My One True Love

The most harmful lies are the ones we tell ourselves…

Georgia, USA. 1916. Margaret Sweeney has endured enough loss to last anyone's lifetime. Unwilling to endure more, she decides to dedicate herself to widowhood, and to Sugar Hill, the tobacco plantation her late husband left her. But when she meets the plantation's tenured overseer and his precocious daughter, her plans to refrain from ever loving someone again, go awry.

Joe Banner loved once, and ended up alone with an infant to raise. A decade later, he's devoted to only three things: his daughter Maisie, Sugar Hill, and bachelorhood. But when the new owner of Sugar Hill upends his carefully ordered existence, he begins to question every decision he's ever made, including to remain aloof.

As the physical barriers come down between Margaret and Joe, the emotional ones grow higher. As does the risk of their losing more than just their hearts. For not everyone wants to see them succeed, in love, or in the continued operation of Sugar Hill. And when Maisie ends up in the crossfire of adult grudges and greed, Margaret and Joe must decide: Will they bow to fear and old hurts and go their separate ways, or will they trust what's in their hearts, and in each other, and give Maisie—and themselves, the life, love, and family they thought they'd never find?

The third installment of the Dear One series is a steamy stand-alone steeped in intrigue and dark history … an emotional read about the heart's relentless quest for a family to call its own, and of love's unfailing power to heal even those hearts believed broken beyond repair.