Rodeo Baby

A SMALL TOWN. A BIG SURPRISE.

Handsome, strange men are not on Violet Summer’s radar—especially ones sitting in her diner in too-new cowboy gear. She’ll eat an old boot if Sam Michaels is a real cowboy. Nope, there’s a reason Mr. Phony Cowboy and his teenage daughter are here in Rodeo, Montana...and she’ll find out the truth.

Sam just wants to get back to New York. He doesn’t need complications, like the gorgeous diner owner who irritates and intrigues him at the same time. Or a simmering attraction that results in one unforgettable night—and an unexpected bun in the oven! Now he’s torn between his big-city life...and becoming a real cowboy for good.

“Now, Miss Retro Diner Owner, are you going to laugh at my riding skills again?”

Vy stalked to the edge of the stream, hot and bothered and struggling to get herself under control.

She felt Sam’s heat behind her.

“Now that we’ve acknowledged our attraction to each other, do you want to tell me why you hate me so much?”

“You’re a phony,” she said. “You’re no more a cowboy than I am.”

“Considering how obvious it is that I can’t even fake it well, yes. I am a phony. I have my reasons.”

She rounded on him. Big mistake. His nearness, his height, his insightful gray eyes disconcerted her.

Damn. She wasn’t used to being out of control. She was the one people came to for her cool head under pressure.

What was this man doing to her?

Dear Reader,

I have so much fun writing about the cowboys and children in my stories, and in particular, about those in the small town of fictitious Rodeo, Montana.

As I moved along in this series, I wondered how the townspeople would react to a man who comes to town pretending to be a cowboy when it’s painfully obvious that he isn’t one!

How would a certain diner owner, who’s been hurt by a phony in her past, be affected?

Sam and Violet’s story blossomed out of that idea and raised so many questions. Why on earth would a normally intelligent city man decide it was a good idea to pretend to be a cowboy? How did he think he could possibly pull it off?

The answer to the second question is that he doesn’t. He is found out immediately.

The answer to the first question is the strongest motivator of all—love for a very dear grandfather. All of his ill-fated decisions were made to protect a man he adores.

Sam’s biggest mistake is in thinking that the six women, including Violet, who are reviving the local rodeo and amusement park to save their small town, could possibly be dishonest and cheating his grandfather. It’s a huge assumption that takes Sam most of the story to realize is all wrong, but along the way he falls for spirited, opinionated Violet.

I hope you enjoy their story.

Mary Sullivan

Rodeo Baby

Mary Sullivan

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MARY SULLIVAN has a fondness for cowboys and ranch settings, even though she grew up in the city. She found her mother’s stories about growing up in rural Canada fascinating. Her passions outside of writing include time spent with friends, great conversation, exploring her city, cooking, walking, traveling (including her latest trip to Paris!), reading, meeting readers and doing endless crossword puzzles.

She loves to hear from readers and can be reached through her website at marysullivanbooks.com, or via her Facebook author page, Facebook.com/marysullivanauthor

To Susan, who has become a very dear friend.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Dear Reader

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

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

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

The second Violet Summer laid eyes on the stranger, an unreasonable swell of sexual awareness bloomed.

The man wasn’t even her type, yet here she stood stunned, and bothered, with Lester Voile’s coffee and Mama’s Best Meat Loaf cooling in her hands.

Rats.

Rodeo, and the Summertime Diner, rarely saw anyone like the stranger sliding into the second booth from the front door—suave, urbane...and dressed like a cowboy?

If he’d ever ridden out on the range, Vy would eat an old boot.

He looked like a movie star acting the role of a cowboy but not playing him well.

She chronicled every detail, including the neatly ironed jeans. What cowboy worth his salt ironed his jeans? How many decades had it been since anyone ironed jeans?

Vy started toward his booth.

He set his cowboy hat, sweat-free and spotless, on the table in front of him. Sunlight streaming through the window shot rays through his golden hair. His strong, clean-shaven jaw sent shivers through her.

