Wolf Creek Father (Wolf Creek, Arkansas Book 3) by Penny Richards

wrote the title at the top of the tablet on his desk, using bold capital letters and underlining it. He wrote numbers down the left-hand side of the page and spent the next ten minutes staring at the front door, racking his mind for the names of eligible young ladies who might make a decent wife.
    Finally he wrote
Holly Jefferson
and
Letitia Farley
in positions one and two, even though it was doubtful that these two young women whom he’d wooed before would give him another chance, even if he explained to them that he’d laid down the law to the kids and promised there would be no more trouble. As his mama always said, a person had only one chance to make a first impression.
    Besides, Holly had been seen around town with James Turner the past few weeks, and after some observation, he’d realized that Letitia, who was mighty easy on the eyes, had to be the most helpless female in town, hardly the kind to be much of a helpmeet. He just couldn’t picture her standing up to Brady and Cilla without dissolving into a puddle of helplessness.
    He drew lines through their names and stared some more, softly whistling the evocatively beautiful “Lorena” while he tapped the pencil on the table. Ellie and Doc Rachel were out since Ellie had made it clear she could not marry anyone, and Gabe had won Rachel’s hand.
Think, Colt. Think!
Young unmarried women.
    Finally, he wrote
Jocelyn Cole.
Another of Cilla and Brady’s victims. Jocelyn was younger and more likely to be forgiving of the kids’ trespasses than the other two. Beside her name, he added
Young. Pretty. Likes kids. Sweet.
He thought of the irritating way she often burst into giggles at the most immature things and scratched through her name...twice.
Too
young. He needed a wife and a mother for his kids; he didn’t need another one to bring up.
    He needed someone older, settled. Ellie’s friend Gracie Morrison came to mind. He sighed and determinedly wrote
Gracie Morrison
next to the number four, then added
Twenty-five or twenty-six. Smart. Very nice.
He couldn’t put that she was homely and ungainly, though it was true. Besides, her genuine goodness made up for her lack of beauty and grace, giving her her own brand of prettiness. What else? He knew for a fact that she’d been trained from childhood in all the wifely pursuits. Gracie was also very perceptive and fair-minded. She would be a good wife.
    He leaned back in his chair and tapped the pencil against his lips. The problem was, he felt not the slightest bit of attraction to her, and desperate or not, if he was going to have to settle for less than love, he at least needed to feel some sort of desirability.
    4. Gracie Morrison. Twenty-five or twenty-six. Smart. Very nice.
    With a single bold line through her list of attributes, Gracie was out of the running.
    Single women, Garrett! Think.
    Ah! Widows!
He needed to consider widows, not just women who’d never been married. Let’s see—there was Lydia North, but she’d made it pretty clear that after losing her husband, Jake, she would never marry again. Besides, she was so shy, he doubted she could even hold up her end of a conversation. He didn’t even bother writing down her name.
    How about sweet-as-apple-pie Sophie Forrester? Sophie’s husband had been killed more than two years ago in a logging accident. She was a sweet woman and pretty enough in a tired way, and she was only a couple of years older than he. On the negative side, she had three ornery boys of her own. Nope. Sophie was definitely out. He didn’t want to add to his misery. Not intentionally, anyway. He drew a heavy line through her name.
    He was staring at the scratched-out names on his list when Dan spoke up from behind him. “What’s wrong with Gracie?”
    Colt flinched in surprise and glared at his second-in-command, who was peering over his shoulder. Big Dan Mercer, his fortysomething, never-been-married deputy, had taken their solitary prisoner’s dirty breakfast dishes back to