Secrets Of Bella Terra by Christina Dodd Read Free Book Online

because she was like his Nonna but because . . . well, because she was tall with a nice rack and good legs. Not admirable reasons, Rafe now admitted, but hell—he’d only been fourteen. At that age, higher aspirations were beyond him.
    So he’d hauled her along in his wake as he swaggered and sneered his way through seventh grade.
    By eighth grade she was a habit.
    By the time they reached high school, she had grown into her awkward beauty and every guy envied him. Not that he laid a hand on her. She was too young, too innocent, too adoring of him, and he was by God determined not to be the jerk his father was, grabbing at every young woman bowled over by his looks. So he kept her at arm’s length, and kept all the other guys there, too, and he was pretty proud of his restraint right up to the time when her crap-ass father came for graduation. When he left, she told Rafe everything went well.
    He snorted.
    She looked at him, blue eyes wide and unblinking, and even he, dumb, insensitive guy that he was, saw the anguish she concealed. What was he supposed to do? Leave her to suffer alone?
    He wasn’t inexperienced sexually, hadn’t been since his earliest adolescence. He knew better than to sleep with her, but my God! They were best friends . . . who fell so wildly in love.
    First love, bright and clean. Forever.
    Except, of course, it wasn’t forever.
    His own fault, he guessed. Because ever since Rafe figured out his own father was far from the hero he portrayed on the screen, since Rafe had done his role in that dragon movie and realized people expected him to be who he had pretended to be—Rafe had been determined to become the real thing. Not some silly on-screen superman, but a brave man. A man of integrity. A true hero.
    At the end of that magical summer, he had followed his dream and joined the military.
    When Brooke found out, she had thrown a fit unlike anything he had ever imagined from the cool, composed girl. She said he should have consulted her.
    Now, looking back, he knew why she’d thought that. They had a relationship.
    And she talked. She talked about going to college and what she was going to study. She discussed her mother’s puzzling behavior in moving them here, and how it was fate that Kathy Petersson had chosen Bella Terra and he’d moved in with his grandmother at the same time. She speculated about their future, painting mental pictures of their lives entwined together forever.
    But it never occurred to him that his plans mattered to her, or that she’d consider his determination to join Special Forces a clear sign that he would turn into a jerk like her father. She hadn’t understood that his decision had nothing to do with her father and everything to do with his.
    In the annals of arguments, theirs had been epic, and by the time he boarded that plane to go to basic training, their relationship was over and she vowed never to speak to him again.
    That hadn’t worked out so well. Her senior year in college . . .
    He sighed.
    “What?” she said.
    “Nothing.” They were like two planets circling each other, and each time it was a cosmic event filled with light and heat and always, always a colossal explosion.
    They pulled up to Nonna’s house and Rafe had a choice—get right down to business or have a frank and open discussion about their relationship.
    He got down to business. Not because he was a coward, but because his priority was Nonna’s safety. He told Brooke, “I want you to follow me through the house. I’m looking for something, anything that strikes you as odd. Anything out of place. Anything . . . anything.”
    “You want a second pair of eyes,” she said.
    “I want a feminine perspective. You taught me early on that women look at things differently.”
    “Not differently. Women look at things properly.” She grinned.
    “Hm.” He didn’t grin back, but not because he wasn’t amused. Because when he saw that impish smile light her whole face, it tugged at his