by Maisey Yates
Praise for the novels of Maisey Yates
“[A] surefire winner not to be missed.”
—Publishers Weekly on Slow Burn Cowboy (starred review)
“This fast-paced, sensual novel will leave readers believing in the healing power of love.”
—Publishers Weekly on Down Home Cowboy
“Yates’ new Gold Valley series begins with a sassy, romantic and sexy story about two characters whose chemistry is off the charts.”
—RT Book Reviews on Smooth-Talking Cowboy (Top Pick)
“Multidimensional and genuine characters are the highlight of this alluring novel, and sensual love scenes complete it. Yates’s fans...will savor this delectable story.”
—Publishers Weekly on Unbroken Cowboy (starred review)
“Fast-paced and intensely emotional.... This is one of the most heartfelt installments in this series, and Yates’s fans will love it.”
—Publishers Weekly on Cowboy to the Core (starred review)
“Yates’s outstanding eighth Gold Valley contemporary...will delight newcomers and fans alike.... This charming and very sensual contemporary is a must for fans of passion.”
—Publishers Weekly on Cowboy Christmas Redemption (starred review)
Solid Gold Cowboy
Maisey Yates
To my Gold Valley readers, thank you for loving these books
Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
EPILOGUE
EXCERPT FROM CONFESSIONS FROM THE QUILTING CIRCLE BY MAISEY YATES
CHAPTER ONE
LAZ JENKINS WAS in the business of giving out advice. Okay, technically he owned a bar, and was in the business of selling booze. But that job came with a certain responsibility. He took the position of armchair psychologist very seriously. He had been part and parcel of more happy endings in Gold Valley, Oregon than he could even count at this point. He had wondered—often—if he should start some sort of matchmaking service. Though in fairness, he wasn’t the person who matched people up, he just told them when to quit being dumbasses and work it out with each other. His choose love speech was so well-worn, so tried-and-true, that he could freely mix it up whenever he wanted to.
But when the door to the bar opened after last call and he looked up to see the silhouette of a woman wearing a voluminous dress standing in the doorway, he had a feeling that there wasn’t going to be a choose love speech that would fit this moment.
“You’re closed, aren’t you?”
He would recognize the voice of his best friend anywhere. But his best friend was not supposed to be here today. She was supposed to be getting married. Technically, she was supposed to already be married, and off on her honeymoon with the pointless asshole that she called a fiancé, having that fabled, sparkling wedding night in a fancy hotel in San Francisco, like she had been so looking forward to.
Of course, she appeared to not be there. Something he might have picked up on sooner had he actually gone to the wedding earlier.
He hadn’t.
But he had hoped he wouldn’t have to have that conversation with Jordan so soon after. And he had sort of been hoping that after she’d gone on her honeymoon she might not really care. They’d been planning on going to Hawaii.
“Since when has it mattered to you if I’m closed?”
He pressed both hands on the bar and waited. And he thought back to that first time she’d walked in his bar.
“You’re closed? Aren’t you?”
“Yeah, last call was a full half hour ago, princess.” But he looked at what she was wearing—a light sweater and what looked like pajama pants and he was...well, concerned and curious. “Why don’t you come in and sit for a minute. I’ll make you a cup of hot tea.”
She stood there, just staring for a moment, as if she were stunned by the offer. Then she mobilized. Crossing the wide, empty room and making her way to the bar. “Oh you don’t have to do that.” Even as she sat down.
“I insist.”
He wasn’t about to send her off at two thirty in the morning looking that vulnerable. He’d never forgive himself if something happened to her.
She walked closer and he could see she looked familiar.
“I should have gotten dressed,” she said. “I have to be at work in like...an hour and a half. But I just live down the street.”
“Sugar Cup,” he said, suddenly putting her face into context. “You work at the coffeehouse.”
He didn’t recognize her without her guard up, that was the only way he could describe it. He’d gotten coffee from her a couple of times and she was...sullen. But not now. Now she just looked soft, vulnerable and a little sad.
“Yeah, so this bout of insomnia is getting intense.”
“Insomnia, huh?” He poured some hot water into a mug and added a tea bag—he only had one kind, this was a bar after all—and slid it toward her.
“Yeah, I’ve always had trouble sleeping but it’s gotten worse lately. Just...having trouble sleeping.”
“Sorry to hear it. I’m Laz, by the way.”
She blinked wide blue eyes at him. “I know. I’m Jordan.”
And that was the first of many, many times over the past decade that he and Jordan had shared a cup of tea in his bar at an ungodly hour. From that they’d built a friendship that he wouldn’t have known how to explain if asked. But fortunately, he wasn’t in the business of being asked about his life, nor was he in the business of explaining himself.
It was hard not to go around the bar. Hard not to put himself on the side of the bar she was on. But he didn’t. Because he wanted to know what the hell was happening.
