A Soft Kiss in Spring

Book 2: Silver Falls

by Lily Graison

Synopsis

Rose Campbell is happy being the town spinster, so when her grandfather sends off for not one, but four mail order grooms, she's forced to turn to the man she loves to hate in order to get rid of them.

Graham Hart has spent years battling Rose for one reason or another. When she asks for his help to get rid of the men her grandfather sent away for, he jumps at the chance to finally get the upper hand. But one soft kiss changes everything and life as they knew it may never be the same again.

Release date: June 19, 2020

Print pages: 228

Sample

Ewan Campbell was known to say outlandish things on a daily basis but, “I ordered ye a husband from that bride magazine you keep getting in here,” had to be the most absurd statement Rose had ever heard her grandfather say.

She raised her head. The smug look on his face said he was quite pleased with himself. She braced her hands on the edge of the counter and narrowed her eyes. “You did what?”

“I ordered ye a husband.” He straightened and puffed his chest out. “Well, four of ‘em actually. I wasn’t sure what kind of man ye wanted, so I got ye a good mix of ‘em. I even requested a brawny highlander too.” He beamed, tugging on the waist of his kilt. “That Grooms’ Gazette that comes in once a month has a section for mail-order grooms willing to relocate so, I picked out a few I thought were the best fit.”

Rose lifted a shaky hand to rub her forehead. A pounding ache started right behind her eyes and traveled back through her skull, the constant barking of a dog out on the street making that dull ache pound harder with every yip it made. 

Her grandfather went into great detail about the men he’d chosen for her and Rose tried to listen but between him, the headache, their low cash flow, and the dog, her nerves were about shot. 

She peeked out the window when the dog kept barking. The pain in her head increased tenfold seeing the beast was actually that mongrel Graham Hart owned, both of which were headed for her store. Great. She sighed. Just what I needed today.

He carried his coat slung over one shoulder and the muscles in his arms and chest were straining against the fabric of his blue chambray shirt. As usual he wore a wide-brimmed brown hat, his golden-brown hair, which was much too long in her opinion, fell past his wide shoulders and was too thick to belong to a man. His beard was trimmed for once and cropped so close to his face she could see his perfectly shaped lips and when he smiled down at the monstrous beast by his side, his pearly white teeth gleamed in the waning evening sunlight. 

Rose scowled. Why did such perfection have to be bestowed upon such a hateful ogre? Graham Hart was a neanderthal. A big, loud, possessive caveman who stomped around town as if he owned it. 

And your traitorous heart skips a beat every time you see him.

Her grandfather stuck his head over her shoulder and startled her. “What are ya looking at so hard?”

Rose jumped back from the window and said, “nothing,”  before walking to the other end of the counter.

“Ah, Graham,” her grandfather remarked. “Now that’s a braw lad if I ever saw one! Built like a highlander, that one. Looks like one too, with all that hair and those burly shoulders. He’d make ye a fine husband.” 

A cold shiver raced up Rose's spine. “Do not try to get that man to marry me again, Gramps or so help me—” She clenched her teeth to keep from cursing a blue streak. Memories of her grandfather asking Graham to marry her still haunted her nightmares. The disgust on Graham’s face told her all she needed to know about the man. 

“He’s not a Scot, but he’s a good choice.” 

Her laughter sounded hysterical even to her own ears. “That will never happen, Gramps. Don’t even entertain the thought of it. Graham Hart and I will never marry. Being civil to the man is hard enough. He’s arrogant and bossy and too nosey for his own good and…and…” She pursed her lips, searching for more insults and blurted, “and his hair is stupid.” 

Her grandfather gave her a knowing grin. Rose scowled and grabbed the receipts from the day before. “Shouldn’t you be at home? I’m sure Daisy has your supper ready by now.”

“I just ate my lunch.”

“Then go walk it off. I’m sure someone in town needs help with something. Go and leave me be. I’ve had enough of you talking about marrying me off. My mind is set and you’ll not be changing it. I’m never getting married.”

