by Piper Rayne
There’s a voice in my head saying, ‘What if?’
At that moment he says, “I’m not promising that this is forever, but this might never end. I hope you’re okay with that.”
He takes my mouth, and I feel as if I found the one person who understands me and knows just what to say.
Suddenly I realize that maybe it’s him who I’ve been waiting for all my life. And maybe life isn’t unfair all the time.
Dear Reader,
Thank you so much for buying this anthology and therefor helping The Women's Venture Fund. I love to write about small towns, strong women, and broken billionaires who find love and family in the warmest, quaintest, and unexpected places.
If you enjoyed Maybe It’s You and would love to learn more about my upcoming series Luna Harbor, or would like to meet my other characters make sure to subscribe to my newsletter.
Sending you all my love,
Claudia x
About Claudia Burgoa
Claudia is an award-winning, USA Today bestselling author. She writes alluring, thrilling stories about complicated women and the men who take their breath away. She lives in Denver, Colorado with her husband and her youngest two children. She has a sweet Bichon, Macey, who thinks she’s the ruler of the house. She’s only partially right. When Claudia is not writing, you can find her reading, knitting, or just hanging out with her family. At night, she likes to binge-watch shows with her equally geeky husband.
To find more about Claudia:
website
Sign up for her newsletter: News Letter
Also By Claudia Burgoa
The Baker’s Creek Billionaire Brothers Series
Loved You Once
A Moment Like You
Defying Our Forever
Call You Mine
As We Are
Yours to Keep
September 2021
Luna Harbor (2021/2022)
Finally You
Simply You
Truly You
Always You
Perfectly You
Madly You
Second Chance Sinners Duet
Pieces of Us
Somehow Finding Us
Against All Odds Series
Wrong Text, Right Love
Didn’t Expect You
Love Like Her
Until Next Time
The Spearman Brothers
Maybe Later
Then He Happened
Once Upon a Holiday
Almost Perfect
My One
My One Regret
My One Despair
The Everhart Brothers
Flawed
Fervent
Found
Standalones
Us After You
Someday, Somehow
Chasing Fireflies
Something Like Hate
Until I Fall
Finding My Reason
Christmas in Kentbury
Chaotic Love Duet
Begin with You
Back to You
Unexpected Series
Uncharted
Uncut
Undefeated
Unlike Any Other
Decker the Halls
Co-writing
Holiday with You
Copyright © June 2021 by Megan Ryder
Cover by Bookin’ It Designs
Edited by Crazy Diamond Editorial and Words Between Pages
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, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Cowboy to Remember
Colton Raines is tired of being the bad boy of country music. He’s ready to find what his sister has with her husband, but doesn’t believe it can happen until he meets a sexy woman dancing alone in a bar. Her free spirit and calm center bring him a peace and a fire that he’s never experienced before. But she’s not interested in being another notch in his belt, despite his protests to the contrary.
Sierra Austin has always wanted a place to belong and a home, after a lifetime of being dragged everywhere. The last thing she needs is a man who has wandering feet and a home base far from the small town where she’s established a strong business. But when her emotions become engaged, will she learn that home is where the heart is or where she is planted?
Chapter One
Colton Raines had officially grown up and he wondered where he could lodge a formal complaint.
He studied the cowboys and girls dancing in the small-town bar and drank his beer, pondering his future and his past, and wondering how he’d gotten so damned melancholy when he used to be the life of the party. Of course, he also would never have been caught dead in a small town. He was Nashville—bright lights, big city all the way, but he was liking the small pace of this Granite Junction, his sister’s newly adopted home, thanks to her new husband. Who would have thought he would have changed too?
It’d been kind of an evolution, he supposed, and it was probably about time since he was over thirty, as his parents loved to remind him. Traveling with his band over the past several months, he’d retreated more and more to his hotel room after shows and didn’t party like he used to, skipping bars and afterparties, avoiding groupies and sure things like they were bear traps eager to snap shut and lock him inside.
He’d gotten bored with the whole thing. Hated being the bad boy of country music.
Maybe it came from spending the past few months with his sister, Piper, and her husband, Ty Evans, who was opening for him during this tour. He joked that he didn’t need to hang out with the man who was defiling his baby sister, but the truth was, he was fucking jealous. Seeing their relationship, their loving, playing out in front of him? Yeah, he just might be thinking he wanted some of that. Someone who might be interested in him for something other than his money, his music, or his connections. He certainly wasn’t going to find that on the road, or even in Nashville at his usual haunts.
He tilted back the bottle of beer and let the cool liquid trickle down his throat, soothing the raw vocal cords from doing a couple of sets as a favor to the owner of the bar in Granite Junction. Yeah, finding someone real wasn’t happening anytime soon. Anyone who got close to Colton Raines saw a meal ticket or their name in lights. Even in this podunk town, people knew who he was, and the girls had been on him like flies on shit, even when he was just trying to lie low and have a few weeks’ vacation. A working vacation, anyway. He had a recording date coming up in Nashville, and he needed to compose new material. But inspiration had been hard to come by.
