Today I'm showcasing Wyoming Homecoming by Diana Palmer a brand new release from the publisher that makes the world go round Harlequin.
Enjoy!
ISBN-13: 9781335620958
Publisher: Harlequin
Release Date: 11-08-2022
Length: 320pp
Wyoming Men #11
Buy It: Publisher/ Amazon/ B&N/ IndieBound
ADD TO: GOODREADS
Overview:
"...You just can't do better than a Diana Palmer story to make your heart lighter and smile brighter."—Fresh Fiction
New York Times bestselling author Diana Palmer's dramatic tale of an embittered small-town sheriff as he comes face to face with the woman who has haunted his dreams for years.
She's haunted his dreams for years, and now she’s back to wreak havoc on his heart
When Sheriff Cody Banks’s wife died, he blamed Abby Brennan for the illness he's sure killed Deborah and, in his grief, made sure she knew it. Looking back now, he knows that his behavior was likely the reason Abby left town years ago. So when he sees her—and the child she’s raising—at her great-uncle's funeral, Cody attempts to apologize, ashamed to see the fear he puts in her beautiful eyes and determined to show her he's no longer that same angry man.
The only reason Abby returned to Catelow, Wyoming, was to bury her last living relative. She has studiously avoided Cody Banks ever since he made it clear how much he resents her, focusing instead on raising her young niece and keeping her own family legacy alive. But when Abby inherits the property adjoining Cody’s, she can't help but face the handsome sheriff who still lingers in her memory. Circumstances keep pulling them together, but has time healed their wounds and given them a chance at a happily-ever-after?
Read an excerpt:
CHAPTER ONE
THE FUNERAL HOME was crowded. Charlie Butler was well-known in Catelow, Wyoming, and he owned a considerable amount of property outside the city limits, in greater Carne County. In fact, his land adjoined a small ranch that Cody Banks had purchased the year before. He’d been reluctant to leave his rented home in the city limits, but he was tired of people. Cody wanted room to breathe. Most of all, he wanted a refuge from his job.
He loved being sheriff of the county. This was his second term, and no serious opponents had jumped up to run against him in the last election. Apparently he was doing a good enough job to satisfy his critics as well as the handful of people he called friends.
He was alone, standing apart from the crowd in his uniform. He’d come to pay his respects. His late wife, Deborah, had been distantly related to Butler by marriage. So he was sort of family. He’d been fond of the old man. He’d stopped by to see him often and made sure he had heat and groceries and whatever he needed while he fought the long battle with cancer that finally claimed him. Cody had a deputy in a squad car standing by to lead the funeral procession to the cemetery, after the service.
He glanced toward the closed casket where a woman was standing with a little girl. He knew them. He winced. It had been a long time. Almost six years ago. He’d stood in the parking lot at the Denver hospital where his beloved wife, a doctor, had just died, and accused the woman and the child of killing her. The child had been sick with a virus that was deadly to a handful of people, his wife included. It hadn’t been until days later that he’d learned the woman and child had been at a funeral home to arrange services for her brother and sister-in-law, who’d been killed in an accident. His wife, Deborah, a distant cousin to the deceased woman, had gone to the funeral home to see them and express her sorrow. It was there that she’d contracted the fatal virus, and not from the woman or child, but from a funeral attendant who later also died of exposure to it.
Cody had been out of his mind with grief. They’d only been married for two years, much of it spent apart while his wife pursued her career as a neurologist in Denver, at a famous hospital. She’d commuted and only managed to get home one or two days a month, sometimes not even that much. It had been largely a long-distance relationship, but Cody had loved her so much. Too much. He thought his life was over when she died. But he picked himself up, thanks to his cousin, Bart Riddle, a local rancher, and he’d gone on. It had been hard. He hadn’t been thinking clearly, then. He’d lashed out at the most innocent people. The woman and child, standing by the casket.
When he’d walked in the door, both of them had looked hunted. The woman had taken the little girl by the hand and walked her back to the restroom. By the time they returned, Cody was at the other end of the room talking to one of the city council members. They watched him, almost fearfully. It disturbed him to see how badly he’d wounded them, so badly that they wouldn’t come near him all these years later. He wanted to apologize, to explain. He couldn’t even get close enough to do that.