Even knowing he was too slick and polished to be a real cowboy, she found him attractive, deep in her gut where reaction came before thought.

No, he was not her type, but good grief, just what she needed—an instant attraction to an imitation cowboy. As if she didn’t have enough to worry about these days.

Irritated, she plunked Lester Voile’s meal on his table.

Ignoring Lester’s muttered thanks, she approached the stranger’s booth, self-protective instincts on high alert.

Why, Vy? He’s just a guy who’s dropped into your diner. A stranger. You know nothing about him. There’s nothing to protect yourself from.

Except her own unruly attraction.

She pulled out her notepad and waited, giving the stranger a minute to adjust to her presence. He knew she was there. As she’d approached, he’d checked out her legs from under his blond lashes.

He set aside the menu and looked up. With that blond hair, she’d expected blue eyes, not the deep, cool gray that studied her.

He smiled, his grin broad and confident. Good Lord, the man had dimples and used them to good effect.

Well, he could grin all day long. She was immune. Plus his smile didn’t reach his eyes, so it was just charm, not innate good humor or character, which she valued a heck of a lot more than personality.

Or, Vy, maybe he’s in a bad mood and trying to rise above it. Don’t make assumptions. People do have them, y’know. You’ve seen enough people come into the diner when their lives were low to not take it personally. Don’t do it now. Park your paranoia in your apron pocket and do your job.

She asked, “Can I take your order?”

“I’ll have the World’s Best Cheeseburger with everything but onions.” Why did he have to have a melodious, deep voice that spoke to Vy’s longings? She hardened her defenses.

She had her hands full running the diner, not to mention pulling together all of the concession stands for the revived fair and rodeo at the end of August.

Handsome men were not on her agenda.

Slowly, the man pulled his eyes away from hers and said, “What do you want, honey?”

Huh? What did she want? And who was he calling honey—

A young voice to her right spoke. Vy glanced toward the other bench of the high-backed booth.

Oh. He wasn’t alone. How had she missed that?

A young girl glared at the man. She couldn’t be more than twelve, maybe thirteen, cloaked in not only enough black punk accessories to build body armor but also plenty of baby fat and attitude. Straight white teeth and a flawless complexion hinted at beauty in development. The kid would be a knockout someday, despite her current wardrobe.

Vy had learned early to be a quick judge of character. Unless she missed her guess, the kid belonged in a prep school somewhere, not in a diner in a small town pretending to be tough.

Vy knew a lost baby chick when she saw one.

She used to be one.

“Chelsea, I’ll ask only one more time,” the man said, voice thick with forced patience. “What will you have for lunch?”

When the girl crossed her arms with a mulish jut of her jaw and refused to respond, the man ordered for her. “My daughter will also have a cheeseburger, but top hers with plenty of onions.”

“Daaad.” Chelsea sat up straight. “You know I hate onions.”

He held up one finger. “Then the next time I ask you a question not once but twice, you’ll do me the courtesy of responding.”

Hmm... With many of the fathers she knew, local cowboys and ranchers, the conversation would have gone something like “When I ask a question, you answer. Got it?” Nothing as refined as “You’ll do me the courtesy of responding.”

Vy bit back a smile. This fake cowboy gave himself away at every turn.

To Vy, he said, “We’ll both have fries with the burgers. I’ll have a coffee and my daughter will have a glass of milk.”

“But I want a soda.” Again with the whiny voice.

“Goes back to what I said earlier. I ask and you respond.” His attention swinging back to Vy, he held on to his grin desperately, but cracks in the wall of his charm showed. “Bring her milk.”

“Got it.” She pointed to his cowboy hat. “No need to leave your hat on the table.”

She indicated the hooks that lined the walls on both sides of the front door.

“Wouldn’t want you to spill anything on your spotless, brand-spanking-new hat.”