He shoved away from the scarred wood table, the loud scrape of the chair on the floor interrupting his sister and Ty’s make-out session. They broke apart, only slightly guiltily, and stared.
Colton snorted in disgust. “I’m going to take a leak.”
“Nice language. And you wonder why women don’t want you,” his sister stated, a little primly, from her perch on Ty’s lap.
“It’s not that they don’t want me. They do. Well, they want everything else, not me.” Damn, now he sounded like a whiny baby. Poor me, everyone wants me. Boo-hoo.
Fuck, he even made himself sick. Time to regroup.
Ty gave him a sympathetic look, having witnessed it all while on the road with him for the past few months. “I get it, man. You want to head back to the ranch?”
“Nah, I’ve got this.” His sister snuggled closer to her husband and Colt snorted. “Aren’t you supposed to be spending time with the bride-to-be or something? I thought you had bridesmaid duties for Emma.”
She shrugged. “We finished everything and now the girls are all dancing. I’d rather spend my time right here. But if you continue to be a giant baby, I might change my mind.”
He scowled, though she wasn’t wrong. He’d been in a foul temper all evening after he and Ty had sung a few set
s for the Saturday evening crowd here at The Rock. He didn’t mind the singing. He just hated the women who crowded around him, running their hands all over him. He’d retreated to this back table to hide. Pathetic.
He tipped the bottle to drink the remaining beer. “Be right back.”
He weaved his way through the crowd, evading the clutches of sharp-nailed cowgirls, until he came to an abrupt stop near the dance floor. A woman danced with pure abandon, her eyes closed, with Emma and a couple of other women he didn’t know from the bachelorette party. Her painted-on jeans showed the most perfectly rounded ass he’d seen in a long time, the plunging neckline of her V-neck blouse showing just the right amount of cleavage. She was part of the group, yet alone, swaying to the music and singing the words—loudly and not exactly correctly—but she didn’t seem to care. She seemed so free, so loose, so completely comfortable with herself and unconcerned with the world around her.
She opened her eyes and met his stare, a half-smile playing about her lips and a faint challenge in her gaze. Something about her drew him in and he had to meet her, a woman who didn’t have the same calculating gleam in her eye when she looked at him but saw the man standing there and appreciated him.
Sierra Austin let the music wash over her and sweep away all of her troubles. The evening had actually been a lot of fun, celebrating Emma Holt’s upcoming wedding. Since it was Emma, the bachelorette party hadn’t exactly been tame or rated G either. In fact, it had only reminded Sierra that, while she was lucky to have found such great friends, she was being left behind again as they made their ways down the paths of marriage and motherhood. Meanwhile, Sierra continued her solitary pursuit of building her day spa business and making sure she always had her ducks in a row. And damn if that didn’t suck.
Of course, having her mother drop in unexpectedly and plan to stay a while had just about knocked all of that out of the water and threatened to completely skewer her plans. Now she had to keep an eye on good old Mom and make sure she didn’t get up to her tricks, even as she promised she’d turned over a new leaf after a short stint in prison. Yeah, she’d heard that story as a kid, and too many times to count. Usually just after she and her mother had slunk out of town in the middle of the night and into some new guy’s place.
This time will be different, Sierra. He’s the one.
Only it never was, and the men never stuck around.
Molly, her friend and fellow small business owner, had dragged her out tonight and refused to let her stick to soda. She’d handed her the first of several shots with the comment, “You’re drinking for two since I can’t. I’m still nursing the little guy. First night away from the baby and Momma needs some freedom.”
If Sierra wanted to be honest, she hadn’t really cut loose in years and whatever Zane put in those pink shots he served in the back room of The Rock packed one hell of a wallop. It didn’t help that they tasted good and everyone was passing them around like water. When Emma announced she was ready for some dancing, Sierra allowed herself to be dragged onto the dance floor to recreate her youth.
God, she sounded a thousand years old. She was just thirty-one, but she felt like she’d lived so much more than some of Emma’s friends. The other women Sierra knew, including Molly, had already all retreated home to their husbands and young children, but Sierra was feeling a bit reckless and needed to blow off steam, always a dangerous combination. It had gotten her into trouble when she was younger, but what the hell? She deserved a little break. Maybe she’d meet someone and have some fun for the night, though she wasn’t convinced there was anyone for her out there, at least not in Granite Junction.
It didn’t help that her friends had put romantic songs on the jukebox. That, combined with the alcohol and the upcoming wedding, made her regretful of some of the choices she’d made and made her long for . . . something else. At the bare minimum, she didn’t need the reminder of romance, love, passion, and, most importantly, sex. Then, one of her favorite Dierks Bentley songs had come on, twisting that knife deeper.
“Hello, pretty lady. Wanna dance?”
