A Cowboy's Love Read online

  Books by J. M. Bronston

  A PURRFECT ROMANCE

  HER WINNING WAYS

  SUMMER ON THE CAPE

  A COWBOY’S LOVE

  Published by Kensington Publishing Corporation

  A Cowboy’s Love

  J. M. Bronston

  LYRICAL SHINE

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  www.kensingtonbook.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  Also by

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  To the extent that the image or images on the cover of this book depict a person or persons, such person or persons are merely models, and are not intended to portray any character or characters featured in the book.

  LYRICAL SHINE BOOKS are published by

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  119 West 40th Street

  New York, NY 10018

  Copyright © 2016 by J. M. Bronston

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  Lyrical Shine and Lyrical Shine logo Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.

  First Electronic Edition: December 2016

  eISBN-13: 978-1-60183-623-6

  eISBN-10: 1-60183-623-6

  ISBN: 978-1-6018-3623-6

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I am pleased to express my thanks to Liza Fleissig and Ginger Harris-Dontzin. They pack a ton of energy, enthusiasm, and effectiveness into their Liza Royce Literary Agency, and I am profoundly thankful for their encouragement and their hard work. I am also thankful for the unfailing care and attention I have received from John Scognamiglio, Rebecca Cremonese, Michelle Forde, Lauren Jernigan, and so many others at Kensington Books. They are an invaluable team and every writer should be so lucky.

  My appreciation also goes to Sandra Kitt, a dear friend and reliable cheerleader who has held my hand and guided me through many steps of my literary journey. You blazed a trail, Sandi, and I am a fervent admirer.

  Michael Anderson, Esq., a Utah attorney, gave me good information when I most needed it. And Google answered a thousand questions—at least a thousand—that were well outside my personal databank. Friends and relatives were sympathetic when I couldn’t come out to play, and neighbors smiled and said, “We didn’t want to bother you. We knew you were working.”

  I acknowledge also, in fond memory, Jim Brady, cowboy, horse whisperer and, in World War II, Navy frogman. This book owes so much to him.

  And then there are my daughters. My dear, perfect three girls, Annie, Mary, and Margaret. To you I owe the most. Thank you.

  Chapter One

  A cloud of gritty, coppery dust swirled above the twisting backhoe. It caught the sunset’s light out of the big western sky, diffused it into sandy red and gold vapors, and drifted back to the desert floor where the big earth-moving machine was cutting a new interstate highway through the ragged sage and rabbit grasses of the wide-open range.

  It often got to well over a hundred degrees out there in the desert, and the girl at the center of the cloud, sitting high up in the backhoe’s swivel seat, wore only a tank top beneath her Day-Glo orange construction vest. Her arms, deeply tanned, shone with sweat despite the dry desert air and her pale blonde hair, hanging straight to her shoulders, was damp beneath the white hard hat. She lifted her work-gloved hand to brush the clinging strands away from her forehead.

  With the big plastic pads protecting her ears from the noise of the racketing engine, she wouldn’t have been able to hear the foreman’s signal, but she knew, from the angle of the light as the sun moved toward the rim of the distant mountains, that it must be close to quitting time. She moved the boom to make the big bucket take one last bite of the sandy, red-gold earth, swung it to the side to drop its mouthful into the trench, and then pulled back the cuff of her glove to check her watch. Even as she did, Gordon Callister came up beside the rig and tapped the doorframe to catch her glance.

  “Okay, Jamie,” he said. “Time to knock off.”

  The girl lifted her hand, nodded her head in response, and Gordon moved on to signal the next man.

  One by one, all along the construction site, the earth-moving machines stopped where they were and the operators dropped off them, leaving the machines scattered and still, under the slow-settling dust, where they would wait like yellow monsters until Monday morning, when they would be roused again to their slow, powerful work.

  Jamie set the backhoe’s big pod stabilizers and dropped the front loader to the ground. Then she switched off the engine and the cloud of dust that shimmered around her began its final slow descent. She climbed down from her high perch, peeled off her gloves and ear protectors, dropped them onto the shoulder-high fender, and headed to the construction shed to log out and pick up her paycheck.

  “Hey, Jamie.” The men were walking to their trucks and cars parked near the shed. “How about a couple of beers?”

  Sounded good. A shower would be nice, too. And a change out of the dirty jeans and the heavy work boots. She undid the yellow bandana tied loosely around her throat, and wiped the back of her neck.

  “Okay. Just a quick one. Where you guys headed?”

  “We’re going into town, to the Canyon Rim. Right off the interstate, just past the Chevron station. Know where it is?”

  She forced a casual smile. “I know where it is.”

  I know where everything in this town is.

  “Catch up with you there soon as I log out.”

  And these guys don’t need to hear my life story.

  She climbed the steps to the shed and went in to get her check.

