Life in the little rustic town on California’s Central Coast had bored Brianna Bellflower to tears that summer she was sixteen. Other than the warm nights sitting next to a handsome cowboy at his granddad’s Leaning’ Tree Ranch. Returning to Rancho Lorena to sell her aunt’s old house a dozen years later, city girl developer Bree finds that the cowboy still stops her breath. But is she over her cheating fiancé?
With the Leanin’ Tree in financial trouble, Akron McCrory knows all about developers swooping into wide, wild spaces and changing things up. But he, too, remembers those sweet summer kisses a half a lifetime ago. He and Bree are all grown up now. Will their involvement at a safe house for needy moms lead them on a path together they never expected? Even as they longed for it way back when?
EXCERPT
She needed caffeine, bad. The map app’s
three-hour-and-fourteen-minute drive along the coast had mutated into five long
hours when her destination came into view. Her heart warmed, pittered. Rancho
Lorena. The Leanin’ Tree Ranch.
A girl never forgot her first kiss. Would
she see him again? He’d come back to stay, hadn’t he?
The charming little cowboy town, with
buildings wearing dates from 1887, boasted a modern coffeehouse nestled on a raised
boardwalk. An empty parking spot right in front of the Brew Basket embraced Bree
with invisible arms. She’d get some fortification, and quick.
Across the spread of ranch land, a far-off
mountain range gleamed with snow-tipped peaks. Camel-brown hills hugging the
valley wore wisps of green grass from January’s brief rains. She slid from the
car. The scent of horses on the wind instead of diesel up her nose started long
ago memories glimmering inside her head.
Akron. Akron McCrory. How could he hitch
her breath twelve years after?
Olivia Faren is devastated when she discovers her fiancé and her best friend have a secret—they’re having an affair behind her back. Olivia can’t leave the city fast enough, longing for the peace she hopes to find in the Arkansas country farmhouse she’s inherited. Though the house has seen better days, Olivia is determined to make it a home for herself, and also for the baby she’s carrying—a secret of her own. They’ll make it just fine without any man in their lives.
But then Rain Banyon, powerful half-Cherokee owner of the Rocking B Ranch, focuses his silver gaze on her, and suddenly she’s not sure of anything anymore. Although Rain mesmerizes her, he’s much too handsome and daring to be trusted. With her world turned upside down, giving her heart to this Casanova rancher would wreak even more havoc on her peace of mind.
Threatened by her ex-fiancé’s obsession with her, Olivia tries to let him know she’s no longer interested, but he’s determined to hold on—no matter the cost to him, Olivia, or their unborn child. Can Rain be the man to protect her and keep her safe from this WILD WIND?
EXCERPT:
“Who are you?” She tried to turn
her head toward the gravelly voice, but even that brought pain in her neck. His
features weren’t clear in the dim light.
“Rain Banyon. I live near here.
Happened to be behind you and saw that deer jump out in front of you. Watched
your car go off the road.” He moved the flashlight to her face. “Are you in
pain?”
“Some…when I move.” Her voice came
out hoarse.
“Yeah. You may have a broken rib or
two. The steering wheel’s bent some where it rubbed against your upper chest.”
He touched her shoulder. “Lie still. We’ll get it checked out in the emergency
room at Mercy Hospital in Fort Smith.”
“I don’t need to go to the
hospital.” Olivia’s voice trailed off, and she closed her eyes, a sense of doom
closing in on her. She did need to go
to the ER to make sure her baby was all right, even if she were just two months’
pregnant.
She sighed. Her plan had been to wait
awhile before telling anyone in Mulberry about her pregnancy. Although it shouldn’t
matter, her new teaching job might depend on her keeping her pregnancy a
secret. And the longer she could wait before sharing her pregnancy the less
chance of Matt, her ex-fiancé, finding out. She longed for stability for her
baby, not the turmoil of having a womanizing father. Olivia hunched her
shoulders and tried to stop shivering.
As February's #blogabookscene theme is "All You Need is Love", I am sharing a falling in love moment from my contemporary vampire/cowboy romance Give Me Tomorrow. This story is set in northeastern Colorado in 1990. The hero, Jax, is on the road with his thoroughbred racehorse transport service. The heroine, Lissa, has called his mobile phone with birthday wishes...
EXCERPT (PG)
Each mile was an eternity traveled in checking and re-checking his phone for the reassurance of service. His anticipation for Lissa’s call waned as the hours passed without hearing from her. While still a long way from Omaha, he pulled into a truck stop just as his phone rang. His hopes rose in the same instant he cursed the phone’s display for only showing Incoming Call and not an identifying number.
“This is Jax. Speak your business.”
“I hear you’re thirty‐seven today.” Lissa.
“Are you there? Jax?”
Clearing his throat, he said, “Yeah. Yeah, I’m here. That’s right. Thirty‐seven. I’m getting to be an old man.”
She laughed. “You don’t know what old is. Where are you?”
“I’m at a truck stop between Chicago and Omaha to refuel and grab a bite to eat.” He rolled to a stop at a diesel pump and set the brakes. “Are you on call?”
