Lone Star Lonely Read Online Free Page B

though. She would be
okay. Garrett had called Joseph’s lawyer, Madden Hawkins, and the
old man had agreed to meet them at the El Paso rangers’ station.
Nobody was going to arrest her, she thought. Not yet, anyway.
Because once they saw the will, they would realize she had no
motive.
    None that they would know of. Kirsten did
have motive, though. Her husband had blackmailed her into marrying
him, had held her deepest secret, her most private nightmare, over
her head for all this time. She’d been more prisoner than wife. And
she’d wished Joseph Cowan dead a thousand times. But they wouldn’t
know that.
    Not if she didn’t tell.
    She glanced at Adam and swallowed her regret.
He’d lived without knowing the truth for this long. Maybe he didn’t
need to know. Maybe no one would ever need to know. It was a huge
relief to realize that the one person who could expose her for what
she’d done long ago was dead. And no one else knew. No one else
ever would.
    Adam’s thigh moved slightly against hers.
Heat and friction. Desire slammed her in the belly so hard she lost
her breath.
    No! Not now. Not anymore. That part of
her was dead and buried. Especially where Adam was concerned.
    She looked up at him. He was looking back at
her. Her lips were dry, her face hot.
    “It’s gonna be okay,” he said, and damned if
he didn’t sound like the same sweet cowboy she’d been in love with
a hundred years ago, instead of the bitter, urban businessman he’d
become.
    “I know it is.” Stupid reply. She should have
said, “I thought you hated my guts. Best keep right on hating them,
Adam.” But no. No Brand alive would treat a woman badly when she
was facing this kind of trouble. Not even when that woman was
her.
    Hawkins was at the station when they arrived,
gray suit impeccable, white hair unruly. He had a quiet dignity
about him that Kirsten had always liked. A dignity that showed
through even here, in a dingy, cluttered office with papers and
files and empty foam cups strewn over every available inch of
space. Wastebaskets overflowed; a watercooler gurgled; coffee rings
marred manila folders and typed sheets. Uniformed men and women
bumped and brushed one another as they hurried back and forth. In
the midst of it all, Hawkins stood. Like a throwback to Mark Twain.
A sweet Southern gentleman, an aging cavalier. He sent her a gentle
smile that was condolence, affection and encouragement all at once,
even before he made his way amid crisscrossing bodies toward her.
She trusted him, even though he had been Joseph’s attorney since
the dawn of time, as far as she knew. She trusted him because he’d
been her father’s friend, even before all of that. And he still
visited her dad in that Dallas nursing home every chance he got.
That made him trustworthy in her book. Anyone who loved her
father….
    “Hello, Kirsten,” he said, clasping her hands
in his powder-soft, wrinkled ones. “Are you all right?” His pale
blue eyes were dull. He smelled of camphor.
    “I’ve been better, Madden.”
    He looked past her, nodded to Garrett, then
looked puzzled as he recognized Adam.
    “Right in here, folks,” a ranger called, and
he held open a door. Beyond it she could see a dim room, a bare
table, a couple of hard-looking chairs.
    She swallowed hard, took a step forward. Adam
moved up beside her and fell into step. And for a second it felt
incredibly reassuring to let herself think he would be in that
little interrogation room with her. Then she asked herself what the
hell she was doing.
    A cop slapped a hand on Adam’s shoulder.
“Just the lady and her lawyer, amigo .”
    Adam stopped, and for just a second, he met
her eyes. He drew his gaze away so quickly she almost couldn’t read
what was going on in his mind. And then it clicked into place, and
she blinked in surprise. It was a question she’d glimpsed in his
eyes just now. He wanted to know if he should insist on coming in
there with her. Fight his way in, if need be. And