Clint Buchanan was sitting at his desk at Buchanan Enterprises wondering how his life could be any emptier. True, he had a beautiful new wife, and he loved her in his own way, but he knew he rushed into this marriage with Lindsay. They were both trying to make it work but, in his heart, Clint knew that he could never feel the kind of love for Lindsay that he still felt for Viki.
Clint quit his job as Editor-in-Chief of The Banner because being around Viki all the time had just becomd too difficult. Working at Buchanan Enterprises didn’t help either; he was a newspaperman, not a businessman.
Clint had just received a telephone call from an old friend in California who ran a newspaper in the San Francisco Bay Area. The old friend wanted him to come out to the West Coast and be the executive editor of his newspaper.
“Maybe this is the answer,” thought Clint. “If I’m away from Viki, maybe Lindsay and I will have a chance, and I’ll be doing what I love again, instead of being bored stiff.”
Clint called Cord in Europe and convinced him to come back and take over Buchanan Enterprises, as well as help Bo take care of the family in Llanview.
When he told Viki his plans, she was at a loss. First, Clint married Lindsay. Then he quit The Banner and now he was leaving town for the West Coast!
Viki knew she made the worst mistake of her life by not remarrying Clint. How could she have been so stupid and let him go? She had been so sure that his marriage to Lindsay would not work and she would eventually have a chance to win him back, but with an entire country between them, how would she be able to do that?
“Well,” Viki thought, “I guess I will just have to learn to live on my own and cope as best I can. I will pray every night that some day Clint will return to Llanview and I will win his love back.”
Meanwhile, in New Orleans, Brent Hamilton had just returned from his mother’s funeral. He sat at his desk in the office of Hamilton Shipping with his head in his hands. The last week had been one of sorrow and turmoil for him. Brent had been close to his mother and loved her very much — and he was in shock. It wasn’t only her heart attack, the hospital stay, her death, and the funeral that had his head spinning. It was her deathbed confession.
Brent had been the only child of Greg and Julia Hamilton. Brent and his father had never gotten along. Greg was part of New Orleans society and head of Hamilton Publishing, noted for publishing mainly books and magazines written in the southern society style. Greg had passed away several years earlier and Brent’s Uncle Cliff now ran the company which was just fine with Brent — he didn’t want any part of the publishing business. Brent left home after flunking out of college and made his own way in life. He started out as a longshoreman and began working his way up the corporate hierarchy until he ended up winning a shipping company in a poker game.
Brent’s luck in love wasn’t as good. He’d had one great love in his life, Blanche. They had been blissfully married for two years when she died while giving birth to his child. The baby girl also died and Brent never got over it. He had been involved with many women during the years since Blanche’s death, but had never had a serious relationship — and he preferred it that way.
Julia’s revelation played over and over in Brent’s mind. Greg Hamilton was not his father, after all. His real father’s name was Asa Buchanan, an oil tycoon whom Julia had met shortly after her marriage to Greg.
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