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Authors: Jill Gregory

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Larkspur Road

BOOK: Larkspur Road
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P
RAISE FOR THE NOVELS OF
J
ILL
G
REGORY

“Entertaining from the first page to the last, with a romantic relationship that sizzles and touches the heart.”

—Catherine Anderson,
New York Times
bestselling author

“Jill Gregory gifts us with a perfect romantic suspense story complete with complex and vivid characters, family intrigue, a fast-paced plot, and unexpected twists and turns.”

—Fresh Fiction

“Gallops out of the starting gate…Gregory expertly weaves the various plot threads together, creating a tight, well-balanced story that packs an emotional punch.”

—Publishers Weekly

“A transfixing blend of fiery romance and spine-tingling suspense.”

—Booklist

“For tales of romance and adventure that keep you reading into the night, look no further than Jill Gregory.”

—Nora Roberts

“A first-rate romance. Gregory…writes the stuff that romance readers yearn for. If you haven’t yet read her, you’re missing out on a great treat.”

—Oakland Press

“Riveting…The ultimate seductive read…Unforgettable.”

—Gayle Lynds

“A page-turner extraordinaire.”

—Douglas Preston

“Stirring and imaginative. A tense, intelligent, and surprising thrill. Drum tight in execution, fueled by imagination, the plot is as sharp as a broken shard of glass.”

—Steve Berry

“With her usual style and gift for characterization, the always great Gregory gives readers a tale of intense emotion spiced with the thrill of danger.”

—RT Book Reviews

“The excitement is palpable. The story is priceless.”

—M. J. Rose

“Convincing characters and a rapidly moving plot… Enjoyable.”

—Library Journal

Berkley Sensation Titles by Jill Gregory

SAGE CREEK

LARKSPUR ROAD

Larkspur Road
 

JILL GREGORY
 

THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

Published by the Penguin Group

Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) • Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England • Penguin Group Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.) • Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.) • Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi—110 017, India • Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.) • Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa

Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

LARKSPUR ROAD

A Berkley Sensation Book / published by arrangement with the author

PUBLISHING HISTORY

Berkley Sensation mass-market edition / May 2012

Copyright © 2012 by Jill Gregory.

Excerpt from
Sage Creek
by Jill Gregory copyright © 2011 by Jill Gregory.

Cover design by Rita Frangie.

Cover art by Hugh Syme.

Interior text design by Kristin del Rosario.

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or
electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of
copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

ISBN: 978-1-101-56897-2

BERKLEY SENSATION®

Berkley Sensation Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,

a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

BERKLEY SENSATION® is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

The “B” design is a trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

10  9  8  7  6  5  4  3  2  1

If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is
stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the
author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

ALWAYS LEARNING

PEARSON

To my family, with love

Acknowledgments
 

A huge thank-you to Leslie LaFoy, friend and quilter extraordinaire, for so generously sharing her time and expertise. Leslie, you’re not only a marvelous quilter, you’re a lovely friend and a patient teacher. Thanks for your invaluable help! And to Marianne Willman, my dear and wonderful friend, thank you for your wisdom and insights, and most of all, for your treasured friendship all of these years.

Table of Contents
 

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

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Twenty-four

Chapter Twenty-five

Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Twenty-seven

Chapter Twenty-eight

Chapter Twenty-nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-one

Sage Greek

Chapter One
 

“When will we get there? To Sage Ranch?”

The sleepy, but still wary voice of the boy in the passenger seat broke the silence of the moonless Montana night.

Travis Tanner glanced at his scrawny ten-year-old adopted stepson. Then back at the long, empty road leading them to Lonesome Way and his family’s ranch. The vast darkness of the June night nearly obliterated the peaks of the Crazy Mountains in the distance—but not quite. A few stars gleamed, despite the clouds, illuminating the faint outline of hefty granite peaks spiraling up, dwarfing the road, the trees, and certainly the black Explorer and its two passengers driving down that lonely road.

“Soon,” Travis said quietly. “We’ll be there soon. Another twenty minutes, half hour, tops.”

It was almost midnight and Grady had been sleeping since ten o’clock. But now the brown-haired boy with his mother’s green eyes looked like he was going to be awake for the duration. Awake and uneasy.

“You need a pit stop?” Travis asked as the Explorer sped past a coyote stealing furtively through some brush at the side of the road. “There’s a gas station coming up just outside of Lonesome Way.”

“I’m okay,” Grady mumbled. His voice sounded low, defensive. And just a tad sulky. Which matched the expression on his face ever since Travis had picked him up at Sky Harbor Airport in Phoenix the previous afternoon, after Val plopped him on a plane in L.A.

The poor kid didn’t know what to expect, Travis reflected, his jaw tightening. One minute he’d been in L.A., in his big fancy new house with an Olympic-sized swimming pool, cabana, guest house, game room, and thirty-seat home theater, and the next he’d been shipped off for the summer with his adoptive father, who was no longer even married to his mother—and was on his way to a remote ranch the kid had been to only once in his life and probably didn’t even remember.

Travis had been stunned when his ex-wife called him, her voice high-pitched and shaking with tension as she yelled that she and her new husband were at the end of their rope and couldn’t handle Grady anymore, that they needed a break. She’d said Grady had failed a class at school and would probably need to repeat fifth grade. He hadn’t bothered doing homework, he’d skipped classes, he’d mouthed off to teachers. Worse, he’d been getting into fights and had even been suspended for the last two weeks of school before summer vacation started.

“Drew’s really angry—and I just can’t take it anymore. The two of them…they just don’t…Travis, you’re his father legally, and I need you to take him for the summer! I really can’t deal with any of this right now. Drew and I—we’re having a big party here in a few weeks—one hundred guests—and I’m at my wit’s end. There’s so much to do, and Grady, he’s so difficult—I just can’t handle—”

“I’ll come get him,” Travis had said instantly. Not for
Val’s sake, that was for damned sure, but for Grady’s. He’d first met Val’s son, then four years old, when he picked her up for their second date. Val’s first husband, Kevin, had died of cancer two years before, when Grady was only a toddler.

The Grady he’d met that night had been a tiny fast-motion machine, a tousle-haired, pug-nosed imp, precocious, funny as hell, and possessing a sweet smile that had burrowed its way into Travis’s heart. A year after he and Val tied the knot, Travis had legally adopted his stepson and had loved being a father to him, even after things went south between him and Val.

BOOK: Larkspur Road
13.81Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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