The Substitute Mommy

Maggie is overcome with emotion that her little girl is actually old enough to start first grade, and it brought back all the old memories of how she became a mother at the tender age of fifteen! She had moved to protect her daughter and to keep the promise she made to raise Charity as her own, and then moved again when someone she knew spotted her and started vicious rumors that weren't true. She was happy in the small town, and when she met the teacher's son, she couldn't help responding to him.
Nathaniel is completely taken with the pretty seamstress, but he was sure she was hiding something. He was tempted to take her over his knee to learn the truth, but he was afraid Maggie would refuse to have anything further to do with him if he gave her a spanking. She had made it clear what she thought of a man spanking a grown woman! She thought it despicable, and it made him wonder if her deceased husband beat her.

Finally, the inevitable happened, and Maggie was faced with telling Nathaniel the truth. She feared losing his love, but she would not give up her daughter, not for any man! The child was hers in every way that mattered.