Last Chance Bride

Last Chance Bride
Jillian Hart

Last Chance At Love… The lonely bearer of a shameful secret, Libby Hodges needed to make a new start - in Montana Territory as Jacob Stone's mail-order bride and mother to his little girl. Hoping to meet a loving husband, she found instead a man shattered by by loss and wary of affection.Libby could read in his gentle gray eyes a desperate plea for the tenderness they both craved. But how could she claim the heart of a man who'd vowed never to give it away again, or tell her prospective groom that she carried another man's child?

“I never wanted a wife.” (#u3113af78-052e-5166-91ec-bdc13df27000)Letter to Reader (#u8cf7d51d-43ee-5388-8596-d673874181fc)Title Page (#u63a53e05-f3f8-590b-951c-0a4e56a8e1a2)About the Author (#ub4df6748-9684-5267-b39a-06f9cf138379)Dedication (#u28f21868-b682-5348-938c-4a9eadea97eb)Chapter One (#ue24dd710-6904-59af-a75d-faa17b05ddb7)Chapter Two (#u98d15002-8a27-5059-8578-3a13eaa73e67)Chapter Three (#ubc0f85b4-08db-513b-96b5-4041e82b408b)Chapter Four (#ub03b8975-425c-5565-87c8-09819434349d)Chapter Five (#udfc5cf10-1ff0-5c46-9efd-731f9cdebe93)Chapter Six (#u3d02e92d-9102-5cab-be1c-7de2f2ca5d59)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)Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twenty-One (#litres_trial_promo)Chapter Twenty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

“I never wanted a wife.”

He stood before the opened window, sunlight glinting on his dark hair, brightening it, and casting his face in shadow. “I took one look at you and I bolted.”

“You ran?”

“I’d ventured halfway down the street this morning before I realized my foolishness. I invited you out here, and yet I am terrified of you. You’re young and pretty. From your letters, I expected someone different. Older.”

“I’m not all that pretty.” Libby spoke up, touched by his words. “I just want a home. A real one.”

Jacob Stone remained silent, staring out the window, still and motionless. “I can’t give you what you want.” He didn’t turn to look at her. “We’ve spent over six months corresponding. That amount of time should tell you right there how unsure I am of making a marriage again.”

Grief haunted his words, and the echoes of that grief hung in the air like the thick Montana dust. Libby wanted to reach out and comfort him, but how could she?

It was not her right.

Dear Reader,

March is the time of spring, of growth, and the budding of things to come. Like these four never-before-published authors that we selected for our annual March Madness Promotion. These fresh new voices in historical romance are bound to be tomorrow’s stars!

Among this year’s choices for the month is The Maiden and the Warrior by Jacqueline Navin, a heartrending medieval tale about a fierce warrior who is saved from the demons that haunt him when he marries the widow of the man who sold him into slavery. Goodness also prevails in Gabriel’s Heart by Madeline George. In this fltrty Western, an ex-sheriff uses a feisty socialite to exact revenge, but ends up falling in love with her first!

Last Chance Bride by Jillian Hart is a touching portrayal of a lonely spinster-turned-mail-order-bride who shows an embittered widower the true meaning of love on the rugged Montana frontier. And don’t miss A Duke Deceived by Cheryl Bolen, a Regency story about a handsome duke whose hasty marriage to a penniless noblewoman is tested by her secret deeds.

Whatever your tastes in reading, you’ll be sure to find a romantic journey back to the past between the covers of a Harlequin Historical.

Sincerely,

Tracy Farrell, Senior Editor

Please address questions and book requests to

Silhouette Reader Service

U S : 3010 Walden Ave, P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269

Canadian PO. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

Last Chance Bride

Jillian Hart

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

JILLIAN HART currently lives near Phoenix, Arizona, but as a Washington State native feels very much out of her element. The desert is beautiful, but she misses the rain. She feels the value of a good rainy day is the opportunity to curl up in a comfortable chair with her twenty-pound cat on her lap and read the day away. Now she’s learned to read in the sunshine.

When she isn’t reading the day away, Jillian likes to spend time with her husband, whom she met on a blind date set up by a mutual friend nine years ago. It was love at first sight, and she’s been living happily ever after since.

To my husband,

who did the dishes so I could

write this book.

Thanks.

Chapter One

Montana Territory, 1866

Where was Jacob Stone?

Her heart tight, Libby searched the knot of the small crowd. Strangers surrounded her, but she saw no sign of Jacob and his child in the hustle of this busy post. Surely they had not given up on her. Surely they remembered she was arriving today.

Disappointed, Libby stepped away from the stagecoach, patting at her wilting hair. She must look a fright. The ride overland had been dusty and dirty, not at all kind. Her best dress was wrinkled and dust stained, her wheat blond hair sliding into her eyes. She felt like a rag used to scrub a particularly filthy floor, all wadded up in the bottom of a sodden bucket. Hardly an attractive appearance for a prospective bride.

Perhaps Mr. Stone had taken one look through the confusion of the crowd and run for the hills at the sight of her. She feared he could see beyond her new dress, soiled as it was, to the real woman inside, to the very reason why she had to answer a man’s advertisement for a wife instead of finding a husband on her own.

She felt a rush weaken her knees, and heat crept up her face. Surely he would not run off without a word. He couldn’t. She needed to meet him, to know if he would be a good man to marry. From his thoughtfully penned letters, he seemed so gentle. A man who would make a good husband and father, a man worth traveling so far to meet. That is, if he decided to show up.

Placing a hand to her stomach, Libby eased through the excited crowd, past those greeting newly arrived loved ones, and walked quietly to a lone bench fronting the station. Her hopes began to wane. The blistering heat of the late August sun bore down on her, even on the partly shaded bench, and she sat baking like an egg on a frying pan.

“There she is, Pa!”

Libby turned toward the child’s excited voice. The spindly girl skipping across the dusty road had to be Emma. Libby’s heart twisted hard at the sight of the beautiful child. The child who could become her daughter.

Her hand to her heart, Libby stood through the long seconds it took for the girl to dash across the street.

“It is her! I knew it!” Emma skipped to a hoppity-stop, her twin braids bobbing too, and tipped up her face. Bright blue eyes shone like the sky overhead and her sweet smile stretched twice as wide. “You have to be Miss Hodges!”

“Yes, I am. I’m so pleased to meet you, Emma.” Libby managed a wobbly smile. She could only stare at the little girl dressed in a crisp red calico dress. Twin brown braids pointed stiffly over her shoulders, adorned with matching red ribbon.

“We’ve been waiting for hours for the stage to come.”

Libby laughed, delighted. Already she adored this small girl, not more than six years old, whom she read about so hungrily in Jacob Stone’s letters. She wanted a home and. a family, but had not imagined having such a wonderful stepdaughter.

“I saw so many interesting things on the stagecoach here,” she said now. “I saved up all the memories to tell you about.”

“Did you see any Indian ponies?” the girl asked.

“Yes, and even the Indians sitting on them.” Matching Emma’s smile, Libby’s mouth stretched painfully. She’d been so worried traveling so far from civilization—and feared she was making the worst mistake of her life. Anything could happen. Jacob Stone could be a drunk or a brutal man. But seeing this child reassured her. Anyone could see how well cared for she was—and what a good father Jacob Stone must be.

“Miss Hodges?”