Addie Hyde spent four years waiting to see if the high-spirited husband she had married in haste would come back after the South lost the war. Yet Kirby Hyde was never among the Confederates in rags and tatters straggling through Arkansas.
Addie always had spunk, but now she also had a young son, two foster children she cherished, and trouble. Deserters and drifters were making Addie's isolated farmhouse a dangerous place for a pretty woman without a man—until John Tallman showed up in town.
He asked about Addie, he watched for her, and suddenly he was using his guns and fists to protect her. His kindness showed Addie not to fear him. Her heart soon told her more. John Tallman had a shadow about him that even love might not chase away. And although yesteryear was gone, it could take all a woman's caring, and all her courage, to make tomorrow theirs.