Love at Last Read Online Free PDF Page B

unsuitable for anyone with social status.
       “What type of work do you do?” she asked, buckling her seatbelt.
       Robert started the engine. “I buy houses, fix them up, and re-sell them.”
       Noelle studied his profile as he steered the truck back onto the road. He was far too good-looking to be a fixer-upper.
       “Are you married?” She asked the question without thinking and blushed at how forward she sounded.
       “No, I’m available,” Robert said lightheartedly. “Are you?” He glanced over at her, his eyes resting on the gaudy rock on her finger. Jack’s rock.
       Noelle turned her hand over in her lap. Her cheeks burned. Her eyes stung with tears.
    Robert opened his mouth to apologize, but she waved his words aside.
       “It’s — it’s me,” she said, her throat raw.  “There is someone who wants to marry me.” She looked away, and one of the dogs in the back seat leaned forward and licked her ear. “I haven’t given him an answer yet.”
       “Then something’s missing,” Robert said, turning the wheel.
       “I didn’t say that.” Noelle’s mind whirled, as if she was sliding over the embankment all over again.
       “If there wasn’t,” Robert insisted, “you wouldn’t have hesitated in saying yes.”
       He was right. She should have leapt with joy when Jack proposed. Instead, she asked for time.
       “I keep waiting for that… special look,” Noelle began, slipping Robert a cautious glance. He was focusing on the road. Wringing her hands together, she continued. “A look where Jack and I look at each other… And for once, the clock stops ticking, the earth stops moving… A look of…” Her voice trailed off in embarrassment as Robert turned his head.
       “Of love,” he said, finishing her sentence.
       A look of love. It was that simple. Jack had never looked at her like that because she and Jack weren’t in love!
       Robert’s gaze held her own as the realization sunk in.
       “Are you all right?” he asked.
       “Yes,” Noelle said, smiling. And for the first time since Jack proposed, she was.

Chapter 5

       After they dropped the dogs off at his sister’s house, Noelle gave Robert directions to the reception hall, and he let her out at the front entrance.
       “Thanks for your help,” Noelle said. “I’m glad I didn’t have to wait out in the cold for a tow truck.”
       “Can’t have you freeze, either,” Robert teased. “You need to be able to dance at your brother’s wedding reception.”
       “Yes.” She smiled. “A ballet teacher should be able to dance.”
       “I have to move this rig before I get a parking ticket,” Robert said. “This is only a drop-off zone.”
       Noelle said a final goodbye and waved as he pulled away from the curb. She hoped she hadn’t made him late for his own social engagement, but with the nasty winter weather, she was sure whoever he was meeting would understand.
       She remembered she had someone to meet, as well. Shaking a few remaining snowflakes from the skirt of her gown, she adjusted the cape draped over her shoulders, brushed back her hair with her fingers, and made her way toward the reception hall’s brass plated double doors.
       Inside, she spotted Jack at the bar, sipping a Martini. His face took on an expectant expression as she approached.
       “Jack, I can’t marry you,” she said, handing him back the ring. “I’m sorry.”
       Jack didn’t seem surprised. He studied the ring for a moment – a hundred glimmering facets reflecting off the ballroom chandelier. “You want something I just can’t give you, Noelle. I’m the one who’s sorry.”
       As Jack left, her brother cleared his throat beside her and she became uncomfortably aware he had overheard.
       “Noelle, there’s someone I want you to meet…”
       She didn’t hear the rest. For suddenly, there was a man coming toward her across the dance floor. A man