The Stranger's Secrets Read Free Page A

friend, but in the inky blackness of the night, in her half-drunk state, her brain finally started working.
    “Get out.”
    “I can feel you heating to my touch. Mmmm, I can even smell you.” He tried to pull her closer.
    Sarah knew she needed to kick Lorenzo out of her bed for both their sakes.
    “Lorenzo, please get out. I will not ruin our friendship by letting you in my bed. Now get out now .” Her voice caught, but it stopped his wandering hands.
    “But I love you, Sarah. Please.” His pleading made her heart ache for him, but she couldn’t—she wouldn’t—do this with him.
    “I love you as a friend, Lorenzo. Nothing more.” Sarah rolled out of bed to her feet. She reached for her chemise. “Now if you don’t leave, I’ll shoot you in the ass.”
    He managed a chuckle, albeit a strangled, painful one. “There will never be another woman like you.”
    Sarah started shaking and it took a huge amount of effort to stand there and be strong. “There are better women than me.”
    Lorenzo slid out of bed with a heavy sigh. He stood and made a big show of pulling his pants on. By the time he was done, Sarah’s courage had reasserted itself. He was trying to manipulate her and it annoyed the hell out of her.
    “Start acting like a man, Lorenzo. I’m too old, too jaded and there is absolutely no future for you and me.” She opened the door and welcomed the cool air from the hallway. Her body was still half aroused and along with her anger had chased away any thought of sleep.
    He shuffled toward the door and stopped to take her hand. When his lips touched her skin, she sighed. Lorenzo was a good man; he deserved a good woman.
    “Good-bye, Lorenzo.”
    He nodded and left her alone. As Sarah watched him walk down the hallway, she let go of the last tie holding her to Virginia.
    Her new life was about to begin.

Chapter Two
    September 1875, Baltimore, Maryland
    “Y ou’re running away.”
    Whitman Kendrick stared at his mother. “Mother, I’m not running. I’m choosing to start my life over again somewhere else.”
    She turned away and walked toward the window. Her silver bun shone in the lamplight as her tiny form blocked the moonlight. The small house had been her home the last two years since he’d brought her to Maryland. She’d refused until the farm was repossessed by the bank. Then she’d had no choice but to accept her son’s help, which she called charity.
    Bonnie Kendrick was a proud woman, too proud sometimes for her own good. She’d passed on that overabundance of pride to Whit, much as he wanted to deny it.
    “You’re running plain and simple. Don’t tell me any different.” She shook her head. “I thought you were stronger than that, more like your father.”
    After an hour of listening to her, he was past annoyed and on his way to angry. Whitman gritted his teeth. “Don’t bring him into this.”
    “Why not?” She pointed one finger at him. “Whether or not you want to remember him, he was your father.”
    When Whit was twelve years old, his father had died from a mule kick on their farm in New York. The death of Bradford Kendrick had had a profound effect on his young son’s life, which flipped upside down.
    His relationship with his mother had turned into a twisted parody of what it had been. They’d spent the last twenty years or so trying to find a way to talk to each other. This was just another example of failing to find a way.
    “I said don’t bring him into this, Mother.”
    “You used to call me Mama. Do you remember that? Before those people turned you into a cold snob.” Bonnie didn’t believe in mincing words.
    Whitman bit back an angry retort. His mother knew exactly how to get his back up, and she seemed to enjoy doing it. “I grew out of a lot of things, including childish nicknames for you.”
    “Why Kansas City?” She sat down heavily in the chair she’d had since he could remember. It was the one piece of furniture along with her bed they’d taken