about him. He wanted Sara to know. She was the one Gus had left his mother for. She was the reason he’d grown up without a father. If it hadn’t been for her, his mother would probably have contacted Gus as soon as she found out she was pregnant. She’d loved him. Because of Sara, she’d spent the rest of her life without him.
Nothing he could do now could change that or the heartache his mother had suffered. He still intended to tell Sara just what kind of man her deceased husband was, if for no other reason than it was time the truth came out. The only problem was…she was on her honeymoon and he didn’t know when she was coming back. It didn’t matter, he decided. He could wait.
“Oh, Phoebe, they’re adorable!” Merry McBride Kincaid cooed as she cuddled one of the puppies that had showed up under Myrtle’s back porch earlier that morning. “Are you sure you don’t want to keep one? It seems like fate that they ended up here, almost as if they’re supposed to belong to you. Maybe you should reconsider.”
“Oh, no you don’t!” Phoebe laughed. “Don’t even think about trying to pawn one of them off on me. They’re just as sweet as they can be, but a puppy’s the last thing I need.”
“But it would be such company for you,” Merry said, her blue eyes twinkling. “C’mon, Phoebe, at least consider the idea. You know you want to. There’s no better way to get unconditional love.”
Phoebe didn’t doubt that—and there was nothing she loved more than a puppy—but the timing was all wrong. Her future was up in the air, her plans too uncertain. If working at Myrtle’s bed and breakfast turned out to be half as enjoyable as she knew it was going to be, then she had some major career decisions to make when she went back home. If she decided to follow her heart and open her own bed and breakfast, she’d have to find the appropriate location, sell her father’s business, move, get the business up and running. And she couldn’t do that with a puppy underfoot.
“Nice try,” she said with a grin, “but it’s not going to work. I’ve got too much going on right now. Maybe next year.”
“Give me a call when you’re ready,” Merry said, understanding, as she returned the puppy she held to the box where his brothers and sisters were sleeping. “Someone’s always bringing me a stray litter of puppies.”
“You’re the first person I’ll call,” Phoebe assured her as Merry hefted the box of puppies and started down the central hall to the front door. “Here, let me get the door for you.”
Pulling the door open for her, she pushed open the screen door and stepped out onto the front porch, only to find herself face to face with Taylor as he came up the steps to the porch. “Oh!” she said, startled, frowning as her heart skipped a beat at the sight of him. Why did she always have this crazy reaction whenever she laid eyes on the man? She didn’t even like him! “I thought you were at the library.”
“I found everything I needed,” he replied, and glanced past her to Merry, who’d just stepped through the front door with the box of puppies.
Phoebe saw him catch his breath and wasn’t surprised. Everyone reacted to Merry that way when they met her for the first time. She was drop-dead gorgeous…and one of the nicest women Phoebe knew. Like all the McBrides, she would give the shirt off her back to someone in need.
“Merry, this is my first guest, Taylor Bishop,” she said, breaking the silence that had fallen with Taylor’s arrival. “He’s a writer. He’s doing a book on the ranching families that helped settle Colorado.”
“Oh, really?” Smiling easily, she said, “Then you need to talk to my mother and brothers. And Janey, too,” she added. “She did the family genealogy and traced the McBrides all the way back to Scotland.”
Still dazed, Taylor hardly heard her. This was his half sister? This was unbelievable. She was beautiful. She was—
“Taylor? Are you all right?”
Glancing up from his thoughts, he found both Phoebe and Merry grinning at him. For the first time in a long time, a blush stung his cheeks. “I feel like I just put my foot in my mouth and I didn’t say a word.”
“I seem to have that effect on people,” Merry chuckled. “It’s nice to meet you, Taylor. Welcome to Liberty Hill.”
“Thank you,” he said gruffly, and only just then realized that the puppies she was holding had to be heavy. “Here, let me take those for you. Where did you want them?”
“In my truck,” she said, nodding toward the white Explorer sitting at the curb. “Thank you.”
“No problem,” he assured her, and easily carried the puppies to the truck.
“He’s nice,” Merry said quietly to Phoebe, “when he lets down his guard. He should do it more often.”
Phoebe didn’t know if she would have described him as nice or not, but she had to agree with Merry. When he forgot to be so angry, he was devastatingly attractive. Who would have thought it?
Walking with Merry out to her truck as Taylor carefully deposited the puppies in the back seat, she was still marvelling at the change in her guest’s attitude when he turned back to Merry and said solemnly, “Phoebe said your father is dead. I’m sorry to hear that. I was hoping to talk to as many of the old ranchers in the area as possible about the old days.”
“Dad would have enjoyed that,” she said with a smile. “I remember when I was a kid, he used to tell us stories about the ranch that his father told him.”
“How old were you when he died?”
“Twelve,” she replied. “It was a shock for all of us—he was only forty-four. My mother was in shock, of course, but I think it was hardest on my brother Joe. He was eighteen and about to go off to college when Dad died. Mom wanted him to go on and go, but Joe knew she couldn’t run the ranch by herself and raise the rest of us. So he did it for her.”
“What about college?” Taylor asked. “Did he ever go?”
“No,” she said simply. “Zeke went on to get his Ph.D, I went to veterinary school and Janey became an RN, but Joe never went. We owe him a lot. If he hadn’t run the ranch and helped put all of us through school, there’s no telling what any of us would be doing now.”
Taylor doubted that any of them would have ended up waiting tables—they all sounded too intelligent for that—but there was no question that their lives would have been different if it hadn’t been for the fact that Joe had sacrificed his own education for theirs. And that gave him a lot to think about. He’d always thought that if his father had any other children, they’d probably been blessed with a golden childhood, free of the worries and lack of security he’d grown up with. Apparently, they’d gone through rough times, too, if Joe had to give up college to keep the family afloat.
For a moment, he almost felt sorry for the unknown Joe. But then a bitter voice in his head pointed out that while he, himself, had been living in roach-invested government housing as a child, his half brothers and sisters had been growing up on a ranch that was, no doubt, nearly as big as Rocky Mountain National Park. Poor Joe? He didn’t think so.
“You would all have probably still found a way to go to college,” he retorted. “And your brother would still have turned out to be a rancher whether he went to college or not. It’s obviously in his blood.”
“Actually,
