Barefoot in the Sun by Roxanne St. Claire Read Free Book Online Page B

brochure she’d picked up at the party the night before. “Look.” She spun it around for him to see. “This used to be this crappy old house on the beach and now look at it. It’s a resort. I’m staying there.”
    “In that house?” He pointed to the largest of the villas, Bay Laurel.
    “I wish. No, my friend puts me up in the not-so-fancy staff housing.”
    He looked up. “Do you work there?”
    “Nah, they don’t have what I do.”
    “What’s that?”
    “I fly hot air balloons.”
    His jaw practically hit the floor and he climbed out of his chair. “You are…” He shook his head, speechless.
    She bit her lip to keep from laughing. “What?”
    “Like, you are the coolest person I’ve ever met.”
    Well, there you go, Zoe. Nice. Your heart just got handed to you on a platter by Oliver’s eight-year-old.
    “Thanks.”
    “When’s your birthday?” he asked suddenly.
    Now there was a question she never answered without consulting her latest fake ID. “Why do you want to know?”
    “I want to know your sign.”
    “You tell me first,” she said.
    “Oh, my birthday’s October 28. I’m a Scorpio. What are you?”
    She angled her head, considering so many possibilities. “Dubious. Do you know what that means?”
    “Doubtful, from the Latin dubito , to doubt. What are you doubting?”
    She cracked up. Could he be any more adorable, this little Einstein? “I’m doubting if you’re for real.”
    “Well, I do have a—”
    “Hundred-and-sixty-two IQ. I heard.”
    He grinned. “You want me to get the cards and you can teach me that game?”
    Holding up both hands, she shrugged. “What the—”
    “Hell,” he finished for her, scampering to the door. What a piece of work that kid was. Dumped by his mother, ignored by his father. She could sure relate to that. And he seemed so much older than…
    October 28. Eight years old.
    For a second she dropped back in the chair, pulling up an image of an unseasonably warm late March day nine years ago, when…
    Using her fingers, she counted the months between March and October.
    Seven months.
    Ice water trickled through her veins, numbing her to her fingertips as realization hit.
    Evan had already been conceived the day Zoe and Oliver took that balloon ride.
    Or maybe Oliver wasn’t—no. One look at Evan confirmed that he was Oliver’s son. Conceived when they were dating?
    Time to fly, Zoe.
    But she couldn’t run away from this; there was Pasha to consider. Pressing her fingers to her temples, she tried to think.
    He wasn’t going to help Pasha. He was going to do what Oliver always did: follow the rules, play by the book, and do the right thing. He’d send Pasha to another doctor, or a lawyer, or the police.
    So why was she sitting around here ready to relive an old pain? Or, worse, start up a new one?
    Run, Zoe, run.
    She snatched her bag and darted around the desk, praying she could get out without seeing him. She made it down the hall, ignored the secretary, then shot out the door into the lobby—right smack into Evan Townshend Bradbury.
    “I got the cards. Can we play that screw game?”
    Behind him, the bitch with the red hair dropped her jaw and stood, sparks shooting from her eyes.
    “This lady was just leaving, Evan.”
    The little boy’s face fell, but Zoe refused to let that stop her. The last person she wanted to fall for was Oliver’s son. Okay, the second-to-the-last person. “Yes, I was.”
    “Why?” he asked, his voice rising in a whine.
    “Because that’s what I do.”
    She dashed to the door and ran across the street to the safety of her getaway car.

Chapter Three
    O liver heard footsteps pounding down the hall, too fast, too loud, too…young to be Zoe. It was Evan, then, running amok in the office. He grunted under his breath as he flipped the last page of Eugene Carlson’s chart.
    “What?” the older man demanded. “Is there something you’re not telling me, Dr. Bradbury? You see something?”
    “Absolutely