Shadows 02 Girl in the Shadows Read Online Free PDF Page A

had just inherited all this and wanted to expand. He wasn't even married yet, Married Mrs. Westington five years later. Asked me to be his best man, which didn't please his younger brother. Arliss. much. By then they weren't even friends, much less brothers," he added, and plucked some more grapes.
"Why was that?"
"Oh, they got into a furious battle when their daddy left title to the house and property completely to Mr. Frank. His brother. Arliss, was a wasteful, lazy, and self-indulgent young man who thought everything was coming to him," he said, and leaned toward me to add. "That's who Rhona takes after. her uncle Arliss. Anyway, they were what Mrs. Westington called oil and water. Makes you wonder how they could have had the same daddy and mama." He looked at the house and then he leaned toward me and in a loud whisper said. "Makes you wonder if their mama didn't maybe look elsewhere once or twice. Sometimes, I thought the only thing they shared was a last name."
I watched him return to picking the grapes. He had a way of doing it very quickly even though he handled each grape as if it were a valuable jewel. Later. I would hear him call the juice "liquid gold."
"Isn't there an easier way to harvest the grapes?"
"Easier? Sure. Better? No. I hand pick them and put them into small crates to protect them from being crushed in the field. Every step of this process is precious," he emphasized.
"How come you only have this small patch acing?"
He laughed and looked at the house. "She thinks it's because she's always yelling at me for wasting time on a dead cause, but the truth is the tight spacing encourages competition among the plants, yielding small clusters and berries, but more
concentrated fruit. Here," he said, offering rile a grape. "Taste it."
I did. "Sweet as honey. Like a fig or..."
"Ripe apple?"
"Yes," I said.
He nodded. "Chardonnay is one of the few grapes that don't require blending. It stands on its own." He gestured at the small vineyard. "I cloned all these vines from the best Mr. Westington had."
"Why didn't Mrs. Westington want to continue the whole vineyard and the winery?"
"It wasn't her passion. It was Mr. Frank's and there wasn't anyone to inherit it. Certainly not Mr. Arliss and surely not Rhona. She never did any chores around here and had no interest in wine except to drink it with her friends."
"How come they had only one child?"
He continued to pluck the grapes without responding, so I thought he wasn't going to answer. A breeze had picked up from the north and the cooler air felt refreshing. I saw Echo standing behind the screen door looking out at the driveway in anxious
anticipation of Tyler Monahan's pending arrival.
"They had another child," Trevor suddenly replied. He worked as he spoke. "A son born after Rhona was born, but he was born with some defect in his brain stem and died a few days later. They did all they could. Mrs. Westington got so she denied the boy was ever born. Don't mention it to her. She never even gave him a name. Wouldn't do it. Mr. Frank named him after his father. Byron, but she didn't
acknowledge it and she didn't attend the funeral or the burial. As far as I know, she never visited the g-rave either. After that, they had no more children. Closest I ever heard to why not was her saying once that she didn't need to be told twice. Don't you go mentioning any of this to her," Trevor warned me. "or you'll be one sorry young woman. Ain't nobody who hates gossip more than she does, although she'll do her fair share of it," he said with a wink.
We both turned at the sound of an automobile coming up the driveway. It was a red convertible sports car. Tyler Monahan's wavy long dark brown hair floated about his face, hiding his features. He parked in front of the house and got out quickly, a packet of books and notebooks under his ann. Echo immediately stepped out of the house to greet him, signing quickly. He signed back and almost entered the house without seeing me. He glanced our