Apology: The publisher notified me Sunday afternoon that KDP wouldn't allow this book to be free on Sunday, so the dates were changed. So sorry for those who tried to get it!

PEACH BLOSSOM RANCHER FREE Nov. 20-24 here http://ow.ly/QzlIP

By Ada Brownell

From Chapter Nine

After a short nap, John reached for the thick letter from Valerie with fresh enthusiasm. Maybe this wasn’t such a bad day after all.

    As he read her beautiful penmanship, bad news seemed to hang on every word like those big worms on Polly’s tomato vines in the summer. Little Christian had been injured but was recovering miraculously, with the broken bone healed and the boy beginning to learn to walk again.
     Then she described a court case she and Archibald had filed, hoping to get a young man released from the state asylum. Excitement filled every word she wrote.
     John tucked the letter in a bureau drawer. Valerie’s mother hoped her daughter would marry Archibald. That lawyer would never drag Valerie off to live on a horse and peach ranch in Colorado.
     Valerie had been to law school. John didn’t know if she graduated, but she could practice law without the degree. All she needed to do was get a license, and her father could help. For all John knew, she already had the law license.
     He shook his head, and his heart quivered with it. Being married to an even-tempered beautiful woman like Valerie would help keep him at peace. Ed’s face popped into his mind. He stomped down the stairs, snatched his jacket off the wall, and headed outside. He’d feed and water the horses, check the pigs, load up all the rabbits he could, and go into town.
     Abe met him outside the barn. “Ya look like a mountain lion about ready to attack. You upset about somethin’?”
     John felt himself change into a bedraggled kitten that escaped a gunnysack and swam the river. “Guess I’m too tired to deal with everything.” He swallowed, trying to rid himself of the lump in his throat. Grown men didn’t cry.
     “You too tired. God know about the murder. He know about the horses and ya bills. He know about the peach crop. He know about pigs and rabbits gettin’ out. A heavy load on ya shoulders. We’s gonna pray, but first, let’s think about things we are thankful about. The peach harvest saved by our work in the night. Lift up your eyes. The weather warmed and will heat the soil, so we probably won’t have the danger of another late frost.”
     John nodded, feeling he’d shaken a little sadness from his fur.
     “Your herd of nice horses are grazing in a green pasture. Then you got all those rabbits to sell for Stuart, and that probably will make him and his parents happy. An’ next week would be a good time to take some pigs to the auction. You don’t need to feed all of ’em any longer. It’s time to sell the bigger ones.”
     A horse pounded up to the barn with a smiling Edwina on its back. “Papa connected with some of his friends, and we have the stallion’s stud services lined up for the next month. The telephone gives Papa a chance to do important business.”
     John’s heart did a romp in his chest. “That’s good news. The phone comes in handy.”
     Edwina jumped off the horse and grabbed John’s hand and tipped her face sideways, lips pursed serious. “Are you sick? You look like you can barely stand up.”
     “Abe and I stayed up most of the night keeping our smudge fires going on account of possible frost. We saved the blossoms. Guess I’m tired. Besides the pigs getting out yesterday, Stu’s rabbits got out this morning. We’re taking as many as we can to town to sell. I think Abe will dress them, and we’ll try to sell the pelts.”
     Ed snuggled close to his side. “You should take a long nap. Then you’ll be ready to take the world on again.”
     John searched out her big blue eyes. Some of her sparkle ignited in his heart. He had a good notion to kiss her. Maybe he ought to give up and quit fighting falling in love with her. Yet compared to living with Valerie, life with Ed would be a wild ride.
     They walked together hand in hand, strength from the woman at his side oozing into his heart. Then Ed jerked, wrenched away from him, and screamed. They’d wandered too close to the hog pen again. This time pig slobber dripped from her riding outfit.

©Ada Brownell 2016

Summary of Peach Blossom Rancher

an historical romance

Sequel to The Lady Fugitive, second in Peaches and Dreams series

By Ada Brownell

A handsome young man with a ranch in ruin and a brilliant doctor confined to an insane asylum because of one seizure. Yet their lives intersect. How will they achieve their dreams?

John Lincoln Parks yearns for a wife to help make the ranch all it should be after his uncle, a judge, ravaged it before he was murdered. John has his eye on his sister Jenny’s elegant matron of honor, Valerie MacDougal, a young widow. But Valerie, a law school graduate, returns to Boston to live. John and Valerie write, but while in Boston Valerie and one of her father’s law partners try to get three patients wrongfully judged as insane out of the Boston asylum—and they spend a lot time together.

Will John marry Valerie or Edwina Jorgenson, the feisty rancher-neighbor who has been in love with John since they were in grade school? Edwina’s father is in a wheelchair and she’s taking care of their ranch. John tries to help and protect this neighbor who has a Peeping Tom whose bootprints are like the person’s who dumped a body in John’s barn. But John and Edwina fuss at one another constantly. Will John even marry, or be hanged for the murder?

Free Nov. 20-24: http://amzn.to/2arRVgG

If you would like to know about the first book in the series, The Lady Fugitive, it's available here http://ow.ly/QzlIP

The Lady Fugitive

By Ada Brownell

You’ll enjoy this historical romance set in 1908. How does a respected elocutionist become a face on a wanted poster?

Jenny Louise Parks, 17, escapes from the coal bin, and her abusive uncle offers a handsome reward for her return. Because he is a judge, he will find her or he won’t inherit her parents’ ranch.

Determination to remain free grips Jenny, especially after she meets William and there’s a hint of romance. But while traveling about the country peddling household goods and showing one of the first Passion of the Christ moving pictures, he discovers his father’s brutal murder.

Will Jenny avoid the bounty hunters? Can she forgive the person who turns her in?

2015 Laurel Award runner-up.

#Review The Lady Fugitive. You’ll laugh, bite your nails; wish you had a gun to help. http://ow.ly/QzlIP

About the Author

When Ada Brownell sat down to write The Peach Blossom Rancher, she drew from her experiences growing up in Colorado’s Peach Country, picking peaches and working in a packing shed.

In addition, she uses some of what she learned about mental illness covering the Colorado Mental Health Institute at Pueblo on her beat as a journalist for The Pueblo Chieftain. In her work, she received a list from the Board of Lunacy Commissioners showing supposed cause of insanity of patients admitted in 1899-1900 and 1909-1910. She uses part of that list in this book and used that information in developing some characters. However, in Peach Blossom Rancher the mental hospital is in Boston, and everything about the asylum is fiction.

Peach Blossom Rancher is Book Two in the author’s Peaches and Dreams series, the sequel to The Lady Fugitive, another Western/historical romance. Both books will stand alone.

Ada is the author of five other books, about 350 stories and articles in Christian publications, and is now retired from The Pueblo Chieftain.

Get Peach Blossom Rancher here: http://amzn.to/2arRVgG

Connect with Ada:

Amazon Ada Brownell author page: https://www.amazon.com/author/adabrownell Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/#!/AdaBrownellWritingMinistries

Twitter: @AdaBrownell

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/1654534.Ada_Brownell

Blog: http://inkfromanearthenvessel.blogspot.comz

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