by Laurel Kerr
Also by Laurel Kerr
Where the Wild Hearts Are
Wild On My Mind
Thank you for downloading this Sourcebooks eBook!
You are just one click away from…
• Being the first to hear about author happenings
• VIP deals and steals
• Exclusive giveaways
• Free bonus content
• Early access to interactive activities
• Sneak peeks at our newest titles
Happy reading!
CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP
Books. Change. Lives.
Copyright © 2019 by Erin Laurel O’Brien
Cover and internal design © 2019 by Sourcebooks
Cover design by Caroline Teagle
Cover images © Jacob Lund/Fotolia, AARTI/Fotolia, olga_gl/Fotolia, Margarita kazanovich/EyeEm/Getty Images
Sourcebooks and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks.
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
All brand names and product names used in this book are trademarks, registered trademarks, or trade names of their respective holders. Sourcebooks is not associated with any product or vendor in this book.
Published by Sourcebooks Casablanca, an imprint of Sourcebooks
P.O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4410
(630) 961-3900
sourcebooks.com
Contents
Front Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Epilogue
Author’s Note
Acknowledgments
Excerpt from Wild on My Mind
About the Author
Back Cover
For my mother: my first fan and on-call babysitter
For my husband: for all the loads of laundry he did so this book could be written
For my daughter: who has graciously allowed Mommy writing time
Chapter 1
“You must be new to Sagebrush Flats.”
Magnus Gray reluctantly turned in the direction of the friendly southern drawl. The speaker matched the rich, sexy voice. Blond. Willowy. Tall. Bonny green eyes. Pink lips curved into a welcoming smile.
Magnus didn’t trust the woman’s grin, so he chose to respond with a neutral expression…not surly enough to be rude, but not pleasant enough to invite further conversation. Unfortunately, the American lass didn’t register the subtlety.
Instead, she slid into the booth across from him. This time, Magnus couldn’t stop a frown. In fact, he even might have growled a bit under his breath. He didn’t want to chat. Couldn’t the hen see his open laptop?
“I’m June Winters.” The woman beamed like the desert sun.
He grunted. Under good circumstances, he hated introducing himself. Even after years of practice, he always stuttered on the letter M in his name.
And this? This was not a good circumstance.
“You don’t need to be a stranger, you hear? You’re welcome to join the celebration. The more, the merrier!” The woman still smiled. Even for a Yank, she was a damn Cheshire cat. Without breaking eye contact, she waved her hand in the direction of a group of rowdy locals congregated around a rustic bar decorated with antlers. Some people might have found the decor quaint, but not Magnus. He’d given up quaint when he’d finally escaped his boyhood home on a remote Scottish isle in the North Sea that was part of the chain of islands that made up Orkney.
Despite his silence, the woman kept blethering. “My friend and her husband just found out they’re going to have twins. The whole town is just as happy as ants at a picnic. Drinks are on the house, well, all except for the new mama-to-be. She’s having sparkling grape juice!”
Magnus could only stare at the woman in disbelief. This was why he avoided small towns. All the endless gossip. Why would he want to know about her friend’s drinking habits or the fact that she had a trout in the well? Next, the lass would be telling him just when and where her friends had shagged to conceive the bairns.
He’d chafed under the scrutiny that came with growing up on an isle with a population of less than five hundred. No privacy. No boundaries. No peace. Even though he’d lived with his da on a speck of an island offshore from the larger one, he’d still found himself entangled in the sticky threads of town gossip. They’d trapped him as surely as a spider’s silk did a struggling beetle. Against the odds, he’d broken free…only for his editor to send him straight into another web. A dusty, arid one, at that.
At nineteen, Magnus had penned his first book between his shifts as a roughneck on an oil rig off the coast of Norway. His muscles had ached, and the constant cold had seeped so deeply into his skin, he’d sworn even his molecules had ice crystals growing in them. But despite the dogged tiredness, he’d used the precious hours meant for sleeping to write about his childhood as if he could purge it from his soul.
It hadn’t worked. Not completely. But the publishing world, and then the public, had loved his cathartic musings about his formative years on a struggling, windblown croft surrounded by the ever-present sea. When he’d hit bestseller lists all over the world, the media had billed him as a wunderkind.
Intoxicated by his first success, he’d quickly written a second book about his adventures in Norway. While working on the ice, he’d encountered a pair of orphaned polar bear cubs that he’d rescued from starvation and kept alive until they could be relocated to a zoo. His fans had adored the tale.
With all the dosh he made from his first books, he’d left the roughneck life behind and headed to Glasgow. Then a few years later, he’d moved to the welcome obscurity of London. In a city of over eight million, no one cared if a man chose to sup alone. Since his author photo was taken from the back with him staring out at the sea, no one recognized him. He could eat, drink, and write in peace. Nobody expected him to converse or even to make small talk. After a childhood on a remote island, he’d finally found solitude and peace in the teeming crowds of one of the largest cities in Europe.
