The Traveling Kind by Janet Dailey Read Free Book Online

because she was on the scene and available. Charley had guessed all this but there was no satisfaction in having her suspicions confirmed. One foolish segment of her heart was wishing he had lied.
    Her gaze lingered on his averted face and watched the breeze rumple his heavy black hair. When he turned his head to meet her look, she felt the throb of tension in the air. It was broken by the powerful drone of an approaching car. They both glanced at the intruder on the scene as the car entered the ranch yard.
    “It looks like you have a visitor,” Shad remarked with cool indifference.
    Charley had recognized the late-model Buick slowing to a stop near the house and would have passed the information along to him if he had shown the least amount of interest. But he had turned his back to her, his attention reverting to the partially dismantled truck motor.
    There was taut pressure in the line of her mouth as she started forward to greet the stocky man climbing out of the cream-colored Buick. She forced it into a curving smile of welcome when she came closer to him.
    “Hello, Chuck,” she greeted the owner of the neighboring ranch, her most patient and persistent admirer.
    He took off his beige, felt Stetson in a gesture of old-fashioned deference to the presence of a woman. His white dress shirt emphasized the broadness of his thickening waist. A heavy silver buckle inlaid with turquoise protruded with his stomach. His face was ruddy from constant exposure to the sun except for a white streak across the top of his forehead where his hat had protected it. By no stretch of the imagination did he cut a dashing figure, yet he was innately good and kind—and devoted to Charley. His deep affection for her glowed with a gentle light from his brown eyes.
    “Hello, Charley,” he returned the greeting and added, “You look lovely today.”
    “Thank you.” It was strange how a compliment from Chuck Weatherby meant nothing to her. Yet if Shad had told her that, she would have beamed inwardly with pleasure.
    “Am I interrupting anything?” he asked, then explained, “I was out for a drive and took the chance that you weren’t busy to stop by to find out how you are.”
    “You aren’t interrupting anything,” Charley assured him. In fact she secretly felt he couldn’t have come at a better time. She had been strongly tempted by Shad’s company. “I was just walking off my Sunday dinner.’’
    “Who is the man you were talking to when I drove in? I don’t think I recognize him.” He frowned as he glanced in Shad’s direction.
    She followed his gaze and felt a surge of reluctant admiration at the sight of Shad’s muscled physique. A sheen of perspiration made his hard flesh glisten like polished bronze in the encroaching sunlight.
    Charley attempted a casual reply to the inquiry. “That’s our new hired hand.”
    “He isn’t local,” Chuck stated and sent her a questioning look.
    “No, he isn’t. His name is Shad Russell— from Colorado, originally.” She realized what scant information they possessed about him, little beyond his name and previous employers. All a rancher needed to know about a man was whether or not he could do the job. She was curious about his past only because she was beginning to develop a personal interest in him.
    “A drifter.” The disapproval of the breed was obvious in the tone of Chuck’s voice. “I thought you and your brother were going to hire someone local to help out.”
    “There wasn’t anyone available,” Charley explained with an unconcerned shrug.
    “You should have got hold of me.” He gave her a reproving glance. “I could have spared one of my men to help you this summer.”
    “Then you would have been shorthanded, Chuck. No, this way is better.” She turned down his belated suggestion, because she didn’t want to be under any obligation to their neighbor no matter how well intentioned it was. She would have felt she owed him something even if Chuck