  One good thing about these big government contracts. Beside the good pay. Gordie’s crews come from everywhere, and they don’t stay around long enough to pick up the local gossip. Best to leave it that way.

  When she reached her battered little green Civic, she tossed her hard hat onto the front seat and climbed in. She glanced into the rearview mirror and frowned at the reflection; she saw what fatigue and too much anger were doing to her. She raked her hands impatiently through her fine hair.

  Twenty-four years old, and I’m already beginning to look like a mean old lady. The way things are going, I’m going to wind up tough and dry before I’m thirty. Like some old pinyon pine out in the desert.

  She adjusted her sunglasses in the mirror.

  But as long as Mandy is here in Sharperville, and the Nixons have her . . .

  She couldn’t help the anger and frustration that every day were etching their marks on her face. Two years since the divorce, and that judge gave custody to
Ray. Not that Ray had ever wanted to be bothered with a two-year-old. He’d handed her right over to his parents, and Edna and Ervil Nixon just couldn’t wait to grab their little granddaughter away from Jamie. They’d never forgiven her for marrying their precious boy and they had jumped at the chance to bring up the child in what they called “the ways of righteousness.”

  God! How Jamie hated the Nixons and their smug show of self-important religious superiority. If they really were so full of piety, she thought, they couldn’t possibly have been so cruel.

  The anger and frustration were hard enough to live with, but just as painful was the humiliation. She looked again into the mirror and tried to smooth out her expression. Only she knew how ashamed she was. Ashamed of how they’d all outfoxed her. Ashamed of the way they’d done it, setting her up the way they did. Ray and that bitch, Tina, and the Nixons, too. And that other one . . .

  She’d been so damned young, just a kid herself, with no one to help her, no one to advise her, and she hadn’t known how to handle the whole thing. She’d been dumb and she’d made mistakes, and now, all she had left was a precious half day every other Saturday—one delicious afternoon every fourteen days. Followed always—oh, God!—by those awful long bouts of tears and sleepless nights.

  She turned the key in the ignition and, for the thousandth time, the old Honda struggled to get going, and for the thousandth time she hoped she’d be able to keep her battered old wreck of a car running a couple of months longer. Maybe she could get one of the guys down at the service station to look it over for her, maybe patch it up again. The last thing she needed was to pour more nickels and dimes into her car. Every penny had to be saved so she could get herself a decent lawyer. This time, she was determined she’d get that custody award turned around.

  But right now it would do her good to just kick back for a while, have a couple of beers with the guys. She switched the car’s radio to the country setting out of Kanab, and let the easy music work its magic, smoothing away the angry tension at the back of her neck. With her paycheck in her pocket and the prospect of a visit with Mandy tomorrow, she felt a little better. She turned the old car south onto the empty highway and, humming along at last with the radio and squinting away from the big sun that was blazing its way west, down into the mountains that were still snow-tipped, even at this time of the year, Jamie headed toward town and a little relaxation.

  * * *

  The Canyon Rim got noisy on Friday evenings when construction crews and cowhands began to drift in, looking to spend their paychecks. Weekdays, it was a quiet place; just a few locals hanging out and maybe the sheriff stopping in for a cup of coffee, or the hunters, during deer season, finishing off their day in the mountains with a steak and some fries. But on Friday night, the dirt parking lot filled up early with pickup trucks and Yamaha bikes and Kawasakis. And a country band, well amplified, started up at six o’clock. By seven, the tiny dance floor was jammed.

  This Friday night, when Jamie got there, the Canyon Rim was already loud with the throbbing music, the air was sharp with the smell of beer, and the air-conditioning was cool on her bare shoulders. She hiked her small frame up onto the empty barstool next to her foreman, Gordie, who always stopped in for one quick one on Friday nights—with a mental wink at his church’s elders—before he went home to LaRaine and the seven kids. His orange hard hat was bright on the bar stool next to him; his summer straw Stetson was on his head. Milt, behind the bar, wiped off the space in front of her.

  “What can I get for you, Jamie?”

  “Let me have a Coors, Milt.” She picked some tortilla chips out of the bowl in front of Gordon. “And can I get some salsa?”

  “You betcha.” Milt brought her the beer, setting it on the bar in front of her.

  She turned on the stool and scanned the room quickly, looking for Harry Marsh and Hutch, and the other men from the crew.

  “Where are the guys?” She swiveled on the stool to face Gordon. “They said they were coming down for a beer.”

  “They won’t be in till later. Couple of days ago, Al Wideman spotted a big cougar up by his place—damned thing came right down into his alfalfa field, not a hundred yards behind his house, and today one of his calves turned up missing. Some of the guys went along to help him look. They’ll be in later, soon’s it gets dark.” He scooped some salsa up on a chip and swallowed it all in one big bite. “But I’m staying only a minute, Jamie.” He leaned his balding head closer to her as the music’s volume was suddenly increased. “LaRaine and I have to be over at the school tonight. Coach says he’s ready to put young Gordie into the game and we want to be there to cheer the kid.”