But the public didn’t like his wry witticisms about city life. Sales from his next two books plummeted. And that had led to the fateful call with his editor a few weeks ago. Magnus could still hear the man’s rough Bostonian accent growling in his ear.
People aren’t buying your urban jungle crap. You’ve gotten too acerbic. Too much misanthropy and too little humor. Get back to your roots. Small towns. Living creatures. I know the perfect place for you. It’s been all over the internet, a zoo in a place called Sagebrush Flats. It’s got the animal angle from your first books, but in a different enough locale so it’ll be fresh. Go work there for a season. Write about it. That, that I can
sell. The other stuff, I can’t.
Because Magnus preferred to keep his current lifestyle and not go back to being a roughneck, he once again found himself in the back of beyond. The idea of shoveling manure again didn’t bother him. Animals and their shite he could take. But the human kind? Aye, that was the problem.
Across from him, the bonny blond still beamed. Welcoming. Charming. Sweet. And he didn’t believe any of it. She’d plopped her arse down in the booth across from him for one reason and one reason only. Gossip. She wanted to be the very first to meet the hulking stranger so she could blether to her friends about him the following morn. Magnus wasn’t a chap who typically attracted the lasses, especially those as braw as the likes of this one.
“I swear none of us bite,” the woman joked and waited a beat for Magnus to speak. He didn’t. If he did, he knew he’d block on at least one of the words. Unfortunately, the woman stayed. “We’re all very friendly.”
Magnus longed for a big city with its pubs and cafés where a man could find solitude among millions of strangers. Really, anything but a dusty town where the only establishments open on a Monday night were a pizza take-out shop and a curious American diner-restaurant-bar hybrid called the Prairie Dog Café. It had all the ills of a local British pub and none of the charm. The assortment of old farm equipment and elk antlers tacked to the walls wasn’t to Magnus’s fancy. Give him an ancient stone building in London with a cheerful fire to chase away the dreich, and he’d be content.
“Come on,” the blond insisted as she rose from the table. Magnus shook his head, but the lass didn’t listen. She reached forward and grabbed his hand. At the unexpected contact, Magnus jerked back, jamming his elbow hard against the wooden booth. He didn’t like being touched, especially by a stranger. He appreciated even less the strange jolt of awareness zipping through him. He didn’t want to lust after the dafty woman.
Surprise showed in the blond’s leaf-green eyes. “I beg your pardon. I didn’t mean to startle you.”
Baws. Now it would be all over town that he was a nervous numptie. Anger and frustration whipped inside Magnus like the furious polar winds of the North. Worse, his larynx muscles tightened ominously, and he felt his chest constrict. If he tried to speak, tried to explain that he wanted to be left alone, he’d never manage to force the words out. His neck would stiffen, and his tongue would feel thick and useless as it stuck to the roof of his mouth. He’d be left as helpless as a carp flopping on a trawler’s deck. The welcome in those green eyes would turn to shock and then discomfort and finally to disgust or, worse, pity. Within a bloody night, the whole town would know about his stutter. They might even give him a nickname like his schoolmates had.
His cheeks burned, and he was grateful his thick beard hid the redness from the lass’s prying eyes. The woman stood there expectantly, clearly waiting for a response.
Magnus grabbed his laptop, the hasty movement upsetting his ale. Quickly mopping up the liquid with one hand, he shoved his computer in his messenger bag with the other. Placing the sodden napkins in a neat pile, he stood up. Although the lass was tall and willowy, his massive frame still dwarfed hers. He expected her eyes to widen at his full height. Most folks’ did upon first meeting him. But instead of a flash of leftover primordial fear, he thought he spotted something else entirely…appreciation.
Lust speared him. Strong and heady. It was an attraction Magnus didn’t want to feel, especially when it tangled his tongue worse than driftwood caught in a fishing net.
He pushed past the lass. He had no choice but to brush against her shoulder since she was blocking his exit from the booth like an auld fairy stone. As his large body collided softly with her slender one, he swore her heat seared him.
“Wait,” the woman said, “I didn’t mean to chase you away like a bluetick hound after a possum. Let me at least replace your beer.”
Magnus swung toward the lass, no longer caring how rude he’d become. He was either going to make a fool or an arse out of himself. And having been both, he much preferred the second. Asses got more respect than jesters. Even if he couldn’t find the rhythm to explain himself, there was one phrase he could always force out.
“Fuck off.”