She was elegant, he thought. Not beautiful. Not really pretty, but she had a pretty figure and a creamy complexion. Her long, silvery-blond hair ell to her waist in back, neatly styled. Her eyes were a pale, almost silver gray. She was dressed in a suit, very conservative. Well, she worked for attorneys in Denver, he recalled, probably she had to dress to maintain the dignity of her office. She was a paralegal. He’d often wondered why she didn’t go on to law school. But his cousin, Bart Riddle, had said that there was no money for the training. And besides that, she was reluctant to leave her little niece Lucinda in someone else’s care at night. She loved the child dearly, because of the fact that the little girl was the last family she had on earth and the last link she had with her late brother.
It had touched him, what Bart said. He had cousins, at least, although his parents were long dead. Abigail Brennan had nobody; just little Lucinda, who was nine now. Technically, he supposed, he and Abigail were related by marriage. Debby’s sister-in-law’s second marriage, after her husband’s death, was to Abigail’s brother Lawrence, and both Lawrence and Mary had been killed in a wreck just days before his wife Deborah died. Mary had been Debby’s former sister-in-law, which was why Debby had gone to the funeral home in the first place.
“Why is the casket closed?” Cody asked his cousin Bart, who’d just joined him near the potted plant at the other end of the big viewing room.
“He died of cancer,” Bart reminded him. “He said he didn’t want a bunch of yahoos staring down at him in his casket, so he put in his will that he wanted it closed.” He frowned. “Why are you standing over here all by yourself?”
Cody sighed. “Because when I walked over to Abigail to apologize for what I said to her six years ago, she took the little girl by the hand and almost ran to the restroom.”
Bart, who knew the background of these people very well, just nodded. “Shame,” he said quietly. “I mean, she and the child have nobody now. Her brother raised her, you know. Their parents died together in a car crash when she was still in school. Ironic, that her brother and his wife died together in a similar manner. Charlie, there,” he indicated the casket with a nod of his head, “was the last living relative she had, besides Lucy.” He laughed softly. “And he wasn’t much of that, either. She sent him cards on his birthday and at Christmas. Would have come to see him, but he didn’t want the kid around.” He indicated Lucinda, who was pretty, with the same silvery-blond hair as her aunt. “He never liked children. It’s a shame. She’s a nice child, from all accounts. Polite and sweet and doesn’t talk back.”
“I know a lot of nice, sweet people who get on the internet and become Frankenstein’s monster with a keyboard at their fingertips,” Cody mused.
“And isn’t that the truth?”
“What’s Abigail going to do with Charlie’s place?” he asked.
“No idea. She works in Denver. That’s an impossibly long commute.”
“It’s a good ranch. Clean water, lots of pasture, and I think he still had a pretty decent herd of Black Angus cattle, despite the downturn in the economy.”
Bart was staring at him. “What if she came to work here? J.C. Calhoun’s wife, Colie, is pregnant with their second child and she really wants to stay home with her kids. God knows Calhoun makes enough, working on Ren Colter’s ranch as his head of security. That means her job will be up for grabs, and there aren’t that many paralegals in a town the size of Catelow.” Cody winced. “I don’t think she wants to be any closer to me than Denver,” he said quietly. “I wish I could take back all the things I said to her that day. I scared her. I scared the little girl, too,” he added sadly. “I love kids. It hurts me, remembering how they both backed away from me and ran for her car.” His eyes closed. “Dear God, the things we do that come back to haunt us.”
Bart laid a hand on his shoulder. “We can’t change the past,” he said. “We can only deal with what we have right now.”
Cody’s eyes opened, dark and somber. “I reckon.” His face was hard. “Six years,” he said. “And I still mourn her. I blamed everybody except myself. If I’d insisted, she might have come back here to live and got a job at our community hospital.”
