by Liz Isaacson
The woman she’d been before she’d had to become a mother overnight, grieve the loss of her sister and brother-in-law, and hold the remaining members of her family together.
Sammy’s dating life had dried up when she’d gotten custody of Lincoln. It was already on the decline, because she’d opened her mechanic shop six months before the terrible accident that had claimed her sister’s life.
She kept telling herself that she’d go on a date when Lincoln started school. Then it was when he could read by himself. Then when he could tie his shoes without help. Then when he knew how to ride a bike.
The truth was, no one was asking, and Sammy didn’t have time to find someone herself. She felt perpetually surrounded by men—at the shop, at the ranch—but none of them interested her half as much as Bear.
She looked up again to find he’d moved closer. He ran his fingertips along some of her tools, and she said, “Did you say something? Sorry, I got lost inside this thing for a second.”
He looked at her, those eyes overpowering her in less than a breath. “I was just going to ask you—” He pulled his hand back from her tools. She kept them in a bag she’d bought online that was made for chefs to carry their knives.
And it went with Bear’s hand, her tools clattering all over the cement floor in the she-shed. The noise was absolutely astronomical, and she clapped both hands over her ears as the metal bounced on the cement.
“I’m sorry,” Bear said while her ears were still ringing. He got down on the ground and started picking up the pliers, the wrenches, the screwdrivers.
“It’s fine,” Sammy said, finally getting her senses back. She reached for a ratchet at the same time Bear did, and they froze, their hands touching.
“Listen,” Bear said, maybe a little roughly. He turned his hand, and slipped his fingers between hers. “Would you go to dinner with me?”
Sammy’s world turned white for a moment. “What?” she asked, out of instinct and nothing else. A light giggle followed, one she’d never made before and would likely never make again.
Bear released her hand and stood, seemingly in one motion. For a big, tall cowboy, he could move really well. He laid her bag out on the countertop and said, “Forget it.”
Forget what? her mind asked, and Sammy looked down at her hand. Her skin tingled for some reason, and she could still feel Bear’s fingers between hers.
Dinner, her brain whispered. He asked you to dinner!
But Bear had already started walking away.
Wait, she called to him in her mind.
He opened the door and walked out, leaving Sammy mute and alone on the floor. Everything that had happened in the last thirty seconds rushed at her, and Sammy groaned as she realized she’d laughed when Bear had asked her out.
Legit laughed at him. At the idea of going out with him.
“Why did I do that?” she asked, looking up at the ceiling. “Dear Lord, can’t anything go right for me? Would it have been so hard to make me loquacious for that one moment?” She felt like crying, but the door opened again, and Sammy spun onto her hip and hid her face from whoever came into the shop.
“Hey,” Simone said. “How’s it going? Did Bear get his pictures?”
“Pictures?” Sammy asked, glancing over her shoulder. “I have no idea.”
Simone frowned as she bounced her baby in her arms. “What do you think?”
“I think you need a new exhaust fan,” Sammy said, deciding on the spot not to try to clean the one inside the kiln. “I’m just getting the serial number and make and model so I can get one ordered for you.”
“Oh, that sounds easy,” Simone said.
“It should be,” Sammy said, standing up. Her tools were an absolute mess, but she needed to get out of this shop and away from this ranch. She folded them up to deal with later and practically ran from the she-shed with, “I’ll call you when it comes in, okay?”
“Oh, okay,” Simone said behind her, and Sammy knew she’d have to answer the woman’s questions later.
Right now, that didn’t matter. Right now, she needed to get back to the shop, because Clayton would be there with Lincoln in less than thirty minutes. She didn’t like leaving Lincoln alone for any amount of time, though he’d turned eight last fall and could certainly go inside and get a snack by himself.
She lived next door to the bus driver who brought the kids home from the elementary school, and Clayton had agreed to bring Lincoln to her mechanic shop every afternoon after the regular run. The system had been working for three years now, and Sammy always made sure she was in the shop at three-forty-five.
Sure, Lincoln could stay with the other mechanics there, and he’d probably prefer it. But Sammy carried a great burden to care for her nephew according to her sister’s wishes, and she was going to do that the best way she knew how.
Sammy practically flew through the garage, only to find Bear’s big, black truck parked behind hers, blocking her escape. He sat behind the wheel, looking down at something in his hand. Probably his phone.
He’ll move, Sammy told herself as she opened the passenger door and tossed in her tools. She walked around the back of her truck so he’d see her, but she didn’t look directly at him. Looking directly at a man like Bear Glover was like looking into the sun, and she’d already made a big enough fool of herself for one day. For a whole month, in fact.
“Sammy,” Bear said, getting out of the truck.
“Hmm?” She didn’t turn fully toward him as she put her hand on the door handle of her beat-up pickup. It had been her brother-in-law’s, and it was familiar to Lincoln, so Sami kept fixing it when it broke down, and she kept driving it to keep something of Lincoln’s father’s in their lives.
Bear said nothing, forcing Sammy to look at him. He commanded every room he stepped into, and she wondered what it was like to hold that much power in the palm of one’s hand.
