His Heart for the Trusting (Book 2 - Texas Hearts (Contemporary Western Romance)

by Mondello, Lisa

  HIS HEART FOR THE TRUSTING

  by

  Lisa Mondello

  KINDLE EDITION

  * * *

  PUBLISHED BY:

  Lisa Mondello

  His Heart for the Trusting

  Copyright © 2002 by Lisa Mondello

  First Edition published 2002 by Avalon Books

  Second Edition published 2012

  License Notes

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, it was not purchased for your use only and it is not part of the Kindle Lending Program, then you should delete it from your device and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

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  “Truly a joy to read.” - Susan Mobley

  Her Heart for the Asking - 4 STARS Romantic Times

  “The Marriage Contract is a very entertaining read.” - Sunnye Tiedemann

  The Marriage Contract – 4 STARS Romantic Times

  “Cradle of Secrets, a story shrouded in mystery, darkness and confusion, is quite difficult to resist…captivating, and often quite emotional.” – Robin Taylor

  Cradle of Secrets – 4 STARS Romantic Times

  “Lisa Mondello's Her Only Protector is an extremely stimulating romance and suspense story.” – Robin Taylor

  Her Only Protector – 4.5 STARS Romantic Times

  “Mondello's action-packed story has a nice developing romance.” – Susan Mobley

  Yuletide Protector – 4 STARS Romantic Times

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  His Heart for the Trusting – Book 2 of Texas Hearts

  Ever since Mitch Broader set foot in Texas, he dreamed of owning his own ranch. Now that he’s bought a share in the Double T Ranch, he’s one step closer to the dream. Then his past greets him in the form of a baby basket, complete with infant and birth certificate naming him as the father. He can’t change diapers and work toward his dream at the same time.

  When Sara Lightfoot, “Miss Hollywood” in Mitch’s eyes, rescues him with her particular knack for handling his precocious son, he hires her on the spot as a temporary nanny. No matter how much Sara’s dark eyes and warm heart make this bachelor think of settling down and making their arrangement permanent, she’s made it perfectly clear she has other plans that don’t include him or his dreams.

  Sara Lightfoot never thought she’d return to her home on the reservation. Now she plans to reclaim the life she left by going back to the reservation as a Native American storyteller, teaching the Apache children stories of their culture. She didn’t expect Mitch Broader’s sexy smile or job offer as a live-in nanny to derail those plans. After all she’s been through to come home, can she open up her heart once again to love?

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  EBooks available by Lisa Mondello

  The Marriage Contract ##

  All I Want for Christmas is You ##

  The Knight and Maggie’s Baby##

  Her Heart for the Asking ++

  His Heart for the Trusting++

  The More I See++

  Nothing but Trouble

  Material Witness

  Cradle of Secrets – Harlequin Love Inspired Suspense**

  Her Only Protector – Harlequin Love Inspired Suspense**

  Yuletide Protector – Harlequin Love Inspired Suspense

  Fresh-Start Family – Harlequin Love Inspired Romance

  In a Doctor’s Arms – Harlequin Love Inspired Romance

  Fate with a Helping Hand (Massachusetts) Series

  Texas Hearts Series

  ** Cradle Series

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  This book is dedicated to Maria, Tina, Linda and Torry.

  Much love and hugs!

  Your sister, Lisa

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  HIS HEART FOR THE TRUSTING

  Chapter One

  What a homecoming, Sara. First day back in Texas in years and you crash the town social.

  Sara Lightfoot chuckled at the nervous energy racing through her veins. She never thought coming home would be easy, but she certainly hadn't expected this much anxiety.

  When she had first received Mandy's letter telling her she'd come back to Texas, she'd gotten the bug to come home. Safety in numbers, Mandy had said. No one will expect it.

  Yeah, right! She hadn't always done the unexpected, but this time she was sure her arrival would cause enough of a stir that heads were going to turn and a flurry of whispers were going to race across the lawn like a brush fire on a dry Texas day.

  It wasn't that big a deal and she didn't relish the kind of attention that was sure to come her way. She was coming home to a place she should have never left in the first place. But when all was said and done, it had taken the leaving to appreciate the home she had fled on the Apache reservation she'd grown up on.

  As she drove down the endless highway toward Steerage Rock, Sara smiled to herself. She hadn't fled this time. This time she chose to leave LA and shed a little piece of herself in the process. She'd given up her old life and taken back her family name. That was the first of many steps she hoped would bring her closer to home.

  Her divorce to Dave was now final. Another huge step. Going home to reclaim a life she threw away years before like a worn out dress was the next step. She only hoped that old life would want her back as much as she wanted to be back.

  Mandy had insisted it would and Sara clung to that hope.

  Main Street looked exactly as it had the day she and Dave had walked into the Justice of the Peace's office downtown and married. As she drove passed City Hall, she took in the cold and lonely feeling that swept through her and pushed it aside. She hadn't thought it lonely the day of her marriage. After all, she had Dave. What more could she need? He was going to make all her childhood dreams come true. Funny how dreams turn...

