Love Without End: A Kings Meadow Romance Read online

  Acclaim for Robin Lee Hatcher

  “In Love Without End, Robin Lee Hatcher once again takes us to Kings Meadow, Idaho in a sweeping love story that captures the heart and soul of romance between two people who have every reason not to fall in love. With an interesting back story interspersed among the contemporary chapters, and well-drawn, relatable secondary characters, Hatcher hits the mark with her warm and inviting love story.”

  — Martha Rogers, author of the series, Winds Across the Prairie and The Journey Homeward

  “Love Without End, the first book in the new Kings Meadow Romance series, again intertwines two beautiful and heartfelt romances. One in the past and one in the future together make this a special read. I’m so glad Robin wrote a love story for Chet who suffered so much in A Promise Kept (January 2014). Kimberly, so wrong for him, becomes so right. Not your run of the mill cowboy romance—enriched with the deft writing and deep emotion.”

  — Lyn Cote, author of Honor, first in the Quaker Bride series

  “No one writes about the joys and challenges of family life better than Robin Lee Hatcher and she’s at the top of her game with Love Without End. This beautiful and deeply moving story will capture your heart as it captured mine.”

  — Margaret Brownley- NY Times bestselling author

  “Love Without End, Book One in Robin Lee Hatcher’s new Kings Meadow series, is a delight from start to finish. The author’s skill at depicting the love and challenges of family has never been more evident as she deftly combines two love stories—past and present—to capture readers’ hearts and lift their spirits.”

  — Marta Perry, author of The Forgiven, Keepers of the Promise, Book One

  “I always expect excellence when I open a Robin Lee Hatcher novel. She never disappoints. The story here reminds me of a circle without end as Robin takes us through a modern day romance while looping one character through a WWII tale of love and loss and the resurrection of hope and purpose. Love Without End touched my heart and guided me to some wonderful truths of how God’s love is a gift and a treasure.”

  — Donita K. Paul, bestselling author

  “Some stories sweetly grab me from the first pages. Love Without End by Robin Lee Hatcher did just that. A slow dance of overcoming loss, daring to breath, and opening to love, the characters welcomed me to their world, and I didn’t want to leave. A welcome escape into a world where healing happens through the lens of time and history. I highly recommend it!”

  — Cara Putman, award-winning author of Shadowed by Grace and Where Treetops Glisten

  “A beautiful, heart-touching story of God’s amazing grace, and how He can restore and make new that which was lost.”

  — Francine Rivers, New York Times bestselling author, regarding A Promise Kept

  “Beloved hits the mark. Hatcher’s books have it all: characters full of personality, attention to detail that makes the history feel real and a gentle message of second chances. “

  — Romantic Times 4½ star review for Beloved

  “A wonderful, 19th-century-Idaho spin on the story of the prodigal son, Beloved has everything a great novel needs: genuine conflict, heartfelt emotion, characters you’ll love rooting for, surprising twists and turns, and a breathless pace that will keep you reading late into the night. Above all, a powerful message of redemption rings through each chapter. You will love Beloved!”

  — Liz Curtis Higgs, New York Times bestselling author of Mine Is the Night

  “Hatcher is a consistent ‘must read’ author. Her books are always engaging, and Betrayal is no different . . . You’ll feel a warm, satisfying glow after turning the final page of this touching novel.”

  — Romantic Times, TOP PICK! 4½ star

  “Featuring an eye for detail and a strong female heroine, this wholesome romance marks a good start to this new inspirational historical series . . .”

  — Library Journal starred review of Belonging

  “Robin Lee Hatcher has created a memorable historic romance . . . she weaves in just enough historic fact and setting to transport the reader to the time and place without getting in the way of the story.”

  — Idaho Senior Independent review of Belonging

  “Tender, evocative, and beautifully written, Belonging is a journey about love after loss, and about two hearts destined to become one—despite their stubbornness! Belonging is Robin Lee Hatcher at her best!”

  — Tamera Alexander, bestselling author of Within My Heart and The Inheritance

  Other Novels by Robin Lee Hatcher

  A Promise Kept

  WHERE THE HEART LIVES SERIES

  Beloved

  Betrayal

  Belonging

  Heart of Gold

  A Matter of Character

  Fit to Be Tied

  A Vote of Confidence

  Autumn’s Angel,

  a novel found in

  A Bride for All Seasons

  © 2014 by Robin Lee Hatcher

  All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, scanning, or other—except for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  Published in Nashville, Tennessee, by Thomas Nelson. Thomas Nelson is a registered trademark of HarperCollins Christian Publishing, Inc.

  Thomas Nelson, Inc., titles may be purchased in bulk for educational, business, fund-raising, or sales promotional use. For information, please email [email protected].

  Scripture quotations from NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®. © The lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995. Used by permission.

  Publisher’s Note: This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. All characters are fictional, and any similarity to people living or dead is purely coincidental.

  ISBN 978-1-4016-8768-7 (eBook)

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Hatcher, Robin Lee.

