Love Letters Volume 6: Cowboy's Command (The Love Letters) Read online

  Love Letters Volume 6: Cowboy’s Command

  By Ginny Glass, Christina Thacher, Emily Cale and Maggie Wells

  These men know how to ride! Meet red-hot ranchers and captivating cowboys in five new novellas in Love Letters Volume 6: Cowboy’s Command.

  V Is for Vindicated by Maggie Wells

  Barrel-racing queen Michelle Kelly likes to ride wild—but her old flame Cole Powell might have what it takes to rope the woman he loves once and for all.

  W Is for Wanted by Ginny Glass

  When Samuel Thrasher is forced to return to his family’s ranch, he doesn’t want to revisit his past…except when it comes to Merrit Hightower, who’s definitely not the innocent girl he left behind!

  X Is for XXX Ranch by Maggie Wells and Emily Cale

  Jane Richardson is stunned to discover that the property she’s inherited isn’t the working ranch she imagined. Handsome neighbor Clive Boland offers to buy the XXX Ranch—and proposes more than just a business deal.

  Y Is for Yearning by Christina Thacher

  Cowboy Ben Hastings is everything Diana wants in a man. He may be quiet, but their passion between the sheets is anything but. Yet making a place for her in his bed and life may be a challenge…

  Z Is for Zeal by Emily Cale

  Rancher Aaron Lyons hates when tourists take over his local bar during rodeo week—until he meets Nathan Howell, and their encounter turns into a one-night stand neither of them will forget.

  53,000 words

  Dear Reader,

  It’s possible I say this every year, but I love October. To me, this is the month that signals the start of a season of hot apple cider, evenings by the fire, and curling up on the sofa with a good book, dressed warmly in sweatpants and a comfy shirt and snuggled under my favorite fuzzy blanket. We at Carina Press can’t provide most of those things, but we can provide the good books, and this month we have more than a few good books!

  In Running Back, the highly anticipated sequel to Allison Parr’s new-adult contemporary romance Rush Me, Natalie Sullivan is on the verge of a breakthrough most archaeology grad students only dream of: discovering a lost city. Her research points to a farm in Ireland, but to excavate she needs permission from the new owner: the Michael O’Connor, popular NFL running back.

  If you’re like me, there are certain tropes in romance that you fall for every time. One of mine is the main theme of Christi Barth’s newest book, Friends to Lovers. (Gee, can you guess what it is?) Daphne struggles with revealing her longtime lust for Gib, sparking it all off with a midnight kiss on New Year’s Eve—only Gib doesn’t know it’s Daphne he’s kissed! Also in the contemporary romance category is First and Again by Jana Richards, which has a special place in my heart because this emotional story takes place in my home state of North Dakota.

  For months, this Red Cross head nurse has been aiding Allied soldiers caught behind enemy lines, helping them flee into the neutral Netherlands. It’s only a matter of time until she’s caught in Aiding the Enemy, a historical romance by Julie Rowe. If you’re a fan of Downton Abbey, be sure to check out the rest of Julie’s historical romances.

  We have two mysteries for readers to solve this month. British crime author Shirley Wells returns to the sleepy northern town of Dawson’s Clough with her popular Dylan Scott Mystery series in the next book, Deadly Shadows. And in Julie Anne Lindsey’s Murder by the Seaside, counseling is murder, but it’s never been this much fun.

  Erotic romance author Christine d’Abo brings us the story of Alice’s obsession with a brooding lawyer at her firm, which takes Alice on a journey of self-discovery through the rabbit hole and into the world of BDSM in Club Wonderland. Also this month, the Love Letters ladies, Ginny Glass, Christina Thacher, Emily Cale and Maggie Wells, round up five sizzling-hot stories to finish off their sexy stampede through the alphabet with Love Letters Volume 6: Cowboy’s Command.

