her father had.
    “What can I get for you?” Avery’s smile was broad and her warm brown gaze was tinged with sympathy.
    “Chardonnay.” Kate heard the clipped notes of her own voice but wasn’t all that inclined to hide them. The friendly smile she could take.
    The sympathy was off-limits.
    “Strawberry margarita,” Trina added. “And some of that bar mix you have.”
    “Be right back.”
    Trina fluffed her hair as she leaned forward to whisper across the small table that separated their chairs. “Look at her over there. She’s a barmaid, for Christ’s sake, and she’s run right back to her friend to gossip about