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Prologue

Peaceable,Wyo Territory December 1872

Tessa Roarke Alexander snuggled closer to her husband, David, and burrowed farther beneath the stack of thick quilts until only her face re on the chest of drawers and realized they had been ht hours

"David?"

"Hmm?"

"I can't stop thinking about the wedding And I can't help thinking it was a shaer after the ceremony"

"I don't recall anyonehim very much after he left the reception" David leaned over and kissed her Lee Kincaid was one of David's oldest and dearest friends—one of the first friends he hadrecruited by Allan Pinkerton to work as a spy for General McClellan and the Union aro, Lee Kincaid had publicly announced his intentions to h Tessa hadn't taken Lee's proposal seriously, David wasn't quite ready to forgive and forget… yet

Tessa pulled her left hand froold band that had joined the sapphire and dia she as still there Tessa smiled to herself and said, "I think Mary did"

"Mary what?"

"Missed Liaiven name

"My sister, Mary?" David laughed "The sao, demanded that I break Lee's too-perfect nose?"

"The salad you didn't break Liam's nose," Tessa told him "You should have seen how disappointed she seemed when I told her Liam had left for Baltimore on a mission for me I could have sworn she was jealous, until I explained that I had hired hiirl as supposed to be yours and Caroline Millen's" She paused for a moment and stared at her husband, suddenly not quite certain she had done the right thing in hiring Liam to try to find the child whose conception had ruined David's Washington career—the illegitihter of the powerful Senator Warner Millen "David, tell ? If you don't want Lily Catherine to becoet about the search Ifor her, so I assumed that meant you wanted us to adopt her Maybe I should have asked you first Maybe I shouldn't have jumped to conclusions and involved Liam in your private affairs Maybe I should have—"

David stopped Tessa's floords with another kiss "You did exactly the right thing," he told her "I do want Lily Catherine to be a part of our faht for Senator Millen to hide her She's an innocent Her mother made a mistake, but that doesn't mean that Lily Catherine and I have to continue to pay for it I want to right this wrong, and I don't care what other people think I don't care who fathered Lily Catherine, or why herher Senator Millen doesn't want anyone to know about his granddaughter, and while he hter, as far as he's concerned, the scandal died along with Caroline But I know Lily Catherine exists And I know that whatever her reason, Caroline Millen gave her child my family name— Alexander I barely knew Caroline, and I certainly didn't love her I couldn't let the senator force ht I had seduced her I couldn't be the father of Caroline's child, and I refused to marry her and be her husband But I can be a father to Lily Catherine now… I

want to be a father to her And"—he smiled at Tessa—"I want you to be her mother We want her, Tessa Nobody else does That's what important"

Tessa hugged her husband tightly "Then, I'll pray Liam finds her soon"

"Me, too," David admitted

"And I'll be sure to ask him for frequent reports"

"Lee won't always have anything to report," David warned "You'll be disappointed"