  Edgar Mason is losing Agamemnon Frost despite everything they’ve been through—the passion, the torture, the heat. Frost’s fiancée Theodora is back, and Mason can feel his lover gravitating toward her. Every day he sees them together, it tears at his heart. Don’t miss Agamemnon Frost and the Crown of Towers, the conclusion to Kim Knox’s male/male historical science fiction trilogy.

  Because October is the perfect month for the paranormal, we have a wide selection of fantasy, urban fantasy and paranormal to share with you. In Jeffe Kennedy’s fantasy romance, Rogue’s Possession, neuroscientist Gwynn’s adventures in Faerie continue in the long-awaited sequel to Rogue’s Pawn. And in the sequel to Soul Sucker, a powerful magic user is stealing people’s faces in San Francisco, and empath Ella Walsh and shifter Vadim Morosov have been called in to investigate in Death Bringer by Kate Pearce. Also returning with another book in her Blood of the Pride series is Sheryl Nantus, with her paranormal romance Battle Scars.

  Combining futuristic fiction, fantasy and urban fantasy, Trancehack by Sonya Clark is a compelling cross-genre romance. In a dystopian future where magic is out in the open and witches are segregated, a high-profile murder case brings together a police detective and a witch with unusual powers that combine magic and technology. But dangerous secrets, a political cover-up, and the law itself stand between them. Don’t miss this exciting new world of witchpunk!

  Carina Press is pleased to introduce three debut authors this October. Science fiction erotic romance author Renae Jones gives us a Taste of Passion when lust strikes hard for Fedni, an empath who can taste emotion, but her off-worlder neighbor is horrified by the caste system that the former courtesan holds dear.

  Two urban fantasy authors debut with us this month. In Kathleen Collins’s Realm Walker, a realm walker hunts a demon intent on destroying both her and the mate who left her seven years ago. Also debuting in urban fantasy is Joshua Roots with his book Undead Chaos. When warlock Marcus Shifter performs a simple zombie beheading, he soon finds that the accidental framing of an innocent necromancer, falling in lust, and burning down a bar are just the beginning of his troubles.

  Regardless of whether you’re discovering these books in October or in the middle of summer, any time is the perfect time for reading, and I hope you enjoy all these titles as much as we’ve enjoyed working on them.

  We love to hear from readers, and you can email us your thoughts, comments and questions to [email protected]. You can also interact with Carina Press staff and authors on our blog, Twitter stream and Facebook fan page.

  Happy reading!

  ~Angela James

  Executive Editor, Carina Press

  www.carinapress.com

  www.twitter.com/carinapress

  www.facebook.com/carinapress

  Contents

  V Is for Vindicated

  W Is for Wanted

  X Is for XXX Ranch

  Y Is for Yearning

  Z Is For Zeal

  About the Authors

  Copyright

  V Is for Vindicated

  By Maggie Wells

  Heart pounding like a kettledrum, Michelle pitched her weight forward, changing her angle as she raced for the finish. Staccato breaths burst from parched lips as she tightened her thigh muscles and leaned in close. She left al
l thoughts of style and finesse in her dust, and gave voice to the tiny grunts of encouragement she could no longer hold back.

  “Yes, yes, yes!”

  She slapped at the stopwatch strapped to her bicep and pulled up on the reins, her chest heaving in time with her horse’s blustering exhalations. “Attagirl.” She gave the mare’s neck a distracted pat as they slowed to a trot. Her smile faded as she raised her arm and checked the digital display. A flash of white tugged at her attention and her gaze narrowed as she scanned the deserted paddock, but her mind lingered on the clock she kept trying to beat. “Just a little more. I need you to give me just a little more, baby.”

  With the barest flick of her wrist, she turned her mount toward the gaping barn door, determined to get one more practice run in with Sweetpea before calling it quits for the day.

  “You can do this, baby.” Grimacing as they moved into the shadow cast by the barn, she fluttered her lashes, willing her pupils to adjust to the dim light a little quicker. “Fast and tight,” she reminded the mare.

