When Love Comes by Leigh Greenwood Read Free Book Online Page A

every day. Then Gary and I go into town and spend our evenings working at the saloon. I know you don’t like it, but that’s what we have to do to make a living.”
    “We wouldn’t have to do it if we could sell the bull’s services.”
    “We’ve tried, but between his getting out to service Carruthers’s cows for free and Sandoval’s insistence that his cows don’t need to be improved, that hasn’t worked.”
    “If only—”
    “Don’t start with the if only’s ,” Amanda begged. “Saying the same things over again won’t change anything.”
    “I was only going to say that had this been Mississippi, our neighbors would have been glad to help us rather than do everything they could to make sure we fail.”
    “Well, we’re not in Mississippi, so we have to depend on ourselves. Now I’m going to bed. Gary will check on the bull when he gets home.”
    Amanda hurried from the room before her mother could say anything else. She tried to have patience, but it was always the same.
    Light from the small oil lamp her mother kept ready for her cast a pale yellow glow over the room. Its contents looked out of place in a ranch house in Texas. It was in essence the bedroom her mother had grown up with in Mississippi. Beingan only child, her mother had inherited everything when her parents died. She had insisted upon bringing every piece of furniture, every piece of china, every item of decoration when they moved to Texas. She spent most of her day keeping the inside of the house as close as she could to what she remembered from Mississippi. Amanda had given up trying to convince her mother that the boys didn’t appreciate her efforts and considered the elaborate furnishings a nuisance rather than a birthright.
    Amanda did appreciate it, but she didn’t want to build her life around handcrafted cherry and walnut furniture or china imported from En gland. Trunks in the attic were stuffed with dresses she would never wear, hatboxes that would never be opened, shoes that would be unusable after a single trip to town. She was not immune to the lure of pretty clothes, but she wanted clothes that fitted the life she was leading now. She had been born in Mississippi, but in her heart she was a Texan. She liked the openness of the prairie, enjoyed working outside, and didn’t mind the rough manners of cowmen.
    Taking off her dress and petticoats, she hung them up carefully and slipped her nightgown over her head. She crawled into bed and settled the covers over her, but sleep didn’t come right away. She couldn’t banish a certain stranger from her thoughts.
    Even though she knew virtually nothing about him, she was strongly attracted to Broc Kincaid. For some reason, his wound didn’t bother her. Most of the time she was hardly aware of it. There was just something about Broc that rendered his disfigurement unimportant.
    He didn’t draw attention to himself, though she was certain he was the kind of person who could do just about anything he wanted. His good humor and his willingness to be so helpful would have made him a wonderful addition to any gathering. She wondered about the ranch where he worked. Did the people there treat him well despite the wound, or did he have to endure discrimination from them, too? She wondered if there was anywhere he could go where hewould be treated like an ordinary person. It had to be hard to have people stare at you, especially when it was often in horror or disgust. Even when they didn’t stare, Broc must know what they were thinking. It was enough to turn a normal person into a hermit.
    She threw a light quilt to one side. Now that she’d taken the chill off the bed, she was too warm.
    Settling back, she told herself there was little point in worrying about Broc. He would leave tomorrow, and she’d never see him again. She wouldn’t know how he was treated or what was happening to him. Thinking about her own situation would be a better use of her time. She sighed. She’d been