A Solitary Heart Read Online Free

she buckled the edges. But her face remained
    smooth; she even managed to wrinkle her nose in faint distaste. 'I
    don't know; the description sounds vaguely heavy metal to me. I'm
    surprised. I would have thought your tastes ran to the more
    conservative.'
    The setting sun slanted across his hard, intent face, and for the merest
    instant those hazel eyes were lit and reflective. The effect was
    barbaric, uncanny. He almost didn't look human. Sian fought the urge
    to step back in alarm. He said, soft and gentle, 'But we weren't
    talking about my tastes, just my brother's.'
    'What about your brother?' asked Joshua, reappearing at her side with
    her wine and a newly opened beer. He looked defiant as he
    challenged Matt's presence, and almost childishly unformed next to
    the other man's chiselled, hard features.
    Sian consigned yet another sigh to the nether regions of her empty
    stomach. It looked to all intents and purposes as if the two men
    would wrangle over her right then and there like two dogs over a
    bone, never mind what the bone thought of the contention. The
    situation was passing beyond the ridiculous into the farcical.
    'Oh, you got it, thanks,' she said with outward poise to Joshua and
    took the wine. 'We were just discussing individual tastes. I said Matt
    seemed the conservative type.'
    Joshua laughed rather too loudly. 'Matt's about as conservative as a
    race-track. What he got up to in his youth shouldn't be told in polite
    company.'
    One corner of Matt's sensually cut lips pulled to the side, and what
    were engaging dimples in Joshua's young handsome face were deep
    creases stamped into his older brother, signs of decision, temper, and,
    yes, humour. The two looked alike only in their colouring and
    general build of body, and, when they were standing side by side as
    they were, Sian had to admit reluctantly that Joshua was another man
    who paled next to Matt's settled, virile maturity.
    'But you know what they say about youth being wasted on the
    young,' remarked Matt with pointed silkiness, as his fierce hazel eyes
    met and locked with his brother's.
    Sian bit her lip as Joshua bridled visibly and snapped back, 'Just
    because you're young doesn't mean you can't know your own mind!'
    'No, but it does mean that you have a great deal of inexperience in
    knowing what to do when you change your mind,' replied Matt
    coolly, his voice at complete odds with the anger that sparked like
    black lightning from the depths of his darkening gaze.
    Sian looked yearningly across the laughing people who were
    enjoying themselves, oblivious to the storm gathering in their midst.
    She turned her attention back to the men who were glaring at each
    other over her head. Over her head! This bone most certainly did not
    agree to the contention, and said in a dangerously soft voice, 'Let's
    clear the air, shall we?'
    Joshua recalled himself with a start. Matt merely raised his eyebrows,
    and his weary, sardonic expression was the final straw that broke her
    sorely tried patience and ignited her fuse. Sian's eyes blazed and she
    bit out succinctly, 'Your brother, Joshua, has seen fit to tell me that
    he does not approve of our engagement! I, on the other hand, had to
    hear myself denounced at unflattering length in my own home by a
    total stranger. Now, you two can fight among yourselves all you like,
    and it is no concern of mine! However, you will not do so at my
    birthday party, in my time!'
    Joshua fell back a step in astonishment, for Matt had been right
    earlier; he had never seen her lose her temper before but she was far
    too gone in her butane heat to care.
    Well into her stride, she rounded on Matt in fine fury, strands of her
    hair flicking along ivory collarbones like ribbons of black silk. 'And
    you! I have never met a more rude, arrogant, overbearing and blindly
    prejudiced man in my life! You ought to be ashamed of yourself,
    though I suspect in saying so I am merely wasting my breath! If
    Joshua, or any other man, does