  She heaved a heavy sigh as she reached the intersection that led to the main road leading to The Double T Ranch. Anticipation raced through her. Her hands started to tremble. Thank goodness, Mandy had gone against her wishes and come to LA for a spontaneous visit. If she hadn't, Lord knows she’d still be caught in the same prison Dave had neatly built for her.

  Sara hit her directional and took a left hand turn, anticipation of seeing family for the first time in almost nine years and fear of their reaction filling her at the same time.

  As she sped past the red brick elementary school, she pulled over, parked the car on the grass near a chain-link fence, and then felt the whoosh of a speeding car drive past her on the opposite side of the road. Someone was in a hurry to get out of town, she thought. She'd had enough of that in LA, where it seemed everyone was in a hurry. Out here, she'd have time. Time to heal her wounds and build back a life she'd thrown away.

  A cluster of children played in the park and she had to smile. She'd always loved the children. And they had always loved her stories. After volunteering at a daycare in LA sharing her Native American heritage with the children through stories, she decided it was time to reconnect with a piece of her that had been missing. Sure, there were elementary schools and parks in LA and all over the world. She could have gone anywhere. But this...this was home.

  * * *

  A patch of open Texas sky stretched long and wide above the Double T Ranch. Mitch Broader adjusted his straw hat and took a moment to enjoy the view from where he was sitting, strad
dling a long beam of wood. Void of a single cloud, the deep cerulean space above him felt like a warm cozy blanket.

  His face split into a grin that he couldn't hold back. It was a perfect day. They'd get all their work done and the next with time to spare before any bad weather could say different. This kind of luck had been following Mitch Broader ever since he'd bought his share in the Double T's new rodeo school nearly a year ago. That one small step would bring him closer to fulfilling a dream he'd had ever since the day he'd first driven those long roads from the Amarillo Airport with his grandfather.

  Leaning forward on the sturdy beam, he waited for the crew of cowboys down on the ground to pass him and Beau Gentry, his longtime friend and now partner in the Double T's rodeo school, another beam to slip in place. This barn they were raising would give them plenty of room to house the horses they needed to run the school and bring him one step closer to the day when he'd own his own ranch, a dream he'd had since he'd come to Texas.

  Of course, back then, when Mitch was still a gangly green boy from Baltimore, Mitch hadn't understood the hard work and dedication it would take to own a spread. After years of working alongside some well-seasoned Texas cowboys, he knew. He'd listened and learned his lessons well. Having a piece of the Double T's new rodeo training school might not be the same as owning his own ranch, but it was a step in the right direction. And for now, that suited Mitch just fine. He wasn't in a hurry.

  When this crew--mostly volunteers from surrounding ranches and neighbors who'd come out for the event like it was a square dance social--was done putting all the pieces of this post and beam barn together, when the last spike was hammered deep and secure into the fine wood, they would all celebrate. A party the size of Texas with all the food and fixins' he'd come to enjoy.

  Dancing and women. Yeah, there would be plenty of that, too. And that was the fun part of being a cowboy.

  “Yo, Mitch!”

  He peered down from the beam he was holding on to, toward the sound of a familiar female voice calling for him. A drop of sweat from his brow followed gravity and imbedded itself in his eye causing it to sting. He had to blink twice before he could focus.

  “I'm kind of hung up, Mandy. Want to wait a sec?” he called back to the blonde haired woman staring up at him through squinted eyes. Mandy held her arched back with both hands, clearly uncomfortable in the heat being that she was nearly seven months pregnant with her first baby. There'd been a time, early on when he'd first arrived at The Double T Ranch that he'd thought Mandy Morgan was the cutest little creature he'd ever laid eyes on. Still sporting one heck of an adolescent broken heart, he'd set himself for more heartache when she up and fell in love with Beau, only to leave and never return to the ranch until last summer. Within the last year she'd become Mandy Morgan Gentry, his bride.

  Mitch reached for one end of the beam being eased his way by the ground crew and slipped it cleanly into the pre-notched hole.

  “Ah, Mitch?” Mandy called again. “If it was just me, I'd have no problem waiting on you. But I don't think this is something that can wait.”

  “You ain't in labor or anythin', Mandy, are you? “ Beau said, ready to jump down from the beam he was straddling to aid his wife, his face panic-stricken. “The doctor said you were supposed to take it easy to keep from having any more contractions.”

  “Cool your jets, Beau. I'm doing just fine,” she said with a chuckle and a twinkle in her eye that made instant relief register on Beau's sun tanned face. Pointing a finger at Mitch, she urged, “You're wanted in the house. Pronto.”

  Mitch couldn't help but stare as Mandy spun on her heels, with as much grace as a woman in her condition could, and waddled back to the main farmhouse.

  Beau chuckled from the other end of the beam. “What'd you do, Mitch? Forget to scrape the muck off your boots before walking into the house again?”

  “It wouldn't be the first time. Corrine made it more than clear she'd have my head on a spit if I ruined that new carpet in the dining room.”

  “Never known Corrine to tell a lie.”

