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He’s an ex-marine with so much to prove...
Ex-marine Trevor Farrell is a classic workaholic. Which means he has a successful chain of resorts...and an empty house. So having Jade Evans, the widow of a war hero, and her three kids stay with him while their new home gets renovated is no problem. For a few weeks anyway.
Trevor admires Jade’s determination to give her kids a good life. For years, he’s only needed to focus on himself. And yet spending time with Jade leaves him yearning for more. But after being married to a genuine hero, why would she want a man who never saw active duty? If Trevor wants a life with Jade and her family, he’ll need to prove to her—and himself—that he deserves it.
Before she even learned to read, GINA WILKINS announced that she wanted to be a writer. That dream never wavered, though she worked briefly in advertising and human resources. Influenced by her mother’s love of classic Harlequin romances, she knew she wanted her stories to always have happy endings. She met her husband in her first college English class and they’ve been married for more than thirty-five years, blessed with two daughters and a son. They also have two delightful grandchildren. After more than one hundred books with Harlequin, she will always be a fan of romance and a believer in happy endings.
Also By Gina Wilkins
Soldiers and Single Moms
The Soldier’s Forever Family
The Way to a Soldier’s Heart
Proposals & Promises
The Boss’s Marriage Plan
A Reunion and a Ring
The Bachelor’s Little Bonus
Bride Mountain
Healed with a Kiss
A Proposal at the Wedding
Matched by Moonlight
A Match for the Single Dad
The Texan’s Surprise Baby
The Right Twin
His Best Friend’s Wife
Husband for a Weekend
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk
The Soldier’s Legacy
Gina Wilkins
www.millsandboon.co.uk
ISBN: 978-1-474-08106-1
THE SOLDIER’S LEGACY
© 2018 Gina Wilkins
Published in Great Britain 2018
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
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www.millsandboon.co.uk
“Anything that might develop between us has to be strictly casual. No strings or expectations—and no involving our families.”
Whoa. Was she suggesting—?
Jade smiled, and Trevor felt his throat close. “Just in case something should happen,” she murmured.
“Something...like this?” With a grin and a rare surrender to impulse, he reached out with his right hand to snag the back of her neck. She made no effort to draw back when he lowered his head—and he would have stopped immediately if she had. Instead, she met him halfway, seemingly as curious as he.
The kiss was light, carefully restrained. Just an exploratory meeting of lips, a brief, testing sample. Jade tasted exactly as he’d expected: sweet, with just a touch of spice beneath. Had it not been for the resented crutches, he’d have moved closer to prove that the rest of her felt as good against him.
Dear Reader,
Coming from a large family with many distinguished veterans among the generations, I married the son of a career army/air force veteran who served in two wars, and we live near the US Air Force base in central Arkansas. I have a great regard for those who have served in the military. I’ve seen the scars, both physical and emotional, that remain after that service ends, and I was intrigued by the idea of writing a series of romances with veteran heroes, each with his own issues to overcome before finding his happily-ever-after destiny. I’ve also seen the dedication required by the loved ones who keep the home fires burning while their warriors are away.
The Soldiers and Single Moms trilogy came from that initial idea. And, as a mother of three now-grown “kids” and grandmother of two little boys, I always enjoy writing about the rewards and challenges of parenthood. I’ve loved spending time with the characters I’ve grown to know during their journeys in these three books—and I hope you’ve enjoyed meeting them along the way!
Happy reading!
Gina
As always, for John, who has been with me through forty years of marriage, raising a family and more than a hundred books. I couldn’t have done any of it without him!
Contents
Cover
Back Cover Text
About the Author
Booklist
Title Page
Copyright
Introduction
Dear Reader
Dedication
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
Extract
Chapter One
ALWAYS-PRACTICAL SINGLE MOM Jade Evans had made detailed plans for the coming weeks for herself and her three children. A fire ignited by a careless construction worker had sent that carefully-crafted schedule up in smoke along with the kitchen of their new home, only days before they were to have moved in. Their furniture and most of their belongings had already been delivered before the fire, though fortunately most of the damage had been confined to the kitchen and roof.
“Wow.” Twelve-year-old Caleb stood with his mother and two sisters in a soaring entryway with a dining room on the left side and a front parlor on the right. Glass sliders at the back of the big den ahead looked out over a spacious deck, a glistening pool and a beautifully landscaped lawn that sloped gracefully down to a private dock on the Intracoastal Waterway. His brown eyes wide, Caleb pushed his floppy brown hair off the top of his glasses. “Nice place, huh, Mom?”
