On a rainy evening, when the only bar in Virgin River was already empty, a young woman appeared on its threshold with a three-year-old boy in her arms. She had a huge bruise under her eye and a split lip. Cook John Middleton, nicknamed Preacher, sheltered her in a room above the kitchen and learned that Paige had run away from her husband, wealthy businessman Wes Lessiter, who brutally beat her. Preacher, an intimidatingly large and strong man, had an unusually kind heart, step by step he tried to help Paige return to normal life. John liked this beautiful, sincere woman, and he also became attached to her son. But Paige had a hard time trusting a man again. And Wes wasn't going to let her go so easily.