The lass’s lower jaw dropped slightly, revealing that she’d understood his deep Orcadian Scots accent. Instead of looking ridiculous with her mouth agape, the lass’s perfect pink lips formed a rather seductive O. Not waiting for his body’s reaction to that particular observation to become apparent, Magnus stormed from the Prairie Dog Café. As he burst out into the twilight, he greedily turned his face in the direction of the cool evening breeze. The restaurant had been roasting. Although Sagebrush in early January was much cooler than what he’d expected for the desert, the air still felt thin and dry. Aye, he missed the familiar damp of Britain.
Shoving his hands deep into his pockets, Magnus slouched as he ambled down the street. He’d been waiting all day for that ruined draught and a bit of relaxation after a long flight. Perhaps he’d have better luck in the morn at the tea shop on the corner. It looked pleasant with its lavender-painted facade and lace curtains in the windows. He’d checked the menu online. The owner claimed her nan was British, and some of the items sounded surprisingly authentic. It was one of the few things Magnus was looking forward to in Sagebrush. Knowing his luck, it probably would turn out to be the favorite haunt of the blond, although she was probably too busy getting blootered to make it to the tea shop as early as he planned.
* * *
“What was that all about?” June’s best friend, Katie, asked as she appeared, holding a glass of sparkling grape juice. She had her other fingers spread wide over the slight swell of her stomach. June didn’t think Katie even realized that she’d barely moved her hand from her belly all evening. The new mama simply radiated protective affection for her unborn twins. Scientists claimed hormones caused the pregnancy glow, but June believed it sprang from pure love, and Katie had always been a big softie when it came to family.
“That man just told me to fuck off,” June said, still unable to shake her disbelief at the man’s rudeness. Her atypical feeling of annoyance only spiked when Katie gave an exaggerated snort, her mass of red curls bouncing.
“Josh,” Katie shouted over to their mutual friend from college who was in town for the weekend to celebrate her good news. “You won’t believe it. Some guy actually told June to fuck off.”
“Well, he didn’t tell me to fuck off exactly. It was more like ‘feck aff.’”
“Suu-uure,” Katie said before she took a long sip from her flute of grape juice. “Totally different.”
Josh sauntered over to join them, his West Coast designer clothes looking slightly out of place in the sea of flannel and jeans. “What’s this I hear about some guy giving June the brush-off?”
“My word, you’d think no one has ever been rejected before in the history of mankind.”
“Oh, we all have, June. Just not you.” Josh slung an arm over her shoulder in a brotherly gesture. Although he’d moved back to California after college to start his own computer security company, the three of them had remained close. “What did this guy look like anyway?”
“From the back, not June’s usual type,” Katie said. “Too hairy. Too beefcakey.”
“Too rude,” June added.
Katie’s husband, Bowie, walked over to them and pulled his wife against his side. The two had been married less than six months, and they still basked in the honeymoon glow. June had a suspicion, though, they’d probably be this adorably sweet when they were in their nineties, and she was never wrong when it came to matters of the heart.
“Who’s a rude, hairy beefcake?” Bowie asked.
“June’s unrequited love.” Katie stood up on her tiptoes to brush a quick kiss across her husband’s mouth, even though they’d only been separated for a matter of minutes.
June found the coup
le’s affection incredibly sweet. Josh, though, had a tendency to tease them. When she spotted him starting to roll his eyes, she jabbed him in the stomach with her elbow. This was Katie and Bowie’s evening, and she didn’t want anything to ruin it, even good-natured ribbing.
Before Josh could protest, June said quickly, “Heavens to Betsy, I was just making nice to the man. I don’t know why y’all are turning it into a declaration of love. It wasn’t as if I was flirting.”
At her last statement, all three of her friends burst into uncontrollable laughter. June glared at them. Katie got herself under control first. “June, you flirt with every guy. It’s how you interact with the entire male population of our species.”
“Our species? Have you seen how she gets with the cute animals at Bowie’s zoo?” Josh asked.
June popped Josh on the arm, but she couldn’t argue with Katie. She was a flirt. “Well, maybe I was flirting just a smidge, but I was only being welcoming to a stranger. Like Katie said, he’s not my usual type.” June liked her lovers to be as easygoing as herself. A romance should be as delightful and pleasant as sweet jam made from the first spring pickings. It should not have the drama and devastation of a fall hurricane, and Mr. Rude seemed to have the personality of a tempest, a tornado, and a tsunami all rolled into one godforsaken storm.
Plus, June liked her men tall, but not hulking. There was nothing like a refined runner’s build that looked delicious in a suit or just jeans and cowboy boots. Although hair color didn’t matter, she preferred her lovers clean cut with no beard and not even a hint of a five-o’clock shadow.
Yes, June enjoyed handsome, debonair men. She supposed it was from all those classic films she’d watched with her mama. When her father moved the family from one air force base to another, the black-and-white movies had remained a comforting constant. No matter what part of the globe they lived on, Errol Flynn, Clark Gable, and Gregory Peck still possessed those devastating smiles that melted a woman’s worries clean away.
