Wedding at Wildwood by Lenora Worth Read Free Book Online Page A

a hankering to take a walk down to the branch—with a pretty woman by my side.”
    Isabel stared at the picture of Dillon, her smile bittersweet. She’d captured his spirit as he stood there looking up at Wildwood. And somehow, since then, he was coming very close to capturing her heart. She’d have to be very careful about that. She wasn’t ready to admit that Dillon had always held her heart.
    Blinking, she called out, “Couldn’t talk anyone else into it, huh?”
    “Right. You seem to be the only woman around these parts willing to put up with me.”
    Opening the door just a fraction—she surely didn’t want him to see that picture of himself—Isabel pasted an indulgent smile on her face. “You have such a unique way of asking a woman for a date, Dillon.”
    Dillon stood back in the small hallway, his eyes sweeping over her face, his half grin teasing and tempting. “And you, dear Isabel, sure have a way of looking as refreshing as a tall glass of lemonade. How do you do that?”
    Ruffled, she lowered her head and crossed her arms around her chest, sure that she looked raggedy and drained from working in her makeshift darkroom all afternoon. Conscious of her faded cotton T-shirt and old shorts, she asked, “Do what?”
    “You look different now, you know,” he said instead of explaining himself. “I think it’s the hair. You never wore it long before.”
    She left the bathroom and moved up the hall to the front of the rickety old house, running her hands through the swirls of loose curls falling away from her haphazard ponytail. “No, I didn’t. Mama made me keep it cut. Said it was too much of a handful, what with all these waves and curls. I hated wearing it short.”
    He caught up with her in the kitchen. “So you let it grow.”
    “And grow,” she said as she turned to hand him a glass of iced tea. “I guess it’s silly, wearing it so long—”
    “No, it suits you.”
    “Thank you,” she said, acutely aware of his eyes on her. “I think it’s probably more of a personal statement than a fashion decision.”
    “The rebellious daughter doing what her parents didn’t approve of?”
    She nodded, then lifted a brow. “Takes one to know one, I guess.”
    “I am one,” he agreed. He set his now empty glass in the wide single sink and held out his hand. “C’mon, Issy, let’s go for a long walk.”
    Stopping, Isabel stared across at him. “You called me Issy.”
    “Yeah, well, don’t tell me you don’t allow people to do that anymore.”
    “No, it’s just that…no one besides you and my immediate family even knows about that horrid nickname.”
    “Issy, Issy, Issy,” he teased, his grin widening.
    Isabel’s breath lifted right out of her body. She had forgotten what a lethal smile Dillon had. Maybe because she remembered his smiles being so rare. Coming up for air, she said, “Dilly, Dilly, Dilly,” as a retort.
    “Oh, boy. I should have never reminded you.”
    She took his hand in spite of all the name calling, very conscious of the rough calluses on his fingers. “I really need to finish developing that roll of film.”
    He gripped her fingers against his. “It’ll keep.”
    He led her out the back door. The late afternoon air was ripe with the scents of early summer. Peaches growing fat on nearby trees, lilies blooming in her grandmother’s carefully tended flower beds, roses drifting like rich cotton candy in the warm summer breeze. How could a woman resist such a day? Isabel believed God saved such days for special times, when people needed them the most.
    She sure needed one. But with Dillon? How was she supposed to resist him and the sweet summer air, too?
    “Who let you in, anyway?” she asked, looking around the yard for her grandmother.
    He let go of her hand to turn and walk backward in front of her, much in the same way he used to do when they’d walk home after getting off the school bus. “I saw Martha on the road. She was headed to the Wedding War Room to