“Wait for what?” Somehow, she managed to keep her fists at her sides. But her arms began to shake with the effort. “I notice that everyone else here has apologized, Pete—but not you.”
The damned man had the nerve to look amused by this. Chloe was real proud she didn’t take a swing at him—but she did plant her hands on his chest and shove as hard as she could.
That wiped the smile right off his face. “Easy, hon. I’ve got three cracked ribs.”
“I don’t care,” she snapped. “You all will never change. You’ll never give me a seat at the table. You make a major change in ownership to the All-Stars and can’t even be bothered to run it by me? I’m done. I don’t want your self-serving apologies or your condescending attitudes. I wanted you to have faith in me. I wanted you to trust me. But you don’t. None of you do.” Tears streaming down her face, she turned on Pete. “Not even you, Wellington. I hope you’re happy. You got what you wanted. You can have the All-Stars.”
Somehow, he’d gotten closer. The look in his good eye about broke her heart. “Chloe,” he said and she heard regret and sadness in his voice.
She couldn’t take this final humiliation. Bad enough that she’d surrendered. But did she have to do it in front of an audience?
“Just go,” she whispered, squeezing her eyes tight. It didn’t stem the tide of her tears, though.
She felt his warmth seconds before his arms went around her shoulders and she wanted to push him away, wanted to knee him in the groin—to make him pay for using her. For letting herself get used. But she couldn’t because this was her last chance to hold him. Fool that she was, she clutched at his shirt, pulling him closer, and leaned her head against his shoulder.
“I didn’t take it,” he said, low in her ear.
It took a second for his words to sink in. “You didn’t take what?” she sniffed.
“I didn’t take Oliver’s share.” She stumbled back from him, but he caught her before she lost her balance. “I don’t want it.”
“But...you love the rodeo,” she told him. “Getting the All-Stars back—that’s all you’ve ever wanted.” She looked around, but her brothers and her father didn’t seem to be in any rush to explain what the hell was going on.
Pete tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and then trailed the tips of his fingers down her wet cheek. “I found someone I want more.”
She gasped but it didn’t get any air moving into her lungs.
“The rodeo is yours, Chloe. Your ideas, your energy—you’re the one who keeps the wheels from falling off and keeps the rest of us in line. It belongs to you.”
Then the man did something she never saw coming. He got down on bended knee. Slowly and awkwardly, but still.
Oh, God.
“I belong to you,” he said, holding on to her hands. “You showed me there was more to life than this stupid feud. You showed me what I’d forgotten—that rodeo was family. My family,” he went on. “When I’m with you, I’m home. So let me be your home, too. Let me love on you for a little while longer. For the rest of our lives.”
Pete Wellington was proposing. Just to make sure she hadn’t passed out and was dreaming this whole thing, she glanced over at Renee, who gave her a look that clearly said, Go for it.
“Pete—are you sure?”
Yes, she was crying. No, she didn’t care.
“I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life. I will always be in your corner, fighting for you—even if you say no. I promise I’ll listen to you and, when I forget because I’m a man and I probably will, you have my permission to punch me. After I heal,” he added with a wink.
“That’s... I...but what about Oregon?” Because Pete Wellington was proposing to her and she was terribly afraid she was about to say yes, but he hadn’t apologized for flying off the handle last weekend and she wasn’t about to let him off the hook for that. “It’s been days, Pete, and I haven’t heard from you and when I do, you show up with an audience?” The words settled around the silence and she realized that probably hadn’t come out right. She glanced up at her family. “No offense.”
“We’re leaving,” Renee announced. “Right after I pee.” She hurried inside as fast as a woman in her condition could.
Chloe snuck a glance at Pete, who had blushed. She thought. Stupid bruises.
“We wanted to apologize, sweetie,” Dad said as Oliver helped Pete to his feet. Dad wrapped his arm around her shoulder and gave her a gentle squeeze. “And we wanted to show you that we’ve all agreed to let bygones be bygones.”
“Plus, we wanted to make sure there was no misunderstanding,” Oliver told her. “I did offer my stake to Pete—after we all got done beating the crap out of each other. But he was right.” Oliver pulled a folded manila envelope out of his back pocket and handed it over to her. “You’ll need to come into the office to sign all the paperwork, but the All-Stars is yours.”
“Damned impressed, really,” Dad drawled, giving Pete a long look. “I reckon he might just be good enough for you, after all.”
“Daddy!”
Dad kissed her on the cheek. “But the decision is yours, sweetie. Yes, no, maybe—it doesn’t matter. We’ll back you up because we love you. Always.” He kissed her on the cheek again. “We want you to be happy. It’s all your mother and I ever wanted for you and if a Wellington is the one who does it, then we’ll welcome him to the family.”
