Holly Jacobs - A Walk Down the Aisle

Speak now…or forever keep your secrets?

Colton McCray’s an “I do” away from the perfect life. He’s got a prosperous farm and he’s lucky enough to have fallen in love with a good woman like Sophie Johnston. What more could a man who loves the simple life want?

Certainly not a wedding-crasher who’s only one of Sophie’s secrets!

Marry a woman he doesn’t really know—or take a chance and trust her? No way! Though the harder Colton tries to cut Sophie out of his life, the more he wants her…complications and all. When he finds out she’s pregnant with their baby, it’s impossible for him to stay away. But first, he must forgive her past in order to rebuild the future they were meant for….

I object.

Those two little words had changed everything.

Colton thought he knew everything there was to know about Sophie, but, as it turned out, she wasn’t an orphan with a past that was too painful to talk about. She had family. In fact, she had a daughter.

A daughter she’d given away.

Colton knew he’d lived an even-keel sort of life. But right now his life was anything but.

He stood in front of the Valley Ridge community and announced, “I’m so sorry for the inconvenience, but the wedding’s canceled. I talked to the caterer and all the food’s being moved to the diner. Please feel free to stop by and help yourself. And please, those who’ve brought gifts, be sure to take them on your way out.”

With that, he marched down the aisle and took off toward the farm. He was a simple man—too simple perhaps to know how to handle something this decidedly unsimple.

Dear Reader,

I know when you think wine, you think the shores of Lake Erie, right? Well, if you don’t, then maybe you should. The hero of this book, Colton, runs a small winery and loves to extol the wonders of our grape-growing region…and he’s right. And while I loved introducing Lake Erie’s very real wineries in this final book of my trilogy, A Valley Ridge Wedding, this is a love story. It’s a different love story.

When we left Colton and Sophie at the end of April Showers, their wedding had been called off because a mysterious young girl objected. Tori’s trying to figure out who she is, where she came from and where she belongs. That’s a journey we all take in one way or another. My particular journey echoed Tori’s. I grew up not knowing part of my family—part of my history. I went looking for answers and found not only closure, but a new part of my family who I love and treasure.

My heroine, Sophie, has her past arrive at her wedding, and it ripples through her present. It threatens her relationship with Colton. But maybe with some time, some tears and some of that Valley Ridge magic, they can come out stronger because of it.

I hope you enjoy this last addition to A Valley Ridge Wedding miniseries! I’ve enjoyed my time in Valley Ridge so much that I’m heading back this holiday season with A Valley Ridge Christmas. I hope you’ll come visit with me!

Happy reading!

Holly Jacobs

A Walk Down the Aisle

Holly Jacobs

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

In 2000, Holly Jacobs sold her first book to Harlequin Books. She’s since sold more than twenty-five novels to the publisher. Her romances have won numerous awards and made the Waldenbooks bestseller list. In 2005, Holly won a prestigious Career Achievement Award from RT Book Reviews. In her nonwriting life, Holly is married to a police captain, and together they have four children. Visit Holly at www.hollyjacobs.com, or you can snail-mail her at P.O. Box 11102, Erie, PA 16514-1102.

To George and Marilyn. I might not have found you until later in my life, but don’t ever doubt that you are loved.

And to Ben, our own “Cletus.” You arrived as I started writing this trilogy, and you’ve already enriched my life more than I ever imagined possible. Always remember, you are loved…and as far as I’m concerned, you are perfect!

A special thank-you to Julie Pfadt of the Lake Erie Wine Country and to all our local wineries. And to Jeff Ore and everyone at Penn Shore Winery for showing me the ropes…or vines, as the case may be!

Contents

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

Epilogue

Excerpt

PROLOGUE

VICTORIA ALLEN PARKED her father’s black SUV next to the library. She purposefully backed it into the parking space so the plates weren’t visible. She felt a guilty sense of dread knowing what was going to happen when her parents got hold of her, but she pushed the feeling aside. She checked the GPS on her phone and headed across the bridge and into town.

Her parents would eventually have to admit that she’d taken their car for a good reason, and it wasn’t as if she didn’t know how to drive. Besides, she’d followed the speed limits much better than most of the drivers on I-90.

Thinking about her parents made her feel a sense of homesickness, though she’d only been gone a couple of hours. She couldn’t help but admit how much her mother would love this small town. As Tori walked down the quiet street, she thought that Valley Ridge, New York, looked like Mayberry. When Tori was younger, her mom had watched episodes of Andy Griffith every day at five o’clock. It struck her as ironic that her college president mother, Gloria Allen, who wore power suits and used her BlackBerry as if it was another appendage, loved such a sentimental show.

Of course, her academic, power-suited mom was a woman of unexpected contrasts. She had married Freedom Jay Allen. Though her mom called her dad Dom, it didn’t change the fact he had been born on a commune. And though he’d now joined the rest of the world, her dad was still a vegetarian, and wouldn’t know a high-flying job if it bit him. He worked from home as a painter. An honest-to-goodness, brush-on-canvas artist.

When Tori was little, her mom went to work and her dad had been a househusband.

Her mother might be conventional in many ways, but she had an unconventional streak in her nonetheless.

Actually, both her parents would love this town. Now she felt even more guilty for taking their car and driving it without a license. They were going to be so pissed.

Well, her mom would be pissed, but her dad would be disappointed in her.

Disappointed was worse.

Tori glanced in a coffee-shop window and caught the reflection of a girl with blue hair. It took a split second for her to register the girl was her. Every time she noticed it, it shocked her. But she guessed that had been the point of her minirebellion. Her mother had been mad at that, too. But rather than being disappointed, her father had smiled and said, “Way to express yourself, Tori.”

She wondered what her father was saying now.

They were going to be so worried once they realized she was gone.

Tori decided that maybe a coffee would calm her nerves, but the lights were off in the small shop. There was a sign on the door that read At the Wedding.

She went to the diner, which also had a Closed for Family Wedding sign on its door.

She looked up and down the street and saw that every business on it was dark.

The whole town shut down for a wedding?

It was a Saturday at the end of June. You’d think that a small town like this would get a lot of touristy people during a weekend in the summer.