One White Rose by Julie Garwood Read Free Book Online

too. We'd rather go without than give either one of the Coopers our hard-earned money."
    "If Ryan were to show up and arrest Boyle, would the man whose hands were broken testify against him?"
    Simpson shook his head. "I expect Ryan will have to find another way to get rid of Boyle," he said, "or run his henchmen out of town first. Wendell's too scared to testify. He's got a wife and two young daughters. He doesn't dare say a word against Boyle, or his family will pay the consequences. The poor man. He's got crops that will be ready to harvest in a couple of weeks, and with broken hands he's going to have to watch them rot."
    "Won't some of the town help him?"
    "They're afraid to do anything that might make Boyle mad."
    "Why does he want Isabel's land?"
    "He's telling everyone he wants to put his cattle there to graze. He has a lot of land surrounding his . ranch house, but he rents that out to some foreigners who buy cattle down in Texas and have them brought I up to his land to fatten up. Boyle's made a fortune over the last fifteen years, but he's greedy, and he wants more."
    "If he wants to use Isabel's land, why doesn't he do it? She couldn't stop him, and he has to know that."
    "He doesn't just want her land, son, he wants her too. He's real blatant about letting everyone know she's going to belong to him. Why, he struts around town like a fat rooster inviting people to the wedding. Folks say he started lusting after her the second he saw her."
    "Why is he waiting? He could force her to marry him now."
    "You don't understand Boyle the way I do. Pride's involved. He wants her to beg him to marry her, and he figures if he makes her desperate enough, she'll do just that."
    "Did he kill her husband?"
    "If the bullet hadn't gone through his back, I would have suspected Parker accidentally killed himself. I'm not speaking ill of the dead, you understand. I'm only stating facts, and the fact is that Isabel's husband was about as useful as a kettle with a hole in the bottom, The man had grand notions about all sorts of things. He treated Isabel good though, real good. And he was kind to crazy old Paddy, even though he knew Boyle would hear of it and be furious."
    Douglas was intrigued. "Being kind to an old man infuriated Boyle?"
    "It's perplexing, isn't it? Paddy came to Sweet Creek straight from Ireland and had lived here for as long as I could remember. Boyle came along about ten years ago and squatted on the land adjacent to where Isabel is living now. Within a year he started building himself a grand three-story house, and when it was finished, it was as fancy as any you'll see in the East, I'll wager you. He filled it with new furniture he had shipped from Europe and then had a big party the whole town was invited to so he could show off the palace. Even Paddy was invited, but something happened that night that started the feud between the two men. No one recollects seeing the two of them together during the shindig, but from that night on, Boyle tormented Paddy with a vengeance. Folks started calling the Irishman crazy then because no matter how often Boyle came after him, Paddy laughed about it. You know what that crazy man told me while I was patching him up one evening? He said he was going to have the last laugh. Can you imagine? The funny thing is, he did."
    "How'd he do that?"
    "Well now, I'm getting to that, son. Paddy was dying of consumption. He hung on until one Saturday night, because he knew that was when Boyle always went to the saloon to play cards. I happened to be there that night too, and I'll tell you it was the strangest dying I've ever seen. Paddy had dragged himself out of his sickbed, came into the saloon, and then laid down on the floor. He folded his hands together on top of his chest as though he was already in his coffin and announced he was going to die in a few minutes. That's when things turned mighty peculiar. Boyle knocked a chair over running to the old man. He knelt down beside him, waving