Read Online Silver Bracelets: A Loveswept Contemporary Classic Romance by Sandra Chastain - Free Book Online Page A

supplies and furniture up to the second floor.
    With a little effort she rolled the small safe out of the van and onto the grate. By using a system of pulleys she raised the grate up to the hayloft doors, then ran back upstairs and pulled it, and the safe, inside.
    She’d have a look at the safe as soon as she was relaxed enough to concentrate. First shedrank a glass of iced tea. Several minutes later, she made a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and poured herself a glass of milk. Nothing satisfied her.
    By midnight she’d given up on the safe and was pacing the floor while carrying on a debate with herself. Asa Canyon might be accustomed to being by himself, but he didn’t like it. He’d lost someone he cared about and she knew how that felt. And he ought not to be alone now.
    Sarah reached into her closet and pulled out the first thing she touched, a deep rose sundress with slim ribbon straps. She stepped into a pair of white sandals and dashed down the stairs. Besides, she couldn’t be mistaken about the way he’d responded to her kiss.
    No, Asa Canyon shouldn’t be alone. And he wouldn’t be, if Sarah could help it. A kiss was a promise, and if she was right, Asa would welcome her. If she was wrong, she’d turn around and come home and nobody would know but her.

Four
    Across the lake the moon hung low over the stand of loblolly pines. Asa studied the golden reflection on the water and decided that it looked like a spaceship, its exhaust wavering outward where the water rippled against the shore. The spaceship made him think of Sarah.
    Everything made him think of Sarah.
    He stood in the doorway listening to the silence, restless, unable to settle down, waiting for something he couldn’t explain.
    A layer of fog began to roll in over the surface of the water as the night air cooled. A frog’s voice pierced the air exploding like the urgent siren of an emergency vehicle on a rescue mission.
    The phone rang. It was Jeanie.
    Apologetic, anxious, at the same time undeniably happy, she wanted Asa to know thatshe and Mike were married. They were truly in love, perfect together. Mike loved to travel and he could go with her, wherever her assignments led her. She hadn’t known what Mike had done until they were on the plane. She hoped that Asa wouldn’t hate her for loving Mike.
    “I won’t, not if you really love him,” Asa said. “But you tell that smart aleck you ran off with that I’m planning his torture. He can just get ready.”
    Mike came on the phone. “I wouldn’t have done it, old buddy, if you’d understood. But you weren’t about to, and we didn’t have time for you to come around, so I had no choice.”
    In the end Asa gave them his blessings. He wondered, after the connection had been broken, if he would have been so willing to wish them well if it weren’t for Sarah.
    When he answered the knock on the door a moment later and found her standing there, he wasn’t sure whether she was real or he was hallucinating.
    Then she threw her arms around his neck and for a moment he gave in to the feeling of contentment she brought with her. Until he realized that what she was giving was more than comfort, and that he had no right to it.
    “You and the mayor were both wrong,” he said tightly. “Running doesn’t work, and cold showers only give me goose bumps.”
    “I know,” she responded softly. “Neither does peanut better and jelly. That’s why I came back.”
    “Maybe we’d better talk about this.”
    “Must we? I’d rather you kiss me.”
    “Sarah, I don’t think what you’re asking for is that simple. Let me put on my pants and we’ll go for a walk.”
    “Put on your pants?”
    Asa turned back into the dark cabin.
    Sarah followed.
    He stepped into a room off the small living area and turned on the light. Through the crack in the door Sarah could see him clearly. Tonight his underwear was blue. He stepped into a pair of faded worn jeans and picked up a pair of sneakers.
    She