The Man She Once Knew Read Online Free PDF Page A

“Miss Margaret wanted you to live here, in her house, for at least thirty days before you are allowed use of any of the income for more than living expenses.”
    Thirty days? Callie was incredulous. “I live in Philadelphia. I have a job. I’m—” I have to salvage my future there, forced leave or not. She began to laugh. “This is absurd. Completely ridiculous.” Abruptly she sobered. “What happens if I reject all of it?”
    “You can’t.”
    She stood and straightened her pencil skirt. “Of course I can.”
    “Ms. Hunter. Please sit down. Calm yourself.”
    “Calm myself? When she—” Callie was aghast at the nerve of the woman she’d been feeling sentimental over.
    He held up a hand. “I didn’t word that right. What I meant was that many people will suffer if you don’t accept this. She left no alternative heir, so the properties would all have to be dealt with by the state of Georgia. The most likely course for the government would be to appoint an administrator who would dispose of the properties. Many of them are inhabited by families who’ve lived there into the second and third generation, but an outsider wouldn’t care about any of that.”
    “You can’t be serious.” She sought to recollect whatever she’d learned about estate law, but she was acriminal attorney, not a civil one. Licensed in Pennsylvania, not Georgia.
    “You’re welcome to check out the law for yourself, Ms. Hunter, if you don’t believe me.” He studied her over the top of his glasses, patient and somehow too knowing. “I can certainly understand why you would have conflicted feelings about Oak Hollow, but are you honestly willing to throw all these people to the wolves just to escape dealing with the past?”
    Callie stared at him.
    Implacably he stared back.
    Are you a coward? was what he was asking really.
    Of course she wasn’t. She was a busy woman with a lot on her mind.
    She closed her eyes for a second. Breathed deep. There was a solution, a way out. There had to be.
    I will not let this place get the best of me, not ever again.

CHAPTER FOUR

    S HE DESPERATELY WANTED an Internet connection so she could find an argument to refute Albert Manning’s opinion. The likelihood of high-speed Internet in Oak Hollow, though, wasn’t something she’d care to bet on.
    How she wished her boss hadn’t ordered her to take extended time off. Her feeling of urgency to return to Philadelphia and salvage her career hadn’t abated as she’d put miles between herself and the city—rather, every moment away ratcheted up her anxiety. She had absolutely no interest in fixing the mess Miss Margaret had dropped in her lap; a much more critical problem awaited her.
    Callie pulled into the driveway of the house she’d been given, but any lingering sentiment from this morning had evaporated under the harsh sun of Manning’s unpleasant surprise. Houses—and the people living in them—were the least of her worries.
    She pressed her lips together. Including the one that put a roof over David’s head.
    She let her forehead sink against her fists, which were clenched on the steering wheel. If she’d known thistangle would be waiting to greet her, she’d never have come. Albert Manning, however much the essential gentleman, would have been easier to resist from eight hundred miles away. Instead, she’d agreed to begin a tour of Miss Margaret’s properties this very afternoon.
    The knock on her window made her jump.
    A child stood there. The mouth moved and thin arms gestured, but Callie couldn’t hear through the closed window. Rather than start the engine to roll down the window, Callie opened the door carefully so as not to hit the child. She couldn’t decide if it was a boy or a girl.
    “I did the watering.”
    “What?” Standing now, Callie saw that the child’s head came only to her midriff.
    “I watered the garden like Miss Margaret taught me.” The child’s frame was skinny all over and was clad in worn jeans