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Forever Wife And Mother
Grace Green
Gabe Ryland knew he was attracted to Caprice the moment she arrived at his rural resort. But she was beautiful and sophisticated–exactly the sort of woman he refused to let into his heart again!Caprice was equally determined not to fall for Gabe. She'd come hoping to discover the truth about her father's past. Yet she found Gabe and his little girl, Willow, irresistible. If only she could convince Gabe to trust in love once more…
“Ah.” Gabe straightened. “You made friends quickly. Willow’s usually much more cautious in her dealings with strangers.”
“She’s a sweetie. You’ve done a great job of bringing her up. It can’t have been easy for either of you—I mean, for a man to bring up a little girl, and for a little girl to grow up without her mother. Willow told me…” Caprice’s voice trailed away as she saw Gabe stiffen.
His eyes had become hard, his lips tightly compressed. Caprice felt the air positively vibrate with tension. She had apparently said the wrong thing, but before she could even open her mouth to murmur sorry, he very pointedly—very rudely—tilted up his forearm and stared at his watch….
Grace Green grew up in Scotland, but later immigrated to Canada with her husband and children. They settled in “Beautiful Super Natural B.C.” and Grace now lives in a house just minutes from ocean, beaches, mountains and rain forest. She makes no secret of her favorite occupation—her bumper sticker reads, I’d Rather Be Writing Romance! Grace also enjoys walking the seawall, gardening, getting together with other authors…and watching her characters come to life, because she knows that once they do, they will take over and write her stories for her.
Grace Green loves to write deeply emotional stories with compelling characters. She’s also a great believer in creating happy-ever-after endings that are certain to bring a tear to your eye!
Forever Wife and Mother
Grace Green
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
For Carolyn and Jan Willem
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE (#u0456f541-3933-50b8-968b-9d36d10c90ec)
CHAPTER TWO (#uc5572800-2d16-55a3-8406-f992b4ee8852)
CHAPTER THREE (#u991eeebd-947f-50ab-8919-2a5d46d3f59e)
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 ONE
WHY had he lied to her?
Caprice Kincaid stood at the study window, tears misting her eyes as she watched three black limos sweep the last lingering mourners from Lockhart House. Never had she felt so lost, so alone…so bewildered. She had trusted her father all her life; it pained her heart now to know he had deceived her.
She desperately wanted to ask him why…but it was too late. He was gone. Forever gone. And she was left to wonder what deep dark secret he had been hiding—
“Excuse me, Mrs. Kincaid.”
Blinking back her tears, she turned to see her father’s lawyer, Michael Duggan, in the doorway.
“Michael.” With a pale smile, she waved the bearded, heavyset man forward. “Thanks for waiting.” The heels of her black pumps spiked into the plush bronze carpet as she crossed to her father’s rosewood desk.
“You said you had something to show me.”
Caprice slid open the desk’s top drawer—the drawer she’d unlocked for the first time last night, with the tiny key she’d found in her father’s wallet. Her fingers shook as she withdrew the sheet of age-yellowed paper—but she steadied them and quickly closed the drawer as the lawyer walked over to join her.
“As I told you the other day,” he offered in a reassuring tone, “your father’s will is straightforward. He has left all his assets to you, as his only surviving relative. You are now one very wealthy young lady….”
Caprice handed him the paper. “This is my father’s birth certificate.” A swath of her long ash-blond hair slid over her cheek; abstractedly she looped it behind her ear. “Dad always led me to believe he’d been born in New York. Why would he have lied to me?”
The lawyer frowned. “According to this, he was born in Washington State. That is a surprise!”
“To you, too?”
“Well, yeah…I had the impression he was born in New York. I know that’s where he met your mother—and I know they moved here to Chicago before you were born. But this place in Washington State…Hidden Valley. Your father owns some riverside property there—yours now, of course.”
“What kind of property?”
“A log house. Modest place, with a bit of acreage.”
“But his investments were all in apartment buildings, weren’t they?”
“Except for this house. Holly Cottage.”
“Is it rented out?”
“Not at the moment, but over the past more than twenty years your father donated it for the summer months to a Seattle charity group called Break Away. They used it as a retreat for women who for one reason or another badly needed a holiday—a break—from problems in their lives.”
“I had no idea….”
“After his second heart attack last fall, your father indicated to Break Away that Holly Cottage would no longer be available to them. He was planning to sell all his holdings—and he did divest himself of all the apartment buildings—but he never got around to putting the log house up for sale. Something seemed to be holding him back.” He returned the birth certificate to Caprice. “I don’t know what it was.”
“I should like to find out.”
“I’ll make inquiries—”
“Thank you, Michael, but this is something I want to do myself. I’ll come into the office on Monday to attend to the paperwork we discussed, and next day I’ll fly out to Seattle. I’ve looked up Hidden Valley on the map—it’s a couple of hours’ drive from the city. I’ll rent a car at the airport.”
“You’ll stay at Holly Cottage?”
“It’ll be habitable?”
“Oh, sure, a caretaker looks after it.”
“Then yes, I’ll stay there.”
“For how long?”
“For as long as it takes.” Caprice’s ebony silk blouse clung to her ribs as she drew in a deep breath. “Can you get me a key?”
“No problem. Come to think of it,” the lawyer added as he prepared to leave, “it may not be a bad idea for you to take off for a while, have a vacation in the country. You’ve been under a lot of pressure over the past couple of years with your dad’s failing health….”
Caprice waited till after Michael Duggan had gone before she opened the drawer again and withdrew the only other item she had found there: a photograph.
The snap was of a modest two-story log house, with a very lovely brunette posed at the front door.
