Chapter One

Heart Falls, Alberta, four months later

“You’re daydreaming again.”

A teasing voice brought Dare’s focus back to earth, and she twisted toward her best friend to offer a smile. “It’s a dreamy kind of morning.”

Ginny Stone took the stairs onto the porch with her usual enthusiasm. Dressed for working the ranch in jeans, boots and a couple layers of shirts, her dark brown hair settled over her shoulders as she held a ceramic mug toward Dare. “I made a new batch of that fruity herbal mix you like, and I’ve time to sit if you want company.”

The railing she’d been leaning on creaked as Dare straightened, turning from where she’d been staring over Big Sky Lake and the rest of the Silver Stone ranch. “I would kill for a coffee right now, but thank you for bringing the next best thing.”

“My company makes it all the sweeter, right?”

Dare settled into the rocking chair while her friend curled up in the pillow-filled wicker chair beside her. “Please. It’s not that long since I’ve stopped being nauseous every morning. Do you really want to send me back there?”

Her friend tried to cover it up, but it was clear her gaze lingered a little longer than usual on Dare’s stomach. She laid a hand over the growing bump, and Ginny’s gaze darted upward guiltily.

“Sorry. Didn’t mean to stare.” She gestured toward Dare’s belly. “It’s just…you’re starting to show.”

“Yeah. Not too much longer before everybody in town and their dog knows I’m pregnant out of wedlock. Oh, woe is me.”

Her friend peered over the edge of her mug, her startling green eyes dancing with mischief. “As if you give two hoots what the town gossips think.”

Dare shrugged. “You’re right, but while I don’t think I’m a fallen harlot, I wish things had gone differently. It’s got to be hard on your brothers, especially Caleb. I never meant—”

“Stop right now.” Ginny’s amusement vanished and her eyes snapped with anger. “My brothers are your brothers, or as good as. They love you, and they would never let anyone say or do anything to hurt you.”

“It’s not as if people have to go out of their way to make up shit. I am pregnant.” Dare wiggled her hand in the air. “Oh, and look! No ring. Ergo, I am an unwed mom.”

“In this day and age, who cares?”

Dare sighed. “We’ve had this conversation before. I’m fully on board with taking care of Buckaroo Banzai on my own. Still wish I could find his daddy—that’s the only part that makes me uncomfortable.”

Ginny leaned forward. “Any luck tracking down the sperm donor?”

Dare shook her head. “Short of hiring a private investigator—as if—the only way is if we run into each other at some point. What are the chances?”

“Who knows? Maybe it will happen.”

Dare wasn’t quite sure what to wish for. The night she and Jesse had spent burning up the sheets had been spectacular. But when she’d missed her period a month later and gone back to try and track him down—because she figured letting a guy know he was going to be a daddy was the decent thing to do—she’d come up with a total blank. He’d paid cash for his room same as she had, and the night clerk hadn’t got a license plate or anything she could use.

And this was old news, and it was time to change the topic. “What’re you working on this week?” she asked her closest friend.

Ginny gestured toward the oversized garden and greenhouse outside the main ranch house where she lived with her oldest brother and his kids. “Garden boxes and farmers’ market, same as usual. What about you? You need help with any of your upcoming posts?”

She could always use more material. “I should come out and take extra shots this week at the Farmers’ Market. You’ve got some new items in the Community Supported Agriculture boxes, right?”

“Yeah. I’ve already printed the descriptions and recipes you gave me to slip into the deliveries.”

“I bet you’re not the only CSA passing out things customers don’t know how to cook. I thought I’d post pictures and recipes. Hopefully others out there will be grateful. Plus, I should start stockpiling a bunch of posts for when Buckaroo puts in an appearance.”

“Smart.” Ginny looked her over, smiling harder. “You need to start a new section to your blog. Ranching with Buckaroo.”

It was like lightning stuck. Dare hauled her jaw back into position and offered up thanks for her best friend. “You’re brilliant. You’re right—I do need to add a section.”

“Anytime you need fabulous ideas, you know who to call.” Ginny winked. “You coming up to the house for dinner tonight?”

“If I can bring dessert.”

“Strawberry shortcake?”

“The girls’ favourite—of course.”

“We’ll eat at five, but if you can come over for three, I’d appreciate it. Caleb said Uncle Frank’s sending a group of new hands from the south, and he’s not sure when he’ll be done the ranch tour. I promised to be around when the girls get off the bus in case he’s not done.”

She was Auntie Dare in name only, but she didn’t mind one bit. Those two little girls of Caleb’s were the cutest things. “Sure, I can come help with the rug rats. It’s good practice.”

Ginny got to her feet, giving her a hug before stealing the mug back and heading to the main house. “You don’t need practice. You’re going to be a great mom.”

