Cowboy 12 Pack
Page 65
When Lt. Camilla Walker’s CO asks her to help out at his family’s dude ranch until he returns from deployment, she never expected to be thrust into a mistaken engagement to his sexy, cowboy twin—a former Navy SEAL who hates the Corps.
The Corps took Finn’s father, his girlfriend and threatened his naval career. He’s worked hard for another shot at getting back to active duty and won’t let his brother’s prank interfere. The last thing he needs is the temptation of a headstrong, unyielding, hot Marine getting in the way.
**♥**
She Does Know Jack
A Romantic Comedy Mystery Suspense
by Donna Michaels
**NOR Reviewer Top Pick**
Former Army Ranger Capt. Jack ‘Dodger’ Anderson would rather run naked through a minefield in the Afghan desert than participate in a reality television show, but when his brother Matthew begins to receive threats, Jack quickly becomes Matthew’s shadow. As if the investigation isn’t baffling enough, he has to contend with the addition of a beautiful and vaguely familiar new contestant.
Security specialist, Brielle Chapman reluctantly agrees to help her uncle by going undercover as a contestant on the Meet Your Mate reality show. Having nearly failed on a similar assignment, she wants to prove she still has a future in this business. But when the brother of the groom turns out to be Dodger, the only one-nighter she ever had—while in disguise from a prior undercover case—her job becomes harder. Does he recognize her? And how can she investigate with their sizzling attraction fogging her brain? Determined to finish the job, she brings the case to a surprising climax, uncovers the culprit and meets her own mate.
**♥**
Time-shift Heroes Series
Book One: Captive Hero
**2012 RONE Awards Nominee Best Time Travel**
**NOR Reviewer Top Pick**
**2013 Reader’s Crown Finalist**
When Marine Corps test pilot, Captain Samantha Sheppard accidentally flies back in time and inadvertently saves the life of a WWII VMF Black Sheep pilot, she changes history and makes a crack decision to abduct him back to the present. With the timeline in jeopardy, she hides the handsome pilot at her secluded cabin in the Colorado wilderness.
But convincing her sexy, stubborn captive that he is now in another century proves harder than she anticipated—and soon it becomes difficult to tell who is captor and who is captive when the more he learns about the future, the more Sam discovers about the past, and the soul-deep connection between them.
As their flames of desire burn into overdrive, her flying Ace makes a historical discovery that threatens her family’s very existence. Sam’s fears are taken to new heights when she realizes the only way to fix the time-line is to sacrifice her captive hero…or is it? Can love truly survive the test of time?
Time-shift Heroes Series
Visit my Time-shift Heroes Series Page for release information and updates!
Book One: Captive Hero
Book Two: Future Hero
Book Three: Unintended Hero
Thanks for reading!
I am Not Your Melody
Shoshanna Evers
‡
Stand-alone Prequel to the Bunking with the Cowboys Series
a Bear Creek Saddle short novel
“Big Bad Bill” Edwards, the biggest, baddest cowboy in Bear Creek Saddle, Idaho, has only gotten meaner in the years since his bride Melody died young…
Allie, a bartender from Miami, has no idea what she’s getting into when she buys half-ownership of the sexy, broken cowboy’s late uncle’s bar. She’d thought they’d built a friendship based on several months of emails back and forth. But in person, Big Bad Bill will do anything to keep her at arm’s length… only he can’t. The man is sinfully sexy trouble—big trouble. Especially since Allie is just one year out from when her cheating ex destroyed their marriage.
How can Bill and Allie be together if their hearts can’t handle the risk of breaking once more?
Bill has just three rules for dealing with Allie: Don’t kill her. Don’t kiss her. And above all, don’t fall in love…not ever again.
© 2015 Shoshanna Evers
I am Not Your Melody © 2015 Shoshanna Evers
Cover art by Rob Sturtz www.SelfPubBookCovers.com
Electronic book publication, Copyright © 2015 Shoshanna Evers
All Rights Reserved.