Laughing, she returned to the kitchen, glad to leave the tension coiled at the table like a rattlesnake. She regretted that they’d wandered into her diner. She welcomed all business, but not the heartache on that poor girl’s face and the fissures in the careful facade of the father’s cultured shell.

The man looked like he belonged more in the Tradition Golf and Country Club way up the highway in Festival than he did in the Summertime Diner in Rodeo, but who they were and what they were doing here were none of her business or concern.

Ha. As if you could ever keep your nose out of other people’s business.

Vy grinned and turned her attention to picking up orders.

* * *

SAM CARMICHAEL, AKA Sam Michaels, watched the waitress walk away, the sway of her nicely rounded hips captivating.

Her nametag read “Violet,” a soft, old-fashioned name for a woman with intelligence and cheekiness snapping in her gaze.

Violet Summer.

One of the five.

No, at last count there were six of them, the people who were reviving his grandfather’s amusement park, the people he’d come here to investigate. Using Gramps’s fairgrounds, five local women planned to stage a fair and a rodeo at the end of the summer. Recently they’d added a newcomer, an accountant, to their team.

They had leased Gramps’s land for one dollar and a handshake.

No contract.

Sam was here to make sure Gramps wasn’t being taken for a ride.

The waitress—a damned good-looking woman with jet hair, clear skin and a retro fifties’ tight bodice and flared skirt—entered the kitchen, cutting off his view of her.

She had purple eyes. No, to be more accurate, he’d say violet, purple softened with a hint of gray. He’d never seen a color like them.

Or maybe he had. Elizabeth Taylor had purple eyes. As a boy, he used to enjoy watching old movies with his mother, but he’d never seen such an unusual color in the flesh before.

Were they real? Could they be contacts?

His fascination with the woman overcame his pique with his daughter’s incessant, grinding resistance.

Chelsea slumped low in the booth across from him.

Sure, divorce took its toll on kids, but it had been a full year since he and Tiffany had signed the papers, and more than a year and a half since Tiff had said, “I’ve met someone else. I want a divorce,” gutting Sam.

Standing, he sighed. Nineteen to twenty months wasn’t nearly long enough to process betrayal and greed. Tiffany’s, not his.

While his daily mantra ran through his head—success is the best revenge—he hung his hat where the waitress had indicated, then returned to his table, nodding to the old guy two booths away eating meat loaf and mashed potatoes.

The man, ancient and wrinkled, eyed him suspiciously.

This diner and the bar at the end of the street called Honey’s Place were the only eating establishments as far as he could tell.

Guess they were stuck with diner food with corny names. World’s Best Cheeseburger...

The diner could have been picked up and plunked down in any fifties’ town. He was surprised there weren’t Elvis and Chuck Berry songs blaring from jukeboxes.

Deep red leather banquettes framed gray Formica tables. Red-and-white-checked cotton place mats sat at the ready.

The paintings on the wall came as a surprise. He expected nostalgic black-and-white photos but instead saw rustic, wild landscapes. Were the artist and scenery local? He couldn’t deny they were good. He also couldn’t deny the scenery around this little town was spectacular.

“Why can’t we use our own names?” Chelsea picked at her peeling nail polish. He wished she’d quit with the unrelieved black. “Why do we have to pretend to be other people?”

“Shush.” Sam shot a glance around the diner. No one seemed to have heard Chelsea’s remark, thank goodness. “We have to be Sam and Chelsea Michaels so I can determine what’s going on about the rodeo.”

“Why don’t you just ask?”

She’s still so young, he reminded himself, and so naive.

“I don’t trust people to be honest.”

“Maybe you should. Maybe we aren’t all the creeps you think we are.”

He stilled. “You actually believe I think you’re a creep?” he whispered, unable to mask the hurt that coursed through him. Hadn’t he proved his love all of the times in her childhood he’d held her and told her how much he loved her?

She shrugged. Love her or not, he’d come to hate her shrugs as much as her eye rolls. Double for the word duh. And d’oh.

