Lies of the Heart Read Online Free PDF Page A

He gulped hard. Directly across from his room, in her pretty pink and white bedroom, he watched Tessa slowly dance. Wonder rained down on him at her graceful ballerina moves.
    “That’s right. She always wanted to be a dancer. I wonder why she didn’t ever become one…” Each gentle glide of her hand, each delicate arch of her body in her white leotard mesmerized him. Just watching her, he could almost hear the haunting music she danced to.
    A low tug in his abdomen and the heat rushing through his blood shook him to his core. He wanted her. And he had for ages. Somewhere deep inside he finally fully acknowledged that fact. But, he figured, after years of following his wild side and getting into risky situations because of it, he’d learned his lesson. Surely he’d be able to squash any latent feelings for the sexy redhead. “No such luck,” he muttered, the knot of desire coiling a little tighter. He’d been closer to her tonight than ever before and he knew he wanted to get closer still.
    He grimaced, and then ran a hand down his face. His gaze remained fixated on her fluid motions while his head hammered away at the yawning gap separating them. Much more than a street kept them apart.
    “How could granddad do this to me?” he wondered for the hundredth time since hearing the news just a couple of hours ago. Inside he still reeled from it all. “He knew I never wanted to marry again.”
    Marriage equaled disaster in his book. He didn’t owe Tessa Warfield anything, but he knew what a lousy husband he’d been in the past and wasn’t about to inflict any other woman with him ever again.
    It hit him then. His granddad’s words rushed back to him and he swore that the owner of that gravelly voice stood beside him at this very moment, saying, “Face your fears head on, my boy. Otherwise they’ll eat you alive.”
    So much made sense now. “The pub to face my fear of falling off the wagon. And Tessa for my fear of failing another woman…” And in forcing Chance to face himself, granddad wanted an end to the decades-old feud. “Why the hell couldn’t you have done that yourself, instead of laying it all on my shoulders?”
    Shame washed over him at the bolt of anger tearing through him. But he couldn’t halt the sense of betrayal any more than he could draw his next lung full of air. “Why couldn’t you have made this so much easier and let me get on with my own life? Now I’ve got to bide my time and fix the mess you got me in.”
    His yearning to fulfill his long-time dreams reared its head. An ache shot through him. He had so much to offer kids. From all he’d learned from the mistakes he’d made, he could help them, steer them in the right direction instead of following the wrong path like he had for so long.
    “So close…” He clutched the fabric in his hand tighter as a war raged inside of him. “Run the pub and wed Tessa for six months, then I can walk away from both without a backward glance and have everything I ever wanted.” The reward in the end outweighed the hardships he’d face over the months to come.
    Unless I fail on both counts. A stab of fright lanced through him at the thought. Beads of perspiration dotted his forehead. He swiped the moisture away, hoping to erase the fear just as easily. But a thread of it lingered in his gut, tying itself in a knot.
    Mentally, he considered the damage of delaying his project even longer if he didn’t go along with the terms of the will. He made decent money as a mechanic, but still hadn’t tucked nearly enough away to launch his own program for troubled teens. Any way he viewed it, he had no real choice unless he started out on a shoestring budget. He pictured fitful starts and stops with that scenario. The kids would suffer greatly if that happened. Years yawned in front of him. Grimacing, he shook his head.
    Across the way, she twirled again and, as if captivated, he simply stared, transfixed. Under the concealing clothes she normally