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons living or dead or places, events or locations is coincidental.
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each reader. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to the ebook store of your choice and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Chapter One
‡
THE LOW GAS light on Allie Crawford’s dash had been flashing for the last fifteen miles. She’d make it to Melody Ranch though, she had to. There was no more money in her bank account or cash in her wallet to fill up, in any case. But she’d never get there if she kept driving around in circles.
Cold wind found its way into the car’s back passenger-seat window, since it wouldn’t close that last eighth of an inch. And this wasn’t Miami-cold, aka sixty degrees Fahrenheit. No. It was only November and yet up here in the mountains of north Idaho, it may as well have been winter.
Then again, Allie had no clue what a real mountain winter was like, so, maybe this was normal “fall” weather here in Bear Creek Saddle?
She sighed. The small town—well, small in number (648 residents, according to the Welcome sign) but huge if you took into account the sprawling acreage—was laid out in a way no developer ever would have planned. Large mountains, evergreen trees, lakes, and creeks interrupted the land, and the roads followed the landscape—no matter how twisty and turny things got. Allie couldn’t even imagine having to traverse the roads when they were covered in ice and snow.
“I’m a reverse snowbird,” she murmured.
Everyone else goes south for winter, and Allie goes north. Of course.
Melody Ranch wasn’t easy to find, despite her GPS’s best efforts. It was as if the road to the ranch didn’t really exist. She’d need to get directions from a local.
A sign that read “Ginger’s General Store” caught her eye. Allie pulled over on the main street in town, sighing with relief when she got out of the car. Finally, a chance to stretch her legs.
She smoothed her clothes, rumpled from the seatbelt. At the Washington/Idaho border, she’d stopped at a rest stop and changed out of her comfy jeans and T-shirt into her emerald-green blouse, black pants, and heels from Payless that looked more expensive than they’d cost (to her eyes, at least).
This was her new life in a new town, and Allie intended on dressing the part of “successful business owner” starting with her very first face-to-face meeting with Bill Edwards. Which—if she managed to actually locate him—would be shortly.
But really, after the several months of email interaction they’d had, the cattle rancher who’d sold her a fifty percent share of his late uncle’s bar business (along with the apartment above the bar) wasn’t a stranger. Despite Bill Edwards’ no-nonsense emails at first, it hadn’t taken long for his personality and glimpses of life on Melody Ranch to shine through in his writing.
She liked to read his emails to herself in his accent, which she’d heard in one brief phone call early on. “Wait’ll you see the stars up here on a clear night, Allie… in the summer the guys an’ I camp out jus’ to see ’em. Yeah, city-girl, I’ll teach ya to build a campfire they ain’t never seen in Miami… You’re gonna love it here.”
Now, though they’d never met—and she’d never even seen a pic of him for goodness sake, despite some late-night Googling—Allie knew him. He’d t
old her too much for him to be a stranger when they finally got to meet in person. They got along really well (online, at least). Maybe when they met, she’d skip the handshake and go straight to a hug?
There was something sexy about Bill. Nothing overt, just… hot. Dominant, maybe. His very alpha-maleness came through his emails.
Allie shook her head. It was silly to have feelings for a man she’d never met.
If she had contacted Bill to tell him she’d be showing up earlier than they’d agreed on, then he could have said no. And if he’d said no, she’d be screwed. Her money was tied up in the bar, and rent was due in Miami. She needed that apartment now, not in two weeks.
Better to ask for forgiveness than ask for permission, right? That’s exactly what she’d do when the man from the emails finally stood before her.
As soon as she figured out how to find him.
A bell rang to announce Allie’s presence when she pulled open the door to the general store. The place was a huge departure from the franchised, big-box stores she always shopped in, in Miami. Wooden tables were set up around the open space, each covered with a selection of goods. On one table, crates of fresh produce with “local” scrawled on a black chalkboard sign. On another table, piles of used paperbacks, fifty cents apiece. And there was jam, lined up in beautiful glass jars, hand-labeled with an artisan touch. Then there were the… fish hooks. And buckets of hard wheat.…
General, indeed.