  Raising one hand she turned the spirited paint in a tight circle, her eyes fixed so intently on the barrels dotting the practice ring she didn’t see the cowboy lounging against the faded barn wall before he spoke.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doin’, riding like a crazy woman?”

  The husky rasp in his oh so familiar voice ripped her insides to shreds. Her fingers tightened convulsively on the reins, but before she could cover her shock with the sequin-bright smile she’d perfected, he pushed away from the wall and caught hold of the bridle.

  Michelle stared at the sun-baked barrels, for one breathless second wishing she could make a break for them. Hell, she wished she could hide herself in one like a rodeo clown. But the stubborn bull of a man who haunted her dreams held tight, trapping her there with him. That is, if she let him.

  Forcing the smile she wore each time she took a victory lap, she swung her leg up and dismounted. Her cheekbones creaked when the toe of her boot kicked a cloud of dirt onto his well-worn but spit-polished Lucchese boots. Her stomach turned a slow somersault as she let her eyes slide shut for the length of a heartbeat. A white-hot bolt of anger streaked through her like lightning. She could almost hear her hair crackle in the still twilight. Michelle ran a protective hand over the thick ponytail trailing down her back. She’d given Cole Powell her virginity and he’d broken her heart. She’d be damned if she let him give her split ends too.

  Squaring her shoulders, she took off for the dimly lit interior of the barn, leaving him to follow with her horse. Like a stable boy. A grim smile curved her lips as she gave a passing thought to how far the golden boy of the Badlands Circuit had fallen. “Well, lookie what the barn cats drug in.”

  “Dragged,” he corrected, brushing past her to lead Sweetpea into the stall.

  She narrowed her eyes and nudged him aside, a smirk firmly in place as she busied herself with stripping tack. “You always were much so smarter than the rest of us. How did we ever survive without your guidance?”

  The twitch of his lips made her wish the words back before they even settled around them. “I imagine you muddled through the same way I did without your smart mouth sassing me day and night.”

  She hadn’t laid eyes on the man in over a year, but nothing much had changed. One mention of the word mouth and she fixated on his. His lips were full and soft, a pale shade of pink that might have looked feminine on a man who wasn’t so unapologetically masculine. Like the rest of his bold features, they were precisely defined as if they’d been cut by an artist’s chisel. He ran his hand over the two days’ growth of beard he wore better than any man, and her heart thudded to life once more.

  The battered Resistol sat low over his eyes, but the familiar chestnut curls licking at the lobes of his ears were enough to make her chest ache. She knew better than most the unyielding planes of his handsome face weren’t even the hardest parts of the man lurking in the shadows. One crazy night he’d covered her with the length of his body, molded her flesh with his hands and buried his cock deep inside her. The very next day his dreams and her heart had been shattered to pieces.

  It felt strange to look at him through fresh eyes. One day in the not so distant past she would have sold her soul to the devil for a kiss. She had, actually. One touch and he had her panting and moaning his name, practically climbing the man like a tree in her haste to give him everything she had. And now the devil was back to collect.

  Cole raised his head at last, meeting her gaze with the kind of lazy insolence that made her grit her teeth and clench her thighs together. He thought he still knew her, but she wasn’t the trusting girl he’d known. She no longer believed love to be enough. He wasn’t her be-all and end-all anymore.

  At least, that was what she wanted him to think.

  The scent of drugstore aftershave mingled with expensive leather proved gut-wrenchingly familiar. A hot flush scalded her neck and cheeks as she went reeling right back to feeling like an awkward kid begging for scraps of his attention and affection. She hated him for that. One whiff and her panties were soaking wet. A fact that made her hate herself a little more.

  His gaze remained steady as his sensuous mouth flattened into a stern line. He looked just like his granddad when he glared. A lecture was coming. He wet his lips and all thoughts of family resemblance flew from her head. For one wild, reckless moment, she wondered what Cole would say if she told him she’d rather have a spanking than a lecture.

  “Chasen called me.” The mention of his grandfather reined in her wayward thoughts. “He said you were trying to kill yourself. Silly old coot thought it might be over me.”

