His Wicked Dream (Velvet Lies, Book 2) by Adrienne deWolfe Read Free Book Online Page B

son. Honestly, if she weren't more than twice your age, I think she'd try to marry you herself."
    Michael grimaced. He supposed he should be flattered that half the female population in this town hoped he'd set his cap for them, but he didn't think of himself as any great prize. The simple truth was, Blue Thunder was short on bachelors, and that meant the wedding-bell chasers had time to make mischief.
    Most bachelors in Blue Thunder considered the two-to-one ratio a dream come true. But for Michael, who knew his illness would prevent him from doing right by a wife, the surplus of love-starved women was nothing short of a nightmare.
    "You know, Michael," Sera said, locking her sky-blue stare with his. It was a sure sign she was about to brave forbidden territory. "It wouldn't hurt you to start courting again—and it sure would make my life easier," she muttered under her breath. "Did you get to meet Eden? Is she the hootenanny Bonnie says she is?"
    Michael nearly choked to have his kid sister stumble across his most shameful, secret fantasy about Eden.
    "'Course, I wouldn't want your heart stepped on by a hootenanny," Sera said quickly, misinterpreting his distress. "Bonnie says the only reason Eden left Colorado is 'cause the Injuns, Chinamen, and beggar-trash wouldn't have her."
    Michael flinched. He didn't want to believe that the seventeen-year-old he still remembered so vividly had fallen into the desperate straits of prostitution.
    "You have no right to spread such rumors, Sera."
    "I'm not spreading rumors," she corrected him primly. "Bonnie is. I'm just trying to find out more about Eden. Is she pretty?"
    Michael tore his gaze free as the heat started building again in his face... and his loins.
    The devil take him. How was he supposed to answer Sera? That Eden Mallory transcended "pretty"? That she was an angel, a vision of the divine? That he was an unholy bastard for taking an innocent's memory to bed with him every night, year after year, until the fantasies had eroded the reality completely?
    Crouching under that wagon today, thigh to thigh with the flesh-and-blood woman, he might not have recognized her at all, if it hadn't been for her cascade of auburn hair. And then to learn from Aunt Claudia that her niece, his fantasy, was named Eden, of all things...
    "Michael Elijah, I declare." The unabashed amusement in Sera's voice brought him crashing back to the present. "You're blushing."
    He snapped erect, towering over her in dire warning. She merely grinned.
    "So, you liked her, eh?"
    "Seraphina, I will not have you matchmaking for me."
    "Of course not, Michael." She flashed impish dimples and turned on her heel, tossing the apron over the banister.
    "Sera! Where are you going?"
    "To take a gander at this Eden Mallory you like so much."
    Michael groaned to himself. The last thing he wanted was Sera growing friendly with a woman whose father had been a doctor. If any of Mallory's medical wisdom had rubbed off on Eden, she was the one person he could count on to see past his pretenses and warn Sera he was sick.
    "Sera," he said sternly, "ogling strangers and carrying tales are not pastimes for proper young girls—"
    "I know," she countered cheerfully. "That's why I do them." Waving, she darted for the kitchen's outside door.
    "Sera—"
    "Bye, Michael," she called, her words floating above a receding rumble of thunder. "Have a nice sulk."
    He muttered an oath. For a moment, he chased after her. But when the lower half of the back door slammed and he glimpsed her dashing rabbitlike through the puddles of their backyard, he stopped to reconsider. Short of raising Sera's suspicions, and acting like a horse's rear end in the process, what possible excuse could he provide to prevent his sister from visiting their landlord and her guest?
    Giving in to the torment, Michael finally raised a hand to his head. Hellfire. Eden Mallory was bunking next door.
    It was going to be a long summer.
    Rubbing his temples, Michael turned