Read Online The Eden Tree by Doreen Owens Malek - Free Book Online Page A

all,” Linn answered pointedly.
    He ignored that. “Anyway,” he went on, “we became… involved. Isn’t that the word? Very involved. She was rich, of course. Her family had homes everywhere: a townhouse in New York, where she was staying when I knew her; a vacation place in Florida; a ski chalet in Aspen. And I was,” he chuckled bitterly, “much as you see me. Quite the primitive in her eyes, I should think. Unpublished in those days, not a prospect in the world, an uncouth foreigner with an amusing accent.”
    Linn listened, and she could tell by his tone that she wouldn’t like what was coming. A breeze blew through the trees, sprinkling them with an aftershock of raindrops. She shuddered as Con leaned back against a tree trunk and hooked his thumbs into his belt, continuing his tale.
    “I don’t know why I didn’t realize that to her I was just an entertainment, a toy like the Corvette and the speedboats. That will tell you how green I was, grass green. I suppose I was something different, a breed apart from the usual stud service. A curiosity to be served up at cocktail parties along with the canapés. A romantic figure,” he spat derisively.
    Linn waited, her head averted now.
    “Well we went on that way for a while, I in my ignorance, she in her playful mood. We were happy enough until, as I recall, I brought up the subject of marriage. I was also foolish enough to suggest that I didn’t want to live off her father’s money.”
    Linn said nothing.
    He sighed. “What a clod I was. She laughed at me. Trying to separate that girl from her da’s greenbacks was like trying to separate sunshine from summertime.”
    Con straightened, frowning at the clearing night sky. “And then I began to see myself as she had seen me all along, an half wild bogtrotter totally unacceptable as a husband but desirable enough for . . . other pursuits. She wasn’t paying me by the night but she might as well have been for all the difference it made. It was quite a revelation, I can tell you.”
    Linn could hear the old pain, buried but still present, in his words. She found her voice. “Don’t put that on me, Con, just because she hurt you,” she said softly. “She was thoughtless and cruel. I’m not like that.”
    His eyes swept over her face. “Are you not? I wonder.”
    “No, I’m not!” she responded heatedly. “Just because she was American you assume that I’m shallow and selfish too. That’s ridiculous and totally unfair.”
    “You’re Kevin Pierce’s daughter!” he shot back.
    So they were back to that again. “Why should that make a difference?” Linn demanded.
    “It makes a world of difference to me. I mean to bear it in mind in future.” He moved to take her arm. “Come along, I’ll take you back to the house.”
    Linn snatched herself away from his grasp. “I’m not taking one step from this place until you tell me exactly what my father did to make you so bitter,” she stated firmly.
    “I’m not bitter,” he replied, in a manner that belied his words. “I was merely a madman to forget for a minute who you are.”
    “I mean it. I’ll stay right here until you tell me.”
    He shrugged. “Suit yourself, my lady. The ruins are said to be haunted but I’m sure the spirits are locals. Just tell them who you are and they’ll trip all over themselves to bow and scrape before you.” He started off down the slope.
    Maddened beyond endurance, Linn ran after him and dodged in front of him, blocking his path. He stopped short to avoid plowing her down.
    “How can you be so unreasonable?” she said, clutching at his hands. “You’re blaming me for something and I don’t even know what it is. Please, don’t I deserve an explanation? Connor, you owe me that much.”
    For just an instant his fingers returned her pressure and she could see him relent. He inclined his head in his habitual way.
    “So I do,” he agreed. He stepped back from her and folded his arms. “Your father seduced