After the Music by Diana Palmer Read Free Book Online

packed and ready to go," she promised. "Now I'd better get some sleep. Walk me home?"
    "I'll drive you," he said. "Don't worry. It will be all right."
    She hoped he was on target with that prediction. She truly was afraid of Hamilton Regan Thorndon the Third, and he hated her. This was an insane thing to do; she needed her head examined. Of course, maybe he wouldn't be at the ranch. She comforted herself with that hope. Then she realized something else.
    "Jessica!" she burst out as he pulled up in front of her apartment house.
    He stared curiously. "What?"
    She swallowed. "Uh, I was just wondering what people will think."
    "That's not what you said. Sabina, please. What's going on?"
    The painfully hopeful expression on his face made her come out with it. Jess would kill her, but maybe it would be worth it. "She'll kill me for telling you. But..." she sighed, eyeing him. "Well, you see, Jess is in love with you."
    He seemed struck dumb. At a loss for words, he stared at the dashboard as if he'd never seen it. His fingers toyed with the key in the ignition. "She is?"
    Sabina didn't reply. She just sat and watched him. He took a deep breath and began to smile.
    "Are you sure?" he asked, glancing at her. She nodded, smiling back
    "Damn!" He took another deep breath. "Jess..." Then the sudden exaltation faded and his face fell. "What difference does it make now? Thorn won't let me have her. She doesn't have an oil refinery."
    "I'm going to be the decoy, remember?" She grinned at him, flashing the emerald. "Go tell Jess you just got engaged to me. She's home alone tonight. I was going to have a late cup of coffee with her after the show. You can go instead of me."
    He frowned and then smiled. "Well-"
    "Go on, for Pete's sake! Thorn won't know unless you tell him!"
    He shrugged. "Well-"
    "Faint heart never won, etc., etc.," she quoted.
    "You're right." He glanced at her. "You aren't afraid to go through with this?"
    Sabina shook her head. Inside she was trembling, but no one would ever know it. Jess was her best friend. Al was as much to her. She could do this one thing for them. Besides, she thought angrily, it would do the oil baron good to be set on his heels for once. And she was just the girl to do it.
    "Okay. Here goes nothing. See you tomorrow."
    She got out of the car. "Don't blow it, Romeo," she teased.
    He made a face at her and pulled back out into traffic, preoccupied and thoughtful. She thought about calling Jess to warn her. But then she reasoned that Jess was a divorcee with a sharp mind, and didn't. Jessica could take care of herself. Or, at least, that's what she thought until the next morning.
    Just as she was having her first cup of coffee, there was a hard knock on her door.
    She got up and opened it, shocked to find Jessica standing there, her eyes red-rimmed, her red hair disheveled.
    "Jess!" she burst out. "What's wrong?"
    "Everything," came the wailing reply. "Can I have some coffee, please?"
    "Of course." Sabina pulled her robe closer and got a second cup from the cupboard. When she came back into the room, Jessica was sitting at the small table with her head in her hands. "What happened?"
    "Doesn't it show?"
    Sabina took a long, hard look at her best friend, shocked by her unruly appearance, the dark shadows under her eyes.
    "Al and you...?" Sabina said.
    "Bingo!" Jessica poured herself a cup of coffee and sipped it nervously. She looked up with a pained expression. "What did you say to Al last night?"
    Sabina blinked. "Nothing." She lied.
    "You must have said something, you must have," Jessica moaned. She put the coffee cup down. "He came to the apartment. He was passing, he said, and thought I might have a spare cup of coffee. You know how I feel, how I've felt for months. Well, he said you and he had just got engaged, and I. went crazy. I threw a lamp at him and swore." She smiled sheepishly. "Well, one thing led to another, and he kissed me. Then he told me the engagement was just to throw Thorn off the