Carolyn McSparren - Taking the Reins

If he never had to be responsible for anything ever again…it would be too soon for him

Jake Thompson never realized how many decisions he used to make in a day until he lost the nerve to make any and was forced to leave the army. But he’s starting to believe this horse therapy program they’ve put him in might actually help to get past the nightmare of indecision he’s faced since losing his troop. And it’s all because of instructor Charlotte Nicholson.

As if the recently widowed single mom in charge of the rehab farm doesn’t have enough on her plate without Jake adding his problems to hers. But being with Charlie makes him think beyond his pain to the future. If seems as if he’s being offered a second chance at happiness…and all he needs to do is make the decision to take it. Something far easier said than done.

I could drive like this forever.

Jake’s shoulders touched hers as they sat behind the horses, and she felt a wave of guilty pleasure.

Remember, he’s still a warrior even if his smile and his hands are gentle at the moment. Whatever terrible event had broken this man, he showed signs that with time he might heal. The colonel wouldn’t have included him in group therapy if he hadn’t believed Jake could be healthy eventually.

Who knew what he would become once he pushed himself?

He was used to being alone, used to moving to the ends of the earth at a moment’s notice, just like Steve. Steve, the husband she was supposed to be mourning.

Were they so different, Jake and Steve?

Yes, Charlie thought, answering her own question. Here, in this carriage in this twilight, the two men were different. How deep the difference went, she had no way of knowing. Yet.

But she intended to find out.

Dear Reader,

This is a story about five wounded army vets who come to a draft-horse farm in west Tennessee to learn to drive carriages and build new careers. When I read about a group in Virginia that does just that, I knew I had to write Taking the Reins. I’ve been married to a retired army officer for over forty years, so I know firsthand the terrible strain military life puts on the men and women who serve, and their families, as well. Sometimes the wounds don’t show. That doesn’t mean they aren’t there.

If she teaches them to drive successfully, Charlotte (Charlie), the widow of a soldier, will prove she’s capable of running her father’s farm and providing a permanent home for her daughter, Sarah. She’s not interested in love. No more warriors. And her students are definitely off-limits. But then there’s Jake Thompson.…

Not only is Jake Thompson her student, he’s a soldier who is so psychologically damaged he refuses to make the smallest decision. But he can’t deny his feelings for Charlie, no matter how much he wants to. Can he take the chance of hurting her and her daughter? How can he learn to trust himself again?

Can these two damaged people find the strength to grow and heal so that they are worthy of lifelong love? What do you think?

I hope you like Jake and Charlie.

Carolyn

Taking the Reins

Carolyn McSparren

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CAROLYN McSPARREN

This is Carolyn McSparren’s first Mills & Boon Heartwarming novel and her fourteenth book for Mills & Boon. Animals are important in all of her books. She has bred, birthed, trained, ridden and driven horses most of her life. At the moment she rides her dressage horse, a 17.2-hand half Clydesdale, and drives her carriage horse, a 16.2-hand half-Shire mare. A RITA® Award nominee and Maggie winner, Carolyn has lived in Germany, France, Italy and “too many cities in the U.S. to count.” She teaches writing seminars to romance and mystery writers, and writes mystery and women’s fiction, as well as romances. Carolyn lives in the country outside Memphis, Tennessee, in an old house with three indoor and half a dozen barn cats, three horses and one husband, not necessarily in order of importance.

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Taking the Reins is dedicated to Joanna Wilburn, Bob Martin and the wonderful clinicians who teach me to drive my big half-Shire mare, Zoe. Thanks to the Nashoba Carriage Driving Association, my local driving club, for their stories, and their comradeship. Thanks for Meredith Giere, who makes sure I do things right on my harness and carriage, and to Sam Garner, who taught me to drive in the first place. Thanks to Pam Gamble, who drives a big carriage in downtown Memphis and showed me how to run a stable for very large horses in a very small city space. Finally, thanks to Beverly Hollingsworth, who conned me into my first carriage ride behind a nasty little Welsh pony named Picadilly. I’ve been hooked ever since.

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 ONE

CHARLOTTE NICHOLSON, known as Charlie, slewed the elderly pickup through the farm’s front gate in a cloud of dust. She slammed on her brakes, slid to a stop five feet behind the Veterans Administration van, climbed out and ran to meet her class. She was late. Her father, the colonel, would kill her.

“Sorry, Daddy,” she said as she raced up to him. “I had to wait while they loaded the oats into the truck, and then they could only find three of the big trace mineral blocks I need for the pasture.”

Her father stood straight and tall, eyes on the van doors. “Charlotte Abigail, you are ten minutes late. You should learn to budget your time better, if you expect to teach this class.”

“You hired me to run the farm. You blackmailed me into teaching. Anyway, I didn’t miss anything. The van just got here.”

“That’s hardly the point. They were late. You should not have been.” He didn’t turn his head to look at her but continued to smile at the van doors as they soughed open. “I’m not blackmailing you. Call it other duties as assigned.”

Right. Maybe not blackmail, but he’d implied that this class was her baptism by fire. If she could train this small group of wounded vets to drive the draft horses the farm bred, all the while managing the daily operation of the place, she’d prove she was competent to take over the draft horse operation on her own without her father’s constant oversight.

He’d never cared about the farm, but it had always been her paradise. The place where her grandfather taught her to love horses.

Since the colonel owned the farm until his death, when it would pass to Charlie, she didn’t have much choice but to follow his orders. She loved the colonel in spite of what he called their issues, but she’d have preferred to love him from afar after he moved to a luxury condominium in Outer Mongolia. Harder to micromanage her from there.