Bart didn’t remind his friend that Deborah had been aggressively ambitious. She wanted to be the best in her field, and that was only possible working at a big hospital, where such opportunities were available. He knew, as Cody never seemed to, that Deborah was never the sort of woman who’d want to cook and clean and have babies. She’d even told Cody, when they first married, that children were out of the question for the immediate future. Cody hadn’t seemed to mind. He was obsessed with Deborah, so much in love that if she’d said she wanted to go to the moon, Cody would have been looking at ways to build a spaceship. Obsessive love like that seemed to Bart to be destructive. There was an old saying about relationships, he mused, that one kissed while the other turned the cheek. Cody was in love. Deborah was affectionate, but her true love was her work, not her husband. In the two years they’d been married, they’d spent far more time apart than together. Cody saw what he wanted to see.
“I’m going to say hello to Abby,” Bart said, hesitating.
“Go ahead,” Cody replied. “I’ll be standing here, holding up the wall.”
Bart’s eyebrows lifted in a silent question.
“If I start over there, she’ll find a way to get out of the room,” Cody replied quietly. “It’s all right. I won’t be here much longer. I was fond of Charlie and I wanted to pay my respects. I didn’t come to terrorize the women and children.”
The last remark sounded bitter, Bart thought as he walked toward Abigail. Cody didn’t realize that he was just as intimidating to men as he was to Abby and Lucinda. He did a hard job and it had made him hard. He wasn’t the easygoing, friendly man who’d attracted Deborah during a visit eight years ago. The Cody of today would have sent Deborah in search of a man who was more easily controlled. He laughed to himself. He wondered if Cody realized how much he’d changed since he’d been sheriff. He truly doubted it.
ABIGAIL WAS SAYING goodbye to an elderly woman who’d gone to school with Charlie.
The old woman smiled at her and held on to her hand. “You should come back home,” she said, smiling down at Lucinda as well. “Small towns are the best place to raise a child. And besides, Colie’s pregnant and she’s going to resign from her job at the attorney’s office. They’ll need a paralegal.” Her eyebrows lifted. “Charlie has a nice ranch, with a house he’d just renovated, and there’s kittens in the barn.”
“Oh, boy, Aunt Abby. Kittens!” Lucinda exclaimed, and her whole little face lit up.
Across the room, Cody saw that delight on the child’s face and felt a weight on his shoulders like a concrete slab. He’d wanted children so badly. But Deborah had said they had years to think about kids. She didn’t really like them. Cody did. But he loved Deborah enough to sacrifice his own hungers. Now, looking at Lucinda’s joy, bright and shining, he felt the hunger again, deeper and stronger.
“You look well,” Bart told Abby, smiling as he hugged her gently. “How do you like Denver?”
She made a face. “I hate it. Lucinda’s in a school she doesn’t like, and we live in a poky little apartment on the top floor with a drunk next door and a drummer on the next floor.” She leaned toward him. “He likes to practice at two in the morning!” She laughed.
Cody saw that laughter in her face and felt as if he was smothering to death in a misery of his own making. He turned and went out the door. It hurt, to see the woman and child so happy, when they looked at him as if he’d committed all seven deadly sins and was bent on retribution.
Abby watched him go and she relaxed. “Why was he here?” she asked bluntly.
“He and Charlie were friends as well as third cousins,” Bart told her. “They played chess together. Cody got tired of town living, so he bought Dan Harlow’s place, the ranch that adjoins Charlie’s property.”
She looked hunted all over again.
“Don’t,” Bart said gently. “He’s sorry for what he said to you and Lucy,” he added. “He said he’d give anything to take it back.”
She averted her eyes. She didn’t have to tell Bart about her past, he knew. Everybody in Catelow knew everybody’s business. It was a big, sprawling family, and there were no secrets in it. Abby’s father had been a hopeless drunk. He’d gambled away everything her mother had, and there had been a good deal of money when they’d married. He’d turned to strong drink when his luck at the gaming tables turned, and he’d been brutal. Abby and her mother wore concealing garments so that the bruises wouldn’t show. It was almost a relief when the old man died, but he took Abby’s mother with him. Her older brother, Lawrence, had come to get her and take her to live with him and Mary. They both loved her dearly, and she’d been grateful for a home, even if it was in Denver.
