Joan Johnston - Sisters Found

Dear Reader,

It’s amazing how characters become real when you write about them. When I first introduced Faith and Hope Butler, I never imagined that they were anything more than twins. But I was having dinner with a couple of Harlequin sales reps, when one of them quipped, “What about Charity?”

I suddenly realized, “Oh, my God. There is a Charity!” But why would one third of a set of triplets be separated from her siblings? Why would loving parents allow two sisters to grow up thinking they were twins when they had a sister who was lost out in the world somewhere? Answering those questions became the challenge when writing Sisters Found. I hope you’ll enjoy reading the story of Faith, Hope and Charity as much as I enjoyed writing it.

I appreciate hearing your comments and suggestions. You can reach me through my Web site, www.joanjohnston.com. Be sure to sign up on the mailing list at my Web site if you’d like to receive an e-mail/postcard when the next Joan Johnston novel is in stores.

Take care, and happy reading!

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My deepest gratitude to my editors

Karen Taylor Richman

and

Dianne Moggy

for your unending patience and support.

PROLOGUE

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

EPILOGUE

HOPE BUTLER WAS DESPERATE. The man she loved was engaged to another woman, and he planned to marry her in two weeks. Hope had to do something. Jake Whitelaw didn’t belong with that other woman. He should be spending the rest of his life with her.

Jake had fought his attraction to Hope from the very beginning. She could hardly blame him. She’d been only eighteen when she’d first realized she loved him. He’d been thirty-six. Perhaps her infatuation would have died a quick death if Jake hadn’t returned her interest. But he had.

She hadn’t known for sure until that fateful day more than three years ago, when she’d placed temptation in his path. She recalled their confrontation in her daddy’s barn as though it had happened yesterday.

She’d been waiting a long time for the chance to get Jake alone, and it had come when he made a delivery of hay.

His shirt was dirty, the sleeves rolled up to reveal strong, sinewy forearms. His Stetson was sweaty around the brim, and shaggy black hair was crushed at his nape. His cheeks were hollow, and he had a sharp nose and wide-set, ice-blue eyes. He was half a foot taller than she was, lean at the hip, but with broad, powerful shoulders. He made her body come alive just looking at him.

“How are you, Jake?” she said, walking with her shoulders back so her breasts jutted and her hips swayed.

He eyed her sideways. “Just dandy,” he muttered.

“Daddy wants that hay in the barn,” she said, hop-skipping to keep up with his long strides.

“Why didn’t you just say so? You don’t need to come with me, little girl. I know where it goes.”

Little girl. Hope ground her teeth. She’d show him she was no little girl! “There’s some stuff needs to be moved first,” she hedged. “Machinery that’s too heavy for me to pick up by myself.”

“Why didn’t your daddy move it?”

“I told him I could do it. That is, before I realized how heavy it was,” she fibbed.

Jake didn’t look suspicious, but it wasn’t going to take long once they got inside the barn for him to realize she’d lied. The space where the hay was supposed to be stacked had been cleared out that morning. She opened the door and went inside first, then waited for him to enter before she closed the door behind him.

The barn smelled strongly of leather and manure. Sunlight streamed through the cracks between the planks of the wooden barn, leaving golden lines on the empty, straw-littered dirt floor.

He turned to confront her. “What the hell is going on, little girl?”

She was backed up against the door to keep Jake from leaving. She put her hand over the light switch when he reached for it, afraid of what she’d see in his eyes in the stark light of the naked overhead bulb. He didn’t force the issue, merely stepped back and stood facing her, his legs widespread, his hands on his hips.

“What happens now?” he said. “You want sex? Take off your jeans and panties and lie down over there on that pile of straw on the floor.”

Hope’s eyes went wide when he started to unbuckle his belt. “Stop! Wait.” She was shocked by his brutally frank speech, by the rough sound of his voice, by his plain intention of taking what she seemed to be offering without any pretense of romance. This wasn’t how she’d imagined things happening between them.

He had his shirt unbuttoned and was ripping it out of his jeans when he paused and looked her right in the eye. “You chickening out, little girl?”

Maybe if he hadn’t made it a dare, she would have run, which is what she realized he expected her to do. She stared right back at him and began untying the knot at her midriff.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

She watched his eyes go wide, then narrow. A muscle jerked in his cheek. He no longer seemed interested in taking his clothes off. He was too busy watching her. Waiting, she suspected, to see how far she would go.

Her mouth was bone dry, but she wanted him to know why she was doing this. “I…I love you, Jake.”

He snorted. “Get to it or get out.”

Her cheeks pinkened in mortification, but she refused to run. It wasn’t easy undressing in front of him. She kept her eyes lowered while she fumbled with the knot. He stood watching, waiting like a lone wolf stalking an abandoned calf, certain of the kill.

When the knot came free, her shirt fell open. She let it slide off her shoulders and onto the floor, revealing the pure white demi-cup pushup bra she’d bought with her baby-sitting money, which revealed just about everything but her nipples.

When she lifted her gaze to his face, she was frightened by what she saw. His eyes had a dangerous, feral look, his jaw was clenched tight, and his hands had balled into fists. He looked intense, unapproachable, but she forced herself to walk up to him, to slide her hands around his neck, to lift up on tiptoe to press her lips against his.

A second later she was shoved up hard against the barn door with Jake’s hips grinding against her own. His tongue was in her mouth taking what he wanted, and she was so full of sharp, exciting sensations that she couldn’t breathe.