LITMIR.BIZ

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      MARY J. FORBES

      Her rural prairie roots granted Mary J. Forbes a deep love of nature and small towns, a love that’s often reflected in the settings of her books. Today, she lives with her family in the Pacific Northwest where she also teaches school, nurtures her garden and walks or jogs in any weather. Readers can contact Mary at www.maryjforbes.com.

      For A, E and S—

       Treasures of our hearts

      Contents

      Chapter One

      Chapter Two

      Chapter Three

      Chapter Four

      Chapter Five

      Chapter Six

      Chapter Seven

      Chapter Eight

      Chapter Nine

      Chapter Ten

      Chapter Eleven

      Chapter Twelve

      Chapter Thirteen

      Chapter Fourteen

      Epilogue

      Chapter One

      How long are you going to sit on that motorcycle, pal?

      Peering through the rain-splattered front window of her big, rectangular kitchen, Kat O’Brien wondered if the guy even breathed. At least fifteen minutes had gone by and he hadn’t moved. Not a muscle, not a gloved fingertip. No, draped in a yellow slicker, he sat still as a stone carving on the leather seat of the big black bike parked in her circular driveway…staring ahead at the surrounding evergreens, leafless birch and maples and verdant winter undergrowth. Perhaps the hammering February sleet had frozen his body in place and it merely waited for a gust of wind to topple it and the bike to the ground.

      God forbid, Kat thought.

      Well, she couldn’t stand here all afternoon ogling the fellow. If he’d come as a potential guest to her bed-and-breakfast, he’d knock on the door when he was ready. Or if he had gotten lost, sooner or later he’d crank the machine and boot it back to the village proper, a mile up Shore Road.

      Restless, she returned to making cookies on the large wooden worktable, the one her late husband had constructed when he was alive, when his big laugh and voice boomed throughout the Victorian he inherited from his grandparents before he married Kat.

      Again, she glanced toward the window. Seldom was she leery about her guests, and those she instinctively had gut-twinges about, she didn’t book. However, the majority of her customers were annual returnees, folks loving the peace and quiet, the bit of wilderness offered within the hills and forests of Firewood Island. But this stranger had driven slowly up the lane to park and stare at God-knew-what.

      Come on, mister, she thought for the tenth time. Make up your mind.

      A shiver scurried along her arms. She told herself if his intentions were unsavory, he would not have ridden up on a guttural Harley-Davidson. Yet, she wasn’t a fool. She always kept her doors locked, and she never questioned her instincts.

      Currently, both her rental cabins stood empty. It was, after all, the last Tuesday of February. With fewer vacationers during the winter season in Washington’s Puget Sound, she was thankful that at least one man—Dane Rainhart, who’d been her older sister’s boyfriend twenty years ago—had booked the smaller cabin last week. He was due to arrive tomorrow for a three-month sabbatical, though from what Kat didn’t know.

      After putting the third cookie sheet in the oven, she set a candle centerpiece on the ten-seater rectangular oak table that had been in the O’Brien family for eighty years.

      Should she stand on the veranda, yell out to gain the guy’s attention? Go tap his shoulder or his wet, glossy helmet?

      Pressing her lips together to hold back a chuckle, she pictured her eleven-year-old son, Blake, rapping on the helmet…. Yo, dude. Anybody home in there? Good thing school was in session for another hour.

      Well, hopefully, before the school bus arrived, the man would come to his senses.

      Sighing, she slanted another look toward the country-paned front window. Biker-man hadn’t budged. Rain gear and big black boots aside, he had to be chilled to the bone.

      “Okay, mister,” she muttered. “Enough already.”

      She checked the oven clock—ten minutes left—and headed for the mudroom to grab her red quilted vest off a hook and the orange umbrella out of the stone crock next to the boot shelf. Striding from the kitchen, Kat hurried across the living room to the front entry.

      “Either you come in,” she grumbled, stepping outside, “or find yourself another driveway to view.”

      She slammed the door. Not a muscle moved on his body.

      Was he dead?

      Certainly, he had to be cold. Heck, he had to be frozen.

      The veranda’s downspouts gushed water into a pair of stocky wooden barrels. The American flag her late husband, Shaun, had hung when they first opened the B and B, drooped like a drenched sheet from its pole-to-pillar attachment.

      Flipping up the umbrella, Kat jogged down the six wide steps and strode toward the motorcycle. Under her shoes the lane’s gravel lay slick with sleet, while her umbrella vibrated under the onslaught of snow and rain. Relentless since yesterday, the inclement weather chilled the air and vaporized her breath.

      “Hi,” she said, approaching the man’s right side. “Lost your way?”

      For the first time, he stirred, turning his head slowly in her direction. Her breath staggered. His irises were the electric-blue of the summer delphiniums she grew in the corners of the porch steps, and his lashes…the rain had clumped them into long dark spears. At first glance, she assumed he was a California beach-bum—his skin sported a deep bronze

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