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PROLOGUE

MATTHEW

(This prologue also appeared as the

bonus scene at the end of

Restoring You:

Watercress Falls, Book 1)

Nothing brings me more joy than seeing a wide smile on my daughter’s face and a cheerful bounce in her step.

“Daddy, do you mean it?” Emmie stands in front of my chair at the dinner table with her hands clasped at her chest. Her big green eyes stare up at me, the overhead light glinting off her pupils.

“Yes.” I chuckle and kiss the top of her head. “I signed the papers a few days ago. As soon as Uncle Jimmy signs them, this house is ours forever.”

Emmie jumps into my arms and squeals right next to my ear. It’s so loud I pull back and flinch. I can’t say I blame her. We’ve been talking about buying this house since we moved in three years ago. For her, this is the only home she’s ever known.

She was a year old when I decided to rent the house from Uncle Jimmy. He isn’t really my uncle, though. It’s just what everyone in town calls him. Always have. I don’t know when or why that started. We’re a close-knit community in Watercress Falls, and I guess in a way, we’re all like family.

I’d been working as a traveling vet for a few years. Ithad worked fine before Emmie was born, but as a single dad, all the driving had started to wear on me. Having a permanent location to run a clinic was ideal. But finding a place where we could live on the same property as the clinic proved to be more challenging than I’d expected.

The first time Uncle Jimmy offered to let me rent this house, I’d said no. I said no to him the next three times, too.

The house had sat empty for a couple years. Uncle Jimmy refused to move into it after his brother and sister-in-law were tragically killed in a car accident. He insisted he preferred the bunk house on the vineyard he co-owned with his brother. Maybe that’s true, but I’m sure it hurt him too much to live in the house his brother had made home. It didn’t matter that it was Jimmy’s house, too. They'd been close. Losing them hit him hard.

He said, me living there would do him a favor—keep the house in good shape so it didn’t fall to shambles sitting empty.

But I had my own reasons for not wanting to live there. I had too much history with his niece, Jessica, and our shared memories in this house were too personal. Living in the house Jessica grew up in didn’t feel right. Not with how badly things ended between us.

Even now, I can still see the seventeen-year-old version of Jessica sitting across the table from me grinning while she played footsie with me during family dinner. Every time she’d run her foot up my leg and make me squirm, her father would glare at me. If he only knew half the things I did to his daughter in this house, he would’ve done a hell of a lot more than glare at me.

My need to provide for my baby girl eventually won out. I pushed my memories of Jessica aside, and took Uncle Jimmy up on his offer. And now I’m buying the house. It feels weird and a little wrong, but Emmie loves it here. I’ll do anything to make her smile.

“Daddy.” Emmie presses her hand against my cheek and forces me to face her. “Did you hear me?”

“Sorry, sweetheart. What?”

“Does this mean I can get that treehouse now? And a big horse? You said I couldn’t get a big horse until you had another barn. Can we get another barn now?”

I scoot my chair back from the table and reach for her. “Get uphere, kiddo.” She jumps up into my lap and wraps her little arms around my neck. Not much else on this earth makes me feel better than a hug from my little girl. “All those things will be possible one day soon. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. You’ve still got some growing to do before you get a big horse. You’re only four.”

She pulls back and frowns. “But Aunt Leann was riding big horses when she was four.”

“Maybe so, but I wasn’t her daddy.” I wrinkle my nose and rub it against hers. “You’ll be riding big horses in no time. I promise.”

She sighs, and her shoulders sag. “But when? I’m a good rider. I can do it.”

“Yes, you’re a very good rider. But you’re still little, and I worry. Horses can be dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing.”

“But I know—”

“Emmie.” I lower my eyes so I’m level with her. “I know you’re a safe rider. But I still worry. I want you to get a little bigger first. If anything happened to you, I’d never forgive myself.”

“I know.” She drops her head, defeated. “Because you love me, and you’d be sad if I got hurt.”

“That’s right. I just need you to be patient with your old man. Give me time to catch up with you. You’re all I’ve got.”