  Mitch couldn't help but laugh. Corrine Promise was a small woman, but the last two years had tested her strength--had tested them all--and she'd come out of it victoriously. The matriarch of the ranch, even though she'd rather hole up in her art studio with her hands in clay or paints to being ten feet near a cow, she was the epitome of the old time pioneer woman in spirit. While her husband might be in charge of running the daily business as owner of The Double T Ranch, there was no doubt it was Corrine who was in charge of the Promise home.

  Mitch adjusted his straw cowboy hat on his head, feeling another trickle of sweat make a journey down the side of his face before dropping off and hitting his already sweat soaked white T-shirt. He finished toe nailing the steel spike into the beam to keep it in its place.

  He glanced at his handiwork with appreciation. If done right, this barn would be standing long after he was nothing more than dust on this earth.

  “Wish me luck,” he muttered in somewhat of a groan as he climbed down from the skeleton of the barn.

  Beau's laughter faded as Mitch hiked through the crowd of neighbors and friends gathered to help with the festivities. A bundle of women stood gabbing under a shady tree about something intense as they poured pink lemonade to pass out to the chain of people working on the barn. They paid no attention to him as he grabbed one of the filled paper cups lined on the table and drank it down before shooting it into a garbage can at the end of the table.

  Mitch drew in a pensive breath before he reached the screen door. Pausing, he scraped his boots extra hard on the doormat with a little more care than usual before walking into the house.

  “Would it help if I said sorry for whatever I did, Corrine?”

  He heard her lighthearted chuckle and let out a breath of relief. How much trouble could he really be in if she still held her humor?

  “Do what you like,” Corrine called back to him from inside. “But I'm afraid it'll do no good.”

  He made a face and groaned audibly. What on earth had he done this time?

  * * *

  “You've got to be kidding,” Mitch said just moments later, still not believing the bombshell that had just exploded in his face. He swayed for a second, and then slumped against the wall. It was a joke. It had to be!

  Corrine held the tiny infant in her arms and eyed him. Not a trace of humor on her face. “Do I look like I'm kidding?”

  “You've got to be--”

  “Hard to believe, isn't it? Mitch is a daddy. Hearts will be breaking wide open now that Mitchell Broader is no longer footloose and fancy free,” Mandy chimed in. “You're gonna be changing diapers instead of picking up women after bringing the cows home.”

  “This is a sick joke, right?”

  Corrine shrugged as she blew a fallen tendril of hair from her forehead. “Maybe, but we're not the one playing it on you.”

  “We're not into cruel and unusual punishment. Even for you.”

  “Thanks a lot, Mandy,” he said, his mouth skewing into a wry grin.

  She chuckled softly as she peered over the baby Corrine held in her arms and crooned softly. “No problem.”

  “She actually said...Lillian said that I'm this kid's daddy? I mean...and then she just...left? She left the kid here for me to raise?” His throat constricted and he was finding it hard to draw breath. Right now, the only thing keeping him upright was the solid wall behind him and that was only as long as his knees didn’t give way.

  Corrine motioned to the window. “Didn’t you see the dust cloud running down the driveway? The woman was in quite a hurry to escape.”

  “I'll just bet.”

  That would be typical Lillian. If it involved money, Lillian was in a hurry.

  “Did anyone else talk with her? Did she say when she was coming back?”

  “Nope, and with all the commotion today, no one would have noticed her, anyway. I came into the house to check on the lemon pies and she w
as just there sitting at the kitchen table like the rest of the chairs. I have no idea how long she'd been sitting there. All she said was this was your baby and your responsibility now. She didn't say anything about coming back for him.”

  Corrine stood up from the worn couch she'd been sitting on, rocking the sleeping baby in her arms. She padded softly over to Mitch and held the child out to him. Her arms hung in the air. What did she expect him to do?

  “He's truly an adorable child. Don't you want to hold your son?” she asked with the kind of warmth and compassion he'd come to love about her. Except this time, he didn't want to see it.

  His son? Had she really called this warm little bundle his son? He looked at the baby boy dressed in a Baltimore Orioles baseball outfit and little sock booties, back at Corrine , and then at the baby again.

  Corrine chuckled softly so as not to rouse the baby. “He's not going to do anything. I promise you that. It's a lot easier to hold him for the first time while he's asleep. Pretty soon he'll probably be crying for something.”

  “I don't know anything about holding a baby.”

  He was vaguely aware of Mandy coming into the living room, holding a freshly laundered white tee shirt. He'd somehow missed the fact that she'd left the room for a moment.

  “You are not touching this precious baby wearing that sweaty shirt,” Mandy insisted. “Put this one on.”

  He did as he was told, handing the shirt he'd been wearing to Mandy, who took it between her fingertips and walked back to the laundry room.

  He shook his head. “I can't do this. There's got to be a mistake.”

  “He's a baby, Mitch, not a bomb. Although he'll probably deposit something explosive in his diaper real soon,” Mandy said.

  Corrine placed the baby in the crook of Mitch’s arm and closed his hand around the baby to keep him snug. “Don't worry. You've encountered worse messes in the barn. You can handle a little diaper.”