You’re not the kind of girl a man like me marries, Rosey. 

The hateful words Lucien had said to her whispered through her head as her grandfather continued to stare out the window at Graham. It seemed as if they would haunt her for eternity and the look on Lucien’s face as he'd smiled and said them were like a knife to her chest even after all these years. Her greatest mistake was trusting him with the one thing she was never giving away again—her heart. She certainly wasn’t entrusting it to Graham. She’d been foolish once, and that betrayal was enough to last her a lifetime.

Her grandfather was still talking and despite his meddling, she knew he was only thinking of her well being, even though she didn’t need him taking care of her anymore. She certainly didn’t need him finding her a husband.

“Looks like Graham is headed this way. He looks thinner than I remember. How longs he been up on the mountain this time?” 

“I don’t know, nor do I care.” Her grandfather's mention of Graham brought back memories of him cornering Graham and goading him into asking for her hand in marriage. The entire awful day would be permanently etched into her brain. Graham had gone so still it had been hard to determine what he was going to say, but the laughter she always saw shining in his eyes twinkled like diamonds. The hateful old goat had been amused.

She scowled at the memory and slammed the ledger closed and shoved it under the counter as her grandfather continued his, “you need a husband,” tirade. He harped on about it every other month now and she was almost ready to do it just so he’d hush about it. If she ever was stupid enough to go through with it, it certainly wouldn’t be to Graham Hart. The man was a horse's arse and always would be. He was nothing like his brother, Gideon, who was quiet and kept to himself, especially now that he was married with a baby on the way. Graham had to stick his nose into her business as if he had a reason to be there, and her telling him to go away only made him come back more often.

Her grandfather stopped talking, and she looked up at him. He was staring at her. “What?”

“I said, if you would have just married him like I wanted, I wouldn’t have had to send off for ya a husband.”

Marry Graham Hart? She laughed. As if that was ever going to happen. She wasn’t marrying anyone. Not now, not ever. She was perfectly fine being a spinster, especially if Graham Hart was her only option. 

The bell above the door chimed. She regretted looking up when the bane of her existence walked inside, followed by that monstrous wolf he tried to pass off as a dog. 

Rose clenched her jaw and braced her hands on her hips. “Get that beast out of my store this instance, Graham Hart! You know he’s not allowed in here.”

* * *

Graham rolled his eyes at her fussing before the door even closed behind him. Typical Rose, always harping on about something. She was heading his way when he turned toward the counter, staring at Wolf and not him this time. 

She pointed to the closed door. “Put him outside.”

“Woman, why are you so damn ornery all the time?”

“I’m not.” She lifted her nose into the air and met his gaze. “In case it's escaped your knowledge, Mr. Hart, this is a place of business and no place for a—” She glanced back down at Wolf and Graham saw her physically recoil. “—a wolf.”

As usual, Wolf was sitting by his side, waiting for a command. He supposed the animal could be off-putting. His coat was mostly white with dark patches running along down the back of his neck. His size—the top of his head reached Graham’s hip even when sitting—was intimidating, and his amber eyes menacing. He was as gentle as a kitten, though. Had been since the day he found him lying beside his dying mother after she’d got caught in one of his traps. 

He put a hand to the top of Wolf’s head and gave him a pat and listened as his tail thumped against the floor. 

Rose was staring at him, and despite her anger he could tell Wolf scared her. Hell, the animal scared most people, but he had no doubt in his mind that Wolf would never hurt a soul.

Graham tucked his coat under one arm and blew out a tired breath. “It’s unpleasant seeing you, Rose. You make a man wish he didn’t ever have to come to town.” 

She looked the same as she had the last time he’d seen her. As always, just the sight of her made his heart beat a little faster. It was probably a by-product of the disdain he saw on her face every time they were in the same room together or the fact he’d been on the mountain for the better part of three months and seeing her made him realize just how lonely it was up there all by himself.

