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Kissed By The Country Doc
Melinda Curtis
She came to sell a town… But she found a home Never in her wildest dreams could single mum Ella Monroe imagine co-inheriting the small town of Second Chance, Idaho – or falling for its curmudgeonly doctor, Noah Bishop. Despite his rough edges and protests for isolation, Noah has her believing in love at first sight again!
She came to sell a town...
But she found a home
Never in her wildest dreams could single mom Ella Monroe imagine co-inheriting the small town of Second Chance, Idaho—or falling for its curmudgeonly doctor, Noah Bishop. Despite his rough edges and protests for isolation, Noah has her believing in love at first sight again. But when she’s pressured to sell her stake, Ella is torn between family loyalty and following her heart.
Prior to writing romance, award-winning USA TODAY bestseller MELINDA CURTIS was a junior manager for a Fortune 500 company, which meant when she flew on the private jet, she was relegated to the jump seat. After grabbing her pen (and a parachute), she made the leap to full-time writer. Between writing clean romance for Mills & Boon and indie-pubbed romantic comedy, Melinda recently came to grips with the fact that she’s an empty nester and a grandma. Brenda Novak says Melinda’s book Season of Change “found a place on my keeper shelf.”
Also by Melinda Curtis (#u620f0279-c426-5259-9dc8-308fc4fad755)
Dandelion WishesSummer KissesSeason of ChangeA Perfect YearTime for LoveA Memory AwayMarrying the Single DadLove, Special DeliverySupport Your Local SheriffMarrying the Wedding Crasher
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Kissed by the Country Doc
Melinda Curtis
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-09100-8
KISSED BY THE COUNTRY DOC
© 2019 Melinda Wooten
Published in Great Britain 2019
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
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www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Contents
Cover (#u657f9f24-9e4a-5060-b824-3b55004c6147)
Back Cover Text (#u59efd5c4-31fb-55b6-98b4-58cebb9cb639)
About the Author (#u65d9fce1-4049-56ea-8816-9e4680327e15)
Booklist (#u114b3d67-7bf4-56c0-93a0-b545374b1856)
Title Page (#u77507b86-7674-5e04-863b-84a92b87e280)
Copyright (#ua04262b8-adc9-55c1-a820-ad833e97bc11)
PROLOGUE (#uaca61f2d-b9e2-54a9-9175-bae63439ebc1)
CHAPTER ONE (#ub5bf481a-5a24-5ba1-94e2-d0ef37452510)
CHAPTER TWO (#u35bbfdbb-437c-5619-9434-7d7a5694786a)
CHAPTER THREE (#u387ca85c-5af8-56a8-a55d-2ec96c91592c)
CHAPTER FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIXTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
PROLOGUE (#u620f0279-c426-5259-9dc8-308fc4fad755)
THERE WERE DAYS when Ella Bowman Monroe felt like life couldn’t get any better—when her house was clean, when her little girl was clean and when she was surrounded by her large family of boisterous in-laws. On those days, this orphaned widow felt like singing as loudly as Grandpa Monroe.
Today wasn’t shaping up to be a singing kind of day.
Chalk it up to her grandfather-in-law’s funeral on this snowy January afternoon, the reading of his will and the Spanx she’d wiggled into that were so tight every breath was a struggle.
“Mom,” two-year-old Penny whispered from her lap. “I go.” And her daughter didn’t mean she wanted to leave. The ripe smell of dirty diaper mushroomed around them in the dining room of the Monroe Philadelphia compound like an alien force field.
To Ella’s right, her husband’s cousin Sophie spared Penny a glance and a nose tweak. “No more artichoke quiche for you.”
To Ella’s left, Sophie’s twin brother, Shane, waved a hand in front of his nose. “Penny la Pew.”
Penny giggled and grinned, glorying in their attention. “Kiss,” she whispered, leaning to kiss first Sophie and then Shane, and then twisting to kiss Ella.
The smiles, teasing and kisses would have been normal—so very normal—except for the elderly lawyer wheezing through the legalese of the will and the black-clad Monroes ringing the formal dining-room table. They nodded at appropriate wheezes as if well-versed in legalese.
Near the head of the table, Ian Monroe, Ella’s father-in-law, turned his somber face her way, his expression one of reluctant farewell.
Because his father just died.
No. That wasn’t grief.
Ella had been on the receiving end of reluctant farewells before, most notably when she’d been transitioned out of one foster home and into another, repeatedly. Ian’s expression wasn’t rooted in grief. It was rooted in regret. The remorse of goodbye. She was suddenly certain of it. It made little sense—why now?—but she couldn’t see past Ian’s regret or her fear.
The Monroes were the only family she had. The only family Penny had. This couldn’t be goodbye.
Don’t panic. Don’t pass out. Breathe.
Ella breathed deeply, despite the Spanx.
And then nearly gagged.
She’d inhaled too much eau de poopy pants.
Thankfully, the elderly lawyer with the rasping voice finished reading the first part of Grandpa Harlan’s will and signaled a break. Ella carried Penny out of the lavishly decorated dining room and toward the bathroom down the hall, fighting the feeling that she was about to be excommunicated.
Two years ago, Ella had been an interloper in Ian’s eyes, a woman who’d “trapped” his son, Bryce, into marriage by becoming pregnant a month after their first date. The Monroes were old money, old traditions, old school. In the Monroe world, nobody fell in love at first sight. You dated. You were vetted by the family and a private investigator. And after several years, you had a lavish wedding ceremony at the country club.
