Read Online The Heart of a Hero by Janet Chapman - Free Book Online Page A

Julia was about to lose access to her supply of cedar. She could collect pinecones on Nova Mare land and dry her balsam needles and package her soaps in her new apartment, but he suspected the kindling was her most lucrative product.
    And since there didn’t appear to be anyone around to stop him, Nicholas pulled out his cell phone to call some of his men to come load up a couple of pickups with the cedar, because what fun was there in bringing a small team of elite warriors with him from Atlantis if they couldn’t do a little neighborly raiding to keep life interesting? It wasn’t like they were attacking Carthage or anything; they’d leave all the buildings and equipment and any stacked stones intact.
    And they’d grab the chopping block and hatchets and pinecones while they were at it, along with the soaps and pillows and balsam needles, and simply move Julia’s little cottage industry up the mountain—which should make the order-issuing, stick-wielding woman deliriously happy that he’d butted into her business.
    But Nicholas suddenly slipped the phone back in his jacket with a snort. It was obviously longer than he remembered since he’d found himself interested in a lovely lady, as he’d apparently forgotten the finer points of a romantic pursuit. Though similar in some ways to mounting a war campaign, he wanted to
capture
this particular target, not overpower her. And last he knew, women balked at a full-speed, head-on attack, but usually responded quite nicely to a more subtle approach.
    He took one last look around, then walked out and pulled the door shut. How convenient that he happened to have a workshop at his new home that was filled with scraps of lumber he’d intended to cut up for kindling. He also happened to know where several large stands of pines teeming with cones stood, some of the groves requiring a slow, lazy boat ride to reach. Well, slow if they happened to be dragging a couple of fishing lines behind them. And what woman wasn’t attracted to a man who enjoyed long walks in the woods?
    No; he’d never been accused of
not
taking advantage of a situation, especially when the prize was a lovely lady he wouldn’t mind finding curled up in bed beside him one morning very soon.
    Nicholas made it back to the house in time to grab two large trash bags just as Olivia set them on the porch. “Let me carry anything down from upstairs,” he said, heading to the truck with what felt like clothes.
    He made five trips inside, up the stairs and down, carrying several more trash bags full of Julia’s and Trisha’s belongings. His last trip to the truck, however, found him carrying a large plastic bin of carefully packed items Julia had pulled off the walls and taken from a china cabinet in the living room. Apparently worried she wouldn’t be allowed back in the house, it appeared the woman was taking some of her mother’s more precious possessions.
    “I . . . There’s one more thing I need to get,” Julia said as she set a half-filled trash bag in the rear seat and turned to Olivia. “You can wait here,” she added, heading at a stilted run toward the mill. “I’ll just be a minute.”
    Nicholas decided he was going to have to get used to Julia’s concepts of time and distance, however, when ten minutes went by and she still hadn’t returned.
    “Let me go see what’s keeping her,” Olivia said, heading for the mill only to stop halfway there when she realized he was following. “I think I should go alone, Nicholas. Julia’s still pretty embarrassed about what happened today and . . . last night.” She shook her head. “I would have come alone with her this afternoon, but I wanted you here in case Vern suddenly showed up.” She smiled. “And to lug the heavy stuff.” But then she sobered and touched his arm. “Don’t take it personally, okay? Just try to understand that it’s . . . well, it’s humiliating for a grown woman to have a man see her throwing all her