“You’ll never know if you can make it unless you try. But if you’re afraid, I’ll go back and bring a truck,” Derek said beside her.

      Sydney gave him a thin glare. He was the reason she felt determined to get up that snow bank that rose twice as high as her head. “And here I thought you were going to manage not to say something insulting. I am not afraid.”

      He lifted his hands innocently, but the devilish curl on his lips was anything but. “It was just an offer.”

      “I think I can manage,” she told him. “You’re not giving me a push, either,” she told him under her breath.

      “Didn’t offer, cupcake. But if you want my hands on your butt, say the word. We don’t have to like each other to want each other.”

      Dear Reader,

      Welcome back to the world of Weaver, Wyoming and the Double-C Family!

      Derek Clay is a pretty traditional guy. Believes in family, duty, honour. He works hard, likes a beer and a game of pool with his cousins now and then, and can definitely appreciate a pretty woman.

      Sydney Forrest isn’t exactly a traditional girl. She’s an heiress, for one thing. Having never experienced a particularly happy home life, she’s never thought that “family” was for her. But now, Sydney’s in the family way, and for the benefit of her child, she’s re-evaluating her entire lifestyle.

      His life is pretty settled and he likes that just fine. Her life is anything but settled, but she thinks at least she’s got a plan.

      And then they meet…

      Best wishes,

       Allison

      About the Author

      There is a saying that you can never be too rich or too thin. ALLISON LEIGH doesn’t believe that, but she does believe that you can never have enough books! When her stories find a way into the hearts—and bookshelves—of others, Allison says she feels she’s done something right. Making her home in Arizona with her husband, she enjoys hearing from her readers at [email protected] or PO Box 40772, Mesa, AZ 85274-077, USA.

      A Weaver

      Proposal

      Allison Leigh

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      For Greg.

      Because you never fail to make me laugh.

       Prologue

      “Don’t pay any attention to him, Syd. He’s full of it.”

      Sydney Forrest hugged her arms around her chest. She could hear her sister’s voice, but it was overridden by the loud tones of her father’s still ringing inside her head.

      You ‘re a worthless slut.

      Just like your mother.

      She stared out the windows overlooking the long, sloping green lawns that spread from their house down to the white-steepled stables. Her dark-haired father was striding across them, his long legs eating up the distance as he headed for the only thing—as far as she could tell—that he did care about.

      The Forrest’s Crossing Thoroughbreds. They even came before Forco, the family’s textile business. At least that’s what her sister Charlotte was always saying.

      Char wanted to run the huge business someday. As far as Sydney was concerned, her sister was welcome to it. The same went for her older brother Jake—he was studying agribusiness at college. Whatever the heck that was.

      “It was only a kiss,” Charlotte continued from behind her. She was being as practical as ever. “No big deal.”

      It had been a big deal to Sydney.

      She was fourteen years old, and it had been her first kiss. Her first real kiss.

      “I wonder if he’d have cared so much if I’d been kissing the son of one of his country club friends,” she said bitterly. “Instead of one of the boys from the stable.”

      Charlotte threw her arm around Sydney’s shoulders. She pressed her head against Sydney’s, her blond hair a sharp contrast to Sydney’s raven-black tresses. “Who knows?” she asked on a sigh. At eighteen, she was four years older than Sydney and decades smarter. Charlotte had kissed plenty of boys, but she knew better than to be caught doing so anywhere around Forrest’s Crossing. “Didn’t help that he’s obviously been drinking.” She waved her hand at the crystal decanter that was sitting, unstoppered, on the desk. “If you really like Andy, just meet him in town. Or at school,” she advised. “The old man never has to know.”

      “Am I really just like her?”

      Charlotte didn’t have to ask what Sydney meant. “You don’t remember what she looked like when she left?”

      Sydney shook her head. She wanted to think she remembered her mother. But what she remembered of the woman who’d abandoned her three children when Sydney was a baby was more likely just wishful thinking.

      As wishful as thinking that her father had any affection at all for the children his wife had given him—particularly Sydney.

      Charlotte crossed their father’s study to his desk. She tipped the pens and pencils out of a silver mint julep cup—the only thing besides the decanter sitting on top of the gleaming wood surface—and fished the desk key out from the bottom. Opening the locked center drawer, she moved a few things, then pulled out a ragged-edged snapshot. She held it up. “Just ‘cause you look like her doesn’t mean you are like her,” she warned.

      Still feeling bruised from her father’s tirade, Sydney took the photograph. Black hair. Thin face. Blue eyes.

      They were the same eyes that stared back at Sydney whenever she looked in a mirror.

      She was just like her mother.

      “Jake looks like the old man and he’s nothing like him,” Charlotte added. He really was the spitting image of their father.

      “He doesn’t even like any of us.” Sydney crumpled the photograph in her fist. “So why’d he bother fighting to keep us?”

      “To win,” Charlotte answered immediately.

      Sydney tossed the crumpled picture on the center of the spotless desk. She didn’t care if it did mean he’d know they’d been into his desk or not. “If we had four hooves and won races would he love us?”

      “Do what I do, Syd.” Charlotte flicked the balled-up photo with her finger and it rolled off the desk onto the floor. “Stop caring what he thinks.” She relocked the drawer, dropped the key in the julep cup and replaced the pens and pencils before heading for the doorway. “He’s not worth it,” she said before sailing out of the office.

      Easy for her sister to say. She was going away to college in the fall and wouldn’t even be living at home. Jake, of course, was already out on his own and had been for years.

      Sydney would be stuck at home with the man for several years yet.

      She turned back to look out the windows. The horse barns where her father’s pride and joy was stabled were visible in the distance. “He’s not worth it,” she repeated.

      But her chest hurt and tears crept down her cheeks when she finally looked away.

      She picked up the crumpled picture of her mother and smoothed it out on the desk.

      Black hair. Thin face. Blue eyes.

      “You’re not worth it, either,” she whispered