Sanctuary Island Read Online Free PDF Page B

he’d never get any range of motion back, or be able to use his hands as more refined instruments than paddles.
    The memory had him gripping the reins more tightly than he needed to as he wheeled Voyager around and pointed him in the direction the car had disappeared in.
    Nothing about this situation was as cut-and-dried as he’d thought when he fielded that happily tearful phone call from Jo telling him her daughters were finally coming to visit.
    If Grady was going to figure out where to go from here, he needed to see how Merry and Ella reacted to Jo, and to the big, rambling, falling-down plantation house she’d inherited. And he needed to be there for Jo if it all went to hell.
    It had nothing to do with wanting to see more of gorgeous, strong-willed, overprotective Ella Preston before she hightailed it off the island back to the city where she belonged.
    Nothing at all.

 
    CHAPTER 4
    Jo Ellen Hollister stared across the gleaming expanse of the polished mahogany desk and fought the feeling of relief washing over her. She wasn’t here to lay her troubles at this man’s feet.
    She’d given up the right to expect his help.
    “I know I said we needed to take a break, but…” Paper crinkled in her grasp, and she had to force herself to unclench her fingers, to smooth out the wrinkles in the letter from the county.
    Harrison McNamara shifted his tall body, making the tufted leather of his chair creak. “Stop that. I hope you know you can always come to me. No matter what.”
    Jo closed her eyes briefly, then forced herself to meet his gaze. “Thank you.”
    He leaned forward, his dark eyes full of the intent focus and attention that never failed to send Jo’s pulse into overdrive. Her heart kicked against her rib cage with bruising force, but this time she was pretty sure it had nothing to do with Harrison’s deep-set brown eyes.
    “Honestly, I can’t believe you’re only coming to me with this now,” he said. “I know we haven’t exactly been on the best of terms these last few months, but if you needed money to get the stables up and running…”
    “She didn’t tell me.” Ridiculous. It was intolerable that out of the whole mess, this single fact could make Jo’s throat squeeze tighter than a fist. “I found out when I got this letter.”
    The words came out whispery and cracked. Jo cleared her throat forcefully and sat up in her chair. “When Aunt Dottie gave me the money—I should’ve questioned it, but she told me a bond had matured, and I just … took it. I wanted my stables so badly.”
    Those dark eyes of Harrison’s softened at the corners. “You wanted to make her proud of you, to show her you were independent.”
    “And instead, I made her think she had no other option than to go to the meanest, nastiest old man on Sanctuary for a loan.”
    Harrison smoothed his close-cropped salt-and-pepper beard with a jerky, agitated hand. “I don’t understand why she didn’t come to the bank.”
    Jo sat back, her shoulders bending down under the weight of new knowledge. “There’s no way she could have gotten a bank loan without you knowing about it. Maybe she thought you’d tell me, and then I’d stop her from putting up the house as collateral. Which I would have. Or maybe she thought she could talk old man Leeds into better terms—she knew him her whole life, ever since they were kids. Who can say?”
    They certainly couldn’t ask Dottie now.
    Grief reached up and slapped Jo in the face, sharp and shocking. Grief faded, everyone said. Time healed all wounds. But Jo had mostly found that as her sadness faded from a constant pain to a dull ache, it had become an even more painful surprise when it flared back up.
    “I’ll look into the lien for you,” Harrison said, reaching across the desk for the letter.
    Jo surrendered it reluctantly. With everything else she had going on, there was no way she’d have time to do as full and thorough an investigation into this situation as