The Cowboy's Secret Son

That assessment of the handsome and charismatic Sebastian Cooper, especially by a woman, was surprising. Usually it was Sebastian who made an indelible impression on females, Lily thought with a trace of bitterness. Just as he had with Julie.

She had hoped for years that Julie would realize Dylan was the one who really loved her. The one who was so obviously right for her. She hadn’t, however, and when she and Sebastian had eloped, Dylan had continued to be a friend to both of them, despite what Lily suspected was a badly broken heart.

“But she took to you?” The mockery had been deliberately injected back into her question, hiding that swell of bitterness.

“Of course. After all, I took her riding,” Dylan said. “And part of my inheritance is the horse we rode on.”

“The horse we rode on?”

“She said she hadn’t been riding in years. I held her before me in the saddle so she could have one last ride on one of her beloved horses. It just seemed…the right thing to do.”

“Just exactly how old was Violet when you met her.”

“According to this, Violet was eighty-one when she died. The fishing trip was before Sebastian and Julie married….” The sentence trailed, and Lily felt unease stir. After a few seconds, however, her brother continued, his voice unchanged. “So, maybe…four years ago. Maybe a little more.”

The tough-as-nails Dylan cradling a fragile old lady before him in the saddle was not hard to imagine. Not if one knew her brother as she did. “And in gratitude, she left you the horse.”

“Considering its bloodlines, that would be no small bequest in itself. But it isn’t all Violet left me.”

Dylan walked across the room and laid both letters on the desk in front of her. Lily scanned the first one quickly, finding the initial paragraphs to be confirmation of what he had just told her. And in the third paragraph…

“Mitchum Oil? Your Violet was that Mitchum?” she asked.

“She and her husband Charles. They had no children. Only Violet’s horses and…that.”

That was a fortune, one of the largest in Texas, where millionaires were not rare. The size of the old Mitchum strike was justly famous even in this oil-rich state.

“And the other heirs?” Lily asked, after she had skimmed the rest of the first letter.

“People who meant something in Violet’s life. They’re all listed in the other letter. That one’s from her lawyer. There’s an old friend, Mary Barrett, who stayed in touch by letter, despite their changing circumstances. There are several who had done Violet favors, like Stella Richards, who sent meals out to the Mitchum house every day until Violet died. And Stuart Randolph, who loaned Charlie the equipment to dig his first well. John Carpenter, who tended her horses,” Dylan enumerated. “And then there are those, like me, who had a chance encounter with her that…changed their own lives.”

“Is that what Violet did? Changed your life?” Lily asked, hearing again the thread of emotion in his deep voice.

“She granted me absolution.”

“Absolution?” Lily asked, surprised at the word, which had such strong religious connotations. “Absolution for what?”

“For not being here when Mother died,” he said quietly.

“Dylan,” Lily said, pity intermingled in her equally soft protest. “I never knew you felt that way. You have to know she understood. She always understood. And she loved you so much.”

“That’s what Violet said. I guess she just said it at the time when I most needed to hear it. She reminded me that a mother’s love has no conditions,” he added. “Mom’s certainly didn’t. Somehow, stupidly, I had managed to forget that.”

Lily nodded, blinking back the sharp sting of tears those memories evoked. “You said there was an assignment for us in this,” she reminded him, not sure that reliving the pain of her mother’s death was what either of them needed right now. Not with Dylan so worried about Julie, and her own pregnancy—

“The other heirs,” Dylan said, interrupting the remembrance of that very private joy. “We’ve been asked to find them and to let them know about Violet’s bequests.”

“And those all involve sums like this?” Lily asked, her eyes again considering the amount that had been left to her brother.

“Some of them are much larger. And each is accompanied by a memento from their association with Violet. Does that sound like an assignment we’d be interested in taking on?”

“Changing lives,” Lily said thoughtfully.

“What?”

