The Creed Legacy by Linda Lael Miller Read Free Book Online Page B

indifferent.
    Brody squared his shoulders, walked on toward the small log structure where he’d been bunking for too damn long.
    He switched on the lights as he stepped over the threshold, but two of the three long fluorescent bulbs in the ceiling fixture were burned out, the third flickering ominously, and the ambience was just plain gloomy.
    The original furnishings were gone, except for the long counter that had served as a sign-in place for campers, when Joe McCall was still running River’s Bend, and the ancient woodstove. Brody slept on a roll-away bed he’d borrowed from Kim and Davis, never made up now that he and Joleen were in an “off” stage of the onagain-off-again thing they had going. He’d had a shower installed in the small rest room, and he did his laundry either at the Wash-and-Go on Main Street or out at the ranch. He owned a double-burner hot plate and a minifridge with a microwave the size of a matchbox sitting on top, and his desktop computer served as TV, DVD player and general, all-around communication device. He used a cell phone when he had something to say to somebody, or he went to see them in person, face-to-face.
    What a concept.
    Tricia’s dad had always referred to the shack as a lodge.
    Brody called it a log cabin—or a shit-hole, depending on his frame of mind.
    That night, despite his best efforts to alter his attitude, it was a shit-hole.
     
     
    H E’D KISSED HER.
    Try though she might, even after the ride on Blossom and the meandering drive back to town, Carolyn could not get past the fact that Brody Creed had had the nerve, the unmitigated gall, after all he’d done to her, to haul right off and kiss her.
    “Unbelievable,” she told Winston in the apartment kitchen as she set his nightly kibble ration down in front of him. “The man is unbelievable. ”
    “Reow,” Winston agreed, though he went straight to his food dish.
    Carolyn shoved up one T-shirt sleeve, then the other, still agitated. She was hungry, but not hungry enough to cook. Remembering the flat bologna sandwiches from lunch, she went downstairs, retrieved them from the refrigerator in Natty’s former kitchen and pounded back up the inside steps.
    She tossed one wrapped sandwich into her own fridge—maybe she’d have it for breakfast—and slowly removed the plastic from the other one.
    Winston was still noshing away on his kibble.
    Carolyn washed her hands and then plunked down in a chair at the table, along with her sewing machine, the day’s mail and a rapidly cooling cup of herbal tea.
    “I’m talking to a cat, ” she told the cat.
    Winston didn’t look up from his bowl. “It’s pathetic,” Carolyn went on. She took a bite out of her sandwich, and it was soggy, tasteless. The crusts of the bread were curling a little, too, and none of that even slowed her down. The meal wasn’t about fine dining, after all. It was about making her stomach stop grumbling. “ I’m pathetic. And do you know what, Winston? I’m no closer to achieving my goals than I was last year, or the year before that, or the year before that— ”
    Winston paused at last, gave her a disapproving glance for talking with her mouth full and finished off the last of his supper.
    Carolyn offered him part of her sandwich, but he wasn’t into people-food, except for sardines, and he’d already had his daily ration of those.
    “You tried to warn me, didn’t you?” she prattled on, dropping the remains of her supper into the trash and then washing her hands again. She squirted a dab of lotion into one palm and then rubbed the stuff in with vigor. “You made your opinion of Brody Creed absolutely clear, but did I pay attention? Did I keep my defenses up?”
    “Reoooooow,” Winston said wearily.
    “This is ridiculous,” Carolyn said, addressing herself now, instead of the cat. Was talking to herself better than talking to a pet? Seemed like six of one thing and half a dozen of another. “I’ve got to get a grip. Do