The Cowboy's Secret Son

Isabella Trueblood made history reuniting people torn apart by war and an epidemic. Now, generations later, Lily and Dylan Garrett carry on her work with their agency, Finders Keepers. Circumstances may have changed, but the goal remains the same.

Lost

His first love. Mark Peterson had never gotten over Jillian Salvini’s desertion ten years ago. She and her family had left in the middle of the night. Mark’s heart hadn’t recovered. Now that she was back, was a second chance possible?

Found

Her son’s father. When Jillian and her son, Drew, reclaimed her family’s Panhandle homestead, she’d never expected there would still be a Peterson in residence next door. Of course, she’d never expected her ranch to be sabotaged. Or to find out what had terrified and made enemies of her father and Mark’s so long ago.

Finders Keepers: bringing families together

“I didn’t know what I was getting into,” Jillian said.

The dark despair of those days coloring her voice even now. The night they had made love, she had never intended to let things go so far.

“You sure as hell acted like you did.”

“Acted. I think that’s the operative word.”

“Are you telling me you were acting that night?”

She couldn’t truthfully tell him that. She hadn’t been. She had simply been swept away by what had been happening between them.

“No,” she said, willing to leave it at that.

“Then what the hell are you saying?”

“That…I wasn’t ready for what happened, I guess. I wasn’t prepared.”

“And you regret it,” he said. Statement and not question.

But of course he was unaware of all the tangled issues in regretting what had happened between them that night. She could never regret having Drew. He was her life. She opened her mouth, knowing it was past time to tell Mark the truth. Long past time.

Dear Reader,

I hope very much that you’ll enjoy The Cowboy’s Secret Son. This is a story close to my heart for many reasons, primarily because it concerns the reuniting of a family, a favorite theme in many of my books, both historical and contemporary.

Also, just like the hero of this novel, my husband is a former army helicopter pilot. He has over 5000 flight hours, many acquired during two tours of duty in Vietnam flying a gunship. While there, he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, as well as an impressive variety of other medals. He is truly my hero, not only for his courage and dedication to country, but for his many acts of love, support and sacrifice for our family through the years of our marriage.

And finally, I loved writing this book because I love Texas. Although we never lived in the Panhandle, my family and I were fortunate to live along the Texas/Mexican border for several years. We fell in love with the beauty and grandeur of the desert Southwest and with the warmth of its people. It was very exciting for me to revisit another part of the state with which I feel such a connection. I hope you’re enjoying all the rich Texas diversity the Trueblood series showcases.

Best wishes for good reading!

Gayle

The Cowboy’s Secret Son

Gayle Wilson

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Gayle Wilson is acknowledged as the author of this work.

To Marsha Zinberg for her endless patience and kindness.

And to Texas, my “other” home.

THE TRUEBLOOD LEGACY

THE YEAR WAS 1918, and the Great War in Europe still raged, but Esau Porter was heading home to Texas.

The young sergeant arrived at his parents’ ranch northwest of San Antonio on a Sunday night, only the celebration didn’t go off as planned. Most of the townsfolk of Carmelita had come out to welcome Esau home, but when they saw the sorry condition of the boy, they gave their respects quickly and left.

The fever got so bad so fast that Mrs. Porter hardly knew what to do. By Monday night, before the doctor from San Antonio made it into town, Esau was dead.

The Porter family grieved. How could their son have survived the German peril, only to burn up and die in his own bed? It wasn’t much of a surprise when Mrs. Porter took to her bed on Wednesday. But it was a hell of a shock when half the residents of Carmelita came down with the horrible illness. House after house was hit by death, and all the townspeople could do was pray for salvation.

None came. By the end of the year, over one hundred souls had perished. The influenza virus took those in the prime of life, leaving behind an unprecedented number of orphans. And the virus knew no boundaries. By the time the threat had passed, more than thirty-seven million people had succumbed worldwide.

But in one house, there was still hope.

