His Wicked Dream (Velvet Lies, Book 2) Read Online Free PDF Page B

cleaved the air, and Jamie, his eyes almost as wide as his mouth, staggered backward. But it was too late. The wagon overturned; flour spewed, and apples bounced around the cowering child beneath the wheels.
    Eden was running before Jamie loosed his first howl. She didn't stop to consider how conspicuous she was being; she didn't consider her own danger. Her heart was in command, and she threw her weight on the leads. Just as she had dozens of times, when Valentine had spooked in his own harness, she dragged the horse back to earth before it could pull the vehicle over Jamie's legs.
    The crisis was over as soon as it had begun. The cursing, hillKit driver gained control, the horse wheezed into stillness, and Eden ducked under the reins. Miraculously, a wooden crate had kept the wagon from crushing Jamie's head.
    "Jamie, honey," she panted, wading past splintered barrels, dripping egg yolks, and seeping pickle juice. "Jamie, are you hurt?"
    "Charlie!" he wailed, scrambling beneath his would-be tomb. She heard a frantic scratching as he dug through the wreckage.
    "Move aside, young woman," a gruff voice commanded, "I'm a doctor."
    Eden gasped as two strong hands grabbed her beneath the arms and deposited her in a heap beside a box of nightcrawlers. Michael didn't seem to notice her exposed unmentionables. Like a man possessed, he braced his shoulder against the wagon. Hands as wide as her face grasped the bed, and he grunted, hiking the wood an incredible foot in the air.
    "Jamie," he panted, "can you crawl free?"
    "No! I won't leave Charlie..."
    At this point, a crowd was gathering. Angus rushed to Michael's aid. He heaved his bulk under the wagon's other end. The hillKit driver, working frantically, unbuckled his horse from its twisted harness, all the while barking threats at the spectators not to steal his grub.
    Jamie, meanwhile, sobbed brokenly beside a bloody patch of bone.
    "Oh, Jamie," Eden murmured, "Charlie's in heaven now. You have to let him go."
    With the help of a few more spectators, Michael and Angus managed to right the wagon. Eden, knowing firsthand the ravages of grief, didn't think twice about crawling beneath the wagonbed to comfort Jamie. To her surprise, neither did Blue Thunder's well-tailored doctor. His neck nearly disappeared into his shoulders as he squeezed his mountain-sized frame between the wheels.
    "It's all right, son." Michael didn't seem to notice or care that his linen sleeve had been shredded on a nail. "Are you hurt?"
    The boy shook his head. "Charlie," he whimpered again.
    Michael frowned, glancing toward the scarlet smear that had once been Jamie's pet.
    "His toad," Eden explained quietly.
    Midnight blue eyes delved into hers. Intense and strangely haunted, they struck a chord so deep within her that she was nearly bowled over by the intimacy. She'd seen those eyes before. Somewhere along the road, in the endless parade of seekers who'd begged miracles from Talking Raven's herbs, she'd met this Michael Jones. Her brow furrowed as she tried to remember.
    "Come here, son." A curious blend of mountain growl and southern drawl, Michael's voice mimicked the storm's lowest rumble of thunder. It wasn't the sort of thing that inspired comfort in a patient, and yet Jamie, consumed with misery, crawled into Michael's arms. Eden's throat constricted as she watched the man embrace the child.
    "It's not fair, I know," Michael murmured, "but sometimes we lose the ones we love."
    His hands, surprisingly gentle for their size, probed Jamie's limbs and picked splinters out of tousled curls. When the boy buried his face in that paternal shoulder, Eden's own grief welled uncomfortably close to the surface.
    "Dad blast it," snapped a voice beyond their haven. "I said make way. Give the boy some air, fer cryin' out loud."
    A gnomelike face bobbed behind an army of elbows. Eden blinked rapidly, becoming aware of a legion of legs and skirts circling the wagon. They parted reluctantly as Claudia used her