Read Online Someone Like You by Barbara Bretton - Free Book Online Page B

fallen in love with her. Not that she had any idea how he felt. That was one of the few blessings inherent in his marrow-deep Englishness.
    She was quiet for most of the drive up to the house. Rain lashed the windscreen, and he focused his attentions on the winding, hilly roads. He had warned Mrs. Macdonald, the woman who tended the house and Annabelle when he was in Glasgow, that he would be bringing someone up for the weekend. The fireplaces would be crackling merrily against the wet spring chill. The rooms would be ablaze with light. And, pray God, his little girl would charm the unwilling Yankee into their lives.
    “Are we there yet?” she asked and when he looked at her for explanation, laughed. “That’s an American joke, William. It’s what little kids say when they’re on a driving vacation with their parents.”
    “Two more kilometers,” he said, and he noted a tiny muscle underneath her left eye twitch in response.
    “I didn’t know you lived out in the boonies.”
    He forced a quick smile. “An Americanism for Highlands?”
    “Something like that.”
    Minutes later he guided the car up the rock-strewn drive, which was lined with overgrown privet hedges and patches of sodden wild thyme that hadn’t seen a gardener’s touch in years.
    The house sat on a small rise overlooking the loch. He tried to see it through her eyes. The shutters hung slightly askew, framing windows that shivered in the punishing wind. The stones were soaked deep gray by the rain, and one glance would tell her that the roof needed repair. A pair of lopsided chimneys rose from either end of the roofline, flanking a satellite dish that always made him smile when he saw it. The front door, a deep barn red faded by time and the elements, was ajar in welcome.
    He couldn’t hear his heart beating anymore. He was fairly certain it had stopped entirely.
    He pulled the Martin up close to the front door. They dashed through the rain and into the warmth of the house, and he saw the moment it happened. The guarded expression in her eyes that he knew so well shifted and changed right in front of him, and for the briefest instant he saw straight through to her heart.
    “Pour yourself some brandy,” he said, directing her toward the library where the double hearth crackled merrily. “I’ll fetch Annabelle.”
    His daughter was playing upstairs in her room. Mrs. Macdonald had dressed her in a red jumper and blue overalls. Her tiny feet were laced into miniature pink trainers. He tried to see her through Joely’s eyes the way he had seen the house, but he couldn’t. She was his baby, and he loved her.
    “Joely,” he said as he and Annabelle walked hand-in-hand into the library, “I want you to meet Annabelle.”
    She turned, and her glance went from him to his daughter, and that was where it stayed. She bent down in front of his little girl. “Hi, Annabelle,” she said softly. “I’m Joely.”
    Annabelle reached out a baby hand and touched Joely’s left earring. “Want,” she said, starting to tug. “Want this!”
    He started to move his greedy child’s hand away, but Joely laughed and slid the earring out and handed it to Annabelle. His daughter cooed with delight and flung herself at Joely with all the force an almost-three-year-old girl could summon. She scooped his daughter up into her arms, and he felt his heart turn over inside his chest. For the first time since Natasha died, he believed he could have a future.
    That was four years ago. The blink of an eye. A lifetime.
    “We’ll be pulling into Kyoto in a few minutes,” George in the next seat said. “Push over. I need to have a slash.”
    “I need to check for messages,” William said as he got up to let George through. “Can I use your mobile?”
    George tossed it to him and headed down the narrow aisle toward the lav. “Don’t expect much, mate. You probably won’t be able to connect until we pull into the station.”
    “I’ll give it a try,” he said.