Isabella Trueblood had come to Carmelita in the late 1800s with her father, blacksmith Saul Trueblood, and her mother, Teresa Collier Trueblood. The family had traveled from Indiana, leaving their Quaker roots behind.

Young Isabella grew up to be an intelligent woman who had a gift for healing and storytelling. Her dreams centered on the boy next door, Foster Carter, the son of Chester and Grace.

Just before the bad times came in 1918, Foster asked Isabella to be his wife, and the future of the Carter spread was secured. It was a happy union, and the future looked bright for the young couple.

Two years later, not one of their relatives was alive. How the young couple had survived was a miracle. And during the epidemic, Isabella and Foster had taken in more than twenty-two orphaned children from all over the county. They fed them, clothed them, taught them as if they were blood kin.

Then Isabella became pregnant, but there were complications. Love for her handsome son, Josiah, born in 1920, wasn’t enough to stop her from grow-ing weaker by the day. Knowing she couldn’t leave her husband to tend to all the children if she died, she set out to find families for each one of her orphaned charges.

And so the Trueblood Foundation was born. Named in memory of Isabella’s parents, it would become famous all over Texas. Some of the orphaned children went to strangers, but many were reunited with their families. After reading notices in newspapers and church bulletins, aunts, uncles, cousins and grand-parents rushed to Carmelita to find the young ones they’d given up for dead.

Toward the end of Isabella’s life, she’d brought together more than thirty families, and not just her orphans. Many others, old and young, made their way to her doorstep, and Isabella turned no one away.

At her death, the town’s name was changed to Trueblood, in her honor. For years to come, her simple grave was adorned with flowers on the anniversary of her death, grateful tokens of appreciation from the families she had brought together.

Isabella’s son, Josiah, grew into a fine rancher and married Rebecca Montgomery in 1938. They had a daughter, Elizabeth Trueblood Carter, in 1940. Elizabeth married her neighbor William Garrett in 1965, and gave birth to twins Lily and Dylan in 1971, and daughter Ashley a few years later. Home was the Double G ranch, about ten miles from Trueblood proper, and the Garrett children grew up listening to stories of their famous great-grandmother, Isabella. Because they were Truebloods, they knew that they, too, had a sacred duty to carry on the tradition passed down to them: finding lost souls and reuniting loved ones.

Contents

PROLOGUE

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

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

EPILOGUE

PROLOGUE

“I’LL BE DAMNED,” Dylan Garrett said under his breath.

Lily Garrett Bishop looked up from the work spread across her own desk, loving amusement lifting her lips as she watched her twin brother. His eyes were on one of two letters that had been hand-delivered to the offices of Finders Keepers.

“Something interesting?” she asked after a moment.

She stacked the report she had just finished and inserted it into its folder, which would eventually be filed with the others in the agency’s growing list of successfully completed cases. At her question, Dylan’s blue eyes lifted from the paper he held.

“A voice from the past,” he said.

“Are you deliberately trying to be mysterious, or is this ‘voice from the past’ strictly personal?”

“Personal? In a way, I guess it is. Part of it, anyway.”

“And the part that isn’t?” Lily asked patiently.

“Involves an assignment for the agency.”

The agency was the investigative venture the Garrett twins had recently formed, using skills developed in their previous occupations in law enforcement. The goal of Finders Keepers was to find people, especially those who had, for one reason or another, been torn apart from their families.

“Something you’re obviously interested in accepting.”

Lily believed she knew every nuance of her brother’s voice. This one contained a tinge of nostalgia. Perhaps even regret.

“Someone,” he corrected softly.

Lily’s smile widened. She knew him too well to be able to resist the opportunity that offered for teasing. “Oh, let me guess. Someone young and beautiful. And female, of course.”

“Young at heart, in any case. Or…at least she was.”

The past tense and the subtle shift in tone warned her, and Lily’s smile faded. “Someone I know?” she asked gently.

