Читать книгу Between Honor And Duty - Charlotte Maclay, Charlotte Maclay - Страница 12

Wiping his hands on a rag he’d found, Logan stepped outside. He came to an abrupt halt when he spotted Janice kneeling beside a rosebush that was in full bloom, the hot summer sun casting her sable hair with highlights of red. Something told him she hadn’t taken a break from washing the car just to smell the flowers.

“Jan? You okay?”

It was a long time before she looked up at him, her ginger-brown eyes bleak, her face as pale as death.

Grief, he realized, feeling a punch in the gut. She’d been cleaning up Ray’s car and the memories must have overwhelmed her.

He hunkered down beside her. It was all he could do not to touch her, to soothe the frown from her forehead, to pull her into his arms to comfort her. But it wasn’t his place to do that. He’d been the one to let her husband die when the tragedy could have been avoided if he’d acted promptly. He might never get past that guilt.

“Tough remembering, huh?” he asked.

To his surprise, she opened her hand that had been closed into a fist. A skimpy bit of silky stuff appeared. A pair of women’s undies, such as they were. Vibrant purple. As sexy as anything he’d ever seen.

He swallowed hard as the image of Janice wearing those thong panties leaped into his head.

“You found them in the car,” he ventured, “and the memories—”

“They’re not mine.”

His mental picture shattered, the pieces separating like a child’s cardboard puzzle tossed into the air.

“I’d never wear thongs. I’d hate them.” Her whispered words rasped with pain. “I wear bikinis. White bikinis so I don’t get a pantyline and they don’t show through.”

A new image appeared. More innocent. Even more desirable. But he knew her thoughts were going in a different direction, the evidence of infidelity.

She opened her other hand to show him a lipstick tube. “This isn’t mine, either.”

“There could be a reasonable—”

“He was having an affair.”