PRAISE FOR THE NOVELS OF JESSE HAYWORTH
HARVEST AT MUSTANG RIDGE
“Jesse Hayworth writes delightful tales that will wrap themselves around readers’ hearts. With breezy, lighthearted writing and plenty of laughter, charm, and emotion, Hayworth gifts her readers with a book that will keep them turning the pages and rooting for these wonderful characters.”
—New York Times bestselling author Jill Gregory
“A wonderful, fun-filled story. . . . If you enjoy romance, a sexy couple, family, ranch background, and terrific secondary characters, you need to read this series. Jesse Hayworth continues to make us feel like home at Mustang Ridge.”
—The Reading Cafe
“Held my interest from the first page to the last. . . . I’d highly recommend Harvest at Mustang Ridge to any romance reader looking for an entertaining, emotional, believable story.”
—Harlequin Junkie
“Beautiful language and descriptive storytelling are found throughout Hayworth’s latest, as she brings us back to the Mustang Ridge dude ranch and the Skye family. With familiar, appealing, quirky characters, good pacing, and the beautiful Wyoming countryside as a backdrop, this is a romantic tale that touches the heart.”
—RT Book Reviews
WINTER AT MUSTANG RIDGE
“This is one of those series that just warms your heart . . . great. . . . Give it a try.”
—Debbie’s Book Bag
“A story that you cannot just help falling in love with. Ms. Hayworth is fast becoming my go-to person to read, with heartfelt stories that steal your heart. . . . If you enjoy a heartfelt romance that has laughs, sighs, and more, then you need to race to get Winter at Mustang Ridge immediately. You won’t be disappointed!”
—Love Romances & More
“With lyrical storytelling and genuine characters, Hayworth has created a love story that will wrap itself around any reader’s heart.”
—RT Book Reviews (4½ stars)
SUMMER AT MUSTANG RIDGE
“A superb read: a gorgeous setting and a beautiful love story.”
—New York Times bestselling author Catherine Anderson
“Warm, witty, and with a great deal of heart, Summer at Mustang Ridge is an instant classic.”
—New York Times bestselling author Kristan Higgins
“The Wyoming backdrop is beautiful, watching a foal being born is miraculous, ranch life sounds like a lot of fun, and Foster and Shelby are sweet and tender with each other.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Hayworth paints the setting so beautifully, you won’t want to leave. The romance is slow and subtle but with enough encouragement to keep you reading all night. I can’t think of a better recommendation for a sweet romance: horses, scenery, and working cowboys.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“A beautiful love story expressed in simple, elegant language. . . . With a solid plot and a host of sympathetic, genuine characters, Hayworth takes her time in weaving a tale of love and healing, all set against the beautiful rural backdrop of the Wyoming mountains. This heartwarming story is a keeper.”
—RT Book Reviews
“Hayworth does a wonderful job creating realistic and great characters . . . a wonderful book to read. . . . If you are looking for a fun and wonderful romance, look no further than Summer at Mustang Ridge.”
—The Reading Cafe
“Jesse Hayworth let Shelby’s and Foster’s feelings and emotions take the lead. That is ROMANCE! Romance where hearts heal, love, and then soar.”
—Once Upon a Romance
“An enjoyable book, providing interesting characters and a sweet love story with just enough unexpected special touches to keep the reader turning pages. . . . Summer at Mustang Ridge is exactly what sweet romance lovers crave, creating anticipation for what promises to be an enjoyable Western contemporary series. A tender love story, told in a unique voice, sure to please any romance lover.”
—Romance Junkies
Also by Jesse Hayworth
Summer at Mustang Ridge
Winter at Mustang Ridge
Harvest at Mustang Ridge
Firelight at Mustang Ridge
Sunset at Keyhole Canyon (digital novella)
SIGNET ECLIPSE
Published by New American Library,
an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014
This book is an original publication of New American Library.
Copyright © Jessica Andersen, 2015
Penguin Random House supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin Random House to continue to publish books for every reader.
Signet Eclipse and the Signet Eclipse colophon are trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.
For more information about Penguin Random House, visit penguinrandomhouse.com.
ISBN 978-0-698-16575-5
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”
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Contents
Praise
Also by Jesse Hayworth
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Author’s Note
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
An Excerpt from Summer at Mustang Ridge
To Wallaby. You were so worth the wait.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Greetings, Reader-Friends!
I don’t always know which comes first for me—the chicken or the egg—but my life often imitates my story-art and vice versa. When going through a long-overdue breakup, I wrote about a relationship that was on life support and a husband and wife trying to decide whether or not to pull the plug. Sure, there were Mayan demons and an apocalypse in the mix, but the central question was universal: Do I stay or do I go? They stayed together. I split. Then, newly single, I wrote about a cop struggling to find herself in the aftermath of a shooting. And later, freshly in love and ready to write happier, more hopeful stories, I turned to a new pen name and a new series, and Mustang Ridge was born.