“Good mornin’,” the middle-aged woman behind the register counter called. “We just got in more huckleberry jam, if that’s what you’re lookin’ for!”
“Um…” Allie looked from the table of jam to the woman. It hadn’t occurred to her to look for huckleberry jam, but now that the woman mentioned, it did look good.
No money. Right.
“Haven’t seen you before,” the woman said, stepping out from behind the counter. Her T-shirt proclaimed I MAKE QUILTS. WHAT’S YOUR SUPERPOWER?
“I’m moving here, actually.” Allie smiled.
Bill had already warned her that news spread fast in a small town, and so her first impression on folks was even more important here than it would be if she were moving to a big city, where she could’ve counted on being relatively anonymous. Like that country song said, “Everybody Dies Famous in a Small Town.”
“Oh, how wonderful!” the woman effused, her round face expressing a mix of surprise and interest. “No one ever moves here, pretty much ever. I’m Ginger by the way, it’s on the sign.”
“Allie Crawford.” She tamped down her exhaustion from the road trip, and frustration with trying to find the ranch, so that she could smile warmly as she shook Ginger’s hand.
“What can I do ya for?” Ginger asked. She said in the sort of way a person asks when they actually want to know, rather than out of courtesy. “I saw you eyein’ the fishin’ hooks. We got fishin’ licenses here too, if ya need one.”
Allie laughed—she wouldn’t know how to fish if her life depended on it—but the offer hadn’t been a joke, so she stopped and just shook her head.
“I just can’t seem to find Melody Ranch,” she sighed, some of her earlier frustration creeping back into her voice. “I’m looking for Mr. Bill Edwards?”
Ginger raised her eyebrows, and meandered over to the big front windows of the store, where she peered out to stare at Allie’s car.
“Florida plates,” she mused. “Long way to go to find Big Bad Bill.”
Big Bad Bill? Is she talking about the same Bill?
“Um…yes,” Allie said. “He’s expecting me.”
That wasn’t exactly true. He was expecting her two weeks from now. But when the first of the month came, she would’ve either had to pay another month of rent or leave her apartment. The long road trip cross-country from Florida to north Idaho was the best option.
She’d wait for the grand tour—and the keys—until Bill could show her the bar they now shared. Back in Miami, she’d thought she would be too excited to do anything else when she got here. That she’d roll into town, pull right up in front of “her” bar, and… what? Pee on the place to mark her territory? Plant a flag like she was on the moon?
Instead, Allie was content to find Bill first thing—her one and only contact in the whole state of Idaho.
Maybe her avoidance was a little bit because she was terrified. She might take one look at the building and business she’d bought a fifty percent share of sight unseen—relying only on emails and photos from a man who technically really was a complete stranger—and start freaking out.
What if she’d made a huge mistake?
Ginger shrugged her shoulders. “You prob’ly want to see Zach, or Eric. Or you know, Chris or Jay. Any of them can help you—the boys practically run the place now.”
“The boys… Bill has children?” Allie asked. He never told me that.
The woman laughed uproariously. “Could you imagine? Oh, you are a firecracker!” She paused to wipe her eyes, which had teared up at the apparent hilarity of Allie’s question.
“I take it Bill Edwards isn’t the children…type?” While Allie and Bill had never found a reason to speak about kids, it was surprising to hear that about him.
Maybe Allie and Ginger were talking about two different Bill Edwards at Melody Ranch.
Okay, not likely.
“No,” Ginger said, “I guess they ain’t really boys no-more—his ranchhands. Time flies, don’t it? Seems like yesterday they were runnin’ in here for pop after school, on their way to the ranch to work… but I guess that was oh, ten years ago?”