  “Sure thing, Gordie. I’m just going to listen to the music for a while. Then I’m headed home for a shower and a good night’s sleep.”

  She swiveled around again and leaned her elbows back on the bar behind her. She let her gaze wander casually over the crowd on the floor, boisterous and boozy in the hazy light. It was just what she needed, just to hang out and enjoy the band and the good end-of-the-week intensity of the noisy dancers.

  She was not aware that while she watched the couples on the dance floor there were other eyes on her. At least one person had been interested ever since she’d come through the door.

  Orrin Dwayne Fletcher leaned against the far wall, nursing his third tequila. His buddies had already picked up a couple of girls and were out on the floor dancing, but O.D. was looking. Then Jamie walked in and he figured he’d found the action he’d been looking for. He was amused by the possibilities Jamie’s arrival presented, and he watched for an opportunity to move in on her. He didn’t need to wait more than a couple of minutes.

  At the bar, Gordon finished his beer, resettled the Stetson in place over the remaining fringe of sparse, graying hair, and stood up from the stool.

  “Okay, Jamie. I gotta go now.” He dropped some bills next to his glass and picked up his hard hat. “See you on Monday morning. Have a good weekend.”

  “You, too, Gordie. And you tell that boy of yours to score at least one run for me.” She waved after Gordon’s disappearing figure as he made his way through the haze.

  The stool next to Jamie wasn’t empty for more than a moment. As soon as Gordon left the bar, Fletcher slipped into the vacant seat, setting his glass down roughly, letting his drink splash over his hand and wet the bar top.

  “Well, well, well,” he said. His speech was already thick and slurred. “Look at who’s here.”

  Jamie’s stomach clutched as she recognized the voice. Two years, but that was one voice she wasn’t going to forget. She turned and saw him, an ugly part of her past, the same pale eyes, now tequila-clouded and mean, the same hollow face, the same thin-lipped, cold smile.

  I’m in trouble.

  Maybe if he hadn’t surprised her, coming at her out of nowhere like that, maybe if she’d had a chance to prepare herself, she wouldn’t have felt so frightened. Maybe she should have been able to handle him more calmly, but he was such a slimy little bastard, and he’d already done her so much harm . . .

  “What are you doing in Sharperville, Orrin? I thought they had you locked up.” She tried to keep her voice steady.

  “Well, they did, Jamie. So they did.” He circled his damp glass around and around in the little puddle he’d made on the bar top. “But not forever, y’know. Not forever. And now I’m out of there”—there was a sly edge to his voice—“and I just thought I’d check out Sharperville, see what’s doing around here, look up some old friends. Maybe get a job or something, y’know?”

  “That’ll be the day,” Jamie said. She pulled some dollars out of her pocket and laid them on the bar for Milt, but as she did, Fletcher reached toward her bare arm and, with one wet fingertip, lazily stroked the smooth skin. His touch disgusted her.

  “Hey, Jamie, don’t leave now, honey. I was thinking you and me could maybe pick up where we left off. I mean, shit, I never did forget that last, wonderful night we spent together.”
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  The sonofabitch was having a good time. His eyebrows lifted in mock sincerity, as though he really, truly, expected her to believe him.

  Jamie stood up abruptly. “I’m getting out of here, Orrin.”

  Drunk as he was, Orrin still responded quickly. One strong hand closed roughly over her wrist, pulling her back against the stool. “Hey, where you going, Jamie-girl? The evening’s young and I just got here.”

  “Leave me alone, Orrin. Just leave me alone.” Jamie twisted in his grip, but he wasn’t letting her go.

  “Hey, darlin’”—his eyes glittered—“is that any way to talk to an old drinking buddy?”

  “Don’t be stupid, Orrin. We sure as hell were never any kind of buddies.”

  She pulled helplessly against his grip as tears rose in her eyes.

  Don’t let me cry, not now, not here, not in front of him!

  “Well, that’s not the way I remember it. Seems to me the last night me and you spent together, we had some real fun.” Orrin rubbed his free hand over his mouth, his fingers caressing the stubble on his cheek, as though he was enjoying the memory. His smile grew meaner, his eyes colder.

  “You know it wasn’t like that!”

  She tried to pry his fingers loose but they only tightened on her wrist, hurting her. Panic filled her chest and she tried desperately to control it. “Please, Orrin!”

  She could hear herself pleading and she tried to get the helplessness out of her voice. “Orrin, just leave me alone!”

  This was the kind of thing Orrin Fletcher enjoyed. He knew he was scaring her.