Five books and two novellas later, I’d like to invite yo
u to turn the page and share Ashley and Ty’s story with me. It’s about how love can bloom when and where you least expect it—even between an artsy dreamer who’s out to prove herself, and a solid, practical cowboy who’d rather be alone than risk trusting his heart again. But more, this book is about fresh starts like the one I’ve been blessed with. And it’s about new beginnings . . . like the son I conceived while writing it, and whom I’m holding right now.
Thank you for being on this journey with me, dear Reader-Friend. Welcome back to Mustang Ridge, and I truly hope you enjoy Ashley and Ty as much as I do . . . and that maybe you see a little of your own story in theirs.
Love,
Jesse
1
“Sign here and here, and initial wherever you see a yellow sticky arrow.” A thick stack of oversize papers came sliding across the glass countertop toward Ashley Webb, obscuring the costume jewelry that glittered in the showcase. When she hesitated, Penny Trueheart, lawyer extraordinaire, said, “Do you need a pen? I brought one with me.”
Fighting an image of her flinging the paperwork in the air and bolting for the shop’s back room—down, brain—Ashley nodded, then shook her head. “Yes, I’ll sign. No, I’ve got my own pen.”
There it was in her hand, bright blue and embossed with: ANOTHER FYNE THING ~ the best in vintage couture and thrift shop treasures, Three Ridges, Wyoming. And it was shaking, ever so slightly. Don’t freak. This was what she wanted more than anything else, ever, in her life.
It was also a buttload of money. Especially for someone like her.
“This is so exciting! I can’t believe you’re buying the shop!” Henrietta squeezed her arm, then danced away in a swirl of fabric.
Today, Ashley’s sole employee had paired a floaty green sundress with a pair of purple capris and yellow sandals that had big plastic happy faces on them. But, hey, it worked on a woman who wore her long blond hair in dozens of braids and claimed to have been conceived at Woodstock while Jimi Hendrix played “The Star Spangled Banner.”
Penny, on the other hand, wore a blue pantsuit with a starched white shirt, which made her pretty much the anti-Hen. Still, the savvy lawyer had been the perfect go-to for the paperwork when the shop’s founder, Della Fyne, had agreed to split the down payment into two installments that Ashley could sort of, but not really, afford.
If business stayed very, very good.
And she didn’t eat or use any electricity.
Oh, God. What was she thinking?
“Ashley? Are you okay?” Hen’s face came into view, eyes worried beneath a striped headband that might have started life as a sock. “Penny, I don’t think she’s breathing.”
Whooshing air into her lungs—what do you know; Hen was right—Ashley said, “I’m fine.” To prove it, she signed her name on the first line, making herself focus on each letter and not get distracted by the part of her that was going, This is nuts. It’s too much, too soon, too everything. What makes you think you can stick it out this time?
Hen beamed. “Hey, you’re a lefty. Me, too. Did you know we can see better underwater, and we tend to hit puberty faster than righties?” She frowned. “’Course, we also die younger. Oh, and there’s that link to insanity.”
“Exhibit A,” Ashley muttered, and signed next to a yellow arrow sticky.
I, Ashley Webb, do solemnly swear that, having just wiped out my savings for this first payment, I will make the second one in forty-five days. Despite dropping out of college and having never held a job for more than six months before this one—which is on month seven, yay me—I promise that I will be smart and responsible. I will keep up with the regular monthly payments to the bank, insure everything I can think of, do all the paperwork on time, file my taxes, turn over the inventory as fast as possible, make regular buying trips, update the Web site—
Gack.
Turning the page, she initialed next to a sticky. Then another. Her head spun. She was really doing it. She was buying Another Fyne Thing from Della—the whole shoot and shebang, everything from the Armani sunglasses to the thirties-era Zelinka-Matlicks, plus the thousand-square-foot retail space, the warehouse out back, and the five-room apartment upstairs.
“Are you ready for me?” Henrietta buzzed back in, bumping Ashley’s elbow and turning her initials into a scribble.
“Almost.” Ashley dealt with the last few stickies, then handed over the papers. “Okay, witness. Do your thing.”
“Yippee!” Hen went to work with her pen, signing her name with a flourish in vivid purple ink.
Watching the lines appear on page after page, Ashley pressed a hand to her belly and regretted the cinnamon bun she had bought to go along with her coffee, even knowing she shouldn’t spend the money. She could do this. She could. The numbers worked, more or less, and she had been running the shop solo ever since Della moved down to the city to be with Max. Really, all she was doing was taking Della’s name off all the official forms and replacing it with her own. Nothing else was going to change.