“Yes, it’s lovely.”
Jade could understand why her son was impressed. It was hard to imagine that this spacious house was home to only one man—Trevor Farrell, the son of her mother’s closest friend. An army veteran and now-successful resort owner, Trevor had been tragically widowed at just twenty-eight—almost a decade ago while he was deployed overseas. Jade didn’t think he’d owned this place when he was married. So, he’d bought it after his wife’s death, either as a private escape or as an investment. Perhaps he had plans to remarry eventually. His mother hadn’t given up hope for grandchildren to enjoy as much as Jade’s mom. Linda McGill relished being Nanna to Jade’s children.
Mary Pat Rayburn, the short, pleasantly rounded woman who’d opened the door and ushered them inside waved a hand toward the staircase in a warm welcome. “Let me show you up to your rooms.”
“We’re going to live here?” six-year-old Bella asked, slipping her hand into Jade’s. With her golden curls and huge amber eyes, Bella was the youngest and most skittish of the children, the one Jade thought of as her “loving little worrier.”
Notoriously impatient, ten-year-old Erin sighed as she pushed back her darker blond hair to focus on her sister. “We talked about this, Bella. This is Ms. Hester’s son’s house. We’re only staying here until our new house is fixed so we can move in. Right, Mama?”
“Yes, that’s right.” Jade agreed rather reluctantly. She was still finding it hard to believe that she and her children would be sharing Trevor’s home for the next couple of weeks.
Having accepted a job here in Shorty’s Landing, Jade had recently sold the house she’d owned, close to her mother’s home in Columbia, South Carolina.
She and the children could have stayed with her mother until the repairs on their new house here were completed, but school would begin in less than a week. It would’ve been difficult to get the kids back and forth with a ninety-minute drive each way, especially with Jade starting her new job. It was hard enough for them that they’d be in new schools, and now they had to deal with their home in upheaval, as well.
When she’d learned Jade needed temporary lodgings in the area, Hester Farrell had railroaded Jade into occupying Trevor’s rarely used second floor until the repairs were completed. Suspicious about Hester’s motives, Jade had initially resisted the offer. When it came to Jade and Trevor, Hester was no more subtle a matchmaker than Jade’s own mom.
Jade had been forced to inform her mother more than once that she wasn’t interested in being pushed into a romance with Hester’s handsome and successful son—despite hints that grew more pointed each time Jade’s path crossed Trevor’s. As if both being widowed early and having mothers who were close friends formed the basis for a lasting relationship between her and Trevor, Jade often thought in exasperation.
She didn’t want to do anything that would throw more fuel on that particular fire. And accepting charity was difficult for someone who’d become accustomed to relying on no one but herself.
Still, the intimidatingly efficient Hester had forged on with her proposition. Both Hester and Jade’s mother had implied that it would be ungrateful of Jade to refuse the generous offer. So now here they were, being welcomed into Trevor’s home by his housekeeper less than two full days after Hester had extended the invitation on her son’s behalf. Jade couldn’t help wondering if Trevor was any more enthused about the situation than she was.
She and Trevor had been introduced for the first time only three years ago during a party at his parents’ house to celebrate Jade’s mother’s sixtieth birthday. Coincidentally in town for a class reunion, Trevor had dropped in to give his regards. Jade and Trevor had interacted on only a few occasions since, most recently when he’d accompanied his parents to Jade’s father’s funeral last year. Jade couldn’t claim to know Trevor well, but when she thought of him, she always recalled his impeccable manners and his charming, but unrevealing, smile. Despite his deeply ingrained courtesy, she’d had the sense that wherever he was at the time, he felt as though he should be somewhere else—a busy man with divided loyalties pulling him in many directions.
Having been wed to a man whose attention was always somewhere else, Jade recognized the type all too well. Stephen hadn’t been home much during their tragically shortened marriage, but when he was, she knew he’d been thinking of his responsibilities to the military. As much as he’d loved her and the kids, and she’d never had reason to doubt that he had loved them, he’d never seemed totally comfortable changing diapers or grilling burgers in the backyard or unclogging drains. The battlefield had called to him. She’d always wondered if he’d felt the pull of home when he was deployed or if a war zone was where he truly felt most himself.
She’d learned to be independent and almost completely self-sufficient during her somewhat unconventional but still happy marriage. She was chagrined to be in the position of having to accept Trevor’s help now, but she hadn’t had many other options. Finding a temporary place to rent for a family of four would have been difficult. She had to admit this was a convenient, if awkward, solution to her crisis.
With a resigned shake of her head, she motioned toward the stairs. “Everyone follow Mrs. Rayburn now.”
