LITMIR.BIZ

      Prologue

       1983

      Damn David for dying. And damn him for marrying an Indian woman.

      Spencer Ashton gazed out the windshield, then blew a frustrated breath. He’d just spent a grueling weekend in Nebraska, taking care of family business. But what choice did he have? Who else would pick up the pieces of David’s crumbled life and offer his half-breed kids a better existence?

      That squaw wasn’t fit to raise David’s offspring, and there was no way Spencer would allow her to take them to her freeloading, war-whooping reservation. It was bad enough they’d lived on a farm that had

      never prospered, a farm Spencer had helped David buy long before he’d married Mary Little Dove.

      But in the end, David had been too proud to admit that he and his family were starving.

      Spencer flipped the sun visor, squinting into the afternoon light. He was on his way home from the airport, heading to Napa Valley, California, where he owned a thriving winery and a twenty-two-thousand-square-foot mansion. The boy and girl he’d acquired—his dead brother’s children—sat next to him in the front seat of his luxury sedan.

      He glanced over and saw that three-year-old Charlotte was still behaving like a lost bird. She even chirped every so often, grating on his nerves. He’d tried to put her in the backseat, but she wouldn’t leave her big brother’s side. Spencer had no use for wounded creatures, but what could he do? She was David’s daughter.

      The eight-year-old boy, on the other hand, had already garnered Spencer’s respect. Walker held his head high. The kid had moxie. Balls. He deserved to be an Ashton.

      Too bad he was part Indian.

      But Spencer would find a way to get past that. Not that he favored children, Lord knew he had enough of his own. He even had another baby on the way, but Walker was different. He would probably prove to be better than any of Spencer’s kids.

      Charlotte made another nervous sound, and Spencer gripped the steering wheel.

      “She’s scared,” Walker said.

      “Yes, of course. Your parents are gone.” Or so they had been told. Their mother was still alive, but that was Spencer’s secret. Everyone, except his lawyer, had been fed the same story: Mary Little Dove had died from injuries she’d sustained in an automobile accident, just like David.

      Spencer and his attorney had strong-armed her into giving up her kids, but it had been the right thing to do.

      Walker was proof. The boy looked dapper in the clothes Spencer had purchased for him. And he hadn’t balked about getting his hair cut, either. Spencer wasn’t about to take the kids home looking like a couple of ragamuffins.

      He turned to study the boy’s posture. Although he protected his sister, keeping her close, he still had an air of independence. His mother had called him a warrior. A Sioux at heart. But Spencer sensed otherwise. This kid should have been white.

      “I was poor when I was young, too,” Spencer said. “But I wanted something better.”

      Walker glanced up. “My dad talked about you.”

      “Did he?”

      “Yes, sir.”

      “I would have saved his farm. I didn’t know it was in foreclosure, that he was losing it.” Spencer knew what people said about him: that he was a bastard, a self-righteous prick. But what the hell did they know? He’d always done right by David, even if his kid brother had been a sentimental fool. “I tried to help your dad succeed.”

      “And now you’re helping me and Charlotte,” Walker said.

      “That’s right, I am. Without me, you and your sister wouldn’t have a home.”

      “I’ve been praying for Mom and Dad.”

      Normal prayers, Spencer hoped. None of that heathen crap.

      Walker glanced out the window. He had a chiseled profile—handsome, in spite of his brown skin. He seemed to be surveying the land, the wealth of the wine country. Spencer suspected he appreciated what he saw. This kid would be grateful for his uncle’s generosity.

      “Is my dad going to be buried here?” Walker asked.

      “Yes, he is.”

      “And my mom?”

      “No, son. She’ll be laid to rest on that Indian reservation. The place where she came from. But it’s too far away for you to attend the funeral.”

      “I’ve never been there.”

      And you never will, Spencer thought. He noticed the eight-year-old’s voice had turned raw, but he wouldn’t dare cry. He was too strong to bawl, to act like a baby. Nope, Walker Ashton wasn’t a sniffling coward.

      It was hard to believe that mealy-mouthed Sioux had given birth to him. She’d fallen apart at the seams, no backbone whatsoever. But just to ensure she kept up her end of the bargain, Spencer had arranged a thirty-thousand-dollar payment.

      A pittance in his bankbook, a fortune in hers.

      As for Walker and Charlotte, he supposed they were worth a few bucks. The boy was, anyway. The timid little girl merely came with the deal.

      But it was the best deal either of them would ever get. As far as Spencer was concerned, he’d done himself proud.