Sierra froze mid-grind and opened her eyes. The hottest man she had ever seen was leaning against the jukebox, his dark hair carelessly falling over one eye, dark jeans cupping what promised to be a truly fine ass, judging by the way they outlined a very nice front. For the first time in a long time, she felt the stirrings of desire and the interest in actually doing something about it. Or that could be the pink shooters she’d done. It didn’t really matter. She needed a distraction and Lord knew the alcohol hadn’t been doing it for her. Maybe some hot sex with a stranger might erase the memories, blow off some tension, and help her forget her life was a bit off the rails right now.
Colton Raines. Country music star and Piper’s brother. Everyone knew Colt, or thought they did, from the tabloids and television. He’d spent very little time in Granite Junction but was visiting his sister out at Redemption Ranch. Damn, he was hot. And temporary. A visitor in their town, and, with his busy schedule, would rarely come back. The perfect choice for an evening of hot, sweaty sex. Go big or go home.
She let what she hoped was a sexy smile cross her face and scanned his body in a slow perusal. “You think you can handle this?”
He pushed off the jukebox and sauntered over to her, a half-smile on his face that said he knew exactly how sexy he appeared. “I think I have a few moves.”
He held out his hand and she took it, letting him pull her against his firm body and into a slow, sexy sway to the song about coming closer and laying her down. She loved this song, had always fantasized about dancing to it with someone special, maybe having it mean something.
She never would have imagined dancing to it with Colt Raines, but he could fulfill her fantasy for one song…maybe one night. He certainly knew how to dance and hold a girl in his arms. She found herself softening against him, laying her head against his shoulder, breathing in his clean, male scent that ignited a slow burn deep inside.
The song ended and segued into another with a slow, sexy beat—one of her favorites. She hummed quietly with the music, then began singing the words under her breath.
“You love to sing,” he murmured, his breath tickling her ear.
She glanced up, his face still a little blurry from the alcohol she’d drunk. “I get points for enthusiasm if not for accuracy or being on tune. Not like you.”
She flushed, wishing she hadn’t said anything, hadn’t wanted to ruin the moment by admitting she knew who he was. She hoped it would get awkward. He stiffened but when she didn’t say anything else, he slowly relaxed.
He arched his eyebrow, studying her carefully. “Enthusiasm beats boredom any day. It’s nice seeing someone enjoy music like you do.”
She grinned. “Well, I have that in spades then. As long as my butchering your music doesn’t offend you.”
He shrugged. “Nope. Long as you enjoy it, I’m a happy guy. I live to please and all that jazz. Clearly you know who I am. I hope that won’t be a problem. I’m staying out at Redemption Ranch for a while. Friend of the family, sort of. Not working there.”
She laughed, her eyes crinkling with amusement. “Why would it be a problem? If Ty and the guys don’t mind you sitting around while they work hard on the ranch, that’s not my problem. You’re definitely not a cowboy or ranch hand.”
He frowned, looking offended at her words. “I’m on vacation. And besides, I’ve worked on ranches before. I can work a herd, even castrate the bulls, though that’s not a job I’d like to do again.” He gave a shudder and she laughed.
“It’s not that. It’s the way you look. You don’t walk like you ride a horse all day. And your hands. Clearly not a working man’s hands. And your boots.” She followed his gaze down to his black cherry, alligator leather Lucchese boots and snorted. “Poser.”
His eyebrow rose. “Do you know what these boots cost?”
“Doesn’t matter what they cost as long as you can muck out a barn with them.”
>
He looked horrified at the very thought. “These boots will never see the inside of a stable. They’re more for the stage.”
She rolled her eyes and shook her head. He pulled a hand off her waist and stroked it over the soft spot behind her ear and down her neck, the feel of calluses on the tips of his fingers sending a shiver down her body. He smirked at her reaction and she grinned.
“So you have calluses. They’re still not working man hands.”
He leaned back, cocking his head down at her. “I give up. What will it take to impress you?”
She blinked at him, sensing she had somehow pushed him a little too far with her teasing and she wasn’t quite ready to say goodnight to Colt Raines. She was enjoying herself. He was witty, charming, a helluva good dancer. And he had other qualities that made him the perfect choice for a fun, forgettable evening, which was all she was going for. Not local, check. Not a loser, check. And he was attracted to her, check. Three very good qualities to recommend him, not to mention that she found him sexy and wouldn’t have to face him every day of her life so he was the ideal candidate for a one-night stand.
“You don’t need to impress me, cowboy. Just show me a good time. Wanna have some fun?”
Chapter Two
Colt wasn’t sure why her question rubbed him the wrong way. Lord knew the old Colt would have jumped at that exact opportunity. Hell, the old Colt was only a few months ago, in reality, yet he no longer wanted to just be the guy women could have a good time with, have a quick one night or so, and go on their merry ways. It figured. The one time he decided he wanted more and found a woman who intrigued him, and she was the one looking for a good time.
