Jed's Sweet Revenge Read Online Free PDF Page A

else here did either.
    Shaking his head, Jed crossed to a half-shut door and pushed it open. His lips parted in an involuntary sigh of admiration.
    Her bed was cradled in a heavy, antique frame made of some sort of reddish wood. Miles of whitenet draped over it from a central fastening on the tall ceiling. Fancy rugs covered the wood floor under the bed. It was a fantasy scene that made sensual images of her leap into his thoughts.
    “Great gosh a’mighty, I’ve never seen anything like this in my life,” Jed murmured. Absolutely enchanted, he sat down in a rocking chair across from the bed and waited.
    Thena came in the front door five minutes later, a sketch pad in one hand and a bucket of shells in the other, with her sandals positioned on top. Softly singing a song from an old Judy Garland film she’d rented a week ago, she put her things on the thick oak dining table and padded toward the bedroom.
    Her voice, nearly in tune, rose heartily as she stepped inside the room and inhaled the scent of hibiscus outside the open windows. Thena began to pull her smock over her head. Then she made a half-turn to her right and saw yesterday’s stranger seated in her mother’s rocking chair. Rocking.
    Jed caught one glimpse of her golden, naked rump before she snapped the smock down and backed away, her eyes full of molten silver, her lips parted in shock.
    “We’ve got to talk, ma’am,” he said as politely as he could, considering that he didn’t know which he felt more—embarrassment or arousal. Didn’t she ever wear panties or a bra? “Whether you want to or not.”
    Her beautiful face became a mask of fury. “Get out of my house,” she said evenly. “You voyeuristic interloper.”
    Jed stood up, determined to be pleasant but straightforward.
    “I apologize for interlopin’ around here,” he said wryly, “but the fact is, ma’am, this isn’t your house.”
    “You, cowboy, have been out in the sun too long. Go!” Thena pointed toward the bedroom door and wished she hadn’t left the dogs outside and the shotgun on the porch.
    “Would you just read somethin’?” Jed reached in a back pocket and brought forward a legal document. “This ought to explain everything—”
    “Out!” she ordered, stabbing the air with one hand in the direction of the door.
    Jed was getting more frustrated by the moment. “No.” He held out the document. “Read this, dammit, and calm your feisty self down.”
    Thena glared at him in utter rage. This was her sanctuary, her home, her island, and she’d had enough of this rough man, handsome or not. She started toward the door. He blocked her way so quickly and gracefully that she yipped in startled dismay.
    “No gun and no dogs,” he ordered, reading her mind. Jed held out the document in supplication. Thena’s gaze darted toward a bedroom window that opened onto the front porch. She caught the subtle movement of the man’s body as he balanced to block that exit, too. Real fear began to gnaw at her.
    Jed saw it and winced. “Now, look, don’t be scared of me. All I want is for you to read this paper and talk to me about it.” And I’d like to know if you sleep naked and alone in that big old bed over there, he added silently.
    Thena relaxed a little at the earnest sound of his voice. She eyed the document for a moment, then jerked it out of his hand and popped it open. Jed shoved his hands into his back pockets and watched her intently as she read.
    Jed felt a wistful little pain curl around his rib cage as her defiant expression faded and the pink undertones drained out of her honeyed complexion.
    “Oh,” she whispered weakly. “Oh, I see.” The look she turned up to him was blank with disbelief. Then she frowned and tilted her head to one side to study him. “My mother was raised here. I was born here.” She pointed to the bed. “Right there. That’s all that’s important.”
    “Folks are born in hospitals, but that don’t mean they own ’em.” She