Barbara Freethy - Almost home

Contents:

Chapter 1

K atherine Whitfield sat in the front seat of her rental car, tears filling her eyes as she traced the handwritten words with a shaky finger.

She'd read the letter a hundred times since she'd discovered it a week ago, hidden away in an old cedar chest in her stepfather's attic. She'd memorized every word, every curve of every line, wondering if it could possibly have been written to her father by her mother.

There was no signature, but the writing looked familiaror did she simply want it to be true? She'd spent years wishing for the tiniest bit of information about her father, but her mother had always said they'd discuss it later. Unfortunately, later had never come. Her mother had died two days before Katherine's twelfth birthday, and she'd been left alone with a stepfather of only nine months and no other blood relatives anywhere in the world.

Was it possible her real father had never known about her? Obviously the letter hadn't been sent. And she'd found the letter with other things in the chest as well, matchbooks, cocktail napkins, and a full-sized hand-stitched quilt with dates and words of memory. But whose words? Whose memories? Whose life belonged to the chest?

It was a question that had sent her halfway across the country from the urban streets of Los Angeles, California, to the rolling hills of Kentucky. Now she had parked her car in the lot of a Dairy Queen, where she'd stopped for a Diet Coke and a few moments to rethink her plan.

Suddenly, a child burst through the doors of the restaurant, holding a large milk shake in her hand. The little girl's small face was covered with an ear-to-ear smile and a matching smear of chocolate.

A tall man stepped out of a car. "Over here, sweetheart," he called.

"Daddy, Daddy. Look what I got," the child said.

The man held out his arms with a wide, beaming grin, and the child ran into his embrace. He kissed the top of the little girl's head, and the small affectionate gesture tore at Katherine's heart. There were no words of reprimand for the messy face, only loving acceptance.

A deep ache of longing swept through Katherine. She'd wanted a relationship like that. She'd never had it with her stepfather. Mitchell Whitfield had always treated her more like a responsibility than a daughter. If there was a chance, even a small one, that her real father could be alive, that he could want to know her as much as she wanted to know himKatherine had to take it.

Setting the envelope aside, she started the car and pulled out of the parking lot. She barely paused at the entrance to the road. Since she'd left the main highway, traffic had been almost nonexistent.

As she headed down the two-lane road, past the rolling green hills, endless white fences, thoroughbred horse farms, and elegant dogwood trees still clinging to a few spring blossoms, she knew she was a long way from home and the only life she knew. But the cocktail napkins, the match covers, all had one thing in common: the name Paradise, Kentucky.

Katherine had never acted so impulsively in her life, but with her stepparents out of town, she'd had no one to answer her questions. So she'd arranged to take care of the loose ends in her life and traveled to Kentucky. She flipped on the radio for a distraction. She was just in time to hear a female singer ask, "Where have all the cowboys gone?"

A good question, she thought with a wistful sigh. She didn't know if it had to do with wanting a father or wanting a boyfriend or a husband or just wanting someone who really cared about her, but there was a hole inside of her that she couldn't seem to fill. She'd tried to keep busy with work and friends and chocolatelots and lots of chocolate. Nothing had worked.

Jeez, she was a head case, wanting, wanting, wanting, when most everyone would look at her life and say it was good. And it was good. It was also a little lonely.

Katherine switched off the radio with a decisive click, knowing it was foolish to yearn for some impossible romance of the century. At twenty-seven, she'd been around enough to know there weren't any more cowboys, no more men who roamed the open plains, who were strong and invincible and protective of their women. Those guys didn't exist anymore.

The men she knew were soft in the middle from too many business lunches and too much time spent firing the remote control. They didn't wear holsters, they wore pagers. And a cowboy hat would have messed up the style of their hair.

Smiling to herself, Katherine knew she was generalizing, but for the life of her, she couldn't think of one man she'd gone out with in the last year who had made her heart race.

Where was the deep, passionate love, the desperate need to be with someone, the feeling of intense and utter connection? She wanted to believe she would feel it all someday, but maybe such a love didn't exist. Maybe her father didn't exist. Maybe she should just turn around and go home and settle for the life she had, the family she had.

As her gaze drifted down the highway, a shiver ran down her spine, and she knew she couldn't turn around and go home. The long, empty road beckoned to her in a way she'd never imagined. She'd spent her entire life in big cities, surrounded by skyscrapers and traffic and people. But here, outside of Louisville, Kentucky, there was a quiet that was oddly appealing. She couldn't shake the feeling that she was meant to come here. Call it destiny, call it crazy, but she had to at least see what was at the end of this road.

Katherine reached for the map sticking out of her purse, then cursed when her purse tumbled to the floor, spilling out the map, her wallet, cell phone, and a dozen coins. She reached for the map, trying to keep one eye on the highway, which had suddenly decided to curve. She had barely straightened when she saw the silver horse trailer parked on the side of the road. She was going too fast. She hit the brakes in panic, but she was too close, far too close

Twisting the wheel to the right as hard and as fast as it would go, she prayed for a miss. The car spun, kicking up gravel and dust. She hung on, urging the car to go to the side, to miss the trailer. She was almost there. She could see the shoulder of the road in front of her, and the deep drainage ditch. Damn! It was her last thought before the car slid headfirst into the gully off the side of the road.

Her head bounced off the steering wheel and she saw a kaleidoscope of colors in front of her eyes. Her ears rang with the sound of bells and horses and swearing. Swearing?

Katherine shook her head, trying to figure out where she was and who was yelling at her. There was a mana tall, dark-haired man with burning black eyesstanding next to her window. He was pulling on the door handle and yelling all sorts of absurdities that seemed to have less to do with her and more to do with a horse.

She roused herself enough to unlock the door. She pushed on it as the man pulled on it, sending her stumbling into his arms.

He caught her with a sureness, a strength, that made her want to sink into his embrace and rest for a moment. She needed to catch her breath. She needed to feel safe.