Ginger groaned, as if suddenly realizing a decade had passed without her noticing. “I tell ya, time flies, it just flies. Can’t even call ’em boys any more. Handsome young men, all four of ’em. Smart, too. It’s no wonder Big Bad Bill let ’em take over everythin’!”
Allie smiled, still unsure of what was going on. The whole Big Bad Bill thing was disconcerting, as if she were about to encounter a villainous wolf.
“You married?” Ginger asked, a glint in her eye.
Allie grit her teeth. Of course, Ginger had no idea that was an extremely sore subject. Wasn’t her fault. But if Allie told the woman her former husband of ten short months had run away with his secretary, it would be all over town by nightfall.
The judge had annulled their marriage, as if it had never happened at all. She didn’t have to consider herself a divorcée. She’d just keep her own business to herself, thankyouverymuch. In Bear Creek Saddle, only Bill knew her past.
“Nope,” Allie said, in response to Ginger’s question. “Not married.”
“The boys at Melody Ranch are single too, ya know,” Ginger said.
Quite the matchmaker, very subtle.
It was flattering actually, considering Ginger couldn’t really know if Allie was a good match, and yet the woman was already trying to pair her up with a cowboy from the ranch. Allie’s choice out of four, no less. That could be awesome… but she’d already decided that staying away from men was probably the safest way to avoid having her heart torn in two again.
Her ex’s betrayal still stung, even a year later.
“Maybe the boys could help me,” Allie said, trying to turn the conversation away from dating and back around to getting directions. “But… Bill Edwards is at Melody Ranch, right? I can find him there?”
The woman leaned in close, as if she were about to tell a secret. Allie looked around. There was literally no one else in the shop.
Still, Ginger dropped her voice. “I don’t know what business you’ve got with Bill that ya can’t take care of with the boys, but I wish you luck, that’s all I’m sayin’. You seem like a sweet girl. Keep yer chin up, and don’t let ’im scare you.”
“Scare me?” Allie swallowed hard. Maybe she’d been duped. Catfished. “Ginger, is he… dangerous?”
This time, the woman did not laugh. “No. Not dangerous. Jus’ mean.” She stopped abruptly, and took a breath, her demeanor back to friendly
-shop-owner mode. “No one blames Bill, though, bless ’im. A man shouldn’t have to lose his wife so young.”
Hmm.
Ginger shook her head as if to clear her thoughts. “Well, anyway that’s just my opinion. If you get yourself into any trouble with Big Bad Bill, I betcha one of the boys on the ranch’ll come to the rescue.” She smiled.
“Why do you keep calling him that?” Allie asked. Please don’t be because he’s a criminal or con artist.
“Oh, just a silly nickname,” Ginger said, waving her hand as if to brush the connotation of the nickname off. “Ya know, ’cause Bill Edwards is the biggest, baddest cowboy in town. We know it, he knows it, an’ I guess pretty soon you will too!” This time, her laughter kicked up, softening the words.
Ginger pointed out the big window. “Look, honey—you just need to take Pleasantview all the way ’round till ya hit the foot of the mountain. Drive past the train tracks and make a right. You’ll start seein’ signs, and smell the cows.”
Allie repeated the directions back to the woman, grateful to finally know where she was going. “Thank you for…all of that information.” She backed out of the shop quickly, before she could get caught up in another long conversation.
Ginger called to her as Allie was already climbing back into her car. “Whatcha need to see Bill about, anyways?”
After everything the woman had told her about “Big Bad Bill,” Allie didn’t doubt that anything she’d told the woman would never stay quiet. She pretended not to hear the question.
“Thanks!” Allie called back over her shoulder. “See ya next time!”
*
A HALF HOUR later, Allie pulled up to a large log entrance-way that declared she had finally found her destination. The ranch was huge, and she couldn’t possibly be seeing all of it. Cattle grazed peacefully—despite the cold weather that morning—on either side of her car, on fields that went on forever. Only the farm buildings and the mountains broke up the skyline. An old ranch farmhouse loomed on the left. Pickup trucks were parked in the gravel lot outside of it.