“Oh, y’all can just call me Mary Pat,” the housekeeper insisted with a musical chime of a laugh as she started up the stairs. “I’ve never cared much for formality, as Trevor would tell you.”
Reaching the second-floor landing, they faced a wall arranged with framed photographs of gorgeous landscapes, an intriguing mix of coastal and inland shots. Jade wondered if Trevor had taken them; she’d been told he was a talented photographer. If these photos were his, his talent hadn’t been exaggerated, she mused, studying an image of ocean spray blasting up from behind a boulder on which a heron posed with proudly spread wings. An aerial view of a wooded mountaintop was breathtaking both in theme and in the implied risk involved in taking the shot. Jade had heard Trevor’s mother bemoan her son’s proclivity for risky activities like riding fast motorcycles, mountain climbing and paragliding. As the widow of an adrenaline junkie, Jade didn’t fault Hester for wishing her son would pursue less risky hobbies.
“I like that one,” Bella whispered, pointing to a tableau of two brown horses standing nose to nose in a rolling green pasture as if sharing a secret from the photographer they side-eyed.
“I like it, too,” Jade said, smiling down at her youngest.
“There are three guest bedrooms up here and one downstairs, all with baths attached,” Mary Pat announced with a wave of a hand. “This door ahead of us leads into the bigger bedroom. I figured you’d want that one, Ms. Evans. The other two bedrooms are on either side of the hallway. Maybe the girls would like to share one and Caleb can have the third. Unless you’d prefer to use the downstairs guest suite, Ms. Evans?”
“No, we’ll all bunk up here, thank you. The girls will share. And please call me Jade. I’m not really the formal type, either.”
“Where does Ms. Hester’s son sleep?” Erin asked, peering into one of the open doors.
“Oh, his suite is downstairs,” Mary Pat replied. “He hardly ever comes up here, to be honest.”
“Then why does he have all these rooms?” Erin asked with typical blunt curiosity.
“He calls it an investment. But I think his mama talked him into buying the place,” Mary Pat added with a wink at Jade. “If you know her, you’re aware she’s a force to be reckoned with. Fine woman, but you don’t want to be getting on her bad side.”
Jade believed Mary Pat had just concisely summed up Hester’s personality. Jade’s mom insisted Hester was simply a well-intentioned meddler, but Jade had always been secretly intimidated by the woman. “Where do you sleep, Ms. Mary Pat?” Erin asked.
“Did you see that cottage off to one side of the property? Trevor had it built for me when my husband passed away three years ago. I was never blessed with children, and Trevor is like the son I always wanted. His mama is gracious enough to share him with me—probably because it takes both of us to keep him in line,” the housekeeper added with another of her musical laughs.
Jade was getting the distinct impression that while the likable Mary Pat adored her employer, she didn’t hesitate to speak her mind to or about him.
“There’s one other room up here y’all need to see.” Mary Pat turned to her left and walked to the end of the hallway. She opened a door and stepped back to invite them in with another wave of her expressive hands.
Jade heard the kids gasp in delight, and she sighed in surrender as she looked into a spacious rec room equipped with a large-screen TV with leather theater seating, a pool table and a foosball table. Tall, leather-covered stools drew up to a built-in bar on which rested a wooden bowl filled with assorted fruits. Two game tables sat in front of shelves stocked with books, games—both video and tabletop—and an impressive selection of movies. A smaller table had been tucked into a dormer nook, surrounded by inviting beanbag hassocks and topped with a nubbed baseplate for use with a big bin of brightly colored plastic building blocks.
Erin was already being drawn to the bookshelves while Caleb studied the video games. Bella, overwhelmed, clung to Jade’s hand, though she looked longingly at the blocks table. Considering this room and the pool in the backyard, Jade figured the kids were never going to want to leave this house for the more modest home she had purchased in a less-expensive neighborhood a few miles away. It was a nice place, but not like this one. No private pool. No extravagant entertainment room.
Still, she thought they’d be quite happy in their new house, once it was fire-damage free and habitable again, of course. The kids had examined and approved every inch of it before the purchase papers were signed. They’d miss their previous home and friends in Columbia, but Jade thought she’d prepared them well for their adventure here.
She’d been considering this move for more than a year, since her physician cousin had first approached her about taking a nursing job in a medical clinic in Shorty’s Landing. With all the children in school, Jade could put her nursing training to full use, having worked only part-time for Bella’s first six years. And frankly, it would be nice to start fresh in a new town with new acquaintances. As kind as everyone in her hometown had been to them after her husband’s death, there were times when it had become difficult for all of them to be always seen as the tragically bereaved survivors of a larger-than-life military hero.