But she and Bryce had tumbled into love at a charity ball. He’d swerved to avoid a passing waiter, bumped Ella, knocked her off her feet and into the shrubbery. She’d laughed—because what else could she do in her rented designer dress? He’d hurried to set down his drink and before he even reached to pull her up, their gazes collided and it was...love. It had hummed in her veins. He’d felt it, too. They’d both froze. They’d both laughed. And then Bryce had helped Ella out of the shrubbery and never let go.
When Ella had told Bryce she was pregnant, he hadn’t blinked. He’d dropped to one knee, professed his love and enthusiastically asked her to marry him, as if her unplanned pregnancy was the best news in the world. A weekend trip to Vegas, and they were married, much to the chagrin of the family. But in time, Ella had won them over. She’d won them over before Bryce had died in a car accident a month before Penny was born.
The memory put an ache in her chest.
Ella was a Monroe now. It said so on her driver’s license. No one could take this family away from her. She was expected at holidays and birthdays and any old day. She was included on trips to the family lake house and family business updates. She was a Monroe.
She. Was. Family.
So why had Ian’s expression shaken her?
Because for fifteen years I had no family.
On their way back down the wide hall, with the Spanx now stuffed into the diaper bag, Ella and Penny stopped at a section of the wall devoted to memorializing the dearly departed Monroes. There were Grandpa Harlan’s parents in 1950s faded photographs, Cousin Carl, who died storming Omaha Beach, Harlan’s four wives—the actress, the pilot, the politician and the oil heiress—and, of course, Bryce.
Ella’s heart hitched when she looked at her husband, at brown hair so dark it was almost black, at friendly bright green eyes, not to mention the smile he’d passed on to their daughter.
“Blow Daddy a kiss,” Ella told Penny.
Together, they sent air kisses toward Bryce’s handsome, worry-free face.
And then Penny wriggled free, running on her short sturdy legs toward the grand marble foyer outside the dining room. She wore a black dress with a white sash and her thin blond curls bobbed as she made her escape, clutching what looked like Ella’s black Spanx in her small fist. She ran in circles around the plush red-and-black carpet, waving the Spanx like a flag.
“Mr. Quinby—” Ian’s voice drifted from the dining room “—we have no need of Ella. Please proceed.”
No need of Ella?
She wanted to protest, to charge inside and shout: But I’m a Monroe.
But... Was she?
Weak-kneed with doubt, Ella sank into an antique chair that was stiffer than her father-in-law’s voice, a chair where she could watch the proceedings like the outsider she was.
At least she’d been asked to attend. Other partners and spouses were barred from the reading.
“And now for Harlan Monroe’s personal message and family bequests.” Mr. Quinby tugged his tie, cleared his throat and cast a sideways glance toward the much younger lawyer behind him. He lifted a sheet of paper with hands that shook. “I’m going to read a letter from the deceased. One that was written over two years ago, notarized and kept with his will. He wrote...”
Two years... Could this have anything to do with Ella falling in love with Bryce? The timing couldn’t be a coincidence.
The old lawyer sucked in thready amounts of air. “‘If you’re hearing this, then I am dead. And if you want an inheritance, you’ll have to listen to my lawyer without any back talk.’” Mr. Quinby did a quick visual survey of his audience.
He was anxious for good reason. The Monroes were an expressive, explosive bunch. But this time, there were no outbursts, no questions, no challenges. Or, as Grandpa Harlan put it, no back talk.
The old lawyer heaved a sigh of relief and resumed his oratory. “‘I was born into a home with nothing but love. I was raised in hand-me-downs and nourished by leftovers. I played unsupervised and ran barefoot until it was too dark to catch a baseball or to fish. Those humble beginnings gave me an appreciation for life, a drive to succeed and, most importantly, a love of my fellow man. I was unable to give the latter to my children. It’s my fault my sons consider themselves superior to others, that they consider their wealth a form of entitlement.’”
That was Grandpa Harlan, calling a diamond-studded spade a diamond-studded spade.
“You, my girl, have gumption,” he’d told Ella the first time he’d met her as he’d grabbed onto her hand from his wheelchair. “Don’t let the Monroes take that away from you. You’ve got to greet every day with a happy song.” He’d given her hand a squeeze and then raised his arms in the air and goofed, “Are you ready, Hezzie?” It was a favorite line of his that had been popular when he was a young man. And then he’d burst into song, uncaring of his surroundings or the audience.
Grandpa Harlan hadn’t had a pretentious or self-conscious bone in his body.
Penny did a slow-motion, near-silent fall to her rump on the plush carpet, and then lay down on her back and pretended to make a snow angel. One hand still clutching black Spanx. She turned her sweet face toward Ella and whispered, “Mom. Mom. Mom.”
How could Ella worry about anything with a daughter like that? And yet, how could she not? She had no family apart from the Monroes. Without them, who would Penny have if anything happened to Ella?
Ella peeked in the dining room, her gaze connecting with Ian’s. Her father-in-law gave her that farewell look once more. It roiled the artichoke quiche in her stomach.
“‘I made my first fortune in Texas oil before I ever married,’” the lawyer went on. “‘I was also a lucky man who found love four times over. My wives were drawn to my sense of adventure and my charm.’”
Someone chuckled. Grandpa Harlan was a straight-shooter with a good heart, but he forgot to mention he had a wandering eye.
