Right Of Possession by Jayne Castle Read Free Book Online

Before she could summon up further arguments, however, he was already striding toward the front door.
    "Where are you going?" she demanded; annoyed with his strange actions. Xavier the cat lifted his head in casual question from across the room.
    "I'm going to get my overnight bag," Josh explained to both of them, leaving the door open as he stepped out into the hall and knocked on the door of the adjacent unit.
    "Josh, come back here!" Reva heard herself exclaim as she realized what he was doing. But it was too late. A moment later her neighbor Sandy opened the door. While Reva couldn't see her, she could hear her friend's voice quite clearly.
    "Did you find her all right? Good. Here's the bag you asked me to hang onto for you. Perhaps we'll see you in the morning? Tom and I would love to get to know you better. After all, Reva's a great friend of ours. Give her my congratulations, will you? Tell her I'll see her tomorrow." Reva could almost picture Sandy's bright auburn head and attractive features as "she peered around her door.
    "Thank you and thank your husband for the directions to the restaurant. I had no trouble finding it at all," Josh said politely. A moment later the other door closed and Josh reappeared, bearing a battered leather bag which looked as though it had seen as much action as he had.
    "Nice neighbors," he remarked laconically, kicking the door shut behind him and turning to throw the dead bolt. He tossed the leather bag down onto the carpet.
    "Josh," Reva began boldly, "I won't have it. Do you understand? I don't have any obligation to provide you with a place to sleep tonight!"
    "You owe me your life," he retorted with a wholly unexpected touch of brutality, coming toward her as he
    stripped off his jacket. The lion eyes clashed with her blue-green gaze and it was Reva who glanced away.
    "All right," she whispered, knowing she couldn't demand that he leave tonight, not if he was claiming a place to sleep as repayment for the way he'd saved her life. It was little enough she could do. And, besides, she wasn't at all sure how to get rid of him. Then there was Sandy and Tom next door. They'd surely hear the fracas if Reva tried to force her unwelcome visitor to leave. They would ask all sorts of questions. Questions she didn't feel up to answering tonight. In the morning she would explain everything to them. They would understand.
    Head high, she faced Josh across the distance of the room. "The couch makes into a bed. I'll get some sheets. But this is it, Josh. In the morning you'll have to leave. Is that clear?"
    "I hear you, little Reva," he half-smiled, halting a few feet away from her and watching her with such an intent look that she was suddenly afraid to say any more on the subject. She turned and went toward the hall closet to get the sheets and blankets.
    Half an hour later Reva tumbled into her own bed, the bedroom door shut firmly behind her. For a long time she lay quietly thinking about the man sleeping on her couch. She had never tried too hard to imagine what a reunion between them might be like because she had firmly refused to contemplate that such a reunion was a genuine possibility. And now it had taken place and somehow it seemed vastly more difficult than she would have thought.
    He would have to leave in the morning, she vowed to herself. He would have to leave. He was a hardened, weathered man but surely he couldn't be completely insensitive. He wouldn't stay when he realized she had no intention of being his 'dream' woman. And he would get
    over this strange fixation he'd developed about her. She wondered how often he had come out of the jungle in this sort of mood, and shivered. Were there other women scattered about the country who had felt the impact of his pent-up desire? Somehow she thought this situation was a little unique, just as he had claimed. Josh Corbett had no doubt known plenty of women, but she didn't see him as the type who vowed to marry each one with whom he had