  She flinched. The words struck too damn close to her soft spots despite being more than a little off the mark. “Better call Doc Mardsen and have him up your granddaddy’s dosage.” Drawing a steadying breath, she held his gaze, needing to prove she wasn’t about to back down. She wasn’t the scared, silly girl with a crush. No need to try to impress the hotshot rodeo star. Cole wasn’t the rodeo star anymore, she was. “He must’ve forgotten you and I aren’t anything to each other.”

  She swung the worn saddle she used for practice from Sweetpea’s back with a grunt and started out of the stall. Moving with the speed he kept carefully concealed outside of the arena, Cole grasped her arm as she passed. Michelle swallowed the sizzle of awareness, keeping her eyes locked on the tack room at the end of the barn.

  “That’s a lie,” he said in a low, harsh whisper.

  She jerked her arm free. “Truer words have never been spoken.”

  “I remember a time when we were everything—friends, partners, competitors…lovers.”

  He drawled the last so slow and soft it hissed like a lit fuse.

  Without looking back, she wagged her head, denying the truth he spoke as cavalierly as he’d denied her. “Yeah, well, I remember the day you made me feel like nothing.”

  She forced herself to walk, not run, for the sanctuary offered by the tack room. The refuge seemed miles away, but she held her head high as she put as much ground between them as possible.

  It had been a mistake to come home to the Figure 8 Ranch to practice, but the invitation had been damn near irresistible. She’d needed a break from the grueling schedule of competing on the Badlands circuit. She needed a little time to rest and recoup. She needed to come home. After eighteen months of relentless pursuit, her championship season was within reach. All she had to do was stay calm, keep her focus, and ride hell-bent for leather.

  The offhanded reason for Cole’s visit was laden with subtext, and that cut her to the quick. Chasen Powell had been her mentor, confidant and confessor ever since she was a horse-crazy girl. A renowned rodeo champion in his own right, Cole’s grandfather exuded an affinity for the sport that sank roots deeper than a need for victory. He’d convinced her parents their little girl had more natural talent on a horse than most of the cowboys who worked their neighboring ranches. In one afternoon, with one cli
ck of an ancient stopwatch, he’d tamed her restless nature by giving her purpose and direction.

  Under his tutelage, she and Cole learned what it meant to compete with drive, honor and valor on a circuit rapidly becoming absorbed in standings and position. He competed on an amateur level through his college years. The grudging respect she earned from a cocky teenage boy turned to friendship, and by the time he turned pro, she’d fallen for him. Hard.

  She was born to be a barrel racer. Cole was destined to become rodeo royalty. It was supposed to be a romance written in the stars. Back when she was young and naive, Michelle believed if she rode as fast as she could, and loved him harder than anyone else, she might lure him away from the bevy of buckle bunnies circling him day in and day out. She kept at him, wearing down his resistance little by little. She saw it as a victory that he didn’t bolt when she took him by his rope-roughened hand and led him into her room.

  Drunk on success and bursting with pent-up emotion, she made her feelings for him painfully clear, certain that one heated night in a dingy Rapid City motel room would be all it took to win his heart. But the next day she heard him tell a fellow bronc rider they were just friends. She tried not to hate him for it. After all, the transition from friends to lovers had happened on impulse. At least on his part. She tried to play it cool. Like he hadn’t trampled her feelings. As if she slept with rodeo riders all the time. But they both knew she didn’t. She planned to be mature and sensible, to talk to him that night, to make sure they were clear on where they stood.

  That was before the man she loved straight down to her toes had to go and get his future busted to bits by a bronco.

  “You gonna hide all night?”

  The arrogance in his voice flew all over her. He had a lot of nerve hollering about hiding after the way he’d holed up after that horse shattered his leg. She’d sat outside his hospital room for days just waiting and praying. She’d never forget the annoying buzz of the fluorescent lights or the pain-etched lines carved into Chasen’s face as he explained that his stubborn-as-a-mule grandson refused to see anyone but family.