“That’s what this amounts to. Changing lives. Changing circumstances. Can you imagine what a gift like this could mean to some of these people? Do you know anything about them?”

“At this point, nothing but their names,” Dylan said, reaching over her shoulder to turn the page, revealing the names of the three still-missing heirs.

“Jillian Salvini, Sara Pierce and Matt Radcliffe.” Lily read the names aloud. “And if we agree to the lawyer’s proposal, we’re supposed to find these people?”

“And tell them what Violet has left them.”

“Do you suppose she meant as much to any of them as she did to you?” Lily asked, looking up from the letter into his eyes.

“If she did…then, despite the money, I would bet they’d rather not be found. I know I’d like to think about Violet still alive and vital, living in that Victorian monstrosity her husband built for her. Still watching her beloved horses and writing her endless letters. Frankly, I’d much rather be allowed to believe that than to have the money.”

“But you can’t speak for everyone. And this much money—” she began to remind him again.

“Can change lives,” Dylan finished for her. “Not exactly the purpose for which we started Finders Keepers, but still… I think I’d like to do this, Lily, providing you’re agreeable. And who knows, we might even manage to reunite a few families in the process.”

“Whether we do or not,” Lily said, “I think this is something you need to do. For Violet. To repay the debt you owe her, if for no other reason.”

“I think you’re right. For Violet,” Dylan agreed. And his voice was again reminiscent. For Violet.

CHAPTER ONE

LIKE A WHIPPED DOG with his tail between his legs, Mark Peterson thought, fighting the bitterness that always boiled up to the surface when he approached the ranch from this direction.

He dropped the chopper low enough that its powerful rotor kicked up dust from the arid ground below. There were no power lines or trees to worry about in this desolate terrain, and it had become his habit to low-level over the Salvini ranch whenever he was coming in from the west.

After a few pointless trips across the deserted ranch, which stirred up memories as well as dust, Mark had given up trying to figure out his motives for doing this. Maybe it was simply a form of masochism. Or maybe it was the fact that this was the last place on earth where he still felt a connection to Jillian. And that in itself was a totally different kind of masochism.

He had never forgotten her, of course, but since he’d come back to Texas, back to his family’s land, all those memories had become stronger. And much harder to deal with.

The For Sale signs were still up, he realized, which meant that the price on the property hadn’t yet dropped enough to make the co-op snap it up as they had most of the land around here. It would soon, of course, because the people who currently owned the ranch would be increasingly eager to get out of it whatever they could and move on with their lives.

The house had been unoccupied for a couple of months and was beginning to show the effects. Despite the fact that the last owners couldn’t afford to hold on to the ranch, they had at least kept it in good shape. Now…

Mark eased the cyclic back, bringing the nose of the helicopter up, and increased the pitch. As the chopper rose and then leveled out, he forced his eyes away from the familiar buildings spread out across the flat High Plains countryside below. He didn’t need to look at them. He knew every square mile of that ranch almost as well as he knew the one next door. The one where he had grown up.

It already belonged to the cooperation, as did most of those in the area that had come on the market in the last few years. Few individuals could afford the investment it took to make ranching up here a financial success. The cooperation had the backing of a couple of major banks and the monetary wherewithal to ride out the volatile ups and downs of the cattle market.

Families didn’t. They couldn’t afford to hold on through the hard times. That’s why more and more land was being sold to groups such as the one he now worked for. And as much as Mark hated to see that happen, he couldn’t blame anyone for choosing a less heartbreaking road than the one that had broken his father.

The thromping blades of the rotor startled an antelope into flight. It raced along under the shadow of the copter for a few hundred feet before it veered off to the right and disappeared beneath him.

Mark’s lips slanted with the pleasure of watching that brief display of grace and power. The country below was too dry and forbidding for much of the wildlife that flourished farther south. Of course, the High Plains were different enough from the rest of Texas that they were almost a separate entity—one Mark loved with a passion that rivaled his father’s.