Thanksgiving Groom Read Online Free

hall to the small parlor they used most often now that it was cold. It was easy to close off, easy to heat.
    â€œShe’s fine. She got herself worked up and then she passed out cold. A little exhaustion, a lot of fear.”
    â€œWho is she?”
    â€œMy guess, Herman Lear’s daughter, Penelope.”
    â€œOh, my. Are you sure?” Mrs. Johnson pulled a throw blanket off the couch and he took the hint and placed the woman on the worn seat of a sofa that they’d had to beat the dust out of just a few months earlier. The Johnsons had been here about a month before he showed up.
    â€œYes, I’m sure.” He’d seen her pictures. He knew her father. She was Penelope Lear. And she was the last person he wanted to see.
    â€œGoodness.” Wilma Johnson clucked, the way she’d clucked over him more than once.
    â€œWake up.” He patted Penelope’s cheek as Mrs. Johnson stood next to him, leaning in, watching. “Ms. Lear, time to wake up.”
    She blinked and looked at him. “Where am I?”
    â€œA hunting lodge.”
    â€œPeople live out here?” she murmured.
    â€œPeople do. It isn’t necessarily the most inhabited part of Alaska, or the most civilized, but here we are.”
    She scrambled to sit up. Mrs. Johnson patted her shoulder. “There, there, sweetie, you’re safe. And don’t worry about Tucker, he’s lacking social skills. We’ll take good care of you until we can get you back to safety.”
    â€œThank you, Mrs….?”
    â€œI’m Wilma Johnson. My husband and I were staying here. And then Tucker came along to stay with us.”
    Penelope looked back at him. “They think you’re dead.”
    â€œI’m obviously not. But why would they think that?”
    â€œThey found your plane, blood and then no sign of you. They haven’t given up, though.”
    Tucker sat down in the chair near the fire. He needed a minute to soak in the idea that the folks in Treasure Creek assumed he was dead. He hadn’t considered that. He should have, though. Wilma was busy untangling Penelope’s hair, pulling small sticks and leaves from the blond strands. The older woman shot him a look, her lips pursed.
    She was a mother at heart. She had lost her only child, but that didn’t stop her from mothering. She’d been hovering over him for months, trying to fix him, to fix his heart. And it had been a long time since anyone had mothered him.
    â€œI’m going to make tea.” Wilma stepped away from Penelope and he knew what she was doing. She was leaving them to share their stories.
    He watched her leave the room and then he turned, facing the woman who had sat up, but still held the blanket tight around herself. He got up to put wood on the fire.
    â€œI was on my way to a friend’s cabin.” He shoved a log into the fireplace, poking it into place with the metal poker and then standing back as sparks shot up and flames licked at the mossy bark. “The plane stalled out on me and I landed on that lake. I did hit my headas I came down, but I managed to get out and to walk here.” He had walked for three days, he explained, and he’d been as lost as he’d ever been in his life.
    â€œI know they’ve searched a large area around the lake.”
    â€œI hadn’t meant to cause panic. I even left a note on a tree, that I’d find shelter and that I was on my way to a friend’s cabin. Not that I made it to that cabin. Mr. Johnson found me wandering the woods. Concussion I guess. I don’t know how far I walked from the plane. And you, Ms. Lear, what brought you to Treasure Creek? Are you hunting for a rugged outdoorsman? A man to share your life and your heart with, as that infamous article stated?”
    She glared at him and he wanted to smile. “How did you know my name?”
    â€œYou’re Penelope Lear. Who doesn’t know the Lears of