  Love without end / Robin Lee Hatcher.

  pages ; cm — (A King’s Meadow novel ; 1)

  ISBN 978-1-4016-8767-0 (softcover)

  1. Single parents—Fiction. 2. Man-woman relationships—Fiction. I. Hatcher, Robin Lee. II. Title.

  PS3558.A73574L675 2014

  813'.54—dc23

  2014020470

  14 15 16 17 18 RRD 5 4 3 2 1

  To Ami McConnell & Traci DePree. Thanks for making even editing a pleasure.

  Contents

  A Letter from the Author

  Anna: 1944

  One

  Two

  Anna: 1944

  Three

  Four

  Anna: 1944

  Five

  Six

  Anna: 1944

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Anna: 1945

  Ten

  Eleven

  Anna: 1945

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Anna: 1945

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Anna: 1946

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Anna: 1947

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Anna: 1947

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Anna: 1947

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Anna: 1948

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Anna: 1948

  Twenty-Six


  Twenty-Seven

  Anna: 1950

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Anna: 1960

  Thirty

  Thirty-One

  Anna: 1970

  Thirty-Two

  Thirty-Three

  Anna: 1984

  Thirty-Four

  Reading Group Guide

  An Excerpt from Whenever You Come Around

  Chapter 1

  An Excerpt from a Promise Kept

  Allison: May 2011

  About the Author

  A Letter from the Author

  DEAR FRIENDS

  When I wrote about Kings Meadow in A Promise Kept, I had no intention of returning there for more stories. My calendar called for me to begin a new historical series. But Kings Meadow had gone deep into my heart, and I didn’t want to let go yet. I was especially pleased that reviewers often mentioned the setting with great fondness, one even saying that they wanted to go live there. That’s how I feel about it too. To be honest, I owed Chet Leonard a second chance at a happy ending after the grief I put him through in A Promise Kept.

  Second chances. Don’t you love them? I do. My life has been littered with mistakes and wrong thinking or wrong choices, and without the second chances God has given me, the results would be rather sad.

  My mom and dad were thirty-four and forty-one when they met. Both had been married and divorced. Because of those failures in marriage, they had a better idea what they were looking for in a spouse. My dad proposed to my mom on their second date. He always said he would have proposed sooner if he hadn’t been so shy.

  Is it any wonder I’m a romantic? Love at first sight is in my DNA.

  Something I discovered for myself is that the crazy physical feelings that come with falling in love—fast heartbeat, dry throat, dizzy head, roller coaster drops of the stomach—aren’t only for the young. They are the same for the young at heart, no matter a person’s physical age. Thankfully, being in love isn’t quite so hard on a person as the falling in love. The settled comfort that comes with true commitment to a lifetime together is a blessing.

  Now that Chet has found his HEA (Happily Ever After) with Kimberly, I hope you’ll join me in Kings Meadow once again in the spring of 2015 for Whenever You Come Around. I’m busy giving grief to another couple who just might get a second chance of their own.

  Happy Reading!

  Robin Lee Hatcher

  www.robinleehatcher.com

  Anna

  1944

  HUNGER TWISTED ANNA MCKENNA’S BELLY AS SHE followed the deer track, leading the blood bay colt behind her. She didn’t know where she was, and many days of walking hadn’t lessened her fear that someone followed her. Every sound in the forest made her heart leap into her throat. Were they looking for her, the relatives who’d taken her in, claiming to want to give her a home? Would she starve to death before she found her way back to civilization? Would someone manage to take Shiloh’s Star from her no matter how far she traveled?

  “Trust and listen,” Mama’s voice seemed to whisper in her ear. “Trust and listen.”

  Thoughts of her mama caused tears to spring to her eyes. Thoughts of Daddy too. Both of them were gone now. Daddy killed in the war. Mama of pneumonia, the doctor had said, but Anna was pretty sure Mama died of a broken heart. The red colt had been a gift from her parents. Shiloh’s Star was all she had left of them, and she wasn’t going to let anybody take him from her. Not anybody. Including Cousin Luther.

  Anna dashed away the tears with her fingertips, and as she did so, the pine trees parted and the path spilled onto a rocky plateau overlooking a beautiful emerald-colored valley. It was shaped like the boomerang she’d once seen in a general store. To her left, in the distance, she saw what looked to be a small town. Much closer and on the opposite end of the curve, she saw a house, barn, and outbuildings, cattle grazing in high grass.

  God willing, she would get something to eat and maybe have one good night of sleep before she and the colt moved on.

  One

  CHET LEONARD WATCHED THE AUTOMATIC DOORS leading from the concourses of the Boise airport, hoping he would recognize Nana Anna when she came into view.

  How much could she have changed in ten years? Perhaps a lot. The last time he’d seen her was about a decade ago when he and his family took a vacation to Disney World in Florida. They’d taken one day off from rides and games to spend an afternoon with Anna and her husband, Walter.