“Haha...hahaha.” He looked at his friend whose shoulders were shaking with the force of her very fake laughter. “Funny story. I didn’t get married. Which, you would know, had you been at the wedding.”
“Looks like you might not have been at the wedding, Jordan. So why do you think I wasn’t?”
“You would have called me. And you didn’t. You haven’t talked to me for three days, actually, Laz.”
“Well. Was there anything to say?”
“Well, I don’t know. We are pretty close, aren’t we? I thought we were.”
Their friendship was a strange one. He could honestly say that he had never been friends with women. Not really. Women liked him. He had absolutely no trouble getting play when he wanted it. He owned a bar, after all. He saw the women who ended up not leaving with the person they wanted to. The women who came to hook up, but didn’t find any they were interested in, except him.
As a blanket policy, he never went home with a woman who had had more than two drinks. Because he was a gentleman like that. And hell, he wanted a woman to know who she was with. And he wanted her to enjoy it. And the fact that he wanted desperately for Jordan to want to be that woman... Well, that was something that stuck in his craw more than he would like to admit. He didn’t do unrequited longing. And hadn’t before he met her.
She’d come in about once a week at first. And in that time he’d managed to collect more and more information on her.
He could still remember the first time she’d mentioned Dylan. Dylan, the eternal boyfriend, who had then become an eternal fiancé. Who had then been intended to be a husband. But was not, it turned out.
“I’ve been with him forever.”
“Is that why you’re still with him?”
She wrinkled her nose. “Weird
question.”
“No it isn’t. We get in habits.”
“He’s a person, not a habit.”
He shrugged. “Just checking.”
“Well, no he’s not. He’s amazing. And he liked me when I was the sad girl in high school with no coat and shoes that were too small. And do you know how many people liked me or tried to know me back then? Approximately no one, that’s how many.”
“All right. Fair. But I bet a whole lot more people like you now.”
“I got busy.”
“You got busy. Great.”
“Are you going to castigate me for declining to come to the wedding that you clearly didn’t have, or are you going to actually tell me what the hell happened?”
“There’s no point talking about it,” she said, wading deeper into the bar, kicking the tulle and lace of her dress out of the way. It did something weird to his heart. Made it get tight. Also made it feel too big for his chest all at once.
It was hell. He didn’t like it.
He hadn’t imagined her in such a fussy wedding dress. Jordan was... The thing about Jordan was she wasn’t actually sullen. She was reserved. She took a while to get to know, but he knew her. And he had a feeling it was her almost-mother-in-law’s fault she was in such a fluffy dress.
I’m not the person that my mother-in-law... My future mother-in-law would’ve chosen for her son. She told me that. I had a lot of changing to do to be...remotely acceptable. Trailer trash and all that.”
“She called you that?”
“Oh, not in so many words. She’s a good churchgoing woman, she would never say it. But she thinks it. I know she does. She was so generous to me, and she gave me a place to stay when I needed one, but it has always come with strings.”
He could remember every conversation they’d had at this bar. For someone who talked to hundreds of people every week, it was telling when he could have a conversation with one person and know it was important.
He’d made good friends with West Caldwell. The guy was an ex-convict from Texas, wrongfully accused of a crime he didn’t commit, who had married the town police chief. There was just something about the guy, easy to get to know, easy to talk to, as well as not talk to. But, he had never once been tempted to kiss West. There were several reasons for that. But it was just one of the many ways that Jordan herself was unique.
Their connection had stuck. That conversation had stuck. And it had bloomed into a friendship. One that took place between the end of his shift and the beginning of hers. That was another thing about Jordan. She often wandered the streets of Gold Valley from 2:00 a.m. to 4:00 a.m., captive to her insomnia, which had become the foundation for their relationship. And he had just... Well, he’d forgone a lot of sleep and a lot of sex for the privilege of talking with her.
“There’s no point talking about it, and yet you’re here. In the place where we talk about it. All of it. So you might as well go.”
“I just couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t do it. I got to the day, and I couldn’t do it. And I owe them everything.”
He knew what she meant. She didn’t just mean Dylan. She meant his whole family. Jordan had been kicked out by her parents when she was sixteen, and it was her boyfriend’s family who had taken her in. He knew that her connection with them was complicated, and went far beyond a simple romantic entanglement with one person. She was enmeshed in the entire family. And she spoke about it in terms of affection and irritation in pretty equal turns. But one thing was certain—always certain—she loved his family. She loved him too, though less often doubted that she loved him the way that a woman should love a man. She carried a lot of affection and obligation for him.
He wasn’t actually an asshole. It was just that Laz didn’t think he was right for Jordan.
And you think you are?
For all his speeches on love, he’d never been in love himself.
He’d been married to this bar for more years than he could count. After moving to Gold Valley to care for his grandmother and work on her ranch, he’d set new goals for himself. And those goals had included buying a piece of the main street of the town that he had come to love so much.
