Lady's Choice by Jayne Ann Krentz Read Free Book Online Page A

"Scream hysterically and fling ourselves over the balcony? It's been five years, after all."
    "Yeah, but we both know his showing up here at this point is not just one of those strange little coincidences that sometimes happen in life. Nothing that man does is a coincidence. Believe me."
    "You know him that well, do you?" Elly gripped the railing and faced the sea. The evening breeze ruffled her graceful white skirts.
    "Let's say I'm getting to know him better by the minute. He's the one, isn't he? The one you were going to marry five years ago. The one who saved Flame Valley Inn from bankruptcy."
    Elly bowed her head. "Yes: He wanted me and he wanted the resort, and Dad and Uncle Roy needed his help desperately."
    "Nobody ever told me the whole story. And I knew was that you'd been shaken to the core by the whole incident. I thought he'd seduced and abandoned you or something, but it wasn't like that, was it?"
    "No." Elly sounded thoroughly miserable. "I'm the one who broke the engagement."
    "But not before you'd played the role of Judas Goat, right? You led him on, making him think that you were going to marry him and that he would get a share of the inn that way? But first he had to do everyone the little favor of saving Flame Valley from its creditors."
    Elly turned to Juliana, her expression anguished. "It wasn't like that. I honestly thought I was in love with him at first. And everyone encouraged me to think that way, including Travis. It was only as time went on that I began to realize I was not in love with him, that what I had felt was just a sort of fascination, a crush. You ought to understand crushes. Men are always having them on you."
    "Sure. And they last all of a day, if that. Within forty-eight hours they always come to their senses and back off as fast as they can. But this was more than a crush, Elly. You got engaged to the man."
    "It was a mistake," Elly cried.

    "What brought about that great realization?"
    "You don't know what it was like. He... he frightened me in some ways, Juliana. He was always one step ahead of everyone else. Always plotting and scheming. Always had his eye on the main goal.
    Always willing to do whatever it took to reach that goal. I decided he was just using me to get a share of Flame Valley. I didn't think he could really be in love with me. A man like that never really falls in love with a woman."
    "So you used him? You didn't tell him the engagement was off until after he'd accomplished the job of saving Flame Valley, did you?"
    "I didn't use him," Elly protested. "Or if I did, you'd have to say I was evenly matched, because he certainly used me, too. In any event, the reason I didn't tell him the engagement was off was because Dad wouldn't let me."
    "Oh, come on, Elly." But Juliana believed her. Anthony Grant had his faults but he had been a good father and utterly devoted to Elly, having raised her alone since the death of his beloved wife years ago. Elly returned that devotion in full measure. She was fiercely loyal to Tony Grant. It would have taken a great deal to make her go against her father's wishes. Obviously whatever she had felt for Travis had not been enough to counter the loyalty she felt toward her father.
    Elly swallowed heavily, slanting an uneasy sideways glance at Juliana's angry expression. "It was wrong, I know it was, but I was afraid. I couldn't bring myself to tell Travis the truth and wind up being the reason the inr went into bankruptcy. And make no mistake about it, fravis would have walked out and let the whole pk te go under if he'd found out the wedding wasn't going to take place. Dad explained to me that Travis had only taken die job in the first place because he wanted a piece of Flame Valley Inn.
    They had an understanding. A sort of gentleman's agreement. Travis would collect his fee—a partnership in Flame Valley— the day he married me."
    "So you continued to wear Travis's ring until he'd pulled Flame Valley out of the red."
    "I had to wait