SECRET IDENTITY Read Online Free PDF Page A

and grinned.
    “If we took ownership, you’d still be able to come and
visit…and stay if you’d like.”
    Brenda stared into those soft depths she’d always adored,
her mouth gaping open without realizing it. For some reason, when he had
offered for her to “stay”, she could almost believe he wasn’t implying for a
few days or a few weeks, but that he meant a lifetime.
    Which was impossible.
    “Thanks, Lo. It’s tempting. Hell, it’s very tempting. Let me
chew on it a while, okay?”
    “Sure.”
    Gentle quiet settled back over them. A wren dropped down
onto the ground a few yards away, grabbed a bug, and flew away. The sight of it
reminded her of the mysterious gentleman who had saved her two days ago.
    “Whatcha been up to lately?” the equally soft voice
inquired.
    It was at that moment that Brenda realized that, in all
these years, she had never heard Lorne raise his voice or yell for any reason.
Lee, on the other hand, had always been the agitated one. The youngest of the
Palmer boys, Lee was the enthusiastic, overly optimistic son. And Luke, well,
being the oldest brother, he had become a surrogate father after their parents
died. And the funny thing was, only two years separated each of them, and
Brenda fell right in the middle between Luke and Lorne.
    “Well, you’ve probably seen me on TV,” she began.
    “Oh, yeah. Hard not to, Miss I’m-Bringing-Dobbling-to-Fullerton,”
he teased.
    Brenda giggled. “Hey, this town deserved it. Besides, it had
everything the company was seeking. Cheap land, lots of available labor, and—”
    “And it made the medical profession richer,” he pointed out.
    At first, she tried to figure out what he knew about the
medical patents the company was trying to obtain when she saw him wave his soda
at her blue-jeaned legs. Then it struck her. He wasn’t talking about the
patents. He was talking about the explosion.
    Brenda reached down and gently placed a hand on her calf
where the bandage wrapping was evident below the cuffs of her denim capris. She
didn’t know how badly she’d been hurt when trying to escape the poisonous cloud
and flying debris, until she and the television news crew arrived at the
hospital emergency room, and someone pointed out the trail of blood droplets on
the floor. The doctor pulled out a sliver of metal three inches long, and put in
eighteen stitches. Fortunately, the cut had been shallow.
    “Yeah, well, there’s risks with any job.”
    “We saw your interview at the company before the accident.
Are you okay?”
    “Yeah, I’m fine. Hospital checked me out, took some x-rays,
sewed and bandaged up my booboo, gave me oxygen and a passing grade, then told
me to go home.”
    “Bet the explosion was worse than it looked.”
    “Oh, yeah. Fortunately, I managed to hide inside the Channel
Eight news van during the worst of it. For a while there, the news people and I
thought we should kiss our asses goodbye.”
    “Until that guy showed up. Who was he?”
    Brenda shrugged. “I don’t know. I didn’t get the chance to
ask.” The mere mention of the stranger in black leather was enough to put her
back in a fog as she recalled the way the mystery man had lit her fuse, if just
for a few minutes.
    “Think he’s going to be our next superhero?” Lorne inquired.
    “Has to be. You should have seen how he took two solid steel
doors and waved them like playing cards to disperse the chemical toxins in the
air.”
    She could see him in her mind’s eye, hovering a few feet
above the ground as he waved those doors, looking like a dark angel with steel
wings. Who is that man? What will he call himself?
    An elbow nudged her arm. “Well, I’m happy to know you’re all
right. It’s been a while since we’ve last talked. How’s it going, living in the
big city? Gotta boyfriend?”
    Lorne gave her another one of those sideways looks, and
added a grin to it. Brenda had to admit to herself that the unshaven, unkempt
look worked for him.
    “Nope.