She put on her shoes, wishing it was as easy to slip on a smile. Stopping in front of the mirror mounted to the back of her closet door, Jill tried on her smile. It looked surprisingly real, and she paid attention to how it pulled, and how her muscles in her face felt. If she could just get through the next few hours with this smile in place, she could retreat to the safety of her bedroom and text her father to find out how Momma was doing.
She met Hannah and Michelle in the hallway, and the three of them walked into the kitchen one after the other. Jill remembered she couldn’t go anywhere without Chapstick and detoured over to the drawer beneath the microwave, where they kept several tubes of the stuff. She slathered up her lips and tucked the tube into her bra before following the other girls out the door that led into the garage.
Michelle almost always parked in the garage, because she only lived at the homestead part-time. She came to the ranch about once a week to meet with Ginger, talk about the prisoners they had there, and offer other legal advice to keep the ranch in the clear. She had a bedroom here, because there was enough room—especially now that Emma, Ginger, and Jess had all vacated their rooms—and because she often came in the evenings after she finished her work in San Antonio, which was a two-hour drive from Sweet Water Falls.
She’d come on Thursday night and stay until Sunday, and Jill had been crossing her path at odd hours as she did left the ranch when Michelle was arriving.
Her sleek, dark eggplant SUV sat just steps away from the entrance to the West Wing, and Jill rounded the hood to get in the passenger seat. She glanced to the back deck that extended off the Annex, and she found Slate leaning against the railing, looking out over the ranch.
He wore a dark suit that fit him like a glove, and coupled with that cowboy hat…Jill’s pulse went crazy. She’d vowed not to date anyone for a while after her last boyfriend—a man she’d met at Nate and Ginger’s wedding—had cited the reason for their break-up to be the distance between them.
Physical distance, he’d meant, and the drive was eighteen minutes.
Jill knew it was something else, but Mike had refused to say what. She’d decided she’d had enough of flirting and flitting from man to man. She was thirty-three years old now, and she was going to take her relationships more seriously. That way, maybe the men she dated would take her more seriously.
“Slate,” she called, though she hadn’t expressly told herself to speak. The faux cowboy turned toward her, his face a stoic mask until he recognized her. Then he lit up, and Jill wondered if that meant something.
It doesn’t, she told herself.
He’d been extremely kind to her a couple of weeks ago, and Jill had not forgotten it. She’d been a complete mess, about to launch herself into the ocean waves and tell God to take her instead of her mother. Slate had been there, and he’d calmed her enough to get her into his truck. He’d spoken to her like her feelings and actions were normal, that she wasn’t the only one who felt the way she did, and that she didn’t need to apologize for the emotions raging through her.
Haven had scolded Jill about “falling apart” in front of their mother, and to “have more faith” to see them all through this crisis.
Jill wasn’t even sure what that meant. All she knew was that she’d had plenty of faith about a lot of things in her life, and God did what He wanted to do anyway. What was the point of pouring her heart out to Him? Why should she kneel beside the bed and beg, plead, and cry, only to do it again the next night? And then the next. And the next.
She felt abandoned, and that morning at the beach had been the worst bout of abandonment of all.
Then Slate Sanders had been here, and while Jill had met him once and seen him around the ranch a couple of times, she didn’t know him.
“Hey,” he said easily, coming toward her though he remained on the deck. His smile was hitched in place too. Jill wondered if he’d looked in the mirror and memorized how it should feel on his face the way she had. “You ladies heading out for the wedding?”
“Yeah.” Jill indicated the car. “Do you need a ride?”
“Nah,” he said. “I’m waiting for Luke and Ted. We’re going together.”
Jill frowned, a conversation from last night’s dinner tickling her memory. “You sure? Ted said he was going with Nate, I thought.”
Slate frowned and looked toward the back door. “I guess I better find out.”
“Do you want us to wait?” She knew the rules with the men who came to Hope Eternal Ranch in the Residential Reentry Program. Slate wasn’t in that program; his sentence was complete. But Luke was, and that meant that he couldn’t leave the ranch by himself. He had to be with a ranch employee, and Jill wondered if Slate counted.
He just likes to drive by the beach. Nate’s words moved through her head. He’d been worried about Slate the past few weeks—worried that he’d get in his truck, start driving, and never come back.
“Maybe,” Slate said. “Give me a minute, okay?” He strode away, and Jill could admit she liked the breadth of his shoulders in that suit coat. Wow, she thought. Tall, trim, tan Slate Sanders. A month ago, had she seen him like this, she’d have sidled up to him at the wedding and tried to get to know him better.
Now, her heart resisted what would come so naturally to her.
Jill loved people, and she’d always enjoyed talking to them, getting to know them, and spending time with them. She was no good alone, and she was usually the last one to go to bed, as she stayed up with whoever was willing to sit with her so she didn’t have to be alone.
“Jill,” Michelle said. “We don’t want to be late.”
“I’m not sure Slate and Luke have a ride,” she said. “He said he needed a minute.” She looked back to the deck, but Slate had gone inside the Annex, and he hadn’t returned yet. “You guys can go. I can drive them in a ranch truck.”
“Are you sure?” Hannah asked, getting out of the back seat. She looked at Michelle and then back to Jill.
“Yeah, sure,” Jill said easily, and her pulse started an increased rhythm.
“They won’t start without Luke and Slate,” Hannah reasoned. “They’re two of Dallas’s best friends.”