“With minimal fistfights,” Flash said. Or at least it sounded like he said that. Oh, she was going to enjoy the weeks of near silence.
She hugged her father and then Oliver and settled for carefully patting Flash on the least-injured-looking shoulder. Then Renee came back out and hugged Chloe again and whispered, “Do what you want but remember—chaps.”
Chloe giggled. “Call me when you go into labor,” she told Renee, then Oliver was helping Renee into her car and Flash and Dad were climbing into Dad’s truck and suddenly, she and Pete were alone.
Finally.
When the last sounds of the vehicles had faded, Chloe took a deep breath and turned to Pete. She was startled to realize he was holding her hand, their fingers laced together as if they’d always been that way.
“Well,” she started but that was as far as she got before he pulled her into his chest and kissed her with so much passion and need that her knees got all wobbly again.
“Babe,” he murmured against her lips as his arms went around her. His hard cast dug into her back but she didn’t care. “Marry me. Please.”
“No more fighting with my family,” she replied, pulling him toward the house, her hands already at the buttons on his shirt.
“No more fighting,” he agreed. “I think we got it all out of our systems.”
He pulled her shirt over her head just inside the front door. “And you’ll ride the circuit with me?”
“I’ll manage the show, but it’s your rodeo.” She got his shirt over his cast and then he spun her around to get her bra undone. “What you say, goes.”
“And...” She swallowed, suddenly shy as he stared at her breasts. “And you’ll love me?”
He stepped into her, staring down at her with a look she recognized. It was the same look that’d been on Oliver’s face when he’d looked at Renee.
It was love.
“Always,” he said, gingerly touching his forehead to hers. “I plan to show you every single day for the rest of our lives how much I love you.” He swallowed. “If you’ll let me. Will you let me?”
She touched his face, carefully stroking his bruises and then leaning up on her tiptoes to kiss the less damaged side. “Come back to me tonight,” she whispered. “Come back to me every night, Pete. For the rest of our lives.”
Rodeos and hotels and ranches—and Pete by her side.
“I’m yours,” he said, a solemn promise.
She knew he’d
keep it.
Epilogue
Flash Lawrence smiled at the buckle bunny who’d sent him a drink. Blonde and buxom, she was everything he normally looked for in a one-night stand, especially when she batted her eyelashes and thrust out those amazing breasts. Her offer couldn’t be clearer.
So why didn’t he take her up on it?
Instead of asking her for a dance, which would’ve turned into another dance, then a trip to her place or his hotel or, hell, even his pickup truck parked outside this bar in Topeka, he tipped his hat and turned away.
“Send her a beer,” he told the bartender who’d given him the woman’s drink. Then he paid his tab—Sprite was cheap—and headed out.
What the hell was wrong with him? This was his life—riding in the All-Around All-Stars, racking up the points to make a run at a world ranking and then, when the dust had settled, hitting the bars and enjoying the ladies to the fullest extent allowed by law.
At least, it had been his life last season, before he’d screwed everything up. But not this year. Not anymore.
Instead, he climbed into the cab of his truck, dropped his hat on the seat next to him and pulled out his phone.
She hadn’t texted. Of course she hadn’t. Why would she?
Logically, he knew why. Yes, he and Brooke Bonner had shared one of the most electric thirty-six hours of his life. It wasn’t an exaggeration to say that she’d left him a changed man.
But that was a year ago. Brooke probably didn’t remember their wild night together at the All-Stars rodeo in Fort Worth last year, right before Flash had spun completely out of control.
Brooke had gone on to tour five other countries after that show. Her album had hit in a major way. She’d won Grammys and CMA awards and broken sales records. Hell, she’d even made the covers of several high-fashion magazines. All Flash had done in that time was almost destroy his rodeo riding career, trash his relationships with his family and accrue way too many legal bills.
So yeah, he could see how one night with a cowboy might have slipped her mind. Or she’d looked him up online and found nothing but the headlines. One glance at his conviction for assault and she’d probably decided to pass. He couldn’t blame her for that. The best possible option was that she thought of him the way he thought of all the ladies he’d danced around—with a fond smile and nothing else.
Brooke Bonner should be that to him. A fond memory of a wild night.
Why wasn’t she?
As hard as he’d tried, Flash hadn’t been able to forget her, not when her voice filled the arenas in between rides, when her face smiled knowingly at him from a magazine cover every time he was in line at a store. Not when she was waiting for him in his dreams, driving him the best kind of crazy.
It should’ve gotten better. After an all-out publicity blitz, Brooke had basically gone dark a few months ago, reportedly to work on her follow-up album. She wasn’t everywhere anymore.
