For the Sake of Warwick Mountain (Harlequin Heartwarming) by Charlotte Douglas Page A

explained. “None of the sisters ever married. The oldest is ninety-eight, the youngest eighty-three. They still live on the homestead their great-grandparents built.”
    “Alone?” Matt asked.
    Becca nodded. “Uncle Jake’s nephew helps with their livestock, but they grow their own garden, fix their own meals. They’re very independent.”
    “Mommy,” Emily asked, “what’s a playboy?”
    “Where did you hear a word like that?” Becca asked.
    “Miss Habersham said Dr. Matt’s a playboy,” the girl said. “Is that a bad word?”
    Becca noted that Matt had the grace to look uncomfortable. She couldn’t resist tossing the ball into his court. “No, it’s not a bad word. Tell her what it means, Matt.”
    “Me?” Matt almost choked on his biscuit.
    “Makes sense,” Becca said with her sweetest smile as she planted her barb. “Don’t you have firsthand experience?”
    Matt swallowed hard and turned to Emily. “A playboy is a man who has so much money he doesn’t need to work for a living, so he spends all his time doing the things he enjoys.”
    Emily cocked her head and considered his definition. “That’s not what Miss Habersham said.”
    “What did Miss Habersham say?” Matt ignored Becca’s attempts to shush him.
    Emily scrunched her face as if trying to remember. “A playboy is a man who has more money than he has sense.”
    “Is that what she said about me?” Matt said.
    Emily nodded. “She said she read it in a magazine.”
    Becca couldn’t resist throwing him an I-told-you-so look. “Guess everyone’s read about Dr. Wonderful.”
    Emily apparently wasn’t going to let the subject drop. “Do you have more money than sense, Dr. Matt?”
    Matt glanced at Becca with a plea for help. “How do I answer that?”
    “Honestly?” Becca suggested, then took pity on him. “Emily, it’s not polite to ask people how much money they have.”
    “Or how much sense?” the girl asked.
    “That’s not polite, either,” her mother said.
    “Then why did Miss Habersham talk about it?” Emily asked. “I thought grown-ups were always polite.”
    “Are you sure this kid’s only four and a half?” Matt said. “Sounds like she’d make a great attorney.”
    Becca sighed. “I have to admit, she’s good at cross-examination.”
    “Miss Habersham said you have lots of girlfriends,” Emily continued. “Is Mommy one of them?”
    “Who wants to know?” Becca asked with alarm. “You or Miss Habersham?”
    “Me,” Emily said. “Miss Habersham didn’t say anything about you, Mommy.”
    Becca breathed a sigh of relief. Once the Habershams started a rumor, it blazed through the community like wildfire in dry grass with a high wind behind it.
    “Your mother’s a girl and she’s my friend,” Matt said. “And so are you.”
    “I am?” Emily said with a touch of awe.
    “Sure.” Matt had handled the girlfriend issue with an ease that won Becca’s reluctant respect. “You’re Dr. Dwight’s girlfriends, too. That’s why he sent you presents.”
    “Can I have mine now?” Emily asked.
    “Not until after supper,” Becca said. “Finish your peas, and I’ll serve Aunt Delilah’s chocolate pound cake.”
    “With ice cream?” Emily asked.
    Becca nodded.
    Matt wiped his mouth with his napkin and sighed with satisfaction. “Best meal I ever tasted. There’s a little bistro in Westwood claims to serve Southern food, but it can’t touch this.”
    “It’s the mountain air,” Becca said. “Visitors often say it improves the appetite.”
    Matt looked longingly at the solitary biscuit left in the bread basket, even though he’d already had three. “Nope. Has to be the cooking. My offer of marriage still stands.”
    The twinkle in his eye was almost irresistible, but Becca somehow managed to avoid melting to his charm. She stood and began to clear the plates. “Maybe it’d be easier if I just teach you to make biscuits.”
    “Can I watch?” Emily asked.
    “Ready to see a grown man