“As a matter of fact, I am. I’m on my way to the clinic now. I’ll likely be here the rest of the night.”
“Well, if you get a chance, give me a call. I’ll be on the road.”
“All right. If I can, I will, but don’t count on it. Anyway, I hope you’ve had a nice birthday.”
“Thanks. Not much opportunity to celebrate when you’re hauling horses from town to town.” He didn’t want her to hang up, so he grasped for anything to keep her talking.
“Mandy says you’re coming to supper on Saturday.”
“Yes.”
“Good. You’ll get to meet my dad.” “Mandy mentioned that.”
“You know, calling and wishing me happy birthday makes me think you called on your personal phone instead of your work phone.”
Silence. He waited.
“You’re right. I did.”
She could have lied. He took it as a good sign that she didn’t. Jax grabbed a pen from the glove box and poised the tip over his palm. “So, what’s your number?”
More silence.
“Are you still—”
She recited the numbers.
“Got it. Thanks.”
“Don’t abuse it.”
“You don’t want me to call you?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Lissa?”
“Yes?”
Say it. Just say it. “I wish you were with me. I’ve missed you.”
Again, nothing from her end. He checked the service. Still connected. “Are you there?”
The light lilting tone in her voice made him smile. He didn’t know what giddiness felt like, but he was pretty sure it must be close to how he felt right then.
“Jax, I’ve reached the clinic. I have to go.”
“Yeah, sure. It was good talking to you. See you Saturday.”
Leaning back in his seat, he sat there staring at the center of the steering wheel as he worked her words around in his head. She admitted it. She misses me. And it sounded like she wasn’t just saying the words. She meant it. His slow grin turned to a full-blown smile.
A full thermos of coffee, an extra sandwich and chips for the road, and the tanks full of diesel, Jax hit the highway. Light‐hearted and counting off the miles, he turned up the volume on the classic country music radio station and sang his way homeward on Interstate 80. It was somewhere west of Grand Island when he realized he was in love.
This is Part 2 of my release day countdown for Give Me Tomorrow…
Give Me Tomorrow, is a paranormal-lite cowboy/vampire novella
set in 1990 Colorado. It releases through Fire Star Press on September 27, 2018
just in time to kick off the October spooky reads of the Halloween season. [Click HERE for Part 1]
While the 1990 setting for Give Me Tomorrow is far enough in
the past to have historical aspects, it is, ultimately, a contemporary story. Still,
it’s far enough behind us that we could use a little help to jog our memories. Let’s take a stroll back to 1990...
What current events did my characters Jax and Lissa talk about at the supper table or
over drinks?
What was showing at the movie theater?
What songs were on the radio?
What books were on their nightstands?
What shows did they watch on TV?
What about technology?
Motorola Microtac 9088X
c. 1989
Photo from www.webdesignerdepot.com
Here is the opening of Give Me Tomorrow:
Granger Horse Ranch – Boarding, Conditioning, and Layover Facility Platte River City, Colorado – 1990
Chapter One Jaxon Granger lurched out of a dead sleep, wide-awake and on the move with the echoes of the emergency buzzer ringing in his ears. Pulling on his jeans, he threw on a flannel shirt over his t-shirt and crammed on his cowboy hat. Alternately hopping on each bare foot, he stomped into his boots then bolted out the front door, his shirt tail flapping in the brisk, early January wind as he raced across the yard.
Bursting through the side door of the indoor exercise arena and stable, he vaulted the metal corral panels and slowed his steps as he crossed to the far side with care so as not to startle the horse his younger brother Steve held by halter and lead rope. Jax approached the horse from the near side, rubbing his hand along the big bay’s back as he moved forward with a calming touch.
Bending down, he squinted, grimacing as he inspected the gash blazing across the stud’s meaty chest and the lesser slash that went up his shoulder.
“How’d it happen?”
Mac Hartley explained, “I was making the last rounds and found him running loose. He busted up his paddock gate trying to get to a mare.”
“Doc Bohlanger coming out, or are we hauling him in?”
“He’s in Hawaii at his son’s wedding. The new vet working with him is on her way now. She’ll assess the injuries and decide.”
Jax straightened, pinning Mac with a sharp glare. “She?”
Mac’s grin widened.
“Figures.”
Mac taunted, “What’s your problem? Afraid someday you’ll have to give a woman credit for being capable at her job?”
“The last female vet Doc sent out here passed out halfway through the procedure.”
Steve argued, “Hey. That was over a year ago. It was August and hotter’n the hubs of Hades that day, and there wasn’t a hint of a breeze blowing through this building. We were all feeling it.”
“What about Doctor Prim and Prissy last spring? She got herself hurt worrying about her manicure. Doc needs to stop hiring women, and get men who can do the job.”
Steve was already shaking his head before Jax finished philosophizing. “I think you’d better reserve judgment with this one. She started working for Doc around Thanksgiving, and she’s already in hot demand with horse owners. Seems to be her specialty. I’m surprised she hasn’t shown up on your new conquest radar. From what I’ve heard, she was unattached when she moved here, but that might have changed by now.”