Abby got a job with Lawrence’s firm as an administrative assistant just out of high school and immediately enrolled in night classes to get her paralegal training. Abby hated having Lawrence responsible for that training. As intelligent as Abby was, she couldn’t qualify for any scholarships that would have paid her way. Private schools were expensive. She hadn’t even had her parents’ home after their deaths. It was mortgaged to the hilt. Lawrence, her brother, had sold it when he took Abby to live with him and his wife Mary.
She loved her brother and Mary, but she felt she was a burden on them, with Mary pregnant and a bedroom needed to convert to a nursery. They protested; they loved her and she was welcome, they emphasized. But she was determined to go, to make room for the baby they’d anticipated for so long. So, she moved into a small apartment. Lucinda was born soon afterward. Abby had loved her from the start, finding excuses to visit, so that she could hold the little girl. She was as fascinated with her as her doting parents.
Then had come the car crash and the agony of the funeral. Deborah had come to pay her respects to her first cousin, Mary, and contracted the fatal virus from one of the attendants, who also died of it. Deborah had been admitted to the hospital with a high fever and Abby had gone from the funeral home where Lawrence and Mary were together in a viewing room to the hospital to see about Deborah.
Cody had come across them in the parking lot, after being told by an aide that Deborah had gone to the funeral home and caught the virus from somebody there. He’d assumed it was the little girl, because she was feverish and sick. Abby had stopped by the emergency room to let a resident look at Lucy and give her something for the complications that had presented themselves. She’d given up the idea of visiting Deborah, with Lucy so sick, and had actually been on her way to the car to take Lucy to Lawrence’s apartment where a friend would take care of the little girl while Abby came back to see Deborah.
That was when Cody had encountered them in the parking lot and raged at them out of his grief.
Abby shivered, just at the memory of his unbridled rage. She was afraid of men anyway. That experience had put a nail in the coffin of her desire to ever get married. First her father, then Cody. Men frightened her in a rage, and she’d rarely seen her father any other way. She’d stay single and raise Lucy and never get involved with a man, she decided.
“Hey, it’s okay, he’s gone outside,” Bart said softly, noting Abby’s expression.
She swallowed. “You think you can get over things. But sometimes, you just can’t.”
“Are you okay, Aunt Abby?” Lucy asked softly, catching one of her aunt’s hands in her own. She had Lawrence’s eyes, pale blue and piercing, and full of compassion.
Abby smiled in spite of herself. “I’m okay, honey,” she replied. “Really.”
Lucy sighed. “I’m hungry.”
Abby realized then that they hadn’t even had breakfast. There was still the funeral service and the graveside ceremony to get through. “It will be just a little while, okay?” she asked.
Lucy smiled up at her. “Okay,” she said.
She was an easy child, eager to please, loving, industrious and gentle. The school she went to in Denver was a hotbed of violence, usually contained, often not. The principal had become used to seeing Abby in her office about various problems Lucy encountered in the course of a week. The classrooms were dangerous. Abby said so. The principal just sighed. She had political considerations to weigh her down and there was very little she could do. She apologized, and sympathized, but Abby saw that nothing would ever change. Lucy was growing more frightened by the day. It was a bad neighborhood. It was also all Abby could afford. Lawrence and Mary’s apartment had been leased soon after Lawrence died, and the landlord immediately filled the space with a new family, giving Abby only a few days to clean everything out, save the most valuable mementos, and find a new place to live. On her salary, she did the best she could. It wasn’t enough.
She wrapped her arms around herself. “I’d love to come back here and live. Except he’s here,” she added bitterly.
“Abby, you won’t have to see him unless you want to,” he said, aware of Lucinda’s rapt attention. “He knows how badly he frightened you. He won’t come near you. Case in point,” he added, nodding toward the door where Cody had left.
She drew in a long breath. Her pale eyes were old with sorrow. “I hate my job. I hate where we live. I hate having to practically live at the school, complaining in the principal’s office about harassment, just to keep Lucy safe,” she added bitterly. “The school has two separate gangs who hate each other, and violence breaks out almost every week.”