He told Wolf to stay and ignored Rose as he walked to the counter, pulling his pack off his back. He untied the animal hides he’d prepared, tossing them onto the weathered countertop, and watched Rose stare at him as she crossed the room, her lips pursed and as pink as berries. Her red hair was braided into a coronet on the top of her head and he leaned one hip against the counter as his gaze traveling the length of her. 

She was still a looker, that was for sure. Too bad she was full of piss and vinegar. She had the tongue of a viper and a disposition to match it. Rose Campbell was the most beautifully infuriating woman he’d ever had the displeasure of meeting. She was surly, rude and bossy and those freckles across the bridge of her nose drew his attention to how pointed the thing was. Hang a wart on the end of it and she’d pass for one of those ugly old crone witches like the ones in those books his ma read to him and Gideon as a kid. 

It would not, you miserable liar.

He straightened when she rolled her eyes at him and rounded the end of the counter. 

“Don’t mind her. That’s a fine looking animal ya have there.”

Graham turned and noticed Ewan Campbell by the window. The family patriarch straightened and tugged at his kilt before heading his way. “Ewan, it’s good to see you.”

“Same to ye, lad.” Ewan looked at the skins he’d put on the counter. “Good hunting?”

“It was decent.”

“You home for a spell or going back up the mountain?”

Graham saw Rose look up at him but ignored it. “I’ll be home for a week or two.”

Ewan nodded. “Well, I’m sure Gideon will be glad of it. He’s had a devil of a time getting that patch of land behind his house ready for planting.” He laughed suddenly. “You can hear him cursing all the way into town most days.”

“I’m sure he does. Gideon never did have much luck with farming.”

Rose grabbed the hides and pulled them to her, counting them before blowing out an irritated breath. He and Ewan both looked her way. “How much are you demanding for these scraggly things?”

Graham grinned. Ornery as the day was long. “They’re not scraggly. They’re perhaps the best I’ve been able to cure in months.” They haggled on a price, neither one of them happy about it. “I’ll take it in store credit, if you don’t mind.”

“Would it matter if I did?”

“Not really.” She rolled her eyes at him and folded the hides up before grabbing her ledger book, flipping through it until she found the right page and scribbled something down before turning the book toward him and handing him the pencil. “Sign there and be on your way.”

He had half a mind to flop down in one of the many chairs that sat around the pot belly stove in the middle of the store just to irritate her but after spending the day climbing down the mountain, he was too tired to bother so he signed his name and straightened. 

She turned the book and slammed it closed before tucking it back under the counter. A jar of peppermint sticks sat by his elbow. He lifted the lid and pulled three out and held them up. “I’ll take these. You can just take them from my account.”

Her face turned a blistering shade of red as she reached back under the counter for the ledger. When she slammed it down and opened it, he chuckled and told Ewan goodnight before heading to the door. “Oh, goodnight to you too, Rose.”

“Drop dead, Graham.”

He laughed when she threw her hand up and gave him a rude gesture, Ewan’s startled voice chastising her for it the last thing he heard as he stepped out onto the sidewalk with Wolf and pulled the door shut.

The sun was beginning to sink behind the mountains as they headed to the house. The normal sounds in town were gone, the children usually playing all at home and sitting down to supper. 

There wasn’t a single light on in his house. Not that he expected there to be, but after spending the last three months talking to no one but Wolf, walking into a silent house wasn’t all that appealing.

Smoke boiled from the chimney of Gideon and Victoria’s house. The two-story Victorian looked out of place in Silver Falls, but no one was complaining but Gideon. Turned out his new father-in-law had more money than he knew what to do with, so he built Victoria a fancy house as a wedding gift. The moment they’d come home from their extended stay with her parents last spring, the builders started arriving. The lumber, shipped in on so many wagons they’d lost count of them, arrived soon after. The boarding house had been filled beyond capacity when workers hired by Victoria’s father arrived in town, many of them having to sleep in tents out on the lawn, but they were being paid so well not a single one of them had complained about it, nor had the businesses in town. The tent at the end of the street that passed as a saloon had even made enough profit to start building a proper structure to house the folk that tended to visit the place.