“Someone Sebastian and I met years ago.”

Dylan’s eyes fell again to the letter, and his sister waited through the silence, anticipating that eventually he would go on with the story he had begun. By now she understood it was one that had engaged her brother’s emotions as well as his intellect.

“Young at heart doesn’t sound much like one of your usual romantic encounters,” she ventured finally. “Or Sebastian’s.”

When Dylan laughed, Lily felt a surge of relief. Whatever this was, apparently it didn’t involve the disappearance of Julie Cooper, which had occupied her brother’s time and energy since his friend Sebastian had come pleading for help to find his missing wife.

Actually, Lily hadn’t heard this much interest in Dylan’s voice in weeks. Not for anything other than Julie’s disappearance. Whatever was in that letter, she could only be grateful for the distraction it was providing her brother.

“We had car trouble,” Dylan said, that subtle hint of nostalgia back. “Down in Pinto.”

“Pinto?” Lily repeated disbelievingly.

“Pinto, Texas, home of Violet Mitchum and not much else.”

“Violet Mitchum is your mystery woman?”

“There was no mystery about Violet. Except this, I guess.”

“This?”

“It seems I’ve been named as one of her heirs.”

“Should I congratulate you on your inheritance?” Lily teased, assuming that whatever her brother had inherited from a chance acquaintance in Pinto, Texas, wouldn’t be substantial.

Dylan inclined his head slightly, as if in polite acceptance of those congratulations. With the movement, the strong Texas sun shining through the wide second-story windows behind him shot gold through the light-brown strands of his hair.

“You may congratulate me along with the seven other recipients of Violet’s largesse,” he said.

“Too bad you have to share your inheritance with so many,” Lily mocked. “And is Sebastian another of Miss Mitchum’s heirs?”

“Mrs. Mitchum. And no, he’s not. Violet didn’t take to Sebastian,” Dylan said, the amusement suddenly missing from his narrative. “She said he had…an impure heart.”

That assessment of the handsome and charismatic Sebastian Cooper, especially by a woman, was surprising. Usually it was Sebastian who made an indelible impression on females, Lily thought with a trace of bitterness. Just as he had with Julie.

She had hoped for years that Julie would realize Dylan was the one who really loved her. The one who was so obviously right for her. She hadn’t, however, and when she and Sebastian had eloped, Dylan had continued to be a friend to both of them, despite what Lily suspected was a badly broken heart.

“But she took to you?” The mockery had been deliberately injected back into her question, hiding that swell of bitterness.

“Of course. After all, I took her riding,” Dylan said. “And part of my inheritance is the horse we rode on.”

“The horse we rode on?”

“She said she hadn’t been riding in years. I held her before me in the saddle so she could have one last ride on one of her beloved horses. It just seemed…the right thing to do.”

“Just exactly how old was Violet when you met her.”

“According to this, Violet was eighty-one when she died. The fishing trip was before Sebastian and Julie married….” The sentence trailed, and Lily felt unease stir. After a few seconds, however, her brother continued, his voice unchanged. “So, maybe…four years ago. Maybe a little more.”

The tough-as-nails Dylan cradling a fragile old lady before him in the saddle was not hard to imagine. Not if one knew her brother as she did. “And in gratitude, she left you the horse.”

“Considering its bloodlines, that would be no small bequest in itself. But it isn’t all Violet left me.”

Dylan walked across the room and laid both letters on the desk in front of her. Lily scanned the first one quickly, finding the initial paragraphs to be confirmation of what he had just told her. And in the third paragraph…

“Mitchum Oil? Your Violet was that Mitchum?” she asked.

“She and her husband Charles. They had no children. Only Violet’s horses and…that.”

That was a fortune, one of the largest in Texas, where millionaires were not rare. The size of the old Mitchum strike was justly famous even in this oil-rich state.

“And the other heirs?” Lily asked, after she had skimmed the rest of the first letter.

