The Other Side of Us (Harlequin Superromance) Read Free Page A

oven. No doubt she’d found a nest of mice
or something equally unpleasant.
    “Good girl, Strudel. Good girl.” Strudel came to his side and
lifted her head for a scratch. He obliged, rubbing her behind the ears where she
liked it. Some of the tension left him as he looked into her big, liquid
eyes.
    For the next five weeks, he had no one but himself and Strudel
to please. Edie and Nick were a thousand miles away, his job was on hold. This
time was all his and he could use it to rage and be bitter and brood—or he could
start putting himself back together again.
    He really hoped it would be the latter.
    He walked to the back door and stepped onto a broad porch that
overlooked a yard thick with grass and overgrown garden beds. A shed huddled in
the left-hand corner. He considered it briefly, then decided he would inspect it
later.
    His gaze shifted to the cottage next door. It occurred to him
that he should probably go introduce himself to his new neighbor, since they
were more or less isolated at this end of the street. His aunt’s place had been
vacant so long he didn’t want some old dear with three cats and a hearing aid
freaking out because a strange man had moved in.
    Then maybe he’d head into town to grab some food and other
supplies.
    It wasn’t much of a plan, but it would get him through the next
few hours.
    * * *
    M ACKENZIE RETURNED THE reformer carriage to the starting position and let her hands drop to
her sides. She was officially done for another day, every exercise on her chart
completed and ticked off. Even the ones that made her want to curl into a ball
and cry, they hurt so much.
    She reached for her towel and blotted her sweat-dampened face
and chest. The sharp taste of bile burned at the back of her mouth, a sure sign
that she’d overexerted herself again.
    Well. A little nausea was a price she was willing to pay if it
meant she made a faster recovery.
    She stood, running the towel over her cropped hair. Mr. Smith
stood, too, tail wagging as he looked at her expectantly.
    “Yes, little man, it’s time for breakfast.”
    If she could stomach it.
    She wrapped the towel around her shoulders like a cape and
headed for the kitchen. A sharp noise stopped her in her tracks before she’d
gotten halfway. It had been so long since anyone had come to the door that it
took her a full second to recognize the sound as a knock. She glanced over her
shoulder. A dark form filled the pebbled glass of the door. She frowned. Who on
earth would be visiting her at ten o’clock on a Thursday morning?
    Her first thought was that it was Patrick, but she dismissed it
instantly. He was hardly going to drive an hour out of town to visit her—not
when he hadn’t bothered to pick up the phone in more than four months. No, she
had a better chance of finding Elvis on the other side of that door than her
ex-husband, and an even better chance of finding a complete stranger who
probably wanted to sell her something.
    The joy. Just what she wanted to deal with when she was shaky
with fatigue and nausea.
    She swung open the door, ready to give short shrift to the
cold-calling salesman on her porch.
    The man on her porch was definitely not a cold caller. Nothing
about this man was cold, from the deep chestnut of his wavy, almost
shoulder-length hair to his cognac-brown eyes to his full, sensual mouth. Then
there was his body—nothing cold there, either. Broad shoulders, a chest Tarzan
would be proud of, flat belly, lean hips. All wrapped up in faded jeans and a
moss-green sweater that was the perfect foil for his coloring.
    “Hey,” he said in an easy baritone. “I’m Oliver Garrett. I
moved in next door.” He gestured toward the house on the other side of the
fence. “Wanted to give you a heads-up in case you saw me moving around and
thought I was a burglar or something.”
    He smiled, so warm and vibrant and alive it was almost
offensive. His gaze slid down her face, scanning her body in a polite but
thoroughly male