Chapter1
No turning back now.Oh, crap.
Lola St. James grabbed the handle of the U-Haul truck so freaking tight her fingers whitened. She blew out a gutful of air and looked across the passenger seat. Pepper, her French bulldog, gazed at her with pricked ears. Could he read her mind? She released the door handle, and slid out of the vehicle, creating a puff of dust as her Louboutins scraped the ground and crunched dry leaves. The wave of scorching heat slapped her face and reminded her that Texan summers, much like Texas men, were brutally hot. But she refused to think about Jack Canyon, her estranged husband. The prick.
With a deep sigh, she stood, entranced at the amazing, red-brick homestead. A huge overhanging roof sheltered the wraparound deck. It had been over two years since her last visit, yet the porch still invited her to take a load off in a place that had never truly been hers. Only on paper. She eased the kinks out of her neck stretching toward the sky. Her body ached from the relentless driving, and nothing short of a hot bath and intravenous Vicodin wouldhelp.
Drawing a breath, she turned back to the vehicle, which contained the last remaining scraps of her glamorous life in Los Angeles. A couple of stained Louis Vuitton trunks filled with clothes and toiletries. Boxes containing sparkly personal objects, the shoes and few vintage dresses she hadn’t managed to part with, and her collection of postcards from her mother.
Lifting Pepper from his seat, she held him against her chest. Hope Springs’ wide-open spaces stretched in front of her like a limitless brown and green carpet. A big barn shone in the far corner, cows idly gathered in its shade, lowing and searching the ground for the sweetest grass.
She faced the house again. I should have come more often. Her stomach clenched. Even though Daddy lived in Los Angeles, he traveled to his country oasis at least a few times a year. She recalled all the times Daddy had tried to persuade her to escape the hustle and bustle of her social schedule and join him at the ranch he visited occasionally, yet loved dearly. Now, it was too late. Her stomach clenched tighter.
For the first time, I’ll see something through in my life and the most important person won’t even be here to seeit.
Pepper whimpered, and she caught herself holding him too snugly against her, using him as a shield. She kissed the top of his head and he returned to his normal, snufflingself.
This place is all I have left. I’ll make you proud, Daddy.
Determination filled her heart.She stepped onto the short staircase leading to the porch and retrieved the key from her front pocket. Pepper shifted in her arms, his paws scratching her chest. “It’ll be okay,” she whispered in his ear, despite the shiver running down her spine. Right?
The sound of heavy thuds in the arid soil prompted her to turn around. “Look Pepper, a cow. How cute.” Lola smiled and stepped down, walking several feet away from the house to greet the docile beast stomping toward her in a cloud ofdust.
She shielded her eyes with her hand and squinted, noticing the pair of long, sturdy horns on the animal. Crap. Not a cow. She swallowed. A bull. A . . . freakingbull!
“Holy Louis Vuitton.”
Pepper’s paws scratched her neck, and she swallowed the lump of fear lodged in her throat. Holding the dog against her chest with one hand, she clasped the key with the other. She ran in the direction of the house, fumbling with the keys to look for the right one. Her fingers trembled, and Pepper got more fidgety in her arms, barking his assoff.
She tried a couple of keys without much luck. When she lifted the third one in the ring to see if it could fit the slot, Pepper scrambled free fromher.
“Pepper.” Her heart slammed against her rib cage, and she dropped the keys and strode to get to her dog. She could maybe survive a face-off with the bull, but her fur baby would turn into bull burrito.
Her hands were still shaking when she scooped him off the ground. No way she’d make it to the house in time. A squeal left her lips, and she glanced around, searching for a place to hide as the bull gathered speed, snorting in her direction. She registered the outline of two men on horseback, chasing down the bull but, with her heart pounding in her throat and time running out, she didn’t see their faces or call them forhelp.
Move.She considered fleeing back to the safety of the U-Haul, and shook her legs to rid herself of the panic locking her knees. Uh oh. Sucking in a gulp of air, she imagined the bull’s hot breath on her skin, his angry black eyes fixed upon her. Pepper barked like a German Shepherd, wriggling to get free from her grasp again. This isit.
She managed to step backward a couple of times, her limbs shaking. Not fast enough.
The shout of a man’s voice was lost in the frantic beat of her heart thumping wildly. The animal huffed within a brush of her and Pepper. Too late. Prepare todie.
Out of the blue, a black rope swung through the whirlwind of dust, the rough material brushing the silk of her dress. Her blood turned colder than the Swiss Alps in the winter, and shaking from the impact, she lost her balance and fell backward on the merciless soil, with Pepper on her chest.
Her back slammed against the dirt ground. Pain surged through her. Not sharp or throbbing, but steady… Much like the past few months. Sounds of the animal jumping and kicking hinted that the men encircled the bull’sneck.
“Ma’am, are you okay?” Came a voice from behind the frame of the struggling bull. One of the cowboys dismounted and approached on foot. With his face creased in concern, he offered her a hand and she took it, using it to pull herselfup.
The other cowboy had her enemy tamed. Wow.
“Yeah, I … I guess so.” She blinked, letting go of Pepper for the first time. The dog sat at her feet, tail wagging. She rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand and examined the man in front of her: medium build, leather skinned, graying hair, mid-fifties perhaps, with a crooked smile, and kindeyes.
“Magnus here can be a little unpredictable,” he said, jerking an extended thumb back toward thebull.
“Unpredictable?” She dusted herself off. “He attackedme.”
“He’s territorial, that’s all,” said the other man, still clutching the bull by the rope around its neck. Upon hearing his voice, the tempting Texan drawl, she raised her eyes to see who it belonged to, though she already knew whose face she would discover. Adrenaline spiked through her system, and her legs started to buckle underher.
Jack Canyon in the flesh. His eyes still turquoise. Still unforgiving. This was the freaking last thing she needed.
