Lone Wolfe Read Online Free PDF Page A

           ‘It’s
the Children’s Garden.’
                 ‘Is
it?’ He continued looking around, as if he’d find a stray child hiding
underneath one of the lilac bushes like some kind of fairy or elf.
                 ‘I
always thought there should be something more childlike about it,’ Mollie
admitted ruefully. ‘Like toys.’
                 Jacob
nodded in the direction of the fountain that reigned as the centre piece of the
small space. ‘I suppose that’s where it gets its name from.’
                 ‘You’re
quick,’ Mollie said with a little laugh. ‘It took me years to suss that.’ She
glanced at the fountain of three cherubic youths, each one reaching for a ball
that had just rolled out of reach. It was dry and empty now, the basin filled
with dead leaves.
                 ‘Did
you come here as a child?’ Jacob asked, and Mollie nodded.
                 ‘My
dad took me everywhere. I know these gardens like my own hand, or I did once.’
She gave a small, sad laugh. ‘To tell you the truth, it’s been years since I’ve
walked through them properly.’ She lapsed into silence, and when Jacob did not
respond, she cleared her throat and attempted to change the subject, at least
somewhat. ‘When are you hoping to sell the manor?’ she asked, a bit
diffidently, for she wasn’t even sure how she felt about the manor being sold.
It had been Jacob Wolfe’s home, but it had encompassed hers as well.
                 ‘By the end of the summer. I can’t stay here longer than
that.’
                 ‘Why not?’ She couldn’t keep the curiosity from her voice;
she had no idea what Jacob did or had been doing with his life. Did he have a
job? A home? A wife?
                 Mollie
didn’t know why that last thought had popped into her head, or why it left her
with a strange, restless sense of discontent. She shrugged the feeling away.
                 ‘I
have obligations,’ Jacob replied flatly. He obviously wasn’t going to say any
more. ‘Why don’t you come back to the house? We can discuss whatever you need
to begin your landscaping, and agree on terms.’
                 ‘All
right,’ Mollie agreed. She glanced down at the blank page of her notebook, and
wondered just how much they would have to discuss. If Jacob wanted to hear her
ideas, she didn’t have any yet. The sun was getting warmer as she followed
Jacob back to the manor, and while she felt her own hair curl and frizz and
sweat break out along her shoulders and back, she noticed a bit resentfully
that Jacob looked utterly immaculate, as unruffled as stone, as cold as marble.
Nothing affected him. Nothing touched him.
                 Was
that why he’d been able to walk away? To leave his brothers and sister, his
entire family, without so much as a backwards glance?
                 And what of his father? Mollie felt a chilly ripple of
remembrance. She’d only been eight, but she remembered the furore of the press,
the gossip of the village, when Jacob had been arrested for the murder of his
father. In the end he’d been let off; everyone agreed it was self-defence. And
William Wolfe had been a brute in any case. The entire village had rallied
around Jacob, and there had never been any doubt that he’d been simply
protecting himself and his sister. Yet walking behind Jacob, Mollie could not
keep herself from thinking: he killed a
man .
                 Almost
as if he guessed the nature of her thoughts, Jacob paused on the threshold of
the house, turning around to give her the flicker of a cool smile. ‘I realise
that as we’re the only two living on the estate, you might feel, at times,
vulnerable. I want to assure you that you are completely safe with me.’
                 Mollie
flushed with shame at the nature of her own thoughts. They were utterly
unworthy of