Run Wild With Me by Sandra Chastain Read Free Book Online Page B

it around.
    “Wait, Andrea.” Sam reached over and placed his hand on hers. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean totease you. Couldn’t we just talk for a minute? I need some advice.”
    What he needed was a cold shower, a swift kick in the pants. He didn’t belong in Arcadia, Georgia, and no foolish emotional binge about having a real home was going to make him fit, even if the thought of giving it a try had occurred to him in the wee hours of the morning. Going over to talk to the tax commissioner was downright dumb.
    Andrea stopped the car again, watching the change of emotion on Sam’s face. What on earth could she have to say to a vagabond man who had already traveled half the world? That he was dangerous? That he made her breathing do funny things? That she wanted to examine the heart-shaped tattoo up close and in detail, wanted to go back ten years and be one of those teenagers who parked under this old oak tree? But she’d never gone skinny-dipping in the creek then, and now it was too late. She wasn’t naive anymore.
    “Talk?” If she was going to talk with him, she wanted it to be in the middle of the Arcadia High School gym with a full house.
    The bright summer sun hit the hood of the squad car and glared through the window. Good, she didn’t want the conversation to be too private. With supreme effort she pulled her thinking together and forced herself to be calm.
    “All right, Mr. Farley, what can I do for you?”
    You can take off that hat and let your hair down the way it was the first night we met
, he wanted to say.
You can open that car door and go for a walk with me by the stream. We can hold hands and pretend we’re a couple of those
teenagers who come to this spot for privacy, for touching and kissing
.
    Sam let his hand slide to the seat beside him. In spite of something in her eyes that told him she wasn’t entirely unaware of the tension that sparked between them, touching and kissing this woman would not be a smart move. He already knew what the results of that kind of thinking would be, and he wasn’t interested in either jail or marriage.
    “Is there someone else waiting to pay the taxes and claim the farm if I don’t?”
    Andrea thought of Ed Pinyon’s plans for the property and decided not to spoil Sam’s mental picture of the land being farmed. Knowing the truth would only spoil Sam’s memory of his mother’s home after he’d gone. “Probably, but I doubt anybody’d live here. People want new houses like they’re building in town now. They don’t appreciate the old homes like Mamie’s.”
    “Oh, she’s a jewel, all right. She’s a grand old lady who just needs a little loving care.”
    Andrea was startled by the genuine excitement in his voice. There was something to the man other than his ability to set off hormonal combustion inside her. “You really like old houses?”
    “I’m a carpenter, remember? With the right tools and a little work, you’d be surprised how my grandmother’s house could look.”
    Andrea heard confidence in his voice and pride, coupled with a kind of suppressed wistfulness that he couldn’t disguise. She hadn’t expected a house to get to him. But he did sound serious about staying in Arcadia. If he really wanted toget to the courthouse, they’d better be on their way. She released the brake and drove the car back to the highway.
    “Say, do people ever swim in the stream back there?” Sam asked, rubbing perspiration from his forehead with his arm.
    “Sure. Farther downstream is Minor’s Lake and a city park where Arcadia holds a Founder’s Day celebration and picnic every Fourth of July.”
    “Founder’s Day celebration? Really? Tell me more about your community, Chief Fleming.”
    “Arcadia was settled in the 1800s by big cotton-plantation owners. It was a gay, thriving city in its time. Then came the Civil War, and the planters lost everything. Now we have nine hundred and thirty-six residents in the city limits, with about the same