Turner's Rainbow 2 - The Rainbow Promise Read Online Free PDF Page A

back downstairs.
    The kitchen was dark, and Lurleen and Dovie were gone. James went into the dining room and took out a bottle of Kentucky bourbon from the sideboard. He poured himself two fingers, and, glass in hand, strolled out onto the front porch. He stood for a moment sipping his drink and gazing out at the dark, silent street. The honeysuckle bush along the side fence was in bloom, and the air was heavy with its sweet, heady scent.
    James closed his eyes, a wistful sadness creeping through him. Honeysuckle had grown wild behind the Turner house, and all that sweet, short June while he and Julia lay in the shelter of the trees there, he had smelled it. He had never been able to smell honeysuckle since without thinking of Julia.
    He took another swallow of bourbon. It was pointless to think about it after all this time. Eleven years. Yet he could still see her as she had looked that day in Harper's store, when he was home for Christmas. It had been years since he'd seen her, and he had had trouble placing her for a moment. She had looked so much like a woman at seventeen, so little like the child he had seen at school. She had worn a faded pink dress and a shawl, and a saucy red knitted cap had sat on her pale golden hair, hanging loose and silken around her face. Her eyes had been a clear, startling blue. Her face was delicate, her eyes huge, and she had a sweet, vulnerable air. He had thought she was the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen.
    James wondered where Julia was now and what she was doing. Probably had a passel of kids and looked twice her age. He didn't know why he still thought about her sometimes after all these years. He guessed it was because she had been his first, and you didn't forget your first woman, your first real love. Your first heartbreak.
    James tossed down the rest of the drink. It was a smooth fire in his throat and stomach.
    He could never forget Julia—the softness of her body beneath him, the sweet taste of her mouth. He would always carry the memory of their lovemaking inside him—just as he would always carry the pain he had felt when he had learned she'd married Will Dobson.
    At first he hadn't believed it. She had lain with him, and James knew he had been her first man. She had told him she loved him. He had loved her desperately, had wanted to marry her. Then, suddenly, she had married Will Dobson— without even telling him. He had had to hear it from her father.
    He hadn't understood it. He had thought about it a million times, and he never had understood it. Julia had said she loved him. How could she turn around and marry another man? But she had, and all he could think it meant was that she hadn't really loved him. She must have deceived him, used him for some hidden reason of her own.
    At first he had been angry and bitter. He had drank too much and spent too much time in New Orleans's Storyville. But eventually the pain had eased, and he had gone back to his studies and qualified for medical school. Over the years, his life had returned to normal. He had become a doctor. He enjoyed his work. He rarely thought of those few, brief months when he had been in love with Julia Turner.
    Just sometimes. . . like tonight. . . when he smelled the strong scent of honeysuckle in the air.
    James sighed and turned away. It was time to stop mooning about on the porch and go to bed. His days started early. He turned and went back into the house, shutting the door on the evening air.
    ❧
    Julia Dobson glanced over at the bed in the corner of the room. Vance and Bonnie lay curled up together, their eyes wide open and fixed on their mother, Bonnie's thumb was firmly planted in her mouth. They were too frightened to go to sleep. They had been scared of their father in life. Now they were scared of him in death, Julia wished she could have put them in another room where they wouldn't have to see Will's dead body stretched out on the table, but their house consisted of only one large room, and