Til Death Do Us Part Read Online Free PDF Page A

he’s a good guy. After Mama died, he came to the reservation and brought me back to the ranch with him. He didn’t have to do that.”
    â€œLook, Elena, I know how much you love your brother. That’s fine and good, but just because you love him doesn’t mean everyone else has to.”
    â€œWhew! He really pushed all your buttons, didn’t he?”
    â€œDrop it, okay? I’m not coming to dinner tonight and that’s final.” Joanna stepped out of her sandals, slid her jeans to her feet and kicked out of them. “Okay. But—”
    â€œWe’ll talk tomorrow. Bye.” Joanna punched the off button on the telephone, tossed it on top of her discarded clothes and removed her underwear.
    Standing naked in the middle of the stucco-walled bathroom, she stretched and gazed up at the slanted, split-log ceiling. She wanted to forget all about her disastrous encounter with J. T. Blackwood. She wanted to wash his scent off her hands and arms and face. She wanted to erase the image of him astride his Appaloosa stallion. And more than anything, she wanted to forget the way she’d felt when her body had been nestled intimately against his.
    Joanna stepped into the warm, perfumed water, immersing her body beneath the layers of foaming bubbles. Reaching behind her, she lifted a gold washcloth from the black metal rack above the tub. She lathered the cloth with her moisturizing soap and scrubbed her face. After rinsing, she clutched the cloth in her hand and glanceddown at the silver-and-turquoise ring on her finger. The ring Annabelle Beaumont’s lover had made for her.
    Where had J. T. Blackwood gotten the matching ring? The one her great-grandmother had been certain Benjamin Greymountain wore till the day he died, as she had worn hers. Had some member of Benjamin’s family sold the ring years ago? Perhaps they’d given it away. Or—was it possible that J.T. was somehow related to Benjamin?
    More than once, Joanna had been tempted to ask Elena if she had ever heard of a Benjamin Greymountain or if she knew how to trace his descendants. But despite her close friendship with Elena, she hadn’t been able to bring herself to share the secret affair her great-grandmother had written about—in great detail—in her diary. There were times when Joanna herself felt like an intruder when she read Annabelle’s words. Somehow it hadn’t seemed right to tell anyone else about Annabelle and Benjamin’s scandalous love.
    But tomorrow, she would ask Elena about J.T.’s ring and explain her curiosity by saying she’d noted the similarity between his ring and her own. And she would ask Elena to come to her home; that way she wouldn’t have to go up to the main house and run the risk of seeing J.T. again.
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    T HE SUN HUNG low in the sky, not quite prepared to set and put an end to the day. Approaching twilight washed an orange-gold translucence over the New Mexico landscape Joanna saw outside her windows.
    After her long leisurely bath, she’d slipped into a floor-length pink-and-lavender cotton gown. Barefoot, she traipsed into the kitchen, opened the refrigerator and retrieved a large pitcher of iced tea she’d made yesterday. She poured herself a tall glass, added ice cubes and pulledout one of the Windsor armchairs at her dining table. Before she could sit, she heard a forceful knock at her back door. Who could that be? Surely, not Elena.
    Walking toward the back door, she peeked out the window over her sink, but couldn’t see anyone. “Who’s there?” she asked. She never opened her door without taking every precaution, even out here on the ranch where she knew everyone. Even now, there were times when she checked under her bed and inside her closets after returning from a trip.
    â€œIt’s J. T. Blackwood,” his voice thundered, deep, rough and gritty.
    â€œWhat do you want?”
    â€œA minute of your