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  “I hear Amber’s going to be there,” Carson teased.

  Amber Jamison was a woman who wasn’t exactly well-known for her upstanding moral conduct and who’d been chasing after Shane for as long as he could remember.

  “Got plans,” he told his brother, glancing at the dark-haired mirror image of their father. “Friend coming from out of town.”

  “Friend?”

  Carson was grinning at him with a suggestive look in his eyes. His dad, Reese, had sired five Gillian kids. He came from a large family, even though his mom had died seven years ago. He had four cousins, too, not to mention assorted step-cousins thanks to his uncle’s first, failed marriage to a woman with kids of her own. All of them, even the ones not related to him by blood, seemed determined to see him settle down. Little did they know. The one woman in the world who’d ever piqued his interest, someone he’d never thought he’d see again, would meet him at her hotel in less than an hour. God forbid she come here. All three of his brothers and two of his cousins shared the ranch-hand quarters, and he didn’t need them to catch wind of his fling with Kaitlin Cooper.

  “What’s her name?” Carson asked, one of his thick brows lifting in a teasing way. Shane slipped the bridle off his sorrel’s head. The horse tried to soothe an itch on Carson’s arm.

  They stood out in front of a single-story twenty-four-horse barn made to match the ranch house a quarter mile down the road. They raised cutting horses and every one of the horses lived like a king in a Spanish-style barn with a terra-cotta-tile roof and a stucco exterior that reflected the sun’s rays, making Shane squint beneath his cowboy hat.

  “None of your business.”

  “None-of-Your-Business?” His brother hooked the bridle on the horn of the saddle. “I’ve met her before. Has a brother named Stay-Out-of-My-Business.”

  “That’s the one.”

  The Gillian families shared a large area of acreage, which meant keeping a secret would be next to impossible. Everyone knew everyone’s secrets when you were constantly under each other’s feet. His uncle and his cousins lived off to the north, but they shared in the duties of caring for five hundred head. The land had been bought with money won at numerous rodeos, including the National Finals. His dad and his uncle had been famous team ropers. Hell, they were still famous, and they’d been smart enough to invest in land and cattle back when it’d been cheap in Via Del Caballo. He planned to settle down on a portion of it, but his dad didn’t believe in simply handing things to his kids, so he was doing his best to make his own way.

  You need to earn it, boy-ah.

  He could perfectly hear his dad’s blustery voice. So he had to win a national championship first. And pay his dad for the land. He was almost there, too, but he’d drawn a dink in the last round of the finals last year and lost the average by a hair. He’d still won a bag of money, but not enough to pay his dad for the land and to build his dream home out in the south forty. It’d about killed him, too. He’d been drowning his sorrows when he’d met Kaitlin in December. She’d walked into the NFR after-party, and he’d been blown away because, of course, he had recognized her. He’d been a fan of stock-car racing ever since he was old enough to watch TV.

  “Heellooo.”

  A hand blocked his view. He realized he’d paused with his hands on the saddle, one on the cantle, the other on the pommel, and with what was no doubt a bemused smile on his face.

  “Okay, spill.” Carson slipped between him and his horse. “Who is she and where’d you meet her?”

  Shane sidestepped him, moving to the other side to take off his saddle. The smell of the animal’s wet coat filled the air.

  “Can you leave me alone?” He hid his eyes beneath the brim of his black cowboy hat. “I’m in a hurry here.”

  “Come on, man.” Carson followed him for a step or two. “I’m dying to know.”

  He wouldn’t tell him. Carson would tell his dad, which would result in a lecture from dear old Dad on the importance of keeping your eye on the goal.

  Carson followed him into the barn and to the tack room to the right.

  “For the love of—” Shane set the saddle down on one of the saddle racks. The room held dozens of them. Championship saddles, all of them. The Dynamic Duo had been his dad and uncle’s team nickname. Rodeo legends, the both of them.

  “You don’t need to know who it is. Besides, she’ll be leaving almost as soon as she arrives, and I doubt I’ll hear from her afterward. Not for a while, at least.”

  But if anything, the words made his brother seem even more curious. Shane refused to talk about Kaitlin, though. Just as he hadn’t told Carson about the night he’d met her. They’d both done a good job keeping their one-night romance out of the limelight. He planned to keep it that way.

  Still, he kept a watchful eye in his truck’s rearview mirror as he drove away from the ranch a half hour later. He wouldn’t put it past his brother to follow him. Carson was that way. Not a serious bone in his body. The thing was, and it irked the hell out of Shane, life just seemed to fall into place for Carson. He was a team roper like Daddy and Uncle Bob, but had he set a goal to try to make it to the NFR? Hell no. And then when he’d gotten there through blind luck, he’d just lackadaisically roped his way through each round, coming within a hairbreadth of winning the whole shebang. Meanwhile, Shane had twisted himself into knots until that final round in his event. Then he’d had the rotten luck to draw Dingo. Some things just weren’t fair.

  He’d traveled halfway to town before he realized the motel was only a few miles away. He’d purposely given her the name of a place on the outskirts of Via Del Caballo. The fewer prying eyes that spotted the two of them together, the better. He loved his hometown with its rolling hills—they were green this time of year—and picturesque downtown, but the thing about Via Del Caballo was that everyone knew who everyone was. Still, he felt a little guilty as he pulled into the single-story Spanish-style motel with a wooden railing and doors that opened to the parking lot. He felt about sixteen again, like a kid sneaking out to a party.

  Nervous.

  He had to wipe his hands on his truck’s steering wheel. Crazy how many emotions were coursing through him. Excitement. Curiosity. Anticipation.

  He would bet it was her rental car he’d parked next to. Sure enough, as he walked by he could see the rent-a-car sticker in the front windshield. He didn’t even need to knock, either, because her motel door opened and there she was, his all-American girl with her blond hair and blue, blue eyes.

  “Hey there,” he said.

  She smiled, but it was a forced grin, and that was his first clue that something wasn’t quite right. He’d expected a sultry grin, maybe even a flirtatious comment, but instead she stepped aside, allowing him access to her room without so much as shaking his hand.

  “Sit down.”

  His heart pumped double-time then, but not for the reason it’d been pounding earlier. Something on her face told him this was not a social call, and if wasn’t a social call, that meant she had news to share, and there was only one kind of news he could think of that would be responsible for wiping the smile off a beautiful woman’s face.

  “Why do I have the feeling you’re about to tell me something I’m not going to be too happy to hear?”

  She motioned toward the bed, and he felt his mind start to detach from his body in the same way it did right before he climbed atop a bull. She stood there, her hair loose and long around her shoulder, a red T-shirt hugging her curves, plain jeans revealing the shape of her hips, and he knew, he just knew.

  “I’m pregnant.”

  Good thing she’d told him to sit down.

  Copyright © 2018 by Pamela Britton

  ISBN-13: 9781488082313

  The Right Cowboy

  Copyright © 2018 by Rebecca Winters

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