  Anna McKenna wasn’t any blood relation to the Leonards, but Chet considered her family all the same. And now, after the death of her husband, she was coming home to Idaho. Coming home to live once more on the Leonard ranch. A place she belonged.

  He caught sight of a white-haired woman in a wheelchair. Was that her? If so, he might need to rethink where she would stay. The automatic doors opened and he took a step forward, then stopped. It wasn’t Anna. He could see that now. Anna McKenna was in her eighties, but aging didn’t change a person’s looks as much as that.

  “Chet Leonard. Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes.”

  His gaze moved a few steps beyond the woman in the wheelchair. A grin split his face. This was Nana Anna. Older, yes, from the last time he was with her, but he would know that smile and those merry blue-gray eyes anywhere. Not to mention that dark red hair—which these days came from a bottle.

  A few quick strides carried him to her, and without any forethought, he lifted her feet off the floor as he gave her a tight hug. She laughed. He recognized that about her too. Setting her on her feet again and holding her at arm’s length, he said, “You made it here fine, I see.”

  “Of course I did.” She patted her collarbone. “And my, my. I swear you grew taller since I last saw you.”

  “I doubt it. I stopped growing years ago, Nana Anna.”

  Color bloomed in her cheeks. “Goodness gracious. It’s good to be called that to my face again. I’ve missed it.”

  He held out his hand to take her small carry-on. “Let’s go down to baggage claim. I assume you’ve got some bags checked.”

  “I do indeed.”

  Chet took Anna by the crook of her arm, and they walked toward the escalator.

  “Can’t believe how much this airport has changed,” Anna said on the ride down.

  He looked around. “Yeah. Guess it’s a lot different from the last time you were here.”

  “I expect more than this airport’s different. Time marches on.”

  Chet nodded.

  They stepped off the escalator in companionable silence and followed other passengers toward the luggage carousels.

  “Do you want to sit down while we wait?” he asked her.

  “No, thank you. Been sitting too many hours as it is. Need some movement in my giddyup.”

  He grinned, remembering Anna as she’d been thirty years ago, before she married Walter Cunningham and moved to Florida. Already in her fifties—which had seemed ancient to Chet at the time—she’d been as active and hardworking as any man they had on the ranch. She could ride a horse all day, make a campfire, sleep on the ground, mend fences, and fix a mean breakfast.

  “Chet?”

  “Yes?”

  “I know I said it over the phone, but I want you to know how sorry I am about all that’s happened to you in the last few years. Rick and Marsha and all.”

  He nodded, words caught in his throat. He’d learned there was no escaping the sadness when it swept over him. He could go days without consciously thinking about the son who’d died in a car crash or the marriage that had ended despite his attempts to salvage it. But the memories and the heartache were there all the same, hidden in a deep corner of his heart.

  Anna laid a wrinkled hand on his forearm. “One day at a time, Chet. That’s all God asks of any of us. Just one day at a time.”

  Chet nodded again.

  The warning light flashed and a loud beep sounded, then the conveyor belt went into motion. A short while later, bags appeared and plopped onto
the oval-shaped carousel.

  “What am I looking for?” Chet asked.

  “Two purple bags with a bright red band around each one.”

  Black suitcases. Green duffel bags. Small and large boxes. One after another dropped into view. And then at last the awaited purple bags. The color was brighter than any other he’d seen so far. Appropriate for the colorful, much-beloved Nana Anna.

  AT THE START OF THEIR DRIVE NORTH, ANNA expressed amazement at how much Boise had grown in the years she’d been away, but when they passed through Kings Meadow a little better than an hour later, she smiled and said, “This place hasn’t changed all that much, has it?”

  “You might be surprised. New library. New schools. New houses. We even have a couple of subdivisions. More changes than you’d think.” He glanced at his passenger.

  Anna’s eyes were awash with tears, though her smile was broad. “It’s good to come home, Chet. No place else ever felt quite right to me, no matter how much I loved Walter. Thanks for letting an old woman come back.”

  Chet felt a little choked up himself. Anna McKenna was the nearest thing to a grandmother—great-grandmother—his boys would ever know. Though she might not realize it, she was the one doing him a favor, not the other way around. Sam and Pete could use a woman in their lives again. Chet did his best, but he was a poor replacement for the mother who’d abandoned them.

  It took another twenty minutes to reach the Leonard ranch, their land tucked between pine-covered mountains to the north, east, and west.

  “Look at that,” Anna whispered as the truck passed beneath the sign proclaiming: Leonard Ranch Quarter Horses. “Would you look at that? Prettiest sight I ever did see. And you’ve got several new outbuildings too.”

  By the time Chet’s black Ford pulled up to the house, Sam and Pete were standing outside.

  A soft gasp escaped Anna, and she covered her mouth with one hand. When she lowered it again, she said, “Look at those boys. They’ve grown so tall since you came to visit me and Walter in Florida. They look like you when you were their age. The photos you’ve e-mailed didn’t do them justice.”

  “Yeah, they’re Leonards to the core. No doubt about it. But I see more of my dad than me in Sam.”