A Long Tall Texan Summer: Tom Walker by Diana Palmer Read Free Book Online

searched her wan face. "You loved him once."
    "A long time ago," she replied, "and he never felt the same way, even then. He talked to me, but it was never more than that, until he got drunk. He doesn't love me. He wanted me that once, and now he doesn't anymore. He thinks I'm a gold digger, out for money and nothing else. He told me so. That was a
    week or so before the business meeting."
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    "Tom actually accused you of that?" Luke was surprised, because Tom hadn't said anything about that
    to him, either.
    "We had words on the street, and I slapped him." She flushed at her brother's level look. "Well, he deserved it! He made me out to be cheap, and all because that French buyer had humiliated me loud enough for the whole town to hear." Her eyes flashed. "Hell will freeze over before I give him a contract
    for our designs,"
    she added coldly. "He did that deliberately
    because I wouldn't have an affair with
    him."
    "Did you tell Tom that?"
    "He didn't let me tell him anything," she replied. "He made a lot of nasty accusations and I hit him. I'm glad I hit him," she added. "I only threw a shoe at him and missed at the business meeting, but I'll practice," she assured
    herself. "Next time, I'll knock his brains out!"
    Luke had to bite back a grin. "He has got quite a few hang-ups," he reminded her. "It will take a brave woman to live with a man like that, if she can even get him in front of a minister to get married. He's frozen halfway through because of his father."
    "I wish I'd known that in New York. It's too late to matter much now. A man that age isn't going to change." She stared out the window
    and grimaced. "But I'm sorry he had a bad time of it." She glanced back at her brother with a rueful smile. "I guess his upbringing was like ours."
    He smiled sadly. "I guess it was," he agreed. "The world is full of wounded children who grow up to be
    wounded adults.
    Sometimes they get lucky and find solace in each other."
    "Sometimes they withdraw and strike at anyone who comes close," she replied.
    He chuckled. "An apt description of our Mr. Walker. But he has a weakness. Crissy. She winds him around her finger."
    "He really likes her?" she asked.
    "He's crazy about her," he said. "She likes him, too. If you're wise, you won't try to separate them.
    There's already a bond growing."
    "I wouldn't deny him access," she said defensively. "But it's going to complicate things. He doesn't like me at all, and it's mutual."
    "He doesn't know you, Ellie. Give him a chance."
    "Even if I would, he'll never give me one," she said finally.
    He saw that arguing with her wasn't going to solve anything. He winked at her instead. "I'll clean those fish for you."
    She was a bundle of nerves by five-thirty. Crissy, in a neat little pink skirt and tank top, was setting the table. She glanced at her mother with wry amusement for such a young child. Elysia, in a sedate denim dress and loafers,
    was pacing the floor. Her hair, in a neat chignon, gleamed in the sunlight filtering Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html through the window.
    Luke came down the hall with a grin on his handsome face. "You'll wear holes in the floor," he told her.
    "Quit that."

    "I'll go mad long before six o'clock," she moaned. "Oh, Luke, why did you..." Her voice trailed off into a
    faint gasp as she heard the crunch of car tires on the gravel driveway. She looked out the window, and there was the gray Lincoln.
    "He's here." She choked.
    "Is it him?" Crissy called, running into the living room. She looked out the screen door. "It is!" She opened the door and ran to him. "Hi, Mr. Tom!"
    The sight of the child running toward him aroused odd sensations in Tom Walker. He opened his arms and caught her, lifting her high, his eyes twinkling with the joy that raged inside him. This was his own, his
    child, his blood. Amazing how attached he'd become to her in such