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The Sheriff's Daughter
Tara Taylor Quinn
Enjoy the dreams, explore the emotions, experience the relationships.Being the sheriff’s only child wasn’t easy. Maybe that’s why teenage Sara Calhoun made one bad choice that changed everything. Twenty-one years later, Sara opened her door – to come face to face with the child she’d loved and given up! For her son’s sake, Sara finds the courage and strength to discover the truth about her past. Her search leads to enigmatic Mark Dalton – the secrets revealed make Sara question all she’s ever believed.As a fragile trust grows between Sara and Mark, their long-ago mistakes will lead to a promise of happiness forever.
“I’m your son.”
She blinked. The young man stood still, as if frozen, while his words replayed themselves in her mind. He’d just said he was her son. He couldn’t be.
Sara clutched the door with both hands and leaned against it, her gaze never wavering from the young man standing just outside.
Who was this boy claiming to be the child she’d given away so long ago? This child she’d worried for, grieved over and daydreamed about ever since. This young man named Ryan.
“Should I go?” he asked.
“No!”
“You’re shocked. How could you not be?” His voice was filled with strength, compassion and a tremble of fear.
Years of training drove her to respond. She held out her hand.
“Nice to meet you, Ryan.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Tara’s first book, Yesterday’s Secrets, published in October 1993, was a finalist for the Romance Writers of America’s prestigious RITA® Award. Her subsequent work has earned her finalist status for the National Readers’ Choice Award, plus another two RITA® Award nominations. A prolific writer, she has more than forty novels as well as three novellas published. To reach Tara, write to her at PO Box 133584, Mesa, Arizona 85216, USA or through her website, www.tarataylorquinn.com.
Dear Reader,
Most of us will never face Sara’s challenges, but almost all of us have to make the same choices she does. The choice to play it safe, to exist – or to take the big risks, to reach for everything, to live fully. We have to be willing to not only face our fears, but to walk right into them if required, so we can get through them to whatever awaits us on the other side.
I’m often asked where I get the ideas for my stories. Sometimes I have specific answers. I have no idea where this story came from. It doesn’t quite fit the usual boundaries or genres. But it wouldn’t go away. I spoke to my editor about this story. She didn’t seem shocked or even hesitant as she told me she thought it would work and asked me to write it. I didn’t question her acceptance any more than I questioned myself about the original creation.
And then, halfway through the book, I questioned everything – mostly myself. What had I done? How was I going to get a romance out of this? How was I going to get anywhere?
I was scared. I’d taken a risk and felt I was about to fail. I considered calling my editor and telling her we’d made a terrible mistake. And then Sara spoke to me. Was I going to work my way through the fears and let her find her happily ever after? I cared about her. And for her, I sat down every day and I wrote.
I didn’t take Sara to her happily ever after. She took me. I hope you’ll join us on this journey.
Tara Taylor Quinn
The Sheriff’s Daughter
TARA TAYLOR QUINN
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
For my father, Walter Wright Gumser.
Because he always did his best.
I love you, Daddy!
CHAPTER ONE
May 24
1:00—Lunch
2:00—Interview (It’s the retired cop. Credentials in folder.)
2:20—Meeting with Rodney Pace. (Presentation schedule included in red folder on desk.)
6:30—Dinner with partners from Mr. Calhoun’s firm. Hanrahan’s.
Note: Proof Sheriff Lindsay’s book. Sign checks and contracts before leaving. (In blue folder.)
Further note: Don’t forget to eat.
SARA CALHOUN SMILED as she read the final line Donna had jotted on the daily agenda, which sat atop a newly readied pile of folders on her desk at the National Organization for Internet Safety and Education early Thursday morning. The redeye she’d taken from a PTA conference in Anaheim had just landed at Port Columbus International Airport half an hour before. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d eaten.
If she’d gone straight home to shower without stopping at the office first to review the day’s materials, she could have had breakfast with Brent.
Glancing at the plain gold watch on her wrist—a college graduation present from her parents—Sara sat, pulled the pile of folders onto her lap and started to read.
THE DOORBELL RANG just as she was finishing her makeup. Stroking a couple of coats of mascara onto her lashes, Sara quickly dropped the tube in the sectioned container on her dressing table and raced to the stairs. Maybe it was just a salesperson, but she couldn’t stand to not answer.
She never let the phone ring, either.
It was five to nine. She’d spent so long at the office already that she was now late for work. But the sun was shining, May flowers were in bloom and an entire lovely summer stretched ahead.
Sara slowed at the bottom of the stairs, taking a deep breath to compose herself as she smoothed a hand down her slim brown skirt and brushed the pockets of her jacket. Dignity and class were her mantras. Always.
Brent expected this from her.
“Can I help—” The ready smile froze on her lips. A cop was standing on her doorstep.
Something had happened to her dad. Or Brent.
The young man’s mouth moved, but at this moment Sara couldn’t concentrate sufficiently to make out his words. “What?” she asked, willing herself to hear what he was saying. “What happened?”
“Are you Mrs. Sara Calhoun?”