Which was a total lie, but at least it kept her breakfast where it belonged. And as Hen finished witnessing the last few pages, Ashley managed to resist the urge to swat the pen cup off the counter and shout, “Wait! Stop! I changed my mind!”
“Okay, Ashley.” Penny made two neat piles with the contracts. “Moment of truth.”
“The checks.” They lay on the countertop, looking up at her with their fat round zeros, like little eyes. Lots of them.
She didn’t know which was scarier, the one from the bank with all the digits, thanks to the thirty-year commercial loan she had gotten by the skin of her teeth, and then only because it was a local bank . . . or the one she had written off her own account at the same bank, wiping out her meager savings plus the overdraft, and including a cash advance from her credit card.
You’re nuts. You know that, right? Utterly mental. The most expensive thing she’d ever bought prior to this was—what—A drum set for Kenny? New tires, maybe? She was still driving Bugsy, the pimped-out VW Beetle her mom and Jack had given her as a high school graduation present, all smiles because she was headed off to art school, the future bright.
Just do it. You can make it work this time. Pressing her fingers onto the checks, she trapped them against the cool glass of the display case. Then she slid them across to Penny. “Here you go.”
And, just like that, she was the new owner of a vintage shop smack in the middle of downtown Three Ridges, Wyoming.
• • •
“You did WHAT?” Wyatt loomed over Ashley, seeming to momentarily forget that he was holding his eleven-month-old daughter in the crook of his arm. “Are you out of your MIND?”
Little Abby let out a startled “Awoooo!” that reverberated off the rough-hewn log walls and overstuffed couches of the sitting-room-slash-reception-area in the main house at Mustang Ridge—aka the gorgeous dude ranch Ashley’s brother had married into last fall, and where Ashley had lasted six weeks as an employee before deciding that working there wasn’t nearly as fun as being a guest.
Thank God there had been a HELP WANTED sign in the window of Another Fyne Thing. Though Wyatt probably didn’t see it that way now.
He gave the baby a bounce, rearranged his face to a fatuous smile, and sweetened his tone to say, “Sorry, sweetie. Auntie Ashley started it.” With his hat off and his dark, russet-streaked hair standing up in agitated spikes, he looked like an irate porcupine.
A very large irate porcupine.
Ashley just folded her arms. “You’re the one doing the yelling.” Though she was pretty sure she was the only one capable of hitting her big brother’s bellow button.
“What did you expect?” he demanded, halfway losing hold of his baby-soothing voice, so he sounded like an irritated cartoon character. “Of all the harebrained, irresponsible—”
“Annd, that’s my cue.” Krista stepped in and sco
oped Abby out of Wyatt’s arms. “Come on, kiddo. We’re going to go find somewhere else to be.” Propping the baby on her hip, the pretty, fresh-faced blonde kissed Wyatt’s cheek, shot Ashley an encouraging finger wiggle, and whisked down the hallway leading to the kitchen.
“But—” Wyatt took a half step after them, then stopped himself with a muttered curse and took a couple of deep breaths. By the time he’d turned back to Ashley, he looked less like a furious porcupine, and more like a concerned patriarch of a porcupine.
Which was worse, really. She could deal with his bluster, but his disappointment always got to her. There was too much history there.
“I can do this,” she insisted. “It’s a fantastic opportunity. And aren’t you the one who was always telling me I needed to find something I love, something I’m good at? Well, this is it.” From the first moment she had stepped through the shop door into the bright, chaotic interior and heard the jingle of the little bell overhead, she had been in love.
“I was talking about you going back to school and getting a degree,” he grated. “You know, giving yourself a shot at a real future? Sound familiar?”
As usual, he didn’t even try to understand where she was coming from. “Seems to me you went right back to cowboying after college.” Sure, he was famous now—in a few high-dollar art circles, anyway—for the Wild West–themed sculptures he made from recycled farm equipment. But those successes hadn’t come out of any classroom.
“We’re talking about you, not me. And I’ve gotten plenty of use out of my degree. You would, too, if you’d just give it a try.”
“Too late. I’ve already signed on the dotted lines. All of ’em.”
Besides, she was allergic to school. Her brain was too quick, too flighty. Too ready to get distracted when things stopped being fun and started feeling like work. That was why Another Fyne Thing was perfect for her—the stock was always changing and the customers were a fascinating blend of locals and tourists. And as of today she could mix things up even more—the advertising, the sales, the window displays, all of it. Nothing at Another Fyne Thing would ever be boring again, now that she owned it.
Coming Home to Mustang Ridge Page 1