A Cold Creek Homecoming. RaeAnne Thayne

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       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      RaeAnne Thayne finds inspiration in the beautiful northern Utah mountains, where she lives with her husband and three children. Her books have won numerous honours, including three RITA® Award nominations from Romance Writers of America and a Career Achievement Award from Romantic Times BOOKreviews magazine. RaeAnne loves to hear from readers and can be reached through her website at www.raeannethayne.com.

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      In memory of my dear aunt, Arlene Wood,

      for afghans and parachutes and ceramic frogs.

      I only wish I’d dedicated one to you before!

      And to Jennifer Black, my sister and hero,

      for helping her pass with peace and dignity.

      Chapter One

      “You’re home!”

      The thin, reedy voice whispering from the frail woman on the bed was nothing like Quinn Southerland remembered.

      Though she was small in stature, Jo Winder’s voice had always been firm and commanding, just like the rest of her personality. When she used to call them in for supper, he and the others could hear her voice ringing out loud and clear from one end of the ranch to the other. No matter where they were, they knew the moment they heard that voice, it was time to go back to the house.

      Now the woman who had done so much to raise him—the toughest woman he had ever known—seemed a tiny, withered husk of herself, her skin papery and pale and her voice barely audible.

       The cracks in his heart from watching her endure the long months and years of her illness widened a little more. To his great shame, he had a sudden impulse to run away, to escape back to Seattle and his business and the comfortable life he had created for himself there, where he could pretend this was all some kind of bad dream and she was immortal, as he had always imagined.

      Instead, he forced himself to step forward to the edge of the bed, where he carefully folded her bony fingers in his own much larger ones, cursing the cancer that was taking away this woman he loved so dearly.

      He gave her his most charming smile, the one that never failed to sway any woman in his path, whether in the boardroom or the bedroom.

      “Where else would I be but right here, darling?”

      The smile she offered in return was rueful and she lifted their entwined fingers to her cheek. “You shouldn’t have come. You’re so busy in Seattle.”

      “Never too busy for my best girl.”

      Her laugh was small but wryly amused, as it always used to be when he would try to charm his way out of trouble with her.

      Jo wasn’t the sort who could be easily charmed but she never failed to appreciate the effort.

      “I’m sorry to drag you down here,” she said. “I…only wanted to see all of my boys one last time.”

      He wanted to protest that his foster mother would be around for years to come, that she was too tough and ornery to let a little thing like cancer stop her, but he couldn’t deny the evidence in front of him.

      She was dying, was much closer to it than any of them had feared.

       “I’m here, as long as you need me,” he vowed.