It wasn't just because of his talent, although that was impossible to ignore. It was a charisma that translated effortlessly on the cameras and to the crowds. It was his undeniable good looks, and yes, it was his patented cockiness as well. He was pretty much the whole package, and she knew she should be grateful to have him doing this PR stunt with her in the first place.
The Strawberry Fest was fast approaching, and this year a major rodeo competition was going to be a part of it. It was meant to draw in more than just local attention, and having Nate Grant be a part of it was a big coup, local boy or no. The PR stunt the two of them were to be engaged in had been cooked up by Nate’s agent to draw even more attention to the whole thing. The festival would end with Nate performing in a rodeo competition against a yet-to-be-named local competitor—but in the days preceding it, Nate was going to be working with Athena’s rodeo students, girls ranging from ages nine to eleven, helping them learn their lessons and such. There were going to be photographers and camera crews leading up to the main event, with the understanding that the more publicity they could get, the better it was for all of them.
It could only mean good things for Athena’s career. She knew that. At the very least, she thought it would be good for her girls. Any publicity brought to them and what she was trying to do for teaching young girls how to rodeo was a good thing. It could lead to more community interest, donations, maybe even partnerships with larger, more established programs. As for what it might do for her personally, Athena was trying not to think about it. If she thought about it too much, she might start to get hopeful, and hope could lead a person down a dangerous path. That was a lesson she had learned the hard way and one she had no desire to repeat.
“Come on, girls!” She called out, clapping her hands to get her class’s attention, “Eyes on me. A visitor doesn’t mean we let up on our drills.”
There was a murmur of agreement from the girls, but Athena could tell she didn't have their attention. They were only half with her, their eyes cutting towards Nate and then the guys who ran the barn. As she watched, her frustration mounting, several of the girls whispered to each other, giggling and blushing furiously. Nate, either unaware of the effect he was having on the class or unbothered by it, let out a loud, booming laugh at something one of the men said, and that only made the girls giddier. Athena sighed to herself and dropped the rope she'd been using for her demonstrations, her hands landing squarely on her hips. For the first time since feeling his presence in the barn, which she had done immediately, Athena allowed herself to look at Nate.
She had to work to keep her face from registering a reaction. It had been some time since she had seen Nate in the flesh and she had forgotten just how handsome he really was. What’s more, she hadn’t been expecting him to be looking right at her when she finally looked in his direction.
“Great,” she whispered to herself disgustedly. She could feel a flush creeping up her neck, making its way to her cheeks where it would surely linger for a while before finally beginning to fade. She pulled her hair out of its messy ponytail, only to smooth it down and put it right back up again. Playing with her hair was something she did both when she was nervous and when she was around a man she found to be good looking. With thick, shiny auburn locks curling halfway down her back, Athena had always considered her hair to be her best feature by far. She saw Nate noticing it and thought he might agree with her estimation.
In the end, it was the little wink he offered her that tipped her over the edge. His eyes were sparkling with mischief in a way she remembered from childhood. They were unapologetically bright with what she was fairly certain was an air of defiant challenge, too. Still, she thought she could have turned and gone back to her girls, pretending he wasn't there at all, if it hadn't been for the damned wink.
“Nate!” she called across the barn, shrugging off Shelly’s hissed questions of what exactly she thought she was doing, “Looks like you got here a little early.”
“What can I say?” he called back amidst the chuckles of the other men, “I like to make an entrance.”
"I just bet you do," she muttered to herself. Her girls giggled and whispered all over again, and it was all Athena could do not to roll her eyes. If Nate's intent had been to come and take over her skills session, he was doing a bang-up job.
"That's not going to be a problem, Moore, is it?" he continued. She hated it when people called her by her last name only, always had. Come to think of it, she seemed to remember that it was Nate who had begun the trend back when they were only children.
“Nope, no problems here,” she called over her shoulder, refocusing her attention on her class. He was goading her, heckling her in front of her girls. If he thought he was going to best her in front of them, however, he had a surprise coming his way.
“Good!” Nate laughed, “I would hate to send you and the girls into a tizzy. I’m just here to watch, after all, aren’t I?”
“Actually? No, I don’t think you are.”
Athena noted the way Nate's brow furrowed with some satisfaction and even smiled when her girls gasped and started asking questions. She had just surprised Nate, put him on the spot instead of the other way around, and she knew it. She also knew that Nate was far more of a showman than he was a teacher. Unless she was very much mistaken, unless Nate had completely changed from the boy she once knew, he enjoyed the spotlight too much to have the patience to teach. The only thing she didn't know was how he was going to handle this curveball.
