A Rugged Ranchin' Dad

“Mom! Over here!”

And Dahlia saw her. Brooke. Her daughter, standing on the path. She was wearing the long white gown, wings and halo of an angel. She looked so beautiful, Dahlia’s heart ached. She hadn’t seen her little girl in such a long time.

Twelve months, to be exact.

Her little girl. Her precious baby—no, not her baby. Brooke always hated it when she called her that. Brooke was gazing back at her with big blue eyes, her long dark hair loose and free, a wreath of white flowers on her head.

“Mom, hurry! I’ve been waiting and waiting for you!” Brooke held her arms out with a joyous smile.

Dahlia started to run toward her, but Basil stopped her with a gentle, but firm, hand. “There will be a short delay,” he said quietly. “It has been brought to my attention—”

“Oh, no, please!” Dahlia cried. “Let me go through the gate now. I’ve waited so long for this,” she pleaded with him. She had to make him understand! “I want to be with my daughter. I haven’t held her or touched her in a year—”

“I am sorry, but there are rules, you know.”

Basil did look as though he regretted keeping her out of heaven, but why couldn’t he just let her go through the gate as planned? Why the delay? What had she done wrong?

“I’ve been standing in this line forever, waiting, waiting to be with my daughter.” Dahlia was close to tears.

Basil’s heavenly blue eyes rested gently upon her face. “It will only be three weeks,” he promised her.

Dahlia looked wistfully at Brooke, who was still waiting on the path. Then she nodded slowly. After all, she wanted to make a good impression. She took a deep breath and almost saluted. “All right.”

Basil looked pleased. “There is a man who is dangerously close to losing faith in himself. You are to help him find it.”

Oh, great! “Who is this man?” she asked.

Basil checked his list, then looked at her for a moment that seemed to stretch endlessly between them. “His name is Stone Tyler.”

Dahlia gasped. She’d never get into heaven now. There wasn’t a snowball’s chance in hell to get Stone to believe in anything. Not after what had happened to their daughter.

“This is top priority,” he continued. “Stone Tyler is worth a little more effort.”

“Yes, I know he is,” Dahlia said softly. But she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t reach him. She’d tried and failed countless times before.

“Remember the power of love.”

Dahlia sighed at the trust she saw in Basil’s blue eyes. She peeked through the gate, but she could no longer see Brooke. Wearily she turned away.

Once again Basil stopped her with a gentle hand. “You have three weeks. If you do not complete your mission and return within the scheduled time, you may not go through the gate,” he warned.

“I’ll be here. I promise.” Dahlia looked at the ticket in her hand. “Do I have to give this back?”

Basil shook his head. “No, it is yours to keep.”

Dahlia stood still for a moment, frightened by the idea of leaving this place, and of the uphill battle ahead to restore Stone’s faith in himself. But she would do it.

She had to.

She’d do whatever it took to be with her daughter again.

Then she felt herself tumbling down, down, down....

Chapter One

Stone Tyler waited anxiously outside the hospital room while the doctor examined his wife. What in hell had he been thinking? Why had he spouted off about wanting to shoot Firelight? It wasn’t the horse’s fault that Brooke was dead.

He buried his face in his hands. If he hadn’t said all those things about killing Brooke’s golden palomino, then Dahlia wouldn’t have—

Guilt piled on top of guilt, like so many layers of dirt and grime.

He wouldn’t have shot Firelight. He wouldn’t have taken his rifle out to the corral and put a bullet in his daughter’s beloved horse.

He’d just been...frustrated. And angry.

At himself, mostly.

But why couldn’t Dahlia understand that the ranch was no place for Field? He didn’t want to lose his son, too. Why couldn’t she understand how much he needed to keep his surviving son safe—no matter the cost?

Why couldn’t she just let him do his job as a father? Sending their ten-year-old boy to a boarding school in San Antonio was not the end of the world. Stone hated the idea of not seeing his son every day, but Field could come home on weekends. Dahlia acted as though San Antonio was on the other side of the country, instead of only sixty miles from the ranch.

He glanced up when he heard footsteps. It was the nurse. “You may see your wife now,” she said. Her smile was reassuring.

He rushed to the door of Dahlia’s room, the past couple of days crowding his mind. The argument, Dahlia racing off blindly to save Firelight, the way he’d found her, unconscious, in the meadow, the coma she’d been in for the past thirty-six hours...

Relief crashed in on him, flooding him with memories. It hadn’t always been like this, Stone thought, as he hesitated outside the private room. Once there had been love and laughter.

Once he’d had a family. A whole family—with Dahlia, Field and Brooke.

Now it was breaking up all around him, and he didn’t know how to stop it from happening.

Stone entered the room, the scent of roses and carnations assaulting him from all sides, reminding him of the flowers at Brooke’s funeral.

And in the middle of the flowers, Dahlia lay still and silent in the white bed. But at least she was okay. The doctors had said so. All they’d been waiting for was Dahlia to wake up.

The doctor and nurse separated and let him pass between them, so he could bend over Dahlia’s bed. Stone swallowed slowly, taking her limp hand in his. “Dahlia,” he said quietly. “It’s okay. Everything will be okay now. I promise.”

He held his breath. He’d been talking to her for the past day and a half, hoping to get through to her. And then, a few minutes ago, she’d stirred and tried to open her eyes.

But what if she slipped back into a coma when she heard his voice this time? What if he was the reason she’d stayed unconscious for so long?

“Dahlia, open your eyes,” Stone said tightly, his fingers gripping her hand like a lifeline. That was exactly what she was to him. His lifeline.

The center of his universe.

But she was going to leave him if he sent their son away.

“Dahlia.” His voice was soft now, urging her to come back to him. “Dahlia, it’s Stone. Open your eyes and look at me.”