“Then come home,” Bart said simply. He smiled. “I’ll do anything I can for both of you,” he added. “It will be an absolute joy to have relatives around. Besides Cody, I mean,” he added with a grimace. “And I never see him except at business meetings or when somebody dies.”
She smiled at him. “You’re a nice cousin, even if you’re only a relative by marriage,” she said.
Lucy laid her head on his shoulder with a sigh. “You’re nice, Cousin Bart,” she murmured.
He chuckled. “So are you, precious,” he replied, dropping a kiss on her blond head.
“You should have married and had kids,” Abby said gently, noting his fondness for her niece.
“I tried.” He sighed. “I have no luck at all finding women who want to live on a poky ranch in a small town.”
“It’s not poky,” she argued. “And you’re one of the nicest men I know.” “With all due respect, Pockets, I’m about the only man you know.”
She laughed. “I’d forgotten that you gave me that awful nickname.”
“You were forever sticking things in your pockets when we were Lucy’s age and in school together. It was a natural assumption,” he said with a grin. “So. Coming home?”
She drew in a long breath and looked worriedly at the front door. She got glimpses of a sheriff’s uniform just beyond it.
“You’ll be safe here,” Bart persisted. “So will Lucy. You won’t find any violence in our local schools. Honest. And there are some very nice people at the law office.”
“They probably have a whole list of paralegals who’ll want that job once it opens up.”
“Tomorrow I’ll take you over there and introduce you,” he said.
She looked at Lucy, who was smiling and happier even at a funeral than she’d been at their apartment in Denver. The school there was so dangerous, and getting worse by the day. A teacher had been assaulted right in her own classroom, and something even worse had happened to a young girl, just a little older than Lucy.
“Okay,” she said.
Bart laughed. “Okay.”
THE FUNERAL SERVICE was nice, but it brought back terrible memories. Her parents had been buried in Catelow. She’d hated and feared her father, but she’d loved her mother. She still missed her. Lawrence and Mary’s funeral had been in Denver and they were buried there. She’d asked Lawrence about that once, at their parents’ funeral. He’d said that he had all he ever wanted of Catelow and didn’t want to return, even in a pine box. So Abby had honored that wish.
Still, the funeral brought back the sorrow and anguish of losing both Lawrence and Mary all at once. Little Lucy seemed to sense that feeling of loss. She slid her hand into Abby’s and squeezed it as the congregation rose to sing “Amazing Grace.” Tears rolled down Abby’s cheeks, and not just for her late cousin. She wept for her whole family, almost all gone, except for the precious child beside her, holding her hand, and her cousin, Bart.
She had a tissue in the hand Lucy wasn’t holding. She dabbed at her eyes. Her cousin, Charlie Butler, who’d been in such terrible pain, was surely in a better place. So were Lawrence and Mary, even her parents. But she was left to take care of Lucy and going back to Denver seemed a terrible prospect. Her cousin had left her a prosperous ranch. The attorneys had told her that, even before the reading of the will, which would come later. It was a surprise. She knew that the late Mr. Butler was also a relative by marriage to Cody Banks. It would have been more natural to leave it to him. But he hadn’t. She wondered why, but chances were that she’d never find out.
Now she had to decide what she was going to do. Bart had mentioned taking her to see the lead attorney at the law firm where Colie Calhoun worked. She supposed it wouldn’t hurt to at least apply for the job. If she got it, she and Lucy could live at the ranch and she could commute. She had a nice little car that got good gas mileage and she could get Lucy into the same grammar school where she’d gone herself many years ago. She knew most of the older families in the area. It would truly be like coming home.
They buried the old gentleman in the family plot, which was only three gravestones down from Abby’s mother and father. After the very brief service she and Lucy went to stand over them. It seemed unreal somehow to look down on the carved name and realize that her family was buried under them.
Lucy held her hand again. “That’s your mama and daddy, isn’t it, Aunt Abby?” she asked softly.
Abby nodded. Her throat felt full of pincushions. “And your grandparents, my darling.”