“Sorry? I’m not sure what you’re getting at,” Nate said, just the smallest hint of uncertainty in his voice as he approached the middle of the ring with his hands shoved deep into his pockets.
“Well, you’re the Rodeo God, aren’t you?” she said with an innocent smile, “Why don’t you come teach my girls their next skill? I’m sure they would be beyond thrilled by it, wouldn’t you, kids?”
“Yes!” came the chorus from a group of children so excited now they were verging on mania. It might have been her imagination, but she thought Nate’s face was just a touch paler than it had been only moments before. Still, he nodded at her, took his hands out of his pockets, and clapped loudly.
“Right, girls. Sounds like a plan. Who wants to tell me what we’re doing?”
The Cowboy’s Rodeo Rival
Available 9 May 2019
LeslieNorthBooks.com
BLURB
Texas rancher Nathaniel Meier always puts his responsibilities first. With his father dead, his brothers away, and his mother off “finding herself,” it’s Nat who runs their sprawling ranch. But with cattle to sell and the bank breathing down his neck, he needs all the help he can get, even when that help comes from the last person he ever expected to see again—his childhood sweetheart January Rose.
Free-spirited January always dreamed of traveling the world. The moment she turned eighteen, she left Close Call, Texas behind and barely looked back. So now that she’s home, she intends to stay only long enough to earn some cash and get back on the road. But when she comes face to face with Nat Meier, she quickly realizes the boy she left behind is now all man.
Even for a nomad like January, wanderlust sometimes gets lonely, and Nat is the one person who’s called to her, even after a decade apart. But for a man ruled by responsibility and a woman whose suitcase is her home, the future is uncertain. And the closer they get, the more Nat worries he’s going to get burned…again.
Grab your copy of Tempting The Rancher here.
* * *
EXCERPT
Chapter One
October in Texas was damned near perfection. Gone was the scorching heat that anchors a pair of jeans to the thighs like a wet straightjacket, hell-bent on dropping anyone not in air conditioning straight to the devil’s back kitchen. Sporadic, deep reds on the sweet gum trees teased the landscape with impending change. Even the cow pies took on the scent of money.
Selling season in the cattle business had a fragrance all its own, and
Nathaniel Meier wasn’t above pulling in a potent lungful of the end.
The end. God in heaven, he fucking hoped not.
Nat’s least favorite part of the ranch was the south acreage. Eighteen wheelers barreled down the adjacent two-lane county road to avoid construction fifty miles and another world away, scattering everything from mockingbirds to piss-filled sports drink bottles. The south acreage’s only saving grace was the perfect alignment of the squeeze chutes and ramps so as not to cast morning shadows or blinding sun—two factors that could make loading hundreds of cows onto trailers feel like a fire-ant enema.
His general apathy toward anything beyond Close Call, Texas, was a side effect of being hyper-attuned to the ranch, cradle to loan, as his grandfather had always said. Four generations saw fit to ensure the Meier legacy continued. For now, the burden fell solely on his sunbaked shoulders.
Nat set to work applying fresh rubber stops to the metal gates so the banging wouldn’t spook the animals. Earbuds in place, he ignored the world beyond the periphery fence. The sidewinding melody of a steel guitar calmed his pre-auction nerves—and was why he failed to notice the SUV tires eating up his good grazing grass until they had damned near galloped up his ass.
Rubber stops tumbled out of his hand. His pulse played catch-up, the way it did when he accidentally stepped into a steer’s flight zone. Spine straightened, he slow-crawled a gaze from the pristine tires to the glossy black rims of a late-model Cadillac, as out of place on a ranch as a drag queen singing show tunes would be.
Well, shit.
Austin Pickford exited his trust-fund vehicle. The banker stood in place as if he could spare no more than a minute, as if the pasture were a mine field. Nat supposed to the guy’s imported alligator loafers, the pasture was Cambodia.
Nat swiped the adhesive bumpers out of the grass and resumed circling the curved race. “You visit all your borrowers this often, or can I tell my mother we’re officially courting?”
“Nice to know the impending sale hasn’t affected your juvenile sense of humor.”
“Juvenile? Keep flattering me like that, and we’ll be married by nightfall.” Nat shot him a wink for good measure.
Austin rolled his eyes and jingled coins in his suit pocket.
