Excerpt from ‘The Cowboy Takeover’

Sweat trickled down Maddie’s neck, gathered in the hollow at the base of her throat then poured into the valley between her breasts. She’d already dialed the air conditioner down to its lowest setting, fan running at full speed. For a fleeting moment, she thought about opening the window to let in a blast of fresh air, but outside, where the sun beat down on the dry grass plains, the temperature was close to forty degrees.

According to the GPS, there were twenty minutes left in a journey that should never have been necessary. If Kyson Brown, manager of Harwood Downs, had returned her phone calls, answered his email or acknowledged any of the numerous attempts the legal firm she worked for had made to contact him, she wouldn’t be driving in this outrageous heat.

A small part of her winced at the thought of this beautiful scenery stripped and scarred by the ugliness of open-cut coal mining, but progress was progress, and profit the bottom line.

An orange warning light flashed ominously on the dashboard, and her lips tightened. She’d told her boss she needed the bigger, newer company car, but John O’Kane had shrugged and said, “Someone else has it booked.”

It hadn’t mattered that the other lawyer was using the car to drive from one part of the city to another, and Maddie had been making a five-hundred-kilometer trip. Maddie was the most junior member of the practice, and the job she’d been given was little more than a courier’s run. The badly maintained vehicle she’d been allocated matched her humble task. She had to deliver a set of documents into Kyson Brown’s hands, then head back to the blessed cool of the city.

Assuming, of course, that Kyson Brown was still working and living on Harwood Downs. The company that owned the cattle station, having acquired it in a takeover and appointed Brown as a manager, had taken no further interest in it. Maddie’s well-regulated legal mind had been horrified to discover there had been no audits, no perusal of expenses, not even the most basic of inspections to make sure the property and its buildings were properly maintained. 

Excerpt from ‘Tied and Taken’

Kase Jakoby did like roughing it.

Okay, so roughing it wasn’t really rough at the KOA, where he had showers and electrical hookups and a pizza and beer with the guys. Still, he liked it better than some of the swanky host hotels at the big events. Kase wasn’t a Vegas man, though he was happy enough to place at the NFR and make money.

His cowboy heart was in the down and dirty little events around the Fourth of July, what cowboy folks called Christmas. He loved the sweat, the sun pounding down on him and the cold shock of beer on his throat after he made a good ride and had the money to buy a round.

’Course, now it was pretty late and he must have been the only roughstock rider not driving out first thing in the morning, because his buddies had all abandoned him and his well-stocked cooler.

Maybe he ought to go take advantage of that shower. With his luck, the next stopover would have a pit toilet. Even worse, the next campground would have a swimming pool near the bathroom and thirty thousand screaming kids wiping out in the communal showers. Right now he could handle some cool water, a little quiet time and enough light to check the shower stall for snakes.

He headed back to his truck from the common area, wheeling his cooler behind him, to grab some shorts and a towel. His eyebrow went up when he saw the little red pickup truck with PRCHD8R vanity plates parked next to his big old duallie as if they were fixin’ to have a snuggle, and Kase dropped his cooler handle like he’d been poleaxed.

Ainsley Preacher. The one that got away. That damn girl had had him thinking about things like rings and ranch houses and fences, for fuck’s sake.

He’d be God damned.

Kase wandered over to Ainsley’s area, noticing the bright purple horse trailer hitched to the pickup. Yeah, Ainsley never traveled without her bitch mare Lilith. Lord, that nag was vicious, but there’d never been a barrel horse who knew her rider as well. Together they’d won, what? Damn near half a million dollars.

Excerpt from ‘Three to Feud’

“Get a move on, Grace. The clock’s ticking.”

Her boyfriend Adam spoke from the doorway. Though they’d worked at the same oil company for over a year, he rarely set foot in her office, clearly considering it a lesser executive’s domain. Unlike his office, hers had only a limited view of downtown Calgary and none at all of the famed Saddledome.

With two years’ experience over her, Adam was on the verge of a senior executive position while she was still assigned mostly routine accounts. It had been a banner day last week when she’d actually got to go to an offsite meeting, carrying a senior partner’s files for her.

Oh, well. It was the way of the world. She was paying her dues.

“I’m ready,” she said, lifting out the overnight bag she’d tucked under her desk. The small bag had felt light as air this morning but now it might as well have been filled with accounting tomes.

She’d already shut down her computer and cleared away the files she’d been working on. She liked to leave an empty desk each night, though perhaps that wasn’t such a good practice, since other people sometimes commented on her apparent lack of work.

At a big oil and gas concern like theirs, you didn’t only need to put in the long hours, you had to be seen to be putting in the long hours.

“You look tired,” Adam told her when she drew near. He dropped an absent kiss on her forehead. “Long day?”

“Yes,” said Grace. “I guess.”

He lifted his eyebrows. “You guess? You’re not sure?”

She tried to explain. “I am tired, yes, but I’m mostly worried.”

“About the trip?”

What else did he think I meant?

“Yes,” she said again, “and about my cousins.”

“Oh, right, the wealthy Walkers.” Adam’s tone put a heavy underline beneath the last three words, as if he was quoting a title. The Wealthy Walkers. A prime time drama, perhaps, or a comedy-horror.

Adam put an arm around her shoulders and steered them both out of the doorway. He started pushing her, ever so subtly, down the hall toward the elevators. Time hadn’t stopped ticking.