So he’d done that. But along the way... Along the way he hadn’t done the whole marriage and family thing. It had never seemed all that attractive to him. His parents had been steeped in icy silence, the success of their professional lives not compensating for the solid wall of ice that existed in their personal lives. There had just been so much resentment. And if they’d hated being obligated to each other, they hadn’t been a whole lot more excited about Laz and his extracurricular activities either.
It was why Gold Valley had been an easy choice. It was why he left home at seventeen. Chosen to graduate from Gold Valley High rather than the high school in Portland he’d been going to. Because while his grandmother had been stern and firm, running the place with an iron fist, there had also been peace in her house. Long talks late into the night, her particular brand of soul food, and sweet tea, owed to her upbringing in Louisiana. She had been a hardworking woman, and she had run the men who worked the ranch, and her house with unfailing energy.
“I can’t believe that she’s gone.” He poured a shot of whiskey for himself, and then one for Jordan. He set both on the bar.
“I’m so sorry,” Jordan said, her hands on his. And he wished it could be more. “I wish I could have met her.”
“She has been pretty poorly ever since we met. Didn’t come down to town really anymore.” He knocked the shot back. But he wished that his grandmother had met Jordan too. He’d have liked to get her take on them.
“To your grandma.” She took the shot, then gasped. “Oh Lord. I’ve never done that before.”
“Well shit. Didn’t tell me that. I wouldn’t have thrown you in the deep end.”
“It’s okay,” she said, wheezing. “I’m fine.”
He laughed. Absurdly, even while sorrow rolled through him. “She would have really liked you.”
“I can’t think of a better compliment.”
And he couldn’t either. Except... Except that Jordan was Jordan. And that in and of itself was a compliment he knew she would never be able to take.
“She would have liked you. So fuck Dylan’s mom.”
She laughed. “Don’t say that. She took me in. She’s been really good to me.”
“She makes you feel bad about yourself. That’s not good.”
“Yeah. I guess not.”
“You’re special. Don’t ever forget that.”
“Laz...”
But he was done talking about himself. Just profoundly done.
“Do me a favor. Help me get up to that apartment upstairs tonight. Because I’m not going to be able to drive.”
“Whatever you need.”
He didn’t need to think about that. The one night he’d needed someone to be there for him. Gladys would have scolded him. She wouldn’t have wanted her grandson getting sloppy drunk over her, that was for sure.
She’d been a staunchly independent woman. The only one in her family to move from Louisiana to the West Coast. She’d forged her own path, and she’d done it with a firm, uncompromising spirit. She wasn’t a woman to raise her voice, but she wasn’t holding in anger. She just spoke her piece when it needed speaking. She did what needed doing. She didn’t have entanglements she couldn’t handle. And she seemed happier for it. Her husband had died before Laz was born, early in his father’s childhood.
And while she had mourned her husband, she had been content with the life she had built for herself on her own terms.
He’d always admired that. It also internalized that you just couldn’t have the life that you wanted, not down to the final detail, if you shared it with someone else. His parents were unhappy because they had each other, and him, and it was one too many obligations.
&
nbsp; Gladys had been good to him. She’d come to his football games at the high school. She’d come to his bar until it had been a bit much for her to make it into town. Her freedom left her free to love him a bit better, and to shine all the brighter.
And he’d wanted to be like her. Not his parents.
His brand of solitude had worked for him.
He saw enough people in the bar.
But then along had come Jordan, and a slow shift of things had begun to make him question whether or not it was what he wanted for always. But then, Dylan had always been a factor. Always Dylan.
“Do you ever wonder if you’ve made a mistake?”
“What kind of mistake?”
“I don’t know. I can’t tell if it’s a big one or small one. But I just feel like. I don’t know how to explain it. My life was never easy. I mean, I’m not trying to be a victim or anything like that, it’s just that it was always tough. Growing up in my house. And I took the first available hand that got offered to me. And sometimes I just wonder. I wonder if I’m in the wrong place. Or maybe I’m the wrong person for the place. I don’t know. I really don’t know.”
“I understand in some ways. I think my parents always felt like they made the wrong choice. Live the wrong lives. And what the hell can you do with that?”
“I don’t know. I guess it depends on how determined you are to keep living in that life.”
Until now, maybe.
“So, what changed?”
“You know, the needing to stand there and say vows. I kept going through them in my head. Over and over again. We didn’t do anything sappy like writing our own vows. You know I hate that shit.”
Jordan liked to play she wasn’t sentimental at all. A holdover from being that girl with no winter coat. But he knew she was. He knew she loved Christmas lights. Just a few months ago the town had been all lit up for Christmas, and it had snowed. And there was Jordan, two in the morning even though it was freezing.
“We should go for a walk.”
“It is fucking freezing.”