Read Online To Tell the Truth by Janet Dailey - Free Book Online Page A

Once, the coupling of those two months would have reminded her of the snide comments made about her marriage to John. Now, she could only consider that the heartbreak she had felt in December was just as agonizing in May.
    Leaning on the board fence, she stared at the beautiful white blossoms, a symbol of spring and the rebirth of life. It seemed as if she had only lived those few short days with Tell. Her life before and after was a vacuum.
    "It isn't fair," she whispered in self-pity. Surely she had been punished enough.
    The haunted, dispirited look filled her eyes, eyes that were too tired to cry—but the tears were shed within. Wrapped in the torment of lost love, Andrea didn't hear the footsteps approaching as she stared sightlessly at the flower-laden trees.  
    "If it was any other time of year, I would swear you were out here planning to steal some pears," a low voice teased.
    Andrea pushed herself away from the fence with a start. Using a gloved hand to brash a dark gold strand of hair from her face, she concealed her broken look, allowing herself the precious seconds she needed to put on her mask of composure.
    "Good morning, Adam," she greeted the sandy-haired man evenly.  
    "Andrea," he smiled naturally, a winning smile that added to his all-American look. His gaze turned to the trees. "I don't know which part of the season I like best. When the trees are white with blossoms, or the first green pears are loading the branches, or in the fall when gold globes weight the branches."
    "It depends which feeling is uppermost in your mind at a particular time," she answered lightly.
    "What do you mean?" He slid her a curious glance.
    "If you're feeling particularly aesthetic, then the blossom time is the best. The green pear urge is hard to ignore when you're hungry, and you can't ignore the fall greed when you start counting the profits hanging on the trees."
    Adam Fitzgerald threw back his head and laughed, "I should have known you would make some remark like that!"
    Recently, twisted by the pain that dogged her every footstep, her tongue had become bitterly cynical. "You work too hard sometimes, Adam. At harvest time Carolyn hardly ever sees you. She couldn't…you're always here. And when you aren't here, you're at some logging camp."
    "There's a lot of work to be done. John's given me a lot of responsibility. Carolyn understands that," he replied patiently.
    "She's much more understanding than I would be," Andrea told him, then sighed ruefully. "I should be saying how grateful I am for the way you take care of everything for John. I know how much he relies on you. Instead, I'm condemning you for doing too much."
    "Well—" Adam shrugged "—Carolyn and I will be married next month. In a few years, she'll probably be glad that I'm not around so much."
    "Oh, no," Andrea disagreed fervently—a protest that came from her own conviction that if she were married to Tell, she would miss him every minute he was away from her for the rest of her life, regardless of the reason for his absence.
    "As long as I'm not gone for very long," he qualified with a mocking smile. "You never did tell me what you were daydreaming about while you were staring at the trees."
    "Actually—" Andrea stalled, absently glancing at the basket and the velvet softness of the budding pink rose that touched her hand "—I was thinking that these roses would look nice with a spray of blossoms, and I was wondering if I dared cut one and escape with my life."
    "It looks to me as if you already have plenty of flowers in that basket," was his typically male response.
    "Mrs. Collins and her daughter are arriving this afternoon. Mrs. Davison thought it would be a good idea to have flowers scattered through the house, and it's a big house."
    "I suppose we could spare one small twig of potential pears," Adams surrendered good-naturedly. "Come on, I'll give you a hand."
    Holding the flower basket and the shears in one hand, he helped her climb over the fence