Sold into prostitution, Sara Fuller robs a client and flees to her brother in White Pines, Montana.
Anxiously awaiting his mail order bride, rancher Caleb Young is delighted when a beautiful woman steps off the stagecoach. A series of misassumptions soon finds the two taking their marriage vows.
When Sara discovers she isn’t Caleb’s intended bride, she hides her scandalous past and sets out to prove she can be a good wife. Caleb adores Sara but suspects her of hiding something very important. Despite Sara’s secrets, their love grows and a child is conceived.
When Caleb’s real bride arrives, their troubles begin, only to be compounded by the appearance of the man Sara robbed. Now the two lovers must discover whether their love is strong enough to survive the forces threatening to tear them apart.
Sara works as a whore at The Palace but she hates the life and the men and wants nothing more to do with any of it. She finally manages to get away but only because she steals one of her customers payroll – and that of all of his employees.
Sara heads off to White Pines where her brother Ty is living with his new wife Cassie. He had found her at The Palace not long before but hadn’t had the money to buy her from the Madame – Crazy Kate. Caleb is waiting at the train station for his mail order bride. A minister from St. Louis had been in White Pines and he had told Caleb that there were many women in St. Louis who would be willing to get married. Caleb had received word that the minister was sending a bride for him so when Sara steps off the stagecoach, and after they both have some serious misunderstandings, Caleb believes that Sara is his bride. They get married almost immediately and soon settle in to a life together.
Sara, at first, is torn about her decision not to tell Caleb about her past. She just wants to forget it and move on. Neither her brother, Ty, nor Caleb’s brother, Gideon, are happy about the marriage but they eventually come to love Sara. When Sara finds out she’s pregnant she’s shocked (as she believed she couldn’t get pregnant) but so happy that she’s with a wonderful man and that they can raise their child in loving home that they now share. When the man that Sara stole the bankroll from shows up and not only names her as a thief and a whore but also mentions that he might well be the father of Sara’s baby all hell breaks loose and the love that Sara shared with Caleb might not be strong enough to keep the couple together.
This third book in the Safe Havens series is a keeper. When I picked up the book I knew it would be good but the time just flew by as I was sucked into the life of Sara Fuller and Caleb Young. I wanted so badly for Sara and Caleb to find the love they deserved.
James has written a story that’s emotional and sometimes downright heartbreaking. It was sexy as well as Caleb was one big hunk of a hero. He certainly was an ass at times, I’ll give you that, but he was the kind of man that learned from his mistakes and didn’t get mired down in his own pity party.
I absolutely loved Sara and the constant strength she showed throughout the story. Yes, I would have liked to have had her come clean about her past right from the start but understood why she was hesitant to do so. I’m not sure Caleb would have given her the chance she deserved and obviously she got that sense as well. The life she had led before heading to White Pines was shocking and horrifying and I was so happy to see she escaped it all. She was one tough cookie and I very much enjoyed reading about her story.
Overall a really great book and one I definitely recommend.
Rating: 4 out of 5