Dare didn’t say anything—it was one thing to have a baby on the way, but it was another to imagine successfully raising the kid all the way to adulthood when she had no mom to turn to for help.

Panic is not an option, she told herself for the millionth time.

She waved goodbye then headed inside the small two-bedroom cottage that had been her home forever. Growing up, she’d shared a room with her sister, then after the accident she’d eventually returned to make the place her own, the ghosts of her past slowly fading into memories.

Her childhood room was now her office, twinned computer screens set up over the desk, a small single bed pushed against the opposite wall.

Not that she had many visitors. Everyone she liked enough to have over lived right there on the Silver Stone ranch. Family by choice if not family by blood.

Dare forced herself to move. She’d been staring out the window again, which wasn’t a terrible thing, except daydreaming was for daydreaming hours, not for when she had work to get done.

While she’d made light of it to Ginny, the morning sickness had been spectacularly rough. She was just starting to feel human on a regular basis, so keeping ahead of the game with prescheduled blog posts was important.

She closed the blinds to block out the distraction of the sun sparkling on the lake, and turned back to the computer and her list of upcoming features.

Little Ranch on the Prairie. Her recovery journal turned online diary turned blog.

Drove the Stone boys up the wall that she made money from sitting behind a computer, but at least they didn’t deny the amount of work she put in. Even when morning sickness had hit, she’d managed to post once a day, although she’d scrambled at times to make it more than “Ugh, I feel shitty. Here, have an LOLcat.”

She laid a hand over the slowly growing bump in her belly. “One good thing, Buckaroo. Mommy’s going to be able to stay at home with you. I need to get my butt in gear, though. Think I should start that kid’s section. What should we call it?”

No response yet. She didn’t expect there to be—although according to the baby books she and Ginny had peeked at, it could be anytime now she’d feel the baby move. “Buckaroo Roundup. My Little Buckaroo? Ranching With Buckaroo? They’re all so cheesy, but then again, I don’t mind cheesy—it makes good copy.”

She punched the ideas into a search engine to see how many other blogs out there dealt with the topic.

She’d put her own slant on it, of course, but raising kids on a ranch was common enough for a portion of the population to get a kick out of her everyday comments, and just fantasy enough for others that she could possibly make this work.

Dare rested her hand on her belly, then laughed. “I know my first post, because I never used to touch my stomach, and now I can’t seem to let go.”

Her rising baby bump would be noticed in town, and she was pretty much ready for it. With her foster brothers looking after her, she wouldn’t have to put up with too many in-her-face comments, but they’d still be there.

Single moms might be a lot more common these days, but being daddy-less in a small town was enough to make tongues wag.

She jotted down a couple of ideas for an extended section for raising kids on the ranch then opened her email.

The daily analytics from her blog opened, and Dare’s heart rate jumped a notch. “Holy moly. That’s not normal.”

She hurried to her blog to double-check. Views had skyrocketed, and she traced it back to a post she’d popped up in a daze while sick as a dog, when Buckaroo was just making his presence known in her life.

Cowboy Back-bacon Biscuits. An innocent enough recipe.

She clicked through to the blog post and grinned. “Well, hello, Mr. Sexy Cowboy.”

Okay, she didn’t remember specifically picking that picture. It wasn’t one of her paid stock photos, but an off-the-cuff shot she’d taken with her phone of the one responsible for putting Buckaroo in her belly. Normally she would never have used the picture, but obviously nausea-brain made for less-than-stellar choices.

“I hope you’re doing great wherever you are, Jesse. If I could track you down, I would.”

Posts going viral were good for her hit and advertising count, though, and hey—if it brought her cowboy out of the woodwork, so much the better. He’d been a decent guy, even though he’d obviously had something to drink about that night as well.

The anniversary of her family’s death was a drinking event. The sex and the baby were bonuses.

Dare eyed Jesse’s picture again. She’d taken it between bouts of really hot sex—and after a shower break.

That’s why he had a towel barely clinging to his fine, firm ass, his backside slightly twisted toward her as he hammed it up. His cowboy hat was pulled down over most of his face, so the main event of the show were abdominal muscles that wouldn’t quit, and those long muscular V lines angling toward his groin.

She sighed happily. He hadn’t sucked in the sack, not one bit. She tingled when she thought back to that night. Which was good, because the memories of how much fun they’d had might have to last her a long time.

Which was very sad because she liked sex. And she’d really liked sex with Jesse, but going forward, the well was probably going to get a little dry.

She figured single moms-to-be weren’t setting the sexual world on fire on a regular basis.

Her second sigh wasn’t as happy.

Dare returned to her email and worked through them, a timer set to go off at thirty-minute intervals so she’d get up and move around.

