Read Online A Perfect Stranger by Danielle Steel - Free Book Online Page A

She could make the next flight to New York. “I … no ….” She murmured softly as she turned away, but before she could take one step from him, she felt his hand on her arm. He had seen the terror in her eyes and was horrified at what he’d done.
    “No, don’t.”
    She turned to face him then, not quite sure she did it. All her instincts were still telling her to flee. “Who are you?”
    “Alex Hale. I just … it’s that …” He smiled gently at her, pained at what he saw in the beautiful woman’s eyes. They were eyes filled with sorrow and terror. Perhaps injured too, but that he did not know yet. Allhe knew was that he didn’t want her to run away, not again. “I saw you buy that in the airport.” He glanced toward the book that still lay on her seat, and to Raphaella it was a non sequitur that made no sense at all. “And I—I saw you once on the steps, at Broderick and Broadway about a week ago. You were—” How could he tell her now that she had been crying? It would only make her run from him again. But his words seemed to jar her, and she looked at him long and hard this time. She seemed to be remembering, and slowly a faint blush overtook her face.
    “I—” She nodded and looked away. Perhaps he was not a paparazzo. Perhaps he was only a madman or a fool. But she didn’t want to travel five hours sitting beside him, wondering why he had held her arm or said “My God, it’s you.” But while she stared at him, immobile, wondering, as his eyes held her tightly, standing where she was, the final announcement to take their seats came over the loudspeaker in the airplane, and he moved slowly around her, to clear the way for her to her seat.
    “Why don’t you sit down?” He stood, looking very strong and tall and handsome, and as though unable to escape him, she silently walked past him and took her seat. She had put the hat in the overhead rack before Alex had found his seat, and now her hair shone like black silk as she bowed her head and turned away. She seemed to be looking out the window, so Alex said nothing further to her and sat down in his own seat, leaving a vacant seat between them.
    He felt his heart hammering inside him. She was as beautiful as he had at first thought the night he saw her sitting on the steps, surrounded by the cloud of lynx, her haunting black eyes looking up toward himand the rivers of tears pouring silently down her face. This was the same woman sitting only inches away from him, and every fiber of his being wanted to reach out to her, to touch her, to take her in his arms. It was madness and he knew it. She was a perfect stranger. And then he smiled to himself. The words were apt. She seemed perfect in every way. As he gazed at her neck, her hands, the way she sat, all he could see was her perfection, and when he saw her profile for an instant, he could not tear his eyes away from her face. And then, aware of how uncomfortable it made her, he suddenly grabbed the two files and stared into them blindly, hoping to make her think that he had forgotten his fascination with her and had turned his mind to something else. It wasn’t until after takeoff that he saw her glance toward him, and from the corner of his eye he saw her stare at him long and hard.
    Unable to play the game any longer then, he turned toward her, his eyes gentle on her, his smile hesitant but warm. “I’m sorry if I frightened you before. It’s just … I don’t usually do things like this.” The smile broadened, but she didn’t smile in return. “I—I don’t know how to explain it.” For a moment he felt like a true crazy trying to explain it all to her as she sat there staring, with no expression on her face other than the look in her eyes that had so touched him when he had first seen it. “When I saw you that night on the steps, when you”—he decided to go ahead and say it—“when you were crying, I felt so helpless when you looked up at me, and then you disappeared. Just like