On the back of the snap was written, in her father’s strong familiar hand, just one word. Angela.
Caprice felt her heart twist as she looked at it. Her mother’s name had been Kristin.
Who was she, this dark stranger who had been part of her father’s past? And why had he never talked about her?
It was a mystery.
And one she was determined to solve.
‘Will! Will! Dammit, where is that girl?”
Willow Ryland woke with a start. Her father’s voice, faint though it was, had penetrated her dreams. Oh, cripes, she thought frantically as she scrambled off the rocking chair where she’d dozed off, I’m in big trouble if he finds me up here!
She whipped off all the jewelry she’d bedecked herself with earlier—the silver charm bracelet, the ropes of pink pearls, the blue earrings, the gold brooch that spelled out Angela—and tucked them away swiftly in the bottom of the old trunk, under the silk dresses and scarves and straw hats and wonderfully shiny high-heeled sandals, before lowering the lid carefully so as not to make any noise.
“Will! Where are you and that damned dog?”
At the word dog, Fang stirred and gave a protesting growl. He’d been dozing, too, his squat little body stretched out on the planked floor in a beam of April sunshine that slanted through the attic skylight.
“Hush!” Willow hissed as she clambered onto the rickety table that sat below the skylight. Raising herself on her toes, she peered out. And—oh, cripes!—there he was, striding around the car park, looking every which way. For her. Then all at once he turned on his heel and strode toward the lodge. His face, she noticed, was set in a dark scowl.
“Oh, hell!” The bad word popped out before she could stop it. She’d have to say an extra prayer that night. “Fang, let’s get out of here!”
The black and white mongrel’s claws clicked as he scurried across the floor and then lolloped down the narrow winding stairs that led to the third floor. Willow climbed down after him backward, rolling her eyes as the dog lost his footing and his roly-poly body landed with a fat thud against the door at the bottom of the steps.
Cautiously, she opened the door a crack. She heard nothing. She crept out, with Fang rudely pushing ahead, and closed the door again. She turned the key in the lock, and biting her lip, planted the key where she’d first found it a year ago, in the shadowy cranny of a glass-doored bookcase, across from one of the guest bedrooms.
Then—heart thumping like mad—she sped to the passage and the landing.
Fang was already halfway down to the second floor. And when she caught up with him, she gulped at the sight of her father in the foyer. He was scratching a hand through his wavy black hair and muttering to himself.
“Dad!” she called. “Hi!”
He raised his head sharply, and she saw relief flood his eyes before sparks of irritation sent it flying.
“Where the hell have you been?” he asked. “I’ve been looking everywhere for—”
“Dad.” She used the same tone Miss Atkinson had used last week when the teacher had sent her to the principal’s office for wrestling with her best friend Mark at recess. “You’re not allowed to say hell. Remember?”
She saw his lips twitch. “Right. Sorry, Will. I’ll try to do better.”
Willow grabbed the banister, swung her leg over and swooped down with her back to him. He caught her—as she’d known he would—just as she shot off the end.
“So…where were you?” he said gruffly as he set her down. “You and that stupid mutt of yours?”
“Oh, just busy,” she said, cocking her head at him. And just loving him, like she always did. “Were you calling me? I didn’t hear you. What did you want?”
“Dinner’s ready,” he said. “Bacon burgers.”
Her very favorite dinner!
Happily, she skipped alongside him as they made their way along the passage leading to their private quarters, to the cozy little kitchen—which was her favorite room in the lodge, second only to the attic.
And this was her favorite time of year. The ski season was over, the summer season hadn’t started, the staff were on holiday, so she had her dad all to herself. Things would be different in two weeks when the lodge would be jam-packed with guests…and then he’d be off into the wilderness with a bunch of rich folks who wanted to do all that neat stuff like rock climbing and white-water rafting.
For now, she wanted to enjoy being alone with her dad. Who was the best dad in the world.
She’d eaten two bacon burgers, washed down with milk, before she noticed something that turned her blood cold.
She’d forgotten to take off the wedding ring.
It glowed like a firefly on her middle finger—the only finger it fit. And it was a miracle, truly a miracle, that he hadn’t noticed it yet.
Palms sweating, she snuck her hands under the table, slid off the gold band and poked it down deep into the side pocket of her overalls. Only when it was safely tucked away did she dare glance at him again.
But he was lost in thought. She could tell by the lonesome look in his eyes, the look that told her he was aching for something. She had never figured out what. It reminded her, though, of the way she looked when she chanced to see herself in a mirror when she was thinking that it was the saddest thing in the whole world not to have a mom and how she longed with all her heart to have one.
At any rate, her dad hadn’t noticed the ring. And for that, she was truly grateful. He had no idea that she spent time in the attic—she knew for a fact that he never went up there himself. First time she went up, the floor and every other thing had been inches deep in dust, and it had taken her two full weeks to get everything cleaned off.
And of course he had no idea she had found the trunk of pretty things. He had no idea that she loved jewelry and silk dresses and shiny shoes and straw hats with pink flowers. He didn’t. He didn’t like pretty things.
And he didn’t like pretty ladies.
She knew that for a fact!
And it was why, from the very moment she’d overheard him say it—when she was four years old, which was three years ago now—she’d known that if he was gonna love her she had to make herself look as ugly as a mud road.
And actually, she reflected as she considered her raggedy straw-yellow hair, her turned-up nose and her too-big eyes that weren’t even the same color as each other—that wasn’t a very hard thing to do!
Heck, no, she thought with a grin, it wasn’t hard at all.
In fact, it was a downright cinch!