She was just about done when a new email came through from her website.

 

Question re: model for post

Oops. Made sense if the post got a lot of attention, she’d get some feedback—of what variety, though? Readers and their comments on her blog were her bread and butter, but direct messages through her contact button were a potshot.

For a pretty PG site, she still got complaints about her content. The morality cops swinging through and deciding her blog had too much sex and skin—and it really didn’t, although she posted bluntly about a lot of ideas.

Okay, the shot of Jesse was borderline. She glanced at it again and couldn’t stop from grinning. Forget borderline, it was straight-up “print this off and use as fantasy material”, and she wasn’t even one bit embarrassed.

Where people got off telling her what she could and couldn’t discuss burned her britches. She’d started opening the emails with a kind of BINGO card in mind.

Reference to burning in hell, one point.

Reference to having no shame, one point.

Offers of prayers for her soul, two points.

Her amusement faded as she read the actual comment, and her heart rate picked up.

 

I’m curious if you know where I could find the model from your March twenty-fourth picture. No worries—only he’s family, and I’m trying to track him down. I thought I’d try you in case you had any current information.

If not—sorry to bother you.

If you do know where Jesse is, and you don’t mind passing on a message, tell the ass to get in touch with us. When I find him, I’m going to tan his hide. (Okay, maybe don’t mention that last bit. The boy gets on my last nerve far too easily.)

Your blog looks great, by the way. I look forward to going through your stuff. Ranch life is definitely up my alley.

 

Jaxi Coleman (Six Pack ranch, Rocky Mountain House)

 

Huh. Dare read the message over again, confusion stirring. It was a connection to her missing man, but if his…sister?…didn’t know where Jesse was—

Did she contact them to say, Hey, if he does show up, tell him I need to talk? Potentially awkward, and she wasn’t letting anyone else know about the baby before he found out.

If he found out.

Drat, this was impossible.

She pushed the email aside to think about it a little longer before responding. Worrying about her missing baby daddy wasn’t going to keep her blog running, and in the end, that was the most important thing.

She’d do whatever it took to remain standing on her own two feet. If there was one thing she’d learned over the years, no matter that others had good intentions, if it needed to be done, in the end she really needed to rely on herself.

She finished by lunch, then spent needed time on cleanup tasks she’d been putting off. About two o’clock she wandered over to the main house to find her friend arguing on the phone.

“It’s not rocket science. Are you sure you can’t—?”

Dare hid her grin best she could.

Ginny huffed into the phone a few more times, rolling her eyes in an exaggerated manner before muttering fine and hanging up.

“Trouble in paradise?” Dare teased.

Ginny flipped her the finger. “I have to go. They’re having trouble sorting this week’s orders and can’t figure it out without my help.”

Dare slipped past her into the living room. “No worries. I’ll look after the girls when they get home if you’re not back yet.”

“Thanks.” Ginny eyed her. “Ummm…is there something you’re not telling me? Like, you’re auditioning for the part of a homeless person?”

Oops. Dare glanced down at her outfit. “It’s comfy, okay?”

“If you’re comfy being half-naked, whatever. I should be back in thirty minutes, and I’ve already got the crockpots going.”

“I’ll get the cake in the oven before I start my yoga.”

She was talking to empty air—her friend was already gone.

Dare didn’t mind the time to herself. She headed into the big old-fashioned kitchen, and ten minutes later she had her cake in the oven. Time enough left to pull her yoga mat from where she’d stashed it behind the couch in the sunroom.

The big ranch house was as familiar as her own. She’d spent hours and hours here growing up, her parents and Ginny’s sharing meals on a regular basis.

They’d shared everything, including—morbidly—their untimely deaths.

She moved into position on the yoga mat and began her practice. As huge and life-changing as her family’s deaths had been, after ten years it was more of an echo than a constant buzz.

There were times that brought to mind what they’d all lost—her and the Stone family—but usually life went on.

Including the unexpected bits of life…

Dare glanced down at her ratty outfit, the leggings so full of holes and the fabric worn so thin it was barely there. Definitely time to buy a new set, but she’d been trying to hold off until her expanding waistline made it impossible to wear her old things.

She had her butt in the air and feet tangled over her head when the door opened and Caleb’s oldest daughter let out a shout. “Auntie G, Auntie D.”

Dare slowly worked to untangle herself. “I’m here, honey. Auntie Ginny had to go into town. She’ll be home soon.”

“Emma’s hurt.” Sasha seemed more excited than worried.

A loud, exaggerated sniffle accompanied the announcement, and Dare shot to her feet, teetering for a moment as she turned to face the door to discover the little girl cradled in the arms of her missing cowboy.