Gone Read Online Free PDF

The petunias were evenly spaced. That prompted another smile. Katie must have a sense of order that Clare herself didn’t possess, in addition to that green thumb.
A decade-old green sedan was parked on one side of the driveway. If that was the only car the Ryders owned, Clare figured it was likely to be parked in the center of the driveway. Again, she considered that it was unlikely Katie’s husband would be at home on a week day, at the noon hour, but there was a car in the drive and she climbed the steps to the porch and rang the doorbell, just in case. As she suspected, no one answered her call.
A gate led to a backyard. She would be trespassing if she wandered through it, invading Katie’s privacy. She held herself back, just barely, from going into the yard, so hungry was she for details about Katie’s life.
She was about to return to her car and wait out the return of Katie’s husband when a white pickup turned into the driveway. The window was rolled down.
The man behind the wheel wore his sandy hair cut military short. It suited his features. He parked, then left the vehicle. On the driveway he stood in place facing her, his blue gaze unwavering. He appeared to be taking her measure, Clare thought, though his expression didn’t alter. She expected some degree of surprise in his eyes, but there was none, and the lack made her think he’d been expecting her.
Clare met his gaze. “Hello. I’m looking for Dean Ryder.”
“You must be the woman my sister called about.”
So this was Katie’s husband. She tried a smile. “I’m Clare Marshall.”
Ryder didn’t acknowledge the introduction. “You do resemble my wife. Her sister, that who you told Connie and our mama you were?”
So much for the pleasant greeting Clare had planned. Expecting a warm welcome for Katie’s relative might have been naive, having learned what she had about Katie leaving him for another man.
“Yes, I’m Ka- ah—Beth’s sister.” Clare was going to have to start thinking of Katie as Beth.
The temperature had to be over one hundred degrees. Ryder’s tan suit jacket was buttoned. A tie was cinched at his throat. He appeared unaffected by the heat. Unlike herself. Clare could feel perspiration trickling down her neck.
“So my sister said.” Ryder nodded. “You’re going to give Gladys quite a turn.”
Clare saw no point in withholding the truth from him. “Hank Linney is not my father or Beth’s. Beth was adopted. She was born Kathleen Marshall.”
His lips pursed. “She never told me about an adoption.”
He appeared angered by that, and Clare rushed to defend Beth. “She might not have known. She was an infant when the adoption took place.” Clare took a deep breath and reigned in her own anger, which wouldn’t be productive in getting any information from Ryder. “Your sister mentioned that Beth is no longer in town. Mr. Ryder—Dean, I’m trying to find her. I’d like to ask you some questions—”
“I got nothin’ to tell you.”
Ryder walked by Clare up the porch steps.
“Did she tell you where she was going?” Clare asked.
Ryder stuck his key in the door lock.
“Did you try to find her?” Clare called out.
Ryder stopped. Without turning around, he said, “She doesn’t want me. I don’t want her.”
He went into the house.
She’d been dismissed. Clare took a deep breath to cool the anger that had increased her body temperature and headed up the steps to the front door. While she sympathized with Ryder’s hurt over Beth leaving him, his feelings ran a distant second to her search for her sister.
He had left the wooden door open behind the screen door, and the glass on that one was raised. Clare took up a position on the welcome mat. She leaned on the doorbell for a few seconds, then waited for the chime to stop.
“If you don’t speak with me, Dean, I’ll get my answers elsewhere,” she said loudly enough to carry into the house. “I’ll speak with every person in Farley if I have to, to find out