“People who meant something in Violet’s life. They’re all listed in the other letter. That one’s from her lawyer. There’s an old friend, Mary Barrett, who stayed in touch by letter, despite their changing circumstances. There are several who had done Violet favors, like Stella Richards, who sent meals out to the Mitchum house every day until Violet died. And Stuart Randolph, who loaned Charlie the equipment to dig his first well. John Carpenter, who tended her horses,” Dylan enumerated. “And then there are those, like me, who had a chance encounter with her that…changed their own lives.”

“Is that what Violet did? Changed your life?” Lily asked, hearing again the thread of emotion in his deep voice.

“She granted me absolution.”

“Absolution?” Lily asked, surprised at the word, which had such strong religious connotations. “Absolution for what?”

“For not being here when Mother died,” he said quietly.

“Dylan,” Lily said, pity intermingled in her equally soft protest. “I never knew you felt that way. You have to know she understood. She always understood. And she loved you so much.”

“That’s what Violet said. I guess she just said it at the time when I most needed to hear it. She reminded me that a mother’s love has no conditions,” he added. “Mom’s certainly didn’t. Somehow, stupidly, I had managed to forget that.”

Lily nodded, blinking back the sharp sting of tears those memories evoked. “You said there was an assignment for us in this,” she reminded him, not sure that reliving the pain of her mother’s death was what either of them needed right now. Not with Dylan so worried about Julie, and her own pregnancy—

“The other heirs,” Dylan said, interrupting the remembrance of that very private joy. “We’ve been asked to find them and to let them know about Violet’s bequests.”

“And those all involve sums like this?” Lily asked, her eyes again considering the amount that had been left to her brother.

“Some of them are much larger. And each is accompanied by a memento from their association with Violet. Does that sound like an assignment we’d be interested in taking on?”

“Changing lives,” Lily said thoughtfully.

“What?”

“That’s what this amounts to. Changing lives. Changing circumstances. Can you imagine what a gift like this could mean to some of these people? Do you know anything about them?”

“At this point, nothing but their names,” Dylan said, reaching over her shoulder to turn the page, revealing the names of the three still-missing heirs.

“Jillian Salvini, Sara Pierce and Matt Radcliffe.” Lily read the names aloud. “And if we agree to the lawyer’s proposal, we’re supposed to find these people?”

“And tell them what Violet has left them.”

“Do you suppose she meant as much to any of them as she did to you?” Lily asked, looking up from the letter into his eyes.

“If she did…then, despite the money, I would bet they’d rather not be found. I know I’d like to think about Violet still alive and vital, living in that Victorian monstrosity her husband built for her. Still watching her beloved horses and writing her endless letters. Frankly, I’d much rather be allowed to believe that than to have the money.”

“But you can’t speak for everyone. And this much money—” she began to remind him again.

“Can change lives,” Dylan finished for her. “Not exactly the purpose for which we started Finders Keepers, but still… I think I’d like to do this, Lily, providing you’re agreeable. And who knows, we might even manage to reunite a few families in the process.”

“Whether we do or not,” Lily said, “I think this is something you need to do. For Violet. To repay the debt you owe her, if for no other reason.”

“I think you’re right. For Violet,” Dylan agreed. And his voice was again reminiscent. For Violet.

CHAPTER ONE

LIKE A WHIPPED DOG with his tail between his legs, Mark Peterson thought, fighting the bitterness that always boiled up to the surface when he approached the ranch from this direction.

He dropped the chopper low enough that its powerful rotor kicked up dust from the arid ground below. There were no power lines or trees to worry about in this desolate terrain, and it had become his habit to low-level over the Salvini ranch whenever he was coming in from the west.

After a few pointless trips across the deserted ranch, which stirred up memories as well as dust, Mark had given up trying to figure out his motives for doing this. Maybe it was simply a form of masochism. Or maybe it was the fact that this was the last place on earth where he still felt a connection to Jillian. And that in itself was a totally different kind of masochism.