“Yes.” She wished she weren’t. Law enforcement officials never came to deliver good news. She ought to know. She’d grown up with one.
“You are.” The young man’s gaze deepened, studying her.
“Yes,” she managed to say, bracing herself.
And nothing happened. Officer Mercedes, according to the thin nameplate above his left pocket, just stood there, apparently at a loss for words.
“Can I help you?” she finally prompted, mystified. She was the one getting the bad news—wasn’t she?
“I…uh…I’ve been planning this moment for a long time and I thought I was completely prepared. But now I have no idea what to say.”
Planning this moment? One didn’t usually plan to deliver bad news.
He looked so lost, so young, Sara’s heart caught. “You’re sure it’s me you want to see? I’m Sara Calhoun, formerly Sara Lindsay. I’m married to Brent Calhoun. He’s an attorney….”
Relief made her talkative.
“Antitrust. Yes, I know,” the tall, well-built officer said with a rueful grin. And a nervous twitch at the left corner of his mouth.
He ran his hand through his short sandy-colored hair, his raised arm drawing her attention to the belt at his waist—and all the defensive paraphernalia strapped there. That gun looked heavy.
“And, yes, you’re the one I’m looking for.”
The kid was young, his green eyes switching back and forth between innocent and knowing as he stood there, shifting his weight. He couldn’t be much more than twenty-one, which made her thirty-seven seem ancient.
“What’d I do? Forget to signal a turn? I have a habit of doing that, though I’m working on it,” she said, brushing a strand of hair back over her shoulder. This had to be his first house call.
He frowned and then, glancing down, his face cleared. “Oh, the uniform,” he said. “I’m not here on official business. I work the night shift in Westerville—just got off duty and finished my paperwork.”
Westerville, a north Columbus suburb a bit west of the New Albany home she and Brent had purchased six years before. There was a park within walking distance of every home in their area. Barely thirty when they bought it, she’d still believed that her workaholic husband was going to agree to have the children they’d always said they were going to have.
“Speaking of work, I’m late,” Sara said now, suddenly anxious to be on her way.
“I can come back another time.”
“No.” She shook her head. What could a young cop possibly have to do with her that would justify a second trip out? Or any trip? “I’m listening.”
“And I’m finding that there’s just no way to say this except outright.”
She waited.
“I’m your son.”
She blinked.
The young man stood still, as if frozen in stone, while his words replayed themselves in her mind.
He’d just said he was her son.
Her son.
He couldn’t be.
Twenty-one years of fighting for dignity and grace served her well enough to keep her standing. Sara clutched the door with both hands, leaned against it, her gaze never wavering from the young man standing just outside it.
He shifted, his hands folded together as if in military or pallbearer stance. Had he ever been in the military, this boy who was standing there claiming to be the child she’d given away so long ago? The child she’d worried for, grieved over and daydreamed about ever since.
Had he, too, suffered the pain of losing one he loved?
“Should I go?”
“No!”
“You’re shocked. How could you not be?”
His voice was deep, not at all that of the little boy she’d imagined so often that he seemed completely real to her.
This voice was filled with strength. Compassion. And a tremble of fear.
Or was she only losing her mind? After all these years, all the determination and trying, the counseling, all the self-flagellation, was the past finally going to undo her, anyway?
“I’m… I’m sorry,” she finally managed, straightening. “I just…”
“I know,” he interrupted, his hands still folded together. “I tried to come up with some easier way to do this, but I guess there isn’t one.”
No. Not easy. Nothing about Sara’s life had been easy since the morning after this boy—if he was her son—had been conceived. Nothing had been quite real. She’d lost things then that she’d been too young to even know she’d prized.
“I… What did you say your name was?”
“I didn’t. It’s Ryan—Ryan Mercedes.”
Ah. Yes. Officer Mercedes. Seemed like years ago that she’d read that name tag.
He was staring at her openly now. Counting the lines on her face? Finding her wanting? Wondering what kind of woman she was who would give away her newborn son?
Years of training drove her to respond. She held out her hand. “Nice to meet you, Ryan.”
Was she insane? Nice to meet you? With a handshake?
He glanced at her hand, looked up to her face. She thought he was going to refuse her offering. And then he reached out, took her hand and held on.
Sara started to cry.
AFTER A QUICK GLANCE behind him, Ryan reached with his free hand to wipe the tears from his mother’s face—and his own. He’d imagined this moment, of course. Many times.
He’d just never thought she’d be such a beautiful woman. Or that she’d look so young. He’d known she was thirty-seven, but he’d pictured someone more like his mom. Harriet Mercedes. Fifty-one. Graying. Twenty pounds heavier than she’d been when he was little.
Brent Calhoun was a first-class fool.
Shoulders tensing as a car passed behind him, Ryan said, “May I come in?”
He didn’t want her neighbors talking, asking her awkward questions. Didn’t want to make life harder for her than he already knew it was going to be.
“Um, of course.”
She turned and backed up, breaking eye contact with him. He was shocked at the loss he immediately felt. Of course, he’d expected to have some feelings for this woman—she’d given him life—but he’d imagined his reaction would be protective, rather than deeply emotional.
