Heart Of Gold Read Online Free PDF Page B

what, I'll even go one further and remember to say please when I ask
you to leave.”
    As his
eyes bored into her, Carter was willing to bet the guy was more than a match
for Blondzilla.
    “So,”
he said briskly, “will you please leave?”
    “You
can't just toss me out before I have a chance—”
    “I
can't? I've got a deed in the safe that says this is my land and I don't think
there's any law that mandates the cheerful tolerance of trespassers.”
    “Lucky
for you,” she shot back. “I don't think you could pull off cheerful
to save your soul.”
    Crossing
his arms over his powerful chest, he looked her over once more. “How old
are you?”
    “Twenty-eight.”
    “Try
eighteen.” He glanced at her clothes. “You look like you could be a
baby-sitter. Or even need one.”
    “It's
hard to look mature in cutoffs and a T-shirt,” she said indignantly.
    “You
pulled that getup out of a closet, not me.”
    “I
had to go to an associate's dig before I came here.”
    “Hopefully
not as an image consultant.”
    “I'm
not here to talk about my clothes.” She glared at him defensively.
    “You
seem determined to talk about something. Since I'm not going to discuss your
digging up my land, I figure clothes are a natural launching pad for inane
conversation. Considering you're a woman.”
    She took
a deep breath, trying like hell not to lose her temper.
    “Look,
I know Conrad Lyst found a cross that could be Reverend—”
    “Perhaps
I need to be more clear. I'm not discussing anybody digging on my land. Your
questionable taste in sportswear is still on the table, however.”
    “I
didn't wear this for you!”
    “Obviously.
Although I must say it made quite an impression on the teenager who just left.
But then he's mistaking you for a contemporary.”
    Carter
felt like she was getting picked clean by a vulture and had to fight the urge
to yell back at him again. Doing her best to regard him calmly, she forced
herself to keep her voice down.
    “Mr.
Farrell, all I'm asking is for you to hear me out.”
    “Call
me Nick and forget the speech. It won't improve your bargaining position any
more than those shorts do.”
    “Are
you always this nasty?”
    “As
a rule, yes. But sometimes I'm worse.”
    She
rolled her eyes. “No wonder you have to get doors rehung.”
    “It's
good for the local economy.”
    “How
generous of you.”
    “I
think so.”
    There was
a long silence. She had the feeling she was amusing him, and that pissed her
off as much as when he'd been verbally attacking her.
    “I'm
a professional, Mr. Farrell, not an itinerant ditch digger. You may be, sitting
on the answer to one of the great puzzles of the Revolutionary era. No one
really knows what happened to the Winship party and the gold they were carrying.
You owe it to posterity”
    “To
let you come in and rescue the solution from my land?” His brow furrowed
deeply. “I've got news for you. I don't think it needs rescuing. As far as
I'm concerned, the past is best left buried and posterity these days is far
more interested in Ozzy Osbourne's family life. They couldn't care less about
minutemen and redcoats.”
    “That's
a pretty narrow view.”
    “I'm
a narrow kind of man.”
    “I
can tell.”
    He
chuckled. “So Miss Manners is also a behaviorist?”
    “No,
it's the flashing ROYAL PAIN IN THE ASS sign over your desk.”
    There was
a long pause, and then Nick Farrell tilted back his head and laughed. It was a
rich, rolling sound. When he focused on her again, he was smiling, and the grin
lit up his austere face, pulling an unlikely dimple out of one cheek.
    Somehow,
now that she'd made him laugh, she wasn't quite so angry at him.
    “Do
you have any idea how many people come at me each spring asking to tear into Farrell Mountain?”
    “No,
but I don't care.”
    “You
don't?”
    “When
you go after some company, do you worry about what all the other little raiders
are doing?”
    His grin
disappeared. “Been doing some research on my