Read Online Now and Forever by Diana Palmer - Free Book Online

eyes of the sun. And she remembered the pleasure on Baker’s face, and that of his son, when they drained the gleaming amber liquid while sweat shrouded their sunburned faces. It had been the same when Russell took over the monumental task of overseeing thousands of acres of farmland and the family cattle business. She’d seen him many times with the sweat dripping from his face and arms as he worked from sunup to sundown in the fields. But when Baker sent her away to school, the memories faded, and it had been a long time since she’d seen men stripped to the waist in the fields struggling with the haying.
    Now, sitting quietly in the Mercedes with the sun blazing down on the field hands as the balers spit out bound bales of greenish brown hay, the years seemed to fall away. A twinge of hunger went through her as she looked at the vastness of the landscape and the sweet smell of fresh hay filled her nostrils. In her mind she compared the rustic beauty of this land with the rising steel beams and dirty streets of New York, andwondered absently how she could ever have thought there was a comparison. Russell had called her a country girl, and amazingly enough it may have been the truth even though she’d spent years pretending it wasn’t.
    As she watched, Russell caught sight of the car and leapt gracefully down from the back of the huge, sideboarded truck where the bales were being tossed. She marveled at his agility, unusual in a man his size. He started toward her, calling something over his shoulder to the denim-clad hands around the truck.
    She gazed at him with a new softness in her eyes, tracing the muscular lines of his imposing frame as he drew nearer. His shirt was off, disclosing bronzed flesh over conspicuous muscles and a broad chest heavily laden with a wedge of black curling hair that disappeared below his belt buckle. She’d seen him without his shirt all her life…but now it was affecting her in a new and vaguely terrifying way. She couldn’t seem to drag her eyes away from him, and with an irritated patience, she opened the door and got out of the car as he joined her.
    He took off his wide-brimmed Stetson and drew his forearm across his beaded, shining brow, and grinned down at her. “If you came out to help,” he mused, his dark eyes taking in the wispy fabric of her red and white patterned dress, “you should have worn something more appropriate.”
    She shook back the waves of her long dark hair and smiled. “Sorry,” she told him. “Baker didn’t raise me to be a farmer.”
    He bent his dark head to light a cigarette. “Why did you come?” he asked, and his eyes narrowed as they met hers.
    She shrugged. “I brought out a case of beer.”
    â€œBeer?” One dark eyebrow went up.
    â€œI know,” she said, anticipating the words. “To you, anything less than bourbon whiskey is sacrilege, but it’s cold and wet and you look like you could use something. You’re soaked.”
    â€œThe fruit of labor,” he said quietly, his eyes steady on hers. “You’ll never see Tyler drowning in his own sweat.”
    â€œIf you’re going to start that again,” she said, “I’ll put the case of beer on the ground and back the car over it a few times.”
    â€œDo it, and I’ll back the car over you a few times,” he returned with a chuckle. “Hey, Jack!” he called to one of the slender young men who followed the big truck through the field to toss the bales onto it.
    â€œYou want me, boss?” came the reply.
    â€œLift this cooler of beer out and take it to the boys,” Russell told the younger man as he joined them at the car. “We’ll take ten minutes. I don’t like the looks of these clouds,” he added, gesturing toward the growing number of dark clouds drifting overhead.
    â€œSure thing. Thanks!” he said with a toothy grin. He lifted out