“Mr. Farrell really never comes up here?” Caleb shook his head in disbelief. “If I had a room like this, I’d stay in it all the time.”
“This floor is set up for his guests. He has a big TV, a reading nook, and a home office in his private suite downstairs,” Mary Pat explained. “When he’s home, he’s usually there.”
“Although I have been known to sneak up here late at night to work on my pool-shooting skills,” a man drawled from the doorway. “I figure if I keep practicing, I’ll beat Mary Pat someday. Don’t ever bet against her, by the way. She’s a hustler.”
“Not a hustler,” Mary Pat said with a grin as everyone turned to watch Trevor Farrell enter the room. “Just better than you’ll ever be, practice or no.”
Trevor laughed, the sound deep and rumbly. Jade swallowed. He was even better looking than she’d remembered—tall and slim, with light brown hair, very blue eyes and a smile that could have come straight from a toothpaste ad. His posture was straight and he looked poised, a man accustomed to being in charge. His expression was warm as he approached her. “It’s nice to see you again, Jade.”
She tucked a strand of blond hair behind one ear. “Trevor, it was so generous of you to take us in while our house is being repaired. We appreciate it very much.”
“As you can see, there’s plenty of room. You aren’t putting me out at all. I’m only sorry the accident at your new house delayed your move-in. That must have been disappointing for you all.”
“Oh, I think everything’s working out just fine,” Erin proclaimed, running a hand admiringly along the back of a leather theater chair. “I’m Erin, by the way.”
“Yes, I recall meeting you at your grandmother’s sixtieth birthday party—what? Three years ago? You’ve grown quite a bit since then.”
Erin nodded. “I was just seven then. I’m ten now.”
“I remember you.” Caleb looked around from the video game selection as he spoke, pushing his glasses up on his nose. “Is it okay if I play Dougie the Donkey on your system later? I’ll be really careful.”
“Of course you can play the game, Caleb, if your mom approves. Maybe you could even show me a trick or two. I’ve never gotten past the Gator Boss fight on level nine.”
“Seriously? I took him out in like three tries.”
Trevor chuckled. “So far my skills at both pool and video games have been questioned. What about you, Little Bit?” he asked casually of Bella, who was peeking out at him from behind her mother. “Do you have a special talent you could embarrass me with?”
Jade half-expected her shy youngest to mumble an answer and hide again, which was Bella’s usual response when spoken to by strangers. Instead, after a moment’s thought, the child replied, “I can do cartwheels. Three in a row.”
Trevor threw up his hands. “Well, there you go. I can’t do one cartwheel without falling right on my...er...face.”
Bella giggled, then crowded behind Jade again as if she’d surprised even herself.
“In case you forgot, her name is Bella,” Erin said in a long-suffering tone. “She’s kind of a scaredy-cat.”
“Am not,” Bella muttered, her voice muffled by Jade’s shirt.
“I wouldn’t call anyone who can do three cartwheels in a row a scaredy-cat,” Trevor said solemnly, giving Jade a wink that made her catch her breath. She blinked a couple of times, as surprised by her own automatic response to this charismatic man as by Bella’s. They’d always been surrounded by crowds in their earlier meetings. Maybe that had somewhat diluted the effect of his substantial charm.
“Anyway,” Trevor said. “I have a dull business dinner tonight and I need to change first. I just wanted to welcome you and tell you that if there’s anything you need while you’re our guests here, please let us know.”
Erin opened her mouth to speak, but closed it again quickly when Jade frowned at her. Heaven only knew what her outspoken middle child had been on the verge of requesting.
Mary Pat moved toward the door. “I’m going down to start dinner for the rest of us. I’ll let you know when it’s ready, Jade.”
“Oh, you don’t have to cook for us,” Jade felt compelled to protest. “I can...”
“Are you kidding? I’m always delighted to have an excuse to cook for a group. And I’m planning to eat with y’all, so I’m looking forward to that, too.” Mary Pat punched Trevor’s arm lightly as she passed him. “This one’s hardly ever home at mealtime.”
“You know I’d rather have your cooking than anyone else’s,” Trevor shot back, patting her cheek. “Just have to work most evenings.”
“And by work, he means schmoozing with guests at the resort or having dinner with travel writers or vendors,” Mary Pat explained in an aside as she left the room. “Most of which he could cut back on significantly without affecting his business in the least. The man is a workaholic, but nothing his mama or I say can make him change his ways.”