Hearts Under Construction Read Online Free Page A

good.”
    “You’d get a decent meal once in a while if you could get away from work long enough to come to our house. I had an awful time finding enough food in your cupboards to come up with dinner.” Her mother finished the last tuck on the blanket and stood up. “By the way, why do you have so much cabbage in your refrigerator?”
    Thoughts of the new soup diet came to her. She’d only been on it for two days and already the thought of cabbage made her want to pulverize the pale green heads when she passed them in the produce section of her grocery store. She never told her mother when she went on diets. Her mother always complained about today’s women being too thin. According to her mother, unless a woman carried an extra twenty pounds, she looked sickly.
    Ellie loved her mother.
    “I heard cabbage is good for you.”
    Her mother eyed Ellie warily. Nothing gets past Mom. Ellie closed her eyes in hopes of stopping further discussion about the cabbage.
    “Sounds like you’ve got a few things to pray about.” Her mother rubbed a warm cloth against Ellie’s forehead.
    Ellie smiled. Her mother’s answer to everything: “Pray about it.” Ellie knew she was right, but something stopped her when she tried to pray about Cole. She dismissed the thought that her attitude was wrong when she approached the matter with the Lord.
    Her mother said something else, but the words were lost in a hazy dreamworld. A world of stability where things didn’t change, where she felt safe.
    A world without Cole Preston.

Chapter Three
     
    T he next week passed in a blur. Chaos in the office kept Jax and Cole busy. Ellie worked hard to avoid them both. She was tired by the time Friday arrived, and felt relieved when five o’clock rolled around. With a glance at the clock, she grabbed her purse and walked from the office toward her car. The afternoon’s winds had swept the sky clean as evening settled upon the city. Ellie pulled in a deep breath. The air smelled sweet with summer. Though she felt tired from a full day’s work, stepping outside had revived her spirits.
    Jax walked up beside her. “So, will you go with us tomorrow?”
    She frowned.
    “Come on, Ellie. It will be fun.” He lifted puppy-dog eyes to her, which always made her give in.
    “Isn’t it enough that I have to work with him every day, Jax? Must I see him on the weekends, too?”
    “It’s not like we do this every weekend. A trip to Chicago, a day of sailing on Lake Michigan. Please? I could use some relaxation, and Alex wants to go with another couple.”
    “Look, Jax, Lucy and Ricky Ricardo, they are a couple. Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, they are a couple. Cole Preston and I work together. We are not a couple .”
    He stepped back and held up his hands. “I know, I know. I didn’t mean you were a couple.”
    Ellie took a deep breath. “I hate like everything to do this, but I will do it for you, Jax. That is the only reason.”
    He smiled like a dieter who’d lost another pound—a smile she hadn’t worn in weeks. He grabbed her with both hands and promptly placed a kiss on her forehead. “You’re the best, Ellie.”
    She shook her head and smiled in spite of herself. “Just you remember this the next time you need a partner.”
    He groaned.
    “Seriously, Jax, I’m doing this for you. The last thing I want to do on a Saturday is spend my day off with Cole Preston.”
    “Why don’t you like him?”
    She wasn’t sure how to respond. After all, Cole was Jax’s best friend. “Besides the fact he’s got an ego the size of Texas?”
    Jax threw back his head and laughed. “I guess he does at that. But then I need someone with confidence in the business.”
    Climbing into the car, she rolled down her window and looked up at him.
    “We’ll pick you up at seven o’clock tomorrow morning,” he said.
    With a reluctant nod, Ellie turned on the engine and pulled her car into gear. She waved goodbye and looked in her rearview mirror in time to see