Tender Is the Storm by Johanna Lindsey Read Free Book Online Page B

wouldn’t like it there.

Five
    Sharisse waved her handkerchief through the air, hoping the wet cloth would cool a little before she brought it to her brow again, but it didn’t. She was appalled to be wiping herself with a piece of linen already soaked with perspiration, but there was no help for it. Her underclothes clung to her, as did her long-sleeved blouse, and the hair on her forehead and temples wouldn’t fit into the tight bun at her neck, so it clung, too.
    She had given up worrying about her appearance. She had meant to tone down her looks anyway, to be sure she wouldn’t be accosted on the train, even borrowing a pair of glasses from one of the maids before leaving home. Those had long since been broken and discarded, but it didn’t matter, because she looked her worst, anyway.
    How had everything gone wrong? She still couldn’t credit that she had only two dollars left. That would buy one more meal if this stage stopped again before reaching Newcomb. She hadeaten atrocious meals and had lost weight she couldn’t afford to lose. Lucas Holt would take one look at her and send her packing.
    She wasn’t supposed to be in this awful, hot place. She was supposed to be living comfortably in seclusion in some small midwest town with Charley to keep her company. Poor Charley. With his long, thick hair, he was suffering even worse than she was, losing great patches of fur, listless, panting constantly. How was she to know it would be this unbearably hot here? This was land she knew nothing about. But even if she had known, she couldn’t have left Charley behind.
    She still couldn’t believe Stephanie had done this to her. Sharisse was the one taking all the risks, including risking their father’s wrath, and all for Stephanie. Why would her sister have wanted to make things even more difficult for her? Yet she had tried to talk Sharisse into going all the way to Arizona. Worse became clear when Sharisse found her jewelry missing. She remembered handing her reticule that contained the jewels to Stephanie while she secured Charley in his traveling basket. After leaving the house, she had not set her reticule down once, tucking it beneath her skirt when she napped on the train that first day. She had found the jewels missing when she searched in the reticule for Mr. Holt’s letter. Why had Stephanie taken the jewels? The thought of being stranded so far from home terrified her, and she had no money to get back with. She would just have to wait and see what kind of man Lucas Holt was.
    His letter gave her no clue, though he sounded almost arrogant in making the stipulation that he have some time to approve her before they married. Well, that could work to her advantage if she had to depend on him for a while. She could use that excuse to postpone the wedding as long as necessary. She would have to disdain everything about him and his life so he wouldn’t be too surprised when she insisted it wouldn’t work out. And from what she had seen so far of Arizona and its hardy men, she didn’t think she would have to pretend very hard.
    The large Concord stage swayed as it crossed a nearly dried riverbed. Only patches of slimy puddles remained of the river. The brightly colored stage had room for nine passengers, but there were just four on this run. Only Sharisse would be staying in Newcomb. Because of the ample room, no one had minded when she had brought Charley out of his basket. They had stared at him, though, as if they had never seen a pet cat before. Maybe they hadn’t. She certainly hadn’t seen another cat since changing trains in Kansas.
    There were mountains ahead that actually had trees on them. This so surprised Sharisse after the deserts and wastelands and mountains of nothing but rock and cactus that she completely missed seeing the town until the driver called out, “Newcomb ahead. A one-hour stop, folks.”
    Sharisse’s stomach twisted into knots. Her vanity surfaced, and she suddenly wished that