Except in his dreams. Night after night, she was waiting for him, his name on her lips, her body underneath his, surrounding him. He hadn’t been with another woman since her. And, pitiful as it was, he was doing his best to keep a grip on his temper and stay on the straight and narrow because he was no idiot. No woman, much less one as wildly successful as Brooke, wanted to deal with an immature, unemployed jerk.
Flash had a brand-new season to make his run at the All-Stars world rankings. He had a new grip on sobriety and his temper under control. He was going to make this second chance count.
For her.
She’d gotten under his skin, that was all. And he knew the cure—a little hair of the dog. He checked Brooke’s social media—and what he saw made his heart pound.
“Just announced—I’ll be at the Bluebird Café with an exclusive sneak-peek at material off my upcoming album in three days! Can’t wait!”
Flash couldn’t believe what he was seeing. The Bluebird Café—that was just south of Nashville.
The All-Stars were rolling into Nashville next week. If he left now...
Hands shaking, Flash fired up the engine. Maybe it was fate. Maybe it was just dumb luck. Either way, one thing was clear—it was high time he looked up Brooke Bonner.
* * * * *
Don’t miss a single story in the
FIRST FAMILY OF RODEO series
from Sarah M. Anderson!
HIS BEST FRIEND’S SISTER
HIS ENEMY’S DAUGHTER
and
Flash’s story, coming in late 2018!
You might also like these Western romances from Sarah M. Anderson:
RICH RANCHER FOR CHRISTMAS
PRIDE AND PREGNANCY
A MAN OF HIS WORD
A REAL COWBOY
Only from Harlequin Desire!
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Keep reading for an excerpt from UNTAMED COWBOY by Maisey Yates.
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From New York Times bestselling author
Maisey Yates comes the sizzling second book in her new GOLD VALLEY Western romance
series. Shy tomboy Kaylee Capshaw never thought she’d have a chance of winning the heart of her longtime friend Bennett Dodge, even if he is the cowboy of her dreams.
But when she learns he’s suddenly single, can she finally prove to him that the woman he’s been waiting for has been right here all along?
Read on for a sneak peek at
UNTAMED COWBOY,
the latest in New York Times
bestselling author Maisey Yates’s
GOLD VALLEY series!
Untamed Cowboy
by Maisey Yates
CHAPTER ONE
KAYLEE CAPSHAW NEEDED a new life. Which was why she was steadfastly avoiding the sound of her phone vibrating in her purse while the man across from her at the beautifully appointed dinner table continued to talk, oblivious to the internal war raging inside of her.
Do not look at your phone.
The stern internal admonishment didn’t help. Everything in her was still seized up with adrenaline and anxiety over the fact that she had texts she wasn’t looking at.
Not because of her job. Any and all veterinary emergencies were being covered by her new assistant at the clinic, Laura, so that she could have this date with Michael, the perfectly nice man she was now ignoring while she warred within herself to not look down at her
phone.
No. It wasn’t work texts she was itching to look at.
But what if it was Bennett?
Laura knew that she wasn’t supposed to interrupt Kaylee tonight, because Kaylee was on a date, but she had conveniently not told Bennett. Because she didn’t want to talk to Bennett about her dating anyone.
Mostly because she didn’t want to hear if Bennett was dating anyone. If the woman lasted, Kaylee would inevitably know all about her. So there was no reason—in her mind—to rush into all of that.
She wasn’t going to look at her phone.
“Going over the statistical data for the last quarter was really very interesting. It’s fascinating how the holidays inform consumers.”
Kaylee blinked. “What?”
“Sorry. I’m probably boring you. The corporate side of retail at Christmas is probably only interesting to people who work in the industry.”
“Not at all,” she said. Except, she wasn’t interested. But she was trying to be. “How exactly did you get involved in this job living here?”
“Well, I can do most of it online. Sometimes I travel to Portland, which is where the corporate office is.” Michael worked for a world-famous brand of sports gear, and he did something with the sales. Or data.
Her immediate attraction to him had been his dachshund, Clarence, whom she had seen for a tooth abscess a couple of weeks earlier. Then on a follow-up visit he had asked if Kaylee would like to go out, and she had honestly not been able to think of one good reason she shouldn’t. Except for Bennett Dodge. Her best friend since junior high and the obsessive focus of her hormones since she’d discovered what men and women did together in the dark.
Which meant she absolutely needed to go out with Michael.
Bennett couldn’t be the excuse. Not anymore.
She had fallen into a terrible rut over the last couple of years while she and Bennett had gotten their clinic up and running. Work and her social life revolved around him. Social gatherings were all linked to him and to his family.
She’d lived in Gold Valley since junior high, and the friendships she’d made here had mostly faded since then. She’d made friends when she’d gone to school for veterinary medicine, but she and Bennett had gone together, and those friends were mostly mutual friends.
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