Excerpt from ‘Between Us’

“Where are a couple of farm boys when I need them?” Channon Kennedy brushed her horse, Peaches, and rested her head on the side of the large animal’s neck. She liked being around the horses. She could talk to them and not have to worry about someone arguing with her. She’d done enough arguing in the last year for a lifetime.

“I don’t know how I’m going to manage,” she said. She stopped brushing the horse and looked Peaches in the eye. “I’m one person with three horses and a hundred acres. That’s a lot for one person to keep things going.”

The horse snorted, then shook her head.

“I get it. We’ll figure it out.” She sighed and surveyed the stall. According to her father’s notes, there were two farm hands living on the property. She hadn’t seen anyone, but the state of the stall said otherwise. Someone had cleaned it out recently. She’d need to shovel out the muck and add fresh straw, but it could’ve been worse.

Not knowing who lived on the farm was her own fault. She’d been at the house for three days, but had only ventured out during the last hour. Between the guilt over not being home when her father died and mourning the loss of him, she hadn’t wanted to be out in public. She grieved for the end of her relationship with her former boyfriend, Jack, too. The bastard had cheated on her and dumped her for a younger woman. She shouldn’t have been so upset. Getting rid of him should’ve been a relief, but it wasn’t. Seven years was a long time to be with someone, only to be shafted.

Channon climbed the side of the stall and sat on the wooden planks. She leaned against the divider bars between the stables. “I miss the boys the most.” She gripped the shelf along the wall. “I could use their help, yeah, but I miss their friendship. Brian and Shaun were here when no one else cared.”

Peaches shifted around and bumped her head against Channon’s side. Channon hugged the horse. “I miss them. I shouldn’t because we’re horrible when we’re together. I still remember all the times we got into trouble, but it was fun.” 

Excerpt from ‘Healing her Cowboy’

“Well, would you look at that! Jack’s back from town and accompanied by a person of interest, if I’m not mistaken.”

Barrett Thorne followed the direction of Clayton Quinn’s pointing finger. He squinted against the late spring sunshine to better make out the approaching vehicle. It was Jack Quinn’s battered red pickup truck all right. He couldn’t make out who was inside, but gathered from his best friend’s reaction that it must be someone significant. Perhaps it was a new guest, some minor celebrity or other come to spend an exciting two weeks at the Moonglow Dude Ranch, or maybe it was Clayton’s latest planned conquest come to visit the ranch for a date. Barrett shrugged. He had neither time nor patience to indulge Clayton if it was the latter, so he turned to walk away but was stopped by a strong hand on his shoulder.

“Hey, Barrett. Don’t you want to say hello to the new arrival?”

   Barrett froze and took a deep breath. He really had no interest at all in who was coming to the ranch, especially if it was a member of the fairer sex. Especially if it was another of Clayton’s disastrous attempts to try to set Barrett up. He’d told his friend countless times that he wanted nothing to do with women, not now or ever, after what Cara had done to him. Trouble was, it seemed that just as Barrett had no intention of getting into anything again, Clayton had no intention of paying any heed to his protests. He sighed, releasing the air he’d slowly sucked in. “No, Clayton, I don’t want to say hello. I’ve work to do.”

   “Not even to my little sister?” Clayton asked. “It’s been a while since you last saw her. Hell, it’s been a while since I last saw her!” Clayton gave a chuckle, then flung a heavy arm around Barrett’s shoulder and led him toward the ranch’s reception cabin.

Clayton was, and always had been, a good friend to Barrett, but sometimes he didn’t realize how heavy-handed he could be. Had Barrett not been so big himself, he was sure he’d have struggled to accept Clayton’s clumsy, tactile ways. He’d wondered at times how Clayton was so successful with women, but then he guessed some women liked their men to act like large, wild bears.

Excerpt from ‘Cadence Falls’

The town hall was filled to capacity and then some. Amanda waved the leaflet she’d been handed earlier in her face, trying to generate some air flow. The building hadn’t been designed for people to be packed in like sardines. Then again, no one had expected to be faced with the threat of an escaped convict in their midst either. Now, here was the entire population of Pine Bluff, Montana, waiting for the federal law enforcement officer to come out and give them details about what the hell they were going to do.

As she waited, melting little by little, she looked around and her gaze met and locked with Cooper Haith, her once best friend. One of the men she’d thought she’d spend her life with and now the one man she could never be with. Her heart stuttered with remembered love. Remembered pain. She really was masochistic to continue living in the same town with him and not have him.

Did he remember how good it used to be between them? Because she did. His touch, his kiss. Their clumsy fumbling in the tall grass, after riding all afternoon. The bubbling water of Cadence Falls providing the soundtrack to their lovemaking. Of course, back then, they’d also had Everett with them, and it had been absolutely perfect. She’d had their future mapped out, filled with love and laughter, as they worked their own ranch.

But that was a long time ago.

Amanda tore her gaze away from Cooper, acutely aware of him now, and where he stood. Her body flushed with longing and an overwhelming need rushed through her. It was an ache that never went away. Even after all these years, she still wanted him.

Luckily, she was saved from continuing down memory lane with the appearance of the town sheriff at the front of the room. Coyote Leigh McCoy was a tall man, more portly than slim, although she’d seen him move pretty fast once when a horse went on a bucking rampage at the annual Strawberry Festival. Sheriff McCoy had managed to capture the reins and soothe the beast before it trampled the gawking spectators.