He had never forgotten her, of course, but since he’d come back to Texas, back to his family’s land, all those memories had become stronger. And much harder to deal with.

The For Sale signs were still up, he realized, which meant that the price on the property hadn’t yet dropped enough to make the co-op snap it up as they had most of the land around here. It would soon, of course, because the people who currently owned the ranch would be increasingly eager to get out of it whatever they could and move on with their lives.

The house had been unoccupied for a couple of months and was beginning to show the effects. Despite the fact that the last owners couldn’t afford to hold on to the ranch, they had at least kept it in good shape. Now…

Mark eased the cyclic back, bringing the nose of the helicopter up, and increased the pitch. As the chopper rose and then leveled out, he forced his eyes away from the familiar buildings spread out across the flat High Plains countryside below. He didn’t need to look at them. He knew every square mile of that ranch almost as well as he knew the one next door. The one where he had grown up.

It already belonged to the cooperation, as did most of those in the area that had come on the market in the last few years. Few individuals could afford the investment it took to make ranching up here a financial success. The cooperation had the backing of a couple of major banks and the monetary wherewithal to ride out the volatile ups and downs of the cattle market.

Families didn’t. They couldn’t afford to hold on through the hard times. That’s why more and more land was being sold to groups such as the one he now worked for. And as much as Mark hated to see that happen, he couldn’t blame anyone for choosing a less heartbreaking road than the one that had broken his father.

The thromping blades of the rotor startled an antelope into flight. It raced along under the shadow of the copter for a few hundred feet before it veered off to the right and disappeared beneath him.

Mark’s lips slanted with the pleasure of watching that brief display of grace and power. The country below was too dry and forbidding for much of the wildlife that flourished farther south. Of course, the High Plains were different enough from the rest of Texas that they were almost a separate entity—one Mark loved with a passion that rivaled his father’s.

Although the doctors had put his dad’s death down to a stroke, Mark knew that bitterness and failure had played as big a role as his physical condition. A longtime widower, deeply estranged from Mark, who was his only child, Bo Peterson had died a lonely and sour old man. And if he wasn’t careful, Mark told himself, coming in now over the ranch that had killed his father, that could be his own epitaph as well.

In contrast to the old Salvini place, the buildings below showed the effects of having enough money. There were only a few hands, including himself, living on the ranch now that the fall roundup was over, but it still had the well cared for air that all of the co-op’s properties possessed.

He wondered how his father would have felt about that. He sometimes wondered how he himself felt about it.

He set the chopper down with the ease of long practice. Even after he had completed the shutdown procedures, he remained in the comfortable warmth of the enclosed cockpit, delaying a moment because he dreaded the bite of the November wind, despite the protection of the leather jacket he wore.

There was nowhere in Texas as prone to bitter cold as the top of the Panhandle. The frigid gusts from the north swept ruthlessly across the flat landscape, chilling to the bone.

And his bones were a lot more susceptible than they had been before he’d left here ten years ago, Mark acknowledged. He remembered the pleasure he had once taken in a long day of hard physical labor or in the equally demanding leisure pastimes.

It had been a long time since he’d wrestled a steer or done any saddle bronc riding. And, he admitted ruefully, his lips quirking slightly, it would be a hell of a long time before he did either again.

He climbed out, feeling the jolt of the short step to the ground in every one of the damaged vertebrae of his spine. He gritted his teeth against the pain, trying to stretch out his back unobtrusively as he walked away from the chopper.

Too many hours in the cockpit without a break. He wasn’t making any complaints, though. Flying was the only activity he had ever found that he loved with the same passion he had once felt for rodeoing. He had been strictly an amateur, not nearly on a level to go pro, but he had been good enough to win some of the local prizes.

And good enough to win a few admiring glances from the women and slaps on the back from the men of the close-knit ranching communities of the Panhandle. Those had meant more to him than the money or trophies he’d won.