The waitress returned. Black eyeliner tilted up at the corners of her eyes and deep red lipstick emphasized lush lips. She fit right in with the decor. Did she have to dress in that fifties’s fashion?

The style suited her spectacular figure, emphasizing generous hips, a tiny waist and full breasts. The lush proportions worked, reminiscent again of Elizabeth Taylor.

Give your head a shake. For Gramps’s sake, it wasn’t wise to find her attractive. She was one of them. Once he determined how the women resurrecting the local fair were ripping off his grandfather, he would shut them down and move back east.

The sooner he could get back to New York to set up his next business venture, the better.

Careful, his rational, less emotional side cautioned. You need to first determine if they are indeed cheating him. But that one-dollar lease disturbed him.

The waitress put his plate in front of him and then Chelsea’s in front of her. He couldn’t smell onions on Chelsea’s burger, but that meant nothing. There were so many scents in the diner he wasn’t sure he would be able to.

Chelsea peeked under the top of the hamburger bun. A tiny, mean-spirited smile that usually meant trouble formed at one corner of her mouth.

Sam braced himself. Where had his sweet daughter gone and who was this stranger now in possession of her body? Apparently, once a girl turned thirteen, demons took over.

He glanced at the waitress. “You wouldn’t happen to know where the closest exorcist lives, would you?”

Violet smiled—even, white teeth framed by cherry red. “We’re plumb out. We burned the last one at the stake with all of our witches a hundred years back.”

Sam stared. She’d gotten his joke! His ex-wife’s reaction had always been a frown because she hadn’t understood his humor. Chelsea used to get his jokes but had become too cool to laugh or even smile. He’d grown used to their negativity. The waitress’s willingness to play along was pure pleasure. He perked up.

She jerked her chin toward his daughter. “It’s surprising what a good cheeseburger will do to expel demons.”

Chelsea took her time looking over the waitress insolently. Apparently, once she’d become a teenager, she’d lost all of the good manners that had been drummed into her throughout her short childhood.

“You dress funny,” she said with a snicker.

“Chelsea!”

Violet leaned one hand on the table and rested her other on her hip. “So do you.”

Chelsea scowled. “You’re only a waitress. You can’t talk to me like that.”

“When you are rude to me, I can respond in any way I please. If you don’t like it, you can leave. Are you going to eat your meal or should I take it away?”

“I’ll eat.” Sam detected grudging respect in Chelsea’s tone.

The waitress straightened away from the table. “Take the silver spoon out of your mouth first so you don’t choke.”

A grudging smile bloomed on Chelsea’s face.

How did the woman know they had money? To fit in, Sam had dressed down in denim and a plaid shirt, along with cowboy boots and hat.

Chelsea wore black punk. What about them said money? Nothing, as far as he could tell. He had to be more careful. The woman’s intuition disturbed him and he struck out at her.

“I asked you to load her burger with onions.” He hadn’t really wanted the waitress to, but Chelsea had many lessons to learn and Sam had no patience left for teaching them. Every stop on this ill-conceived trip, every mile of highway traveled across country and every single black inch of asphalt navigated had been littered with heartache for both of them. When all roads had steep uphill pitches, all you wanted was to roll backward and give up.

He wished he could turn back time and start over with his daughter.

Violet flipped her violet gaze on Sam. “Do you want her to eat or not?”

“At this point, I don’t much care,” he groused. Tired, hungry and out of patience, he wished he was back home in Manhattan where he belonged.

“Mom says I shouldn’t eat too much,” his child piped up. “She says I’m too fat.”

“You’re not fat!” Sam hadn’t meant to raise his voice, but Tiffany’s complaints about Chelsea had worn him thin. “You’re perfect, okay?”

“You should eat, kid.” The waitress smelled like fried food and roses.

Sam held his breath. Nobody called Chelsea a kid and got away with it. On her young, chubby face, thunder started to build.

Then Violet added, “It takes a lot of calories to feed that much ’tude.”

