Stone Cold Charade (A Stone Family Novel) Read Online Free PDF Page B

midnight-blue when he was
angered, making them appear almost black. His mouth would be sensuous, his
cheekbones high, and his chin square with a slight cleft. She caught herself
looking at his hands, lean and strong with long fingers and neatly trimmed
nails that seemed in contrast with calluses that showed he wasn’t afraid to
work hard. Her mind replayed the feel of them along her body the last time they
were in the same room together. That day had changed everything. It forced her
to make a decision she had never regretted.
    Fleeing the next day from home, and
especially Ty, she had refused to question her family about him. She secretly
suspected that he hadn’t even noticed that she’d left. Knowing undeniably how
little she had truly meant to him, her inexperience and plain looks at the time
placed her out of his league.
    Alex cleared her throat, hoping to gain
his attention.
    Ty sensed someone was standing behind
him and waited. Even the carpeting, thick though it was, could not hide her
steps as she walked into the room. His training saw to that. He decided to let
her come to him. Ty was meeting with Sam, and she was always on her high horse
around him. Growing up together, she treated him like an older brother. Her
first year at high school had changed that. It got even worse after she
graduated and returned from a trip overseas. He was downgraded to a second-class
citizen. She avoided him as if it were beneath her to be in the same room with
him. He struggled to figure out why there was a change and had come up empty.
There had been no fights before or after she started high school, nothing Ty
could pinpoint, no harsh words spoken between the two over the years, but
whatever he had done altered their relationship and was still a mystery to him.
    As he spun around to greet Sam, he was
startled to see Alex standing there, facing him with an unfriendly expression.
Ty schooled his features, trying to hide his disbelief. He had not seen or
spoken to Alex since she had left for college. To say he was shocked would be
an understatement.
    As Ty continued to stare, Alex broke the
awkward silence.
    “Seen enough? Or should I turn around in
a full circle so you can get a better look?” her voice dripped with sarcasm as
she stepped fully into the large room.
    He was not amused. Alex’s dry humor and the
way she used it to keep people from getting closer than she wanted them to be
always made his blood heat. She always tried to run from confrontations but hid
behind humor when something unavoidable arose, like now.
    He stared openly at her. Alex was
exactly as he remembered. Nothing had changed. She still downplayed her looks,
intentionally. She hated being compared to her mother and sisters. She never
flirted openly with men or tried to play up her looks as most women did at her
age. If anything, she wore unattractive clothes to get people, especially men,
to ignore her so she could melt into the woodwork. Ty had always thought of her
as a scared kid, afraid to let the world see the real her. He had a soft spot
for her and always had. She had been the only bright spot in working for her
grandfather on the ranch.
    “Where’s your sister?” Ty asked
inspecting her as if he were seeing a bug that had dared to crawl out from
under the rug at his feet.
    Offended at his tone and snide
expression, she went on the defensive, “Well let’s get the preliminaries out of
the way, shall we? How are you Ty? I’m fine, by the way, thanks for asking.
Been meaning to call, but you know how it is, life and all that?” Smiling
coldly, she strolled further into the room and sat down on the couch. It sat
directly in front of the fireplace, and she was very aware that only a coffee
table separated her from him.
    Turning her face up towards him, she
remarked, “Now that we’re all caught up on the pleasantries...” Her voice sounded
sticky sweet to her ears as she finished speaking. Just as fast, she changed
it, the scorn she felt