Lucy sighed. “So now I don’t have grandparents at all. Mama’s mother died when she was little like me, and Grandaddy died just after that. But I still have you, Aunt Abby,” she said.
“And I still have you.” Abby smiled down at her.
A tall man in a sheriff’s uniform watched them from a distance. He could feel the sadness. Abby hadn’t had an easy life, even as a child. Everybody knew her father had been brutal to his wife and daughter. It was no wonder she was wary of men. After what he’d done to her in the parking lot so long ago, she’d probably decided that all men were lunatics and she was better off without one.
His eyes went to the child holding her hand so tightly. His teeth ground together. He turned away, sickened by the memory of his own behavior. He’d have given a lot to go back and change what had happened. It was too late now.
THE DAY AFTER the funeral, Bart came by the motel where Abby and Lucy were staying to take her to meet the attorneys at the law firm where Colie Calhoun worked. Lucy went along, left to sit in the waiting room while her aunt discussed a possible job.
The eldest partner in the law firm, James Owens, was friendly and kind, married and with three grandchildren. He liked what he’d already heard about Abigail’s paralegal abilities. Abby didn’t know that Bart had asked Colie to put in a good word for Abby at the law office.
“We can always use a paralegal,” Owens told her. “And we don’t have anyone with actual experience who’s applied. If you want the job, we’d love to have you.” He went on to mention salary and benefits. “There’s also a nice rental house going spare—”
“One of my cousins just died and left me a ranch,” she interrupted with a sad smile. “I hear he’s got a good manager and nice help, so all I’ll have to do is stand back and let them do what they do best. But I’m still going to work,” she added. “I’m not a stay-at-home person. Besides, my little niece lives with me. I’ll have to get her enrolled in school here.” She grimaced. There was another worry, what to do with Lucy between the time school let out and Abby got home.
“Your ranch manager is Don Blalock,” he told her. “His wife, Maisie, has a little girl just about Lucy’s age and she’ll go to the same school. I’ll bet you can arrange something there. Maisie is a sweet woman.”
Abby let out a sigh and smiled. “I was so worried when I came up here. Life in Denver...well, Lucy’s school is dangerous, and I’m not happy where we have to live. I’m sorry to lose my cousin, but it’s like a miracle that he left his place to me. It’s a whole new life opening up for Lucy and me.” “You’ll like living here again.”
Her face tautened. She grimaced. “You know about my father...?”
He nodded. “It’s a small town. We know everything. But that was long ago. Things will be very different now.” He smiled. “If you want the job, we’ll expect you Monday at eight thirty.”
“I’ll be here Monday at eight thirty. Thanks very much, Mr. Owens.”
“You’re most welcome. And by the way, we were handling your late cousin’s legal business, including his will. We’ll have the reading of it tomorrow at the ranch if that suits you. About ten in the morning?”
“That would be very nice.”
“You could move in now if you wanted to,” he added.
She smiled. “We’ll wait for the will to be read,” she said softly. “It’s going to be a difficult time for the people who work for him. I want to do things by the book.”
He smiled back. “Then that’s fine. One of us will be out there tomorrow for the legal formalities.” Abby shook hands and went to get her niece from the waiting room. One of the administrative assistants had given her a soft drink.
She smiled at Abby. “Hi. I’m Marie, one of Colie’s friends. I came to replace her best friend, Lucy, who used to work with her, but Lucy and her husband moved up to Billings. Welcome to the firm!”
“How did you know?” Abby laughed.
“I happened to be walking past Mr. Owens’s office just now.” She grinned. “You’ll love it here. The attorneys are all nice people and great to work for.”
“I’m very grateful to have found a job so quickly.” She glanced down at Lucy. “We hated living in Denver.”
“I have a son just about Lucy’s age,” came the reply. “The schools here are wonderful, and she’s going to love it.”
“At least I won’t have to be in the principal’s office begging for protection for her,” Abby said on a sigh. She shook her head. “Schools have changed a lot since I was in grammar school.”
“Tell me about it!”
