Read Online A Daring Vow (Vows) by Sherryl Woods - Free Book Online

pulls files and leaves ‘em scattered all around when he’s done, especially on weekends. Then he yells like crazy because he can’t find what he’s looking for.”
    Sounded just like Taylor, Zelda thought wryly. When push came to shove, he apparently never could take the blame for his mistakes. She certainly knew that firsthand.
    By midafternoon she had caught up on the typing and she and Darlene had finished the filing. The filing had taken longer than usual because Darlene kept throwing up. Worried by the expectant mother’s pallor, Zelda sent her home.
    Left alone, she sat quietly for a minute trying to absorb the fact that she was actually working in Taylor’s office. Her gaze was drawn toward the wall that separated the work space from his home.
    She hadn’t heard a sound from next door all morning. Did that mean there was no wife, after all? Was that what Darlene had refrained from telling her, that Taylor and his wife were divorced? Or was it something more? She tried to imagine what might have made Taylor send a seven-year-old off to boarding school. Surely it wasn’t just that he didn’t like the role of single parent? He had always talked about how much he wanted kids, lots of them, since he’d been an only child.
    When she tired of coming up with questions for which she could think of no answers, she picked up the morning’s work and took it into Taylor’s office. As she stacked the letters for his signature and the file notes for him to look over, she spotted the silver-framed photograph of a child in a swing. She glanced around, but could find no companion picture of the girl’s mother. She couldn’t resist picking up the photo of Caitlin to study it more closely, even though it was a poignant reminder that she had once hoped to share a family with Taylor.
    With her fingers trembling more than they should, she touched the glass. The lovely, pint-size angel appeared to be about six or seven, which meant the picture had to be fairly recent. Her face was flushed, her black curls in disarray, but it was the devilish sparkle in her eyes that enchanted Zelda. How many times had she seen that exact same gleam in Taylor’s eyes right before he’d led them both into some mischief?
    “Oh, I’ll bet you’re a handful,” she murmured, somehow pleased by the thought despite the pang of longing deep in her heart.
    She had just replaced the photo on his desk when she sensed Taylor’s presence. Thanks to the thick carpeting, she hadn’t heard a sound. A guilty heat crept into her cheeks as she looked into eyes the exact color of storm clouds.
    “Hi,” she said, offering a tentative smile that wasn’t returned. “I was just putting the work we did this morning on your desk.”
    His gaze went from the photo to her and back again, proving that he’d arrived before she’d put it down. The angles in his face looked harsher than ever. Whatever he was thinking, though, he kept to himself.
    “Where’s Darlene?” he asked finally.
    “We were all caught up, so I suggested she go on home. She had a rough morning.”
    For the first time he actually looked directly at her in a way that wasn’t condemning. “Rough how?” he asked.
    She was pleased by the genuine concern in his voice. It proved he wasn’t as heartless as he sometimes liked to pretend. “Morning sickness,” she told him. “It’s come on with a vengeance. I hope you don’t mind that I let her go.”
    He shook his head and eased past her to sit behind the desk. “Of course not. Everything quiet around here?”
    “Harlan wants to stop by when it’s convenient to talk about filing suit against one of his suppliers. I scheduled him for ten tomorrow morning. He told me a little about the case, and I looked up some of the case law for you. The notes are on top of that stack to your left.”
    If he was startled or pleased by her initiative, he didn’t display it by so much as the flicker of an eyelash. “Fine. Anything else?”
    Oddly