The Borrowed Bride Read Online Free PDF Page A

slim woman whose smile showed no surprise, only welcome.
    “Hi, Gram.” Gary parked his hiking boots on a rubber mat just inside the door. “Found her.”
    “That’s good. Supper’ll be ready in a minute.”
    Gary left the room, and the woman inclined her graying head. “Juanita Sohappy.”
    “I’m Isabel Wharton. I guess Dan told you about me.”
    Juanita nodded, then lifted the lid of a basket. “Here. Take off your shoes and wrap up in that. Sit down at the table. I’ll get you some stew.”
    “I’m not hungry, thank you.” Isabel pulled the blanket, worn soft with age, around her shoulders.
    Juanita’s black eyes glinted with warning. “Everybody eats when they come to my house.”
    Isabel sat down, instantly obedient and secretly delighted by Juanita’s aggressive hospitality. In the kitchen, she observed a poignant collection of poverty and pride. Four dishes stacked just so in the cupboard. A collection of World’s Fair 1962 tumblers. Juanita’s apron had been made from a flour sack with intricate, beautiful embroidery at the edges.
    Isabel took it all in with a lump in her throat, and a stark truth hit her.
    She had built her life in Bainbridge. But she had left her soul in a place like this.

Four
    P etunia swung her head to the side and cast a baleful glare at her rider. She was the best horse in Dan’s stables, but he knew she deeply resented getting wet and wasn’t too fond of the dark, either.
    Dan made a sound of sympathy in his throat and urged her down the hill. Horseback was the best way to find Isabel. Elevated, he had a broader range of vision—at least until it grew dark. Unlike the bike, the horse was quiet, and he could hear Isabel if she answered his calls.
    The rain hissed through the woods, spattering onto the broad, lush tongues of primeval ferns and drumming dully on the hood of his poncho. He ought to check with Theo and Juanita. If Isabel wasn’t with the Sohappys, he would radio the forest search service.
    In the meantime, he yelled until his throat ached.
    Damn it, where was she?
    In one way or other, he thought, heading north toward the Sohappys’ settlement, he had been searching for Isabel Wharton for the past five years.
    Only now he knew what it took to hold her—if he could get her to sit still long enough to listen. If he could get past that wall she had built around her heart. If he could find the words he had never bothered to say to her.
    He remembered the first time he had ever seen her. The scene was branded on his memory. He had been twenty-three, cocky as hell, driven by a need to escape and rebel and shock people. The ponytail, the leather, the earring, the attitude—all were donned with calculated purpose, and he wore them like a second skin. His appearance tended to scare nice people.
    He liked that.
    When Isabel came into his life, Dan was playing his guitar and singing to a crowd as dark and ominous-looking as he. His music had already gained him some startled praise from area critics—not that he cared. He just sank into the sharp, rough rhythm, letting it surge around him like the constant, broken pulse of the sea. Through his music, he expressed the wildness and mystery inside him, expressed it with an insistence and a precision that was profitable, but ultimately destructive.
    He spotted her through the heated, angry glare of stage lights. Only a vague impression at first, but totally mind-blowing given the usual crowds at the Bad Attitude. She was dressed all in white with a burnished halo of sable hair framing a troubled face and the largest, saddest eyes Dan had ever seen.
    He stepped back from the mike, doing idle riffs while he watched her. She bent to speak to Leon Garza, the sound man. Her hair fell forward, obscuring her face. She tucked a lock behind her ear then, with a quick, nervous motion of her hand.
    Leon lifted his eyebrows, skimmed her with a hungry expression Dan suddenly wanted to pound from his face and then nodded toward the