His Secondhand Wife by Cheryl St. John

Noah Cutter is surprised when he finds not only that his younger brother Levi has gotten himself killed but that he also left behind a wife he told no one about.

Driven by his sense of duty, Noah locates Katherine and finds her working at a laundry house, poor and pregnant and without the support of her mother. So, Noah does the honorable thing and asks her to come with him to his ranch, where she and the baby will be safe and provided for.

Katherine isn't sure if she can believe Noah, after all his brother left her behind as if she were so much garbage, but something tells her that Noah is the only chance her baby has to have a good life. So she goes off with him to his ranch in the outsides of Copper Creek, Colorado.

Noah is a bit of the town's loner, he has had scars all over his body and part of his face since he was in his early teens due to an accident and, thanks to his not-so-kind stepmother, has always believed people are better off spared the sight of him. So, having Katherine move in with him is less than ideal, especially since he thinks she's pretty much the most beautiful girl he has ever seen.

After his stepmother, Estelle, drives the idea into his head that Kate could someday re-marry and take his niece or nephew away, Noah asks a still pregnant Katherine to marry him.

When most books end in marriage, for Noah and Kate it's just the beginning as Kate struggles to make a place for herself in Noah's life beyond being the mother of Levi's child - for a long time she thinks the Cutters don't want her, just the baby - and Noah struggles with the fact that he might be falling in love with Kate and the belief that she could never love him back, since she loved his handsome brother and there is no way he could compare to Levi.

This book is a definite hanky-read, I was in tears just a few pages in cried most of my way through, but the story is so wonderful I couldn't put it down. The romance grows slowly and sweetly and it's one of the best stories I've read lately.

Characters from Sweet Annie, show up and you do get a little update on their lives, which is nice.

Anyway, I'm in love with this book.

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