Dream's End by Diana Palmer Read Free Book Online

comradeship had disappeared forever. Overnight they were adversaries, it seemed.
    â€œGot that?” he shot at her when he finished the last letter.
    â€œYes,” she replied sweetly. “Disappointed?”
    His jaw clenched. His face hardened, and he started to rise with a hint of violence that made her heart leap when the door opened suddenly and Amanda breezed in wearing a jaunty gray pantsuit with a white silk blouse.
    â€œGood morning, darling.” She smiled at Curry. “Hi, Eleanor!” she added pleasantly.
    â€œGood morning,” Eleanor replied, lowering her gaze as Amanda slid her thin arms around Curry’s towering neck and reached up to kiss him.
    â€œEleanor?” Amanda turned abruptly, her eyes wide and disbelieving as they fixed on the young girl who sat in the dowdy spinster’s place at the table beside Curry’s huge desk. “Is it you?” she whispered.
    â€œIt is,” Curry smiled maliciously. Hiseyes narrowed on his secretary’s face. “Jim’s handiwork,” he added.
    Something in Amanda relaxed at the words. “Romance in the air?” she teased.
    â€œMaybe,” Eleanor agreed cautiously.
    Curry turned away. “Let me make a phone call and I’ll take you down to the corral with me and show you how we brand the cattle.”
    Eleanor could have sworn Amanda’s complexion went two shades lighter.
    â€œBranding? But, Curry, darling,” she purred, following him to place a pleading slender hand on his hard muscled arm. “I had my heart set on driving into Houston today.”
    â€œWe’ll go later,” Curry told her inflexibly. “I can’t take the time this morning. You know what we go through with roundup.”
    â€œNo I don’t, actually, and I’m not at all sure I want to learn.” Amanda laughed nervously. “I don’t like all that dust, and, darling, cattle smell so.”
    Curry’s jaw clenched hard. “You’ll get used to it.”
    Amanda looked resigned. “Perhaps. At least, after we’re married, I can go to Houston and get away from it,” she teased. “I’ll keep my apartment and we can spend weekends there.”
    Curry didn’t say anything, but his dark face was stormy. He dialed a number and waited. “Terry? I’m going to need you this afternoon if you can make it. I’ve got a new shipment of heifers and I want them all checked before I turn them in with the herd. You can? Thanks. See you about one.”
    He hung up, and Eleanor knew immediately that he’d been talking to Terry Briant, the local vet. She smiled. Terry was a confirmed bachelor, a little crusty around the edges, but he knew his job and he was well liked in the community. He’d come for Curry, but this was one of the busiest times of the year for him, and he wouldn’t have made room for many people in his schedule.
    â€œAll right,” Curry told Amanda, grabbing up his battered wide-brimmed ranch hat and propelled her out the door. He didn’t bother to spare a glance for Eleanor, a deliberate omission that cut her. Curry could be the very devil when he wasn’t getting things the way he wanted them. And, Eleanor thought doggedly, this was one time he wasn’t going to win, no matter how hard he put on the pressure.
    Â 
    For the next two days, Eleanor did her job with robotlike precision, ignoring Curry’s temper and impatience with a stoic calm that she was far from feeling. It was on the third day that things seemed to come to a head.
    It had been a long day, and Eleanor was sitting in the porch swing with the phone in her lap talking to Jim Black when Curry came in from the fields where he’d been checking on the haying.
    â€œJim, I’ve got to go now,” she said as Curry came up the steps.
    â€œWhen am I going to see you?” Jim asked pointedly.
    â€œMaybe this weekend. I’ll phone you. Good