Graham’s booted feet sounded loud on his porch when he stepped up on it. The door opened easily and instead of the musty stale air he’d been expecting, the house smelled of lemons and sun-dried sheets.

Wolf ran past him and took his usual spot on the rug in front of the cold fireplace. Light from the door shined in enough for him to see only a thin layer of dust and a vase of fresh wildflowers sat on the small breakfast table. He smiled. Victoria must have been giving the place a regular cleaning while he’d been gone.

He threw his gear on the floor and pushed the door shut with his foot before heading to the sink. After the long trek down the mountain his muscles were screaming and nothing soothed his aches like a hot bath did. He lit the stove and filled the water buckets before heading out the back door for the tub.

His stomach started growling halfway through his bath. He glanced over his shoulder to the bare cupboards and sighed. He should have picked something up from the mercantile. If he wouldn’t have been trying to get under Rose’s skin, he would probably have remembered there wasn’t a single crumb of food in the house. 

He closed his eyes and laid his head back against the metal rim of the tub. Rose’s face immediately filled his mind’s eye, and he smiled. If that woman wasn’t so dad-blasted irritating, she’d be a welcome sight to come home to. As it stood, she couldn’t stand the sight of him and her surly disposition made her the last person he’d want to spend time with. Didn’t mean he disliked looking at her though and truth be told, their verbal sparring matches were amusing despite the fact she’d always hated him. He wasn’t even sure why. 

Might have been the way he picked on her when his family moved to town. If she hadn’t been so uppity when he spoke to her, he might have left her alone but he could still see the look in her eyes as she turned her head to him. She’d put her nose in the air and dismissed him as if he were something foul on the bottom of her shoe and he’d made it his life’s mission to make her pay for it from that day forward. By the time he was old enough to stop pulling girls’ pigtails, the rivalry between them had been etched in stone and it wasn’t just about getting back at her—it was about getting under her skin. Seeing how far he could push until she exploded and started speaking in that language her grandfather spoke on occasion and as the years progressed, the freckle-faced redhead had turned into a woman who caused heads to turn but she was still as hateful and shrewish to him as ever. Most of the time, he still did things he knew would set her off just because it was what they always did. It was childish but this town was so small, one had to take what form of entertainment they could and irritating Rose Campbell made his day more often than not.

A knock at the door brought his eyes open. “Who is it?”

The door opened and Gideon’s smiling face came into view. “I thought I saw you earlier, but I didn’t see any lights on so wasn’t sure you were really here.”

“I didn’t bother lighting any when I came in. A bath was my first priority.”

Gideon nodded. “Victoria has supper on if you’re hungry.”

“I’m starving. Let me finish up here and get dressed and I’ll be right over.”

Graham watched him leave before standing and drying off, his thoughts still on Rose Campbell as he dressed. For reasons he didn’t want to examine, he’d thought a lot about her over the last several months. It was probably because she’d told him off right good when he’d picked up supplies before heading up the mountain. He’d wanted to wring her neck and damn the consequences. If it hadn’t been for her sister, Violet, calming their tempers down, he probably would have. All he’d done was cracked a simple joke and instead of smiling or laughing at it like Violet had done, Rose had rolled those pretty green eyes and called him childish. Maybe he was. Hell, he didn’t even know why he’d been talking to her to begin with. The woman was a hateful nag who never smiled about anything.

He paused in buttoning his shirt. Had he ever seen Rose smile? He thought back over the years. He couldn’t remember a single instance when he’d seen the woman smile. Not once in all the years he’d known her. So perhaps it wasn’t just him she hated. If she was so miserable she never found a single thing to smile about, then maybe he should just be nicer to her. His ma always said you caught more flies with honey than vinegar. Being nice to Rose might be the key to making peace with her.

“Nah.” He laughed and continued dressing. It would take a better actor than him to pretend to be nice to Rose and honestly, he didn’t care enough to even bother trying.