Read Online The Letter by Rebecca Bernadette Mance - Free Book Online Page B

succulent touch. Victoria was too profoundly affected by William’s words to react to his licentious contact.
    “ I want you to be mine,” he whispered, emphasizing his lecherous intent.
    Recoiling from him, Victoria struggled to push her chair back.
    “ I am leaving,” she managed to choke out while she battled the train of her dress under the chair leg. “I can’t believe what you just said to me. Never, ever, have I been so shocked or embarrassed in my life. Even the rowdy, rough men who came to the store and made crude comments have never embarrassed me so much.”
    And they had never made her feel like this…all fluttering hot and quivering with need.
    “ Damnation. Victoria, wait,” William said, catching her arm in gentle restraint. “Don’t run away darling.”
    Victoria hesitated under his restraining hand, glaring at him, her rage and humiliation almost suffocating her.
    “ Obviously I have moved too fast in my courtship, but being with you has made me act in a most uncharacteristically rash fashion,” he soothed.
    “ Courtship…is that what you call this? I came here to talk to you about the store. You have done everything to divert me, and now, now . . . you have said this. Rash is not the word I would put to your comments. Something like “lewd” would be a better description!” Her chest rose and fell in agitation and furor of a different kind.
    She wanted him too.
    The shocking thought pummeled her. His words had elicited a foreign but undeniable rush of passion and need that stole her breath away.
    Mandy was right! It was a terrible mistake to come here. She should never have written that letter and she should never have left Fort Worth. But it was too late now. Pandora’s box was open wide and her previously undiscovered carnality and desires were pouring out.
    “ We are talking about the store,” he answered, his brilliant eyes pulling her with his anomalous magic power. “The store … you … me and the future,” he said slowly, his voice dropping lower, holding promise so delicious Victoria near fell from her seat.
    “ There is no you, me, or the future!” She declared, glaring at him in outrage, even while she drown in salacious images that were overtaking rational thinking.
    “ Isn’t there?” William coaxed. “Because I believe there has been since the moment we met. Or perhaps even further back than that, the moment you chose to write me that charming letter.” He smiled an incongruent tender smile.
    “ Your appetizer sir, madam….” The waiter inconveniently arrived. They stared at one another in tense silence while he arranged the platter and excused himself from the uncomfortable hush.
    “ What are you talking about?” she asked, her voice quivering.
    “ I know about your father, Victoria.”
    The air left Victoria’s lungs and the earth tilted under her feet. His jolting words suspended between them.
    He knew. Oh God, he knew!
    But how long had he known?
    “ I knew before you even arrived here,” he answered her mute question.
    “ Why did you lie to me, Victoria?” He asked quietly searching her astonished expression.
    She rapidly blinked away the tears that sprang into her eyes.
    “ What choice did I have? If you knew my father was gone, I was certain you would take the store away. I have Mandy to think about,” she justified, looking down at the fine crystal and china that adorned the table and starkly contrasted her life at home.
    Everything had gone so terribly wrong.
    “ And yourself, you had to save yourself,” he stated. She met his emphatic gaze again but said nothing.
    “ Did it ever occur to you just to write me and tell the truth?” he asked gently.
    “ Of course, that is what I wanted to do, but I am a woman and we both know women aren’t given the chance to do anything, much less run a store without a husband or father.”
    “ That may be true, but eventually I was bound to find out, wasn’t I?” he asked, raising one eyebrow as if