The edge of town / Dorothy Garlock.

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

At 21, Julie Jones is convinced that life is passing her by. Her mothers death four years ago left her in charge of caring for her father and five siblings, and dashed her hopes of meeting that special someone who would whisk her away to the glamorous big city. Then all at once, Julies predictable existence is overturned when her father finds love with an attractive widow, and Evan Johnson, the mysterious son of the town drunkard returns home and starts courting her. With his arrival, however, comes a series of devastating tragedies as Evans father is found murdered, and a series of brutal rapes rocks the town. In a rush to judgment, the townsfolk are all pointing to Evan as the guilty party, except for one person. Amid growing tensions, Julie Jones has been hiding a dark personal secretand falling desperately in love. There is growing demand for original hardcover novels by established romance writers. Jane Feather, Julie Garwood, Nora Roberts, and Kristin Hannah are just a few of the authors enjoying significant sales in the cross-over from mass market to hardcover format. Dorothy Garlocks previous novel, After the Parade (Warner mass market, 4/00), was a USA Today bestseller and a Featured Alternate of Doubleday Book Club. It had a first printing of 325,000 copies, and included a preview announcement for The Edge of Town. With over 12 million copies of her novels in print worldwide, and translated into 15 languages, Dorothy Garlocks books reach a huge audience to which this new hardcover will immediately appeal.