Chelsea burst out laughing, stunning Sam. His daughter, who hadn’t laughed in months, who hadn’t given him a genuine smile in twice that long, picked up her burger and happily bit into it.

Violet sauntered away while Sam envisioned himself getting down on his knees and kissing her feet...and every inch of her calves. She had great calves, strong but feminine.

She returned with their drinks.

“Has anyone ever mentioned that your name matches your eyes?” They were gorgeous.

“Nope. Not once. That’s a new one.” She slapped cream and sugar onto the table in front of him.

His jaw hardened. She had no right to treat him badly. It was just mild harmless flirtation. “You’ve got a lot of attitude.” He didn’t like sarcasm. Didn’t like people treating him badly. Back home—

Well, he wasn’t back home, was he?

“Let me speak to the manager,” he ordered.

“That would be me.”

“Okay, then. Is the owner in?”

She tapped one red-tipped fingernail against her chin. “Let me think. Yes. That would also be me.”

Chelsea giggled.

Good Lord. Two against one. “You don’t know much about business and good customer service, do you?”

He’d meant to put her in her place, but she turned to the customers in the large room and called out, “Does anyone have trouble with how I run my business?”

One and all shook their heads no.

Damn. He hadn’t meant to draw attention.

“Do I give good customer service or not?”

“Good service, Vy,” the old guy two tables down yelled. “Love the mashed potatoes. What did you say you put in them?”

“Garlic, Lester. That’s why they’re called garlic mashed potatoes.”

“Makes sense.” Lester nodded. “Like ’em. Refill my coffee when you get a minute?”

“Sure thing. I’ll get right on it as soon as I can get away from this table.”

Heat in Sam’s cheeks burned. His daughter watched him with a mocking smile. The townspeople watched him curiously. Great. He’d wanted to avoid drawing attention to himself, but here he was center stage because of this bad-tempered woman.

She presented her back to him and walked away.

“All I did was be nice to her,” he mumbled while he doctored his coffee.

“You gave her your fake, cheesy grin, Dad. You were flirting with her badly.”

He pinned his daughter with a hard glare. “What do you know about flirting?”

She rolled her eyes. Sick of the action, he pulled out of his pocket a small change purse he’d picked up at a souvenir shop on the way. “You rolled your eyes. Pay up.”

“Daaad.”

“Pay up.” He held out the purse. “Now.”

She took a quarter out of her pink knapsack and dropped it into the change purse.

“It’s getting heavy,” he remarked.

“You’re mean to take money away from your daughter. I’m only thirteen years old!”

“Thirteen going on twenty. Your mother gave you all kinds of money before we left. I give you a good allowance. You ain’t starving, kid.”

“Aren’t. It’s aren’t starving. Just because we’re in this tiny town doesn’t mean you have to speak like the locals.”

Sam grinned, but didn’t apologize. “What was wrong with my flirting with the waitress?”

“Owner.”

“Owner,” he conceded.

“You’re coming on way too strong. It makes you sound corny. Maybe you forget how to do it right because you’re getting old.”

He bristled. “Since when is thirty-nine old?”

She shrugged.

A minute later, he said, “There’s nothing wrong with flirting. It’s what men and women do when they’re attracted to each other.”

“I know, but don’t be so artificial about it.” She mimicked him with a false voice, “‘Your violet eyes match your name,’” and, worse, with a fake smile. She looked like a politician.

“Her eyes do match her name.” Defensiveness made him petulant.

“Yeah, and that’s so obvious. Everybody must say that to her. You have to notice different things and say more original stuff.”

“Like what?”

“She’s funny. She makes me laugh.”

“At my expense. I’m not about to compliment her on her sense of humor when I’m the butt of her jokes.” He liked her legs, especially her calves.

“So should I have said, ‘Great calves, lady’? Yeah, that would have gone over real well.”

Chelsea peered around the edge of the booth to look at Violet’s legs as she stood chatting with customers at another table. The girl turned back to him with wide eyes. “Her calves are kind of big. You think they’re great?”