“Look,” he finally said. “I’m a real idiot, and I’ve gone about this all wrong.” He held up his phone. “I’ve got a whole script, and I can’t say it.” He sighed like his ranch had been infested with tens of thousands of grasshoppers, as it had been in the past.
“I like you,” he said, sort of yelling the words at her. “I like, you know, like you, and I wondered if maybe you’d go to dinner with me, so we can get to know each other on a personal level, not just a ranch level.”
Sammy’s brain threatened to shut down again, but she steadfastly refused to let it. “I’d have to get a babysitter,” she said.
“And…you don’t want to?” He looked absolutely miserable, but he was still standing there. Still looking at her, even as a flush colored his neck and stained his cheeks. Oh, that wasn’t fair. Seeing him in a vulnerable state only made him more attractive than he already was.
“I can ask around,” she said.
“We’ll take Lincoln,” Simone called from the porch, and Sami spun that way. She didn’t know they’d had an audience.
“We’ve got older nieces and nephews,” Micah added. “He’ll love it out here.”
They both beamed like this was the solution to world peace or something equally as great. Sammy looked at Bear; Bear looked back at Sammy.
Together, they burst out laughing, and he took another step closer to her. “Just one dinner,” he murmured so Simone and Micah couldn’t overhear. “If it doesn’t go well, at least it’ll be free.”
“Why wouldn’t it go well?” she asked.
“Well, I mean, I’ve already thrown your tools all around and stomped out of the room like a grizzly. So dinner can’t be as bad as that, right?” He grinned, one side of his mouth pulling up higher than the other. So adorable, and she never thought she’d use that word to describe a man like Bear Glover.
Of course, she’d never seen him smile much around the ranch either.
“All right,” she said. “I’ll go to dinner with you.”
“Yeehaw!” Micah yelled from the porch, and Sammy’s face heated with embarrassment t
oo.
She looked at Bear, who had glared Micah into silence. “And I’m expecting to hear about this script at dinner. Tonight?” She looked back to the porch. “Does tonight work for you guys?”
“Tonight is fine,” Simone said, completely unashamed to be standing there, intruding on this private conversation. Or what Sammy wished was a private conversation.
“I’ll pick you up at seven,” Bear said. “Does that work? We can bring Lincoln out here together, and then go grab something to eat.”
“Sounds like a date,” Sammy said. She finally opened the door and got in her truck, glad when Bear waved to the porch and did the same. He backed out first, and she expected him to trundle on down the lane. He didn’t, but waited for her to leave.
She did, watching in her rear-view mirror as he pulled back into Micah and Simone’s driveway and got back out of his truck. She finally had to look away as the road curved toward the highway, but she acknowledged the jittery feeling in her stomach as she came to a stop and looked both ways.
She wasn’t sure if it was because of what Micah, Simone, and Bear might be saying about her, or because she’d finally accepted a date and would be leaving Lincoln with someone besides his teacher.
“Or because the best-looking man in the state asked you out,” Sammy said as she turned onto the highway and pressed on the gas pedal to get the truck going. It shuddered in protest, its acceleration not very good.
“And you said yes.” A smile curved Sammy’s mouth, and she enjoyed the excitement until she pulled up to the mechanic shop on the south side of town. Then she realized she’d need to pick out something to wear and put on makeup without her sister’s help.
That’s right! There’s more ranch romance and another amazing family — the Glover’s of Shiloh Ridge Ranch — to meet in beloved Three Rivers, Texas! Get ready for heartwarming Christmas traditions, true-to-life family drama, Christian cowboy romance, and strong women in unconventional occupations in the Shiloh Ridge Ranch in Three Rivers Romance series.
THE MECHANICS OF MISTLETOE is coming soon - to all retailers. Preorder now!
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About Liz
Liz Isaacson is a USA Today bestselling author and a Top 30 Kindle All-Star Author. She is the author of the #1 bestselling Three Rivers Ranch Romance series, the #1 bestselling Horseshoe Home Ranch Romance series, the Brush Creek Brides series, the USA Today bestselling Steeple Ridge Romance series (Buttars Brothers novels), the Grape Seed Falls Romance series, the Christmas in Coral Canyon Romance series (Whittaker Brothers and Everett Sisters novels), the Quinn Valley Ranch Romance series, the Last Chance Ranch Romance series, and the Seven Sons Ranch in Three Rivers Romance series (Walker Brothers novels).
She writes inspirational romance, usually set in Texas and Montana, or anywhere else horses and cowboys exist. She lives in Utah, where she teaches elementary school, taxis her daughter to dance several times a week, and eats a lot of Ferrero Rocher while writing.
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MICAH’S MOCK MATRIMONY
Book Seven in the Seven Sons Ranch in Three Rivers Romance series
by Liz Isaacson
Copyright © 2020 by Elana Johnson, writing as Liz Isaacson
Published by AEJ Creative Works
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 Blue Water Books: http://www.bluewaterbooks.com/
Interior Design by AEJ Creative Works