Free Torchlight by Lisa T. Bergren Page B

kitchen to meet the plumbers in the basement, but paused in the doorway. “Oh, and Miles, too bad you haven’t been around more. There have been all sorts of interesting developments lately.”
    Miles glared back at him.
    “Would you two knock it off?” Julia asked, looking from her agitated boyfriend to her general contractor.
    Miles’s face was an angry red, and the veins on his temple bulged. He looked at Julia accusingly as Trevor disappeared. “What’s been going on around here? Has he made a move on you?”
    “No. Of course not.” She shifted uncomfortably. “We’re just friends. We’ve shared a few evenings of reading and such, but that’s it.”
    “Are you sure?”
    “Miles!”
    “I’m sorry, but something about that man drives me crazy. I think he’s after you, Julia.”
    She looked toward the door and back to Miles. “Even if he were, I wouldn’t return his feelings. The man is a wanderer.” She embraced the man she had known for over a decade, dated for the last four years. “I prefer to know that the man I’m interested in will be around, not to wonder when I wake up if he’s off to some new territory.”
    Miles studied her in his arms, wondering if she was trying to convince herself just as much as she was trying to convince him.
    “I’m not surprised you two don’t get along; you’re so different. But I would have thought the two of you would be mature enough to get along. For my sake at least.”
    Miles softened, inhaling deeply. “I’ll try. I’ve certainly dealt with his type before.” He paused in the entry.
    Julia changed the subject. “You could put on your jeans and help us out here tomorrow morning. There’s plenty to do.”
    Miles smiled down at her. “There’s a part of me that wants to dojust that. But I have business calls to make, letters to fax. Meet you back here at five?”
    Julia’s disappointment was evident. “Miles, are you ever going to help me?”
    He took her chin in his hand and raised her face gently to meet his. “This is your dream. Chase it if you must. But do not expect me to. I have my own dreams. Isn’t it enough that I visit, take part in the dream a little? Better than not at all, right?”
    She sighed. “Five will be fine.”

C HAPTER S EVEN
    T hat afternoon Julia was working upstairs, removing molding to be refinished, when she heard a large freight truck pull up front.
What on earth is being delivered now?
She walked downstairs and opened the front door.
    Trevor was already outside, talking to the driver and his assistant. He looked up and grinned at Julia.
    “My luggage!” he explained excitedly. “Bring it around the side,” he directed the driver and followed them toward the cottage.
    Julia watched as the truck, loaded with several large trunks, three sizable wooden crates, and two suitcases, pulled forward.
    “Where’d it come from?” she called to Trevor’s back.
    “Nepal,” was all he threw back over his shoulder.
    Miles arrived promptly at five, showing up at her door with a glamorous bouquet of spring flowers—purple irises, barely open, bright yellow daffodils, tulips of violet, soft pink, and pale yellow, and fragrant stock of several shades.
    “Why, Miles, I’ve never known you to give me anything other than red roses.”
    “I thought it was time for a change,” he said with a wink. “Spring flowers, symbolic of a new era for us.” He leaned close and gave her a deep, searching kiss. Julia settled into his arms, longing to feel intimate with him, but the kiss did little for her heart. Shegave him a tentative smile.
It’s as if I’m giving him a smiley sticker for effort
, she chided herself. She turned and set the flowers in a glass of water, deciding to arrange them in a vase when they returned. Resolutely she took his proffered hand and stepped out of the house.
    As Miles and Julia walked out onto the porch toward the Lincoln town car he had rented, Trevor drove past them on his motorcycle with a