Free The Cowboy's Secret Baby: BWWM Cowboy Pregnancy Romance (Young Adult First Time Billionaire Steamy African American) by Christin Jensen Page B

realize that here were the people she liked and trusted.  This was her new dawn.
    During the course of the project, Angus developed the habit of peeking in through the living room window before he considered knocking on the front door.  You didn’t want to disturb Clarice when she was like this.
    John Pirtle’s visit had left Farris energized.  As a trust officer, Pirtle had had some experience in tracing disappearing family members, and he had given the younger man some valuable leads.  Farris spent the rest of that evening online, checking county history sites and family genealogies.  The next day, armed with the names of his paternal grandparents and some at least approximate dates, he drove to the local court house and started searching through wills and property deeds.  Within a few days, he was sending emails and even paying for online services and family association memberships.
    “I’m glad you’ve started doing that ancestry business in your bedroom,” Terry McGee told him at dinner two days later.  “We don’t need that much extra paper in the business office.”
    “Well, it looks like we’re a family of triers, at any rate,” Farris replied.  “Every male ancestor I’ve come across has been gainfully employed one way or another.  It looks like we’re a bunch of taciturn cusses, though.”
    “Your dad was pretty close-mouthed except when it came to livestock, I remember,” McGee recalled.  “Dina and I were hired only a few months before you were born, so we barely had time to know your mom.”
    “Maybe you should come with me up to the attic tomorrow,” Dina suggested.  “I remember we just boxed away all your mother’s things.  Your dad didn’t even want to go through them. – I can point you to the boxes, but I’m not as young as I used to be.  You’re going to have to heft them down; you’re strong enough.”
    “Let’s get down a couple of boxes after supper.”  Farris responded enthusiastically.  “You know, I had never thought much about this ancestry stuff, but now I’m all excited.”
    Later, Farris found himself sitting on the living room floor, surrounded by little piles of clothing.  “Somebody should be using all these hats and dresses,” he remarked, holding up a delicately flowered hat.  “I guess Dad was just too cut up to think properly.”
    “Your mother had nice clothes,” Dina agreed, “but what you really need to see is this bunch of old letters.  Some of them are from overseas.”
    Farris handled the lovely-wrapped bundle gently.  “I hope I can read these,” he muttered, untying the ribbon.  “This is Dad’s handwriting – my God, he was in Vietnam!  No wonder he never told us anything.”  He began perusing the letters while Dina sorted the dresses and underthings into various piles to go to charities.
    Finally Farris put down the letters and looked up, white-lipped.  “Dad was an aircraft mechanic,” he said.  “No wonder he knew how to build and tear down stuff on a farm.  Judging from these letters, the Air Force must have kept him pretty close to headquarters.  He wasn’t out in the field, but he had to clean up plenty of mess whenever the base was hit by incoming fire. – And he knew a lot of the politics about why the whole mess was happening; you can read it in between the lines if you’re careful.  He must have really trusted Mom.”
    “So now you know more about your parents and a damned dark piece of history.”  Terry McGee had come back from the office in time to hear all this.  “I was just remembering that we lugged several boxes of books to the attic, too; your mother was a great reader.”
    The best find, as far as Farris was concerned, was his mother’s old address book.  Through it, he managed to find her elderly female cousin, who promptly sent him labeled photographs and multi-paged screeds.  Some of them were remarkably indiscreet; Farris learned a good deal about the Larkin branch of his