“We can wait,” Michelle said. “Because she has a point.”
“You can ride in the front,” Jill said to Hannah.
“I’m fine.” Their eyes met, and Jill had never had to spell out much for Hannah. She must’ve been able to say she had some sort of insane crush on Slate, because Hannah just nodded. “I do need to fix my mascara, and I can use the mirror in the front.” She went around the back of the car and got in the front seat.
Slate came out onto the deck. “Can we ride with you guys? Ted left a while ago.” He didn’t look happy about it either, and Jill didn’t blame him.
“Sure,” she said. “We have room.”
Luke came outside too, and Jill seriously doubted they’d fit in the back seat of Michelle’s SUV. They had shoulders Jill had never seen, and she knew all the River Bay men met in the equipment shed at six-thirty to lift weights, something they’d apparently done together in prison.
Slate arrived at her side, and Jill smiled at him. “I’ll ride on the hump in the middle. You scoot on over, cowboy.”
He grinned and reached up to touch his hat. “Do you really think I look like a cowboy?”
“You certainly do,” she said. “I’m not sure if you are one, but you look the part.”
“Good,” he said, and he slid all the way over behind Michelle. Jill gathered up her skirt and got in the car too, sliding over into the middle spot. Luke managed to cram himself in next to her and close the door, and that alone was a miracle.
“All right,” Michelle said. “Are we all in?”
“Yes,” Luke said, and Jill looked at him. He was a handsome man too, and he’d started to grow a beard the same way Slate had. She smiled at him, and he smiled back at her before looking out his window.
Her pulse didn’t react, and she knew he wasn’t
the one she’d spend her time with at this wedding. She didn’t even dare look at Slate, because her hip was pressed into his, and her thigh too, and the entire left side of her body tingled with his touch.
He cleared his throat, and Jill glanced at him. “Do you have enough room?” he asked, moving his right leg over a little. “You can put your foot over here.”
“Thanks,” she said, and she did adjust her leg so it wasn’t so tightly crammed into the back of the console between Hannah and Michelle. She smoothed down her skirt so her legs were properly covered and listened as Hannah and Michelle started talking about the cooking show they’d watched last night.
With the radio playing, and conversations happening, Jill looked at Slate again. “Have you decided if you’re going to stay at Hope Eternal?”
He shook his head, his slate-gray eyes still sparkling under that cowboy hat. “What do you think? Should I?”
“Do you hate it?”
“No.”
“Do you like it?”
“You know what? I actually do.”
Jill looked up at the charcoal-colored cowboy hat. “I mean, the hat fits, right?” She smiled, and it was easier than the one she’d practiced in the bedroom. The smile she could give him felt as easy as the flirty ones she’d doled out at the previous weddings she’d attended.
“So you’re saying if the boot fits, wear it?”
“Sure,” she said. “You have a nice room here. The Annex is big and air conditioned. You like the job. You look the part.” She reached over and smoothed down his tie from where it had stuck on his lapel. Something hot and charged zinged through her, and her eyes immediately went back to Slate’s.
He’d felt that, Jill could tell. She could no longer hear Hannah and Michelle talking, and if there was music playing, it wasn’t reaching her ears.
“Okay,” Slate said. “I’ll stay.” He shifted his shoulders so he could lean his head closer to hers. She actually leaned into him too, ducking her head so he could whisper in her ear. His hand landed on her knee, and Jill pulled in a breath as sparks shot up her leg and down to her toes.
“For you, Jill,” he said. “I’ll stay for you.” He took her hand in his then, and his was so much bigger than hers. Warm, and large, and everything a cowboy’s hand should be. Jill loved holding hands with a cowboy, and she smiled to herself as he settled their joined hands on his leg and looked out his window, the conversation obviously done.
The conversation her heart was pounding out to her brain wasn’t done, but Jill didn’t even listen to the two of them. She closed her eyes and leaned against Slate’s shoulder, her fingers twined nice and tight with his.
Oooh, find out if staying at Hope Eternal Ranch for Jill is the right thing for Slate to do. Preorder CHRISTMAS COWBOY today, because it’s coming soon to a Kindle near you.
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Love the cowboys at Hope Eternal Ranch and want to stay right here? Of course you do! Preorder the next book in the series, CHRISTMAS COWBOY, and meet the next Mulbury Boy, Slate Sanders, as he encounters a beautiful, personable blonde in Jill Kyle.
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Elana Johnson is the USA Today bestselling author of dozens of novels, from YA contemporary romance to adult beach romances. Check out her brides, beaches, and bad boy sweet romances in the Hawthorne Harbor Romance series, the Secret Billionaires of Getaway Bay Romance series, the Beaches & Brides Romance series, the Forbidden Lake Romance Series, the Stranded in Paradise Romance Series, the Carter’s Cove Beach Romance Series, the Sentinels Motorcycle Club Romance series, and the Hope Eternal Ranch Romance series.
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RUGGED COWBOY
Hope Eternal Ranch Romance, Book 3
by Elana Johnson
Copyright © 2020 by AEJ Creative Works Inc, Elana Johnson
All Rights Reserved
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. No part of this book can be reproduced in any form or by electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without the express written permission of the author. The only exception is by a reviewer who may quote short excerpts in a review. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in, or encourage, the electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.
Cover by Carpe Librum Book Design: https://booking.carpelibrumbookdesign.com/
Interior design by AEJ Creative Works Inc.
Rugged Cowboy Page 24