Nat and Austin had a history straight out of rural Shakespeare—same graduating class, same primal ambition, the occasional quarrel between well-established families, a general distaste disguised as friendship. Austin went away to a private university to study finance. Nat attended state school to try for an ag degree. But Nat couldn’t escape the truth that the Meier family couldn’t do what they did best without the generations-old backing of Pickfords. Close Call Community Trust was the only lender left in town. Banks close to the city didn’t understand the financial cycle of ranching past how much a porterhouse at some country club in Houston set them back. Nat and Austin had history. Around here, history counted for something.
“To what do I owe this honor?” Nat called over his shoulder. As in, spit it out and be on your way.
“Came out to check on you. See if you needed anything.”
Liar. The guy was probably measuring for drapes at the main house before he drove out here. Every time Nat thought about the collateral he’d put up last winter to expand his operation, his stomach threatened to empty, full or not.
“Unless you have a new weigh scale in that fancy trunk of yours, I’m good.”
“’Fraid I can’t help you there.” Austin took a few minefield steps away from the safety of his luxury car. His silk tie lifted and twisted on the stiff breeze. “What I can do is tell you what I’m hearing.”
Nat slowed his gait. Good-old-boy gossip came in two forms: bet-the-farm accurate and grizzled, half-baked accurate—usually while buzzed on Shiner at the roadhouse’s Thursday polka night. Either way, previous generations had hundreds of years of droughts and windfalls between them. The year Nat lost his grandfather’s prized truck was the year Nat learned to pay attention to such things.
“Word is, the market is softer than anticipated. Exports are down. More consumers going to plant-based proteins.”
“All things beyond my control.” Nat shook steel rails as he circled the race. A loose belly pipe snagged his progress. He bent down to inspect the fastening bolts. “We’re selling at the right time. First major auction before all the spring-born calves land on the market. Everything before that is speculation. Nothing more.”
“That isn’t all, Meier. Vet’s been out here daily. That happens, people start to think you’ve got a problem.”
Nat’s breathing stalled. He tucked his chin to his collar, mostly so his hat brim blocked Austin, the Cadillac, rigs barreling past, the problems back at ground zero where pink eye had spread to four heifers before they caught it and isolated them. Bet-the-farm accurate, that gossip. With pliers from his tool belt, he tightened the offending bolt. And his voice.
“Only problem I have is getting these ramps ready for transport.” As in, be on your way already.
“Hope you’re right. For your sake.”
Nat’s knuckles whitened around the pliers. He thought of a thousand things he wanted to say but only one his upbringing allowed him to say. His dry tongue felt thick and leaden. “Thanks for stopping by—”
“What the hell?”
Austin’s tone was equal parts delight and alarm—enough of a contrast that Nat glanced up. Idling on the highway’s shoulder was a gigantic plastic shrimp on wheels, its antennae snapping on a robust gale. Two cartoon shrimps shaped into a heart with the words “Bae Shrimp” adorned the food truck’s pink paint job.
Before Nat could echo Austin’s sentiment, a passenger exited the cab and waved to the bearded driver. At a distance, the bare-legged and sandaled figure—undoubtedly feminine—looked like a traveling Sherpa: massive backpack, woven poncho of some sort with brightly colored fringe, stained and wrinkled brown hat that looked as if it had been fished out of a shrimp boat rudder in Galveston. But there was something familiar—the energetic way her tan legs slipped through the tall grass like a native species, the confident, fluid strides despite the heavy load, the slight freedom in her hip rotation. It wasn’t until the stranger removed her hat that Nat realized she wasn’t a stranger at all.
Well, shit.
Austin spoke first. “Isn’t that—?”
“January?” Uttering her name felt like a decade-old trip wire set off in Nat’s chest. One false move? Boom. “Yeah.”
Two airhorn blasts penetrated the slow acceleration of the truck’s diesel engine. The crustacean drifted down the road.
January Rose was damned near perfection. Named for the month of her conception—the only stretch when the Texas heat subsided long enough for two people to want to generate heat of their own. Or so the story went. She was magnificent trouble, the kind of charmer that could lead a devout man straight into the devil’s back pocket and leave him wanting more. Ten years ago, Nat had entered her flight zone and she had left his heart stampeded. The only thing worse than that kind of pain was ten years plus one day for her to do it all over again.
Grab your copy of Tempting The Rancher here.
The Cowboy’s Contract Marriage: Grant Brothers Series Book Two Page 12