Book 2 in the Wild series.
Dutch's reputation with women was well known to Lizzette, but that didn't stop her from falling head over heels in love with him. Dutch wasn't just a local rancher, he was also an ex-hockey player revered by the town. She fell for the man however, not the image, and because of this she had her heart broken. When she returned to the same town five years later, her feelings had not changed, but neither had Dutch.
This ebook is also available for purchase in Kindle format.
Other books in this series: Wild Obsession -- Wild Heart -- Micah Rush -- Hartley's Crush
Excerpt:
"Good afternoon ladies and Gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. We will be landing in approximately ten minutes. We hope you have a good evening and thanks for flying with Mountain Air." After the announcement was over the speakers the seatbelt light came on with a reminding ding.
Lizzette leaned over and snapped the belt over her son"s jean clad lap, "we"re landing soon and you need to wear it." She said with a smile when he looked up from his comic book. He pushed the cowboy hat he wore higher on his brow so he could see her better. He insisted that he was going to learn to be a cowboy if they were moving to ranching territory so Liz found him a hat and he loved it. He even slept with it the night before.
"Like when we took off?" He asked his pale blue eyes wide with excitement.
"Yes."
"Is Uncle Jackson going to meet us there?" "He"s supposed to."
"I can"t wait." He said trying to look out of the window to the approaching city, "Do really they have real cowboys there."
Liz swallowed hard at that question, "Yes honey they do." "Wow, can we go horse riding?"
"We can do anything you want."
"I want to rope a steer like you see in the movies." He said excitedly.
Liz lifted his hat and ran a hand over his blonde curls ruffling them, "You are brave."
Since he was born they"d lived in Phoenix Arizona with her aunt, in a totally urban setting. However Micah always was fascinated with cowboys. He"d watched all the John Wayne movies and had numerous toys with that theme. Maybe it was because his uncle kept telling him how cool it was to live in
cowboy country. Micah adored Jackson.
He was her only brother and they were quite close even though they lived far apart over the past five years. Their parents were killed in a car crash when she was twelve and Jackson gave up everything to keep them together. He told her time and time again that he didn"t regret one minute of it, but she wished that he had a life instead of raising his baby sister. She was his world besides her precious son.
Her son was almost five and it had been longer than that since she was home to Sulphur Springs Montana. However, her aunt had passed away and her kids inherited her estate, which was fine with her for it was time she went home to Jackson. She missed him terribly.
As for her aunt, she was thankful for her. She didn"t need anything except a place to stay all of those years ago and she was the last of her immediate family besides her brother. Now she was going home. Although it sounded wonderful, the only problem was, Micah"s father was still living there too and he didn"t know about his son.
He"d made it clear years ago that he wasn"t interested in a relationship except that one thing that created Micah. She was deeply in love with the man and gave herself to him, and only him. After that, Micah came first and she didn"t want another relationship. She made her brother promise not to say anything before she left thankful that her aunt took her in for the past few years and in turn she nursed her until the day she died. She had a string of illnesses, but Liz actually enjoyed being with her and was grateful for the years that they had together. It was convenient for everyone involved, because her two children, their cousins, were all grown up and had busy careers. They were grateful for Liz"s help with their mother. At least she had a place for her and her son to stay four years since he was born and not run into his father.
She didn"t deny that when she thought about Dutch, Micah"s father, that her heart had a mind of its own. It didn"t help that her son was a spitting image of him either all the way down to those pale blue eyes, but unlike Dutch"s, there was no bitterness in Micah"s. She made sure there was a lot of love in his life and it showed. He was curious and independent, not afraid to take risks, well she could probably give that bit to his father, because Dutch was much the same.
She could remember the first time she set eyes on him as if it was yesterday. She was unsuccessfully trying to change a burnt out light bulb in her brother"s hardware store. It seemed like a lifetime ago even though it"d only been five years. She was so na?ve back then. In some ways she still was.
"Gosh!" She exclaimed teetering on the unsteady ladder to change the light bulb. She paused and glanced down at the wood planked floor thinking that it wouldn"t be that hard of a landing if she slipped.
Who was she kidding? Hardwood hurts. She"d just have to be careful. She climbed up the other two rungs and was satisfied that she kept her balance. The bells above the door tingled letting her know that they had a customer. Her brother Jackson would have heard it in the back and tended to whoever it was.
Carefully she reached up and took the screen down from the ceiling and swapped the bulbs. There, she thought that wasn't so hard. It felt good to accomplish that even though she had a fear of heights. So what if she was on an eight foot ladder and had to lean off to the side to reach the burnt out light because it was directly over one of their display shelves. She did it.