“I’ll see you Monday, then.” “See you.” She grinned at them. “My Matt’s having a birthday party next month. Lucy’s going on the guest list, too! I bake my own cakes and make homemade ice cream.”
“Oh, boy,” Lucy said.
“You can come, too,” Marie added, wiggling her eyebrows. “I have a separate table for the mommies so we can all have treats while the kids do.”
Abby laughed. “Now I’ve got to come! I love cake and ice cream.”
“Me, too!” Lucy enthused.
“I’ll see you Monday, then,” Marie said. “Bye, Lucy. It was nice to meet you both.”
“Nice to meet you, too,” Abby and Lucy chorused.
SHE AND LUCY drove out to the ranch the next morning. It was out in the country, in a stand of lodgepole pines and aspen trees, with the sharp outline of the Tetons far in the distance. The ranch was in a valley with a silvery stream running through it. Autumn was in full glorious display, and the trees were red and gold and the air just nippy enough to make a jacket comfortable. Probably there were trout in that pretty stream, Abby thought. She was an avid fisherwoman, though mainly of the cane pole and bait variety, but she wouldn’t mind learning how to use a rod and reel. In fact, she and Lucy could learn together.
It was a very big ranch. It seemed a long time before they got to the main ranch house, sitting apart from a scattering of buildings. One looked like an equipment shed. The other two were, most likely, a stable and a barn. The fences were relatively new and seemed sturdy enough. The pastures were full of black cattle. Black Angus, Abby recalled.
She pulled up at the front door. The house was rustic, but elegant, basically a huge two-storied cabin, with a long, wide front porch. There was a swing and a few rocking chairs. The steps were firm. The house had been recently stained, because it was a bright dark mahogany color.
She got herself and Lucy out, a little concerned because the people who lived and worked here might not like an outsider taking over the operation. But as she watched, the front door opened and a large, smiling woman with gray hair in a bun and a colorful apron on came out onto the porch.
“Abigail Brennan, as I live and breathe! How lovely to see you again!”
Abby let out the breath she’d been holding. “Hannah,” she laughed, and ran to hug the older woman, who’d been a close friend of her mother’s all those long years ago.
“And who’s this?” Hannah asked, bending down as little Lucy came onto the porch, smiling.
“I’m Lucy,” she said shyly.
“I’m Hannah. Welcome to the Circle B Ranch!”
Praise:
Palmer knows how to make the sparks fly." —Publishers Weekly"...You just can't do better than a Diana Palmer story to make your heart lighter and smile brighter."—Fresh Fiction
"Diana Palmer is a mesmerizing storyteller who captures the essence of what a romance should be." —Affaire de Coeur
"Palmer is back with a flirtatious and fun installment of the Wyoming Men series. Wyoming Winter is a sizzling tale of passion and love that will leave readers with anticipation." -RT Book Reviews on Wyoming Winter
"Fans of small-town romances with rugged, sexy cowboys will want to add Wyoming Brave to their collections."–RT Book Reviews on Wyoming Brave
"A delightful romance with interesting new characters and many familiar faces. It's nice to have a hero who is not picture-perfect in looks or instincts, and a heroine who accepts her privileged life yet is willing to work for the future she wants."-RT Book Reviews on Wyoming Tough
"This is an emotional story about a broken hero who needs mending and a heroine who has her own sorrows and financial difficulties. Palmer once again provides an entertaining tale with a young, intelligent and moral heroine and an angst-ridden older hero."-RT Book Reviews on Wyoming Fierce
"Diana Palmer...is an expert at drawing the country and characters she presents. Wyoming Fierce will be enjoyed on many levels." -Fresh Fiction on Wyoming Fierce
About the author:
Thanks for putting this one on my radar.
ReplyDeletemy pleasure
DeleteOh dear! Sounds like there would be a fair bit of initial tension with this premise.
ReplyDeletetension for sure
DeleteI have enjoyed Diana Palmer's books but it has been a very long time since I read any. This sounds great!
ReplyDeleteme too
Deletemy too and it's been too long since I read one
ReplyDeletedon't they always LOL
ReplyDelete