Heart of Texas Vol. 3: Caroline's Child. Debbie Macomber

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Heart of Texas Vol. 3

      CONTENTS

      NELL’S COWBOY

      CHAPTER 1

      CHAPTER 2

      CHAPTER 3

      CHAPTER 4

      CHAPTER 5

      CHAPTER 6

      CHAPTER 7

      CHAPTER 8

      CHAPTER 9

      CHAPTER 10

      CHAPTER 11

      LONE STAR BABY

      CHAPTER 1

      CHAPTER 2

      CHAPTER 3

      CHAPTER 4

      CHAPTER 5

      CHAPTER 6

      CHAPTER 7

      CHAPTER 8

      CHAPTER 9

      CHAPTER 10

      CHAPTER 11

Nell’s Cowboy

      CAST OF CHARACTERS

       THE PEOPLE OF PROMISE

      Nell Bishop: thirtysomething widow with a son, Jeremy, and a daughter, Emma; her husband died in a tractor accident

      Ruth Bishop: Nell’s mother-in-law; lives with Nell and her two children

      Dovie Boyd: runs an antiques shop and has dated Sheriff Frank Hennessey for ten years

      Caroline Daniels: postmistress of Promise

      Maggie Daniels: Caroline’s five-year-old daughter

      Dr. Jane Dickinson: new doctor in Promise

      Ellie Frasier: owner of Frasier’s Feed Store

      Frank Hennessey: local sheriff

      Max Jordan: owner of Jordan’s Towne and Country

      Wade McMillen: preacher of Promise Christian Church

      Edwina and Lily Moorhouse: sisters; retired schoolteachers

      Cal and Glen Patterson: local ranchers; brothers who ranch together

      Phil and Mary Patterson: parents of Cal and Glen; operate a local B and B

      Louise Powell: town gossip

      Wiley Rogers: sixty-year-old ranch foreman at the Weston Ranch

      Laredo Smith: wrangler hired by Savannah Weston

      Barbara and Melvin Weston: mother and father to Savannah, Grady and Richard; the Westons died six years ago

      Richard Weston: youngest of the Weston siblings

      Savannah Weston: Grady and Richard’s sister; cultivates old roses

      Grady Weston: rancher and oldest of the Weston siblings

      CHAPTER 1

      NELL BISHOP BARRELED DOWN the highway, heading home, racing against the approaching storm. The March winds whipped against the pickup as she hurried toward Twin Canyons Ranch, thirty-four miles south of Promise, Texas.

      Her mother-in-law was with the children, but Jeremy and Emma would have difficulty getting the animals into the barn without help. Ruth would do what she could, but the older woman’s heart wasn’t strong and…Nell didn’t want to think what might happen if she didn’t make it back in time.

      Her life had been on a fast-moving treadmill for the past three years, ever since her husband died in a tractor accident. Storms were the least of her worries, considering the financial challenges she’d faced working the ranch without Jake. Not a day passed that her husband wasn’t in her thoughts. Twenty years from now, forty years from now, he’d still be a part of her.

      Ruth and others had encouraged her to remarry, at least to date, but Nell had resisted. She never expected to love again—not the way she loved Jake. Their love was the kind that happened only once in a lifetime, and no other man could compare to her Jake.

      Nell had always known she wasn’t any candidate for home-coming queen, but Jake had made her feel like one. He’d understood what it was to be big-boned and just plain big. Dainty or elegant would never describe her; at six feet, Nell was as tall as most men. Jake had been six feet four inches by the time he was a high-school freshman, and the only boy in school taller than Nell.

      They’d lived in the same town all their lives, but it wasn’t until high school that she’d noticed him. The very first day of high school, as a matter of fact. She was a freshman to his senior, and the minute his eyes met hers as she walked down the hall, she knew she’d found her life’s mate. He was the only boy she’d ever dated. When he enlisted in the army and became an Airborne Ranger, she’d written him every day. He served his time in the army and was discharged a week after her graduation. Despite her family’s protests, she’d married Jake while still a teenager.

      Neither was to know that ten years was all the time they’d have together. It was Nell who’d found her husband trapped beneath the tractor, Nell who’d held him in her arms as the life flowed out of him, Nell who’d screamed in anguish, helpless to do anything to save her husband’s life.

      Now it was Nell who struggled to hold on to Twin Canyons Ranch, tended what remained of the herd, raised their children and cared for Jake’s aging mother. The ranch had been Jake’s dream—and hers; it was a small spread that they’d bought together, shortly after their marriage. But she was so very tired, weary to the bone with her financial struggles and other worries. The past three years had drained her mentally, emotionally and physically. For that reason she’d sold off most of the herd and started a new venture. A dude ranch.

      Bless Jeremy’s heart. Her son had been the one to give her the idea. Last year, she’d promised him a reward for acing his spelling test and he’d chosen to rent a movie. Of all the movies available, he’d picked City Slickers, and to Nell it was like a revelation.

      After seeing the movie, Nell hadn’t been able to sleep all night. She was certainly familiar with dude ranches, but it had never occurred to her that this might be a solution to her own dilemma. She couldn’t say she understood it, but people actually paid for the opportunity to eat food cooked in a chuck wagon, ride around on horses and drive cattle. Why these people would prefer to live in primitive circumstances when they could experience the luxury of some fancy resort for basically the same price was beyond her. Apparently she had a lot to learn—but learn she did. After months of research Nell was convinced that a dude ranch really was the answer. With a portion of her profits from the sale of last year’s herd, she’d had brochures printed and she’d contacted several travel companies. Now she was СКАЧАТЬ