McKettricks of Texas: Austin Read Online Free PDF

you been, Paige?”
    The backs of her eyes scalded with tears she’d have died before shedding. She swallowed hard.
    How’ve you been, Paige? Since I broke your heart, Imean. Since you chased me down Main Street on a stolen golf cart. How’ve you been, Paige old buddy, old pal?
    â€œFine,” she said, surprised and relieved by how calm she sounded. “I’ve been—just fine. Busy. How about you?”
    There. The ball was in his court.
    Out of the corner of her eye, she saw that Austin had turned his head in her direction, and he was watching her.
    â€œHas it really been ten years?”
    â€œIt has,” Paige said very quietly. A month after their breakup, Austin’s parents had been killed in that terrible accident. She’d wanted so much to go to him, offer her condolences, ask if there was anything she could do to help.
    Alas, he wasn’t the only one with too much pride.
    â€œI went to the funeral,” she said. A joint service had been held for Jim and Sally McKettrick, and there had been so many mourners, they couldn’t all fit into the church. People had stood in the yard and on the sidewalk and even in the street, just to be there.
    He didn’t ask which funeral, though they often turned up at the same ones, both of them raised in or near Blue River as they had been.
    â€œI know,” Austin said very quietly. “I saw you.”
    Austin had attended Paige’s father’s services, too, along with both his brothers. He hadn’t spoken to her then, but it had helped a little, just knowing he was nearby, that he’d cared enough to put in an appearance. She’d been too distracted by grief, that one day, to smart over the loss of her first love.
    There had been plenty of other days to cry over Austin McKettrick, and many a dark night as well.
    They passed the oil wells, long since capped, though there was still plenty of black gold under the Silver Spur, according to the experts. They drove by cattle grazing on good McKettrick grass, and there was so much Paige wanted to say.
    In the end, though, she either had too much good sense—or too little courage—to put any of her emotions into words.

CHAPTER TWO
    C ALVIN R EMINGTON, FIVE YEARS OLD as of a very recent birthday, was one of Austin’s all-time favorite people.
    Going by the broad smile on the little boy’s face as he ran toward Paige’s car, the feeling was mutual. His aunt walked a few feet behind him, looking bemused, while Austin waited in the passenger seat, having buzzed down the window.
    â€œHey, buddy!” he called.
    Calvin’s horn-rimmed glasses were a little askew, and his light blond hair stuck out in all directions. His jacket was unzipped and he was waving a paper over his head.
    â€œMy whole kindergarten class gets to go to Six Flags!” he shouted to Austin. “Because we’ve been really, really good!”
    Austin chuckled. His gaze accidentally connected with Paige’s, and electricity arched between them, ending up as a hard ache that settled into his groin like a weight.
    â€œWhose dog is that?” Calvin demanded, breathless with excitement and crossing the yard between the community center and the parking lot at a dead run. “Is that your dog, Austin? Is it?”
    â€œThat is my dog,” Austin confirmed. “His name is Shep.”
    Calvin opened the car door and scrambled into the booster seat in the back. “Hello, Shep,” he said.
    Paige leaned over to make sure her nephew was properly buckled in.
    She looked after the boy with the same easy competence she’d shown bathing Shep, back in the ranch-house laundry room.
    For some reason, realizing that cinched Austin’s throat into a painful knot.
    â€œGive Shep some space, now,” Paige told the child. “He’s still getting used to belonging to somebody, and you don’t want to scare him.”
    Calvin agreed with a nod and