Torn Devotion (Harvest Ridge #4)

Prologue

Torren Harrison watched the little black lab puppy that his brother, Tag, and sister-in-law, Piper, gave him as a housewarming gift.

They brought the puppy over when they came to see his house last night.

Most people gave flowers or a kitchen gadget or even booze as a gift to congratulate someone for buying a house, but not his brother.

Torren was sure that Tag found the whole idea of him having to take care of another living creature hilarious.

His brother handed him the little ten-week-old puppy and said, “Good luck.” Torren took one look at the pup and wanted to hand him back, but he also knew that his brother’s gift was a silent challenge.

One thing that neither of them ever backed down from was a challenge.

So, he took the puppy and named him Tucker, after ruling out both Tank and Fucker.

He figured that if he had to call the puppy in a public setting, he should automatically cross the name Fucker off his list, although that was his favorite.

Tank seemed too clichéd for a dog that was going to be huge when fully grown.

Tucker seemed to be a nice blend of the two names, so he settled on that.

But his new puppy didn’t care what Torren called him since he didn’t listen to or obey even one simple command.

Tucker made himself busy chewing on one of his new toys as Torren unpacked a box in his kitchen.

In less than twenty-four hours, his new best friend chewed through one of his running shoes, a sock, a pair of gym shorts, a sofa leg, and the actual corner of a wall.

He needed to go out and buy his new little pal a crate to contain some of the destruction.

He wasn’t sure how much chaos a newborn baby could bring down on one household, but he was crossing his fingers that Tag’s new kid wreaked some major havoc.

He would love front row tickets to that show—paybacks were a bitch.

After he finished the renovations on his new house, he was able to move in just in time for their busy summer season at the store.

He and Tag were booked solid for hiking, overnight camping, and white water rafting groups for the foreseeable future.

Luckily, Piper wasn’t due for a couple of months, so Tag would be able to help with most of the day trips and even a few overnight ones, too.

The adventure company that they started together, Rocky Mountain High Adventure, had taken off.

They were hiring more full-time people and taking on even more seasonal hires.

They were to the point of having to either grow as a company or turn away potential clients.

Tag and he both agreed that they wanted to grow their business and hire new people.

Tag was looking to become more of a manager—with the baby coming and his and Piper’s charity work, he didn’t have the time to devote to taking people out on treks.

That worked for Torren since he loved being out on the mountain or barreling down the river on a white water rafting trip.

That part of his life was easy. It was the rest of it that was crap.

After Tag and Piper's announcement on Christmas Day that they were having a baby, Torren had started thinking about what he wanted out of life. Sure, having a different woman in his bed, sometimes two or three at a time, was fun, but in the morning, he was left with an empty condo. It got to the point that he would ask the woman he was with to stick around, which usually ended badly because she would get the wrong idea about what he wanted. He wasn’t into dating or long-term relationships; he wanted carefree and easy.

Torren didn’t count on every one of his friends getting hitched and popping out kids.

Now, he was left with a lot more time on his hands and feelings of complete panic over what was next for him.

He thought about leaving town for a while to see what he was missing out on.

But the thought of leaving his twin brother with the responsibility of running their business felt wrong.

He and Tag were a team—always had been. When their mom died from cancer when they were just six years old, and their dad took off, leaving them on their grandfather’s doorstep, he took comfort knowing that he still had Tag.

Leaving his brother high and dry with a business to run didn’t feel like an option that he wanted to explore.

So, he decided to buy a little fixer-upper and get his hands dirty.

When his grandfather, Dane, moved them into his cabin, he taught both boys how to fix things.

Torren always loved working with his hands, so taking on home improvements made sense to him.

The long hours that he put into the place every night and weekends also helped to fill the void of not inviting women into his bed.

He was trying to turn over a new leaf because being labeled as the town’s “man-whore” was starting to tick him off.

At first, the running joke was that he was dating his way alphabetically through the town’s women.

Tag even got in on the fun, telling Torren that he should just introduce himself to people by shaking their hand and saying, “Hi, my name’s Torren, and I’ve probably dated your daughter.

” Torren didn’t find it as funny as Tag and their friends did.

He was tired of being the joke of the town.

Harvest Ridge was a small enough community without having to deal with everyone’s scrutiny.

So, he was off the “dating” circuit and trying to figure out his shit.

He was about to turn thirty-one, and he needed to start acting like an adult and not some frat boy on MTV’s Spring Break.

He tried telling Tag how he was feeling, even breaking down and sharing that it was four very long months of no sex, but his brother didn’t seem to take him seriously.

Sure, Tag was shocked that Torren had it in him to go four months without a hot woman in his bed.

Hell, when he started this whole thing, Torren wasn’t sure he’d make it four minutes without sex.

With his house finished and moved into, he worried that he would fall back into his old ways.

He needed to figure out his next step, maybe even go on a real date with a woman and not just invite her back to his place for a good time.

He couldn’t remember the last time he went on a date with a woman—maybe high school?

He looked over to where he last saw Tucker and found his puppy taking a piss on his front welcome mat. At least he was getting closer to the concept of being outside before he let loose. Torren sighed, grabbed Tucker’s leash, and picked him up to head out the front door.

“No, Tuck. You don’t piss in the house.” He gently put the puppy down in the grass just outside his front entrance.

“This is where you do your business, Dude.” Torren knew that the dog had no idea what he was saying, but still, he felt the need to lay down the law.

Sooner or later, one of them was going to break—he just hoped like hell that it was the puppy and not him.

Tucker lay down and started chewing on a blade of grass.

He barked and rolled to his side, pawing the air as if playing with an imaginary friend.

Yep, his puppy wasn’t interested in any of this peeing outside business.

Tucker yapped again, much to the delight of the two little girls who were carefully crossing the street to get to his yard.

Great, just what he needed—first a puppy and now the neighbor girls.

They both made cute little cooing noises at Tucker, causing him to jump and yap louder, excited to have their attention.

“Mister, can we play with your puppy?” Torren wanted to say no and drag Tuck into the house. Truthfully, kids always scared the shit out of him. But the looks on their identical faces made him change his mind.

“Sure,” he grumbled. The twin girls giggled and plopped down in the grass next to Tucker.

Torren sighed and sat down on the bench that he built for the front porch.

He knew that he wasn’t going back inside anytime soon.

The girls squealed with delight at every cute little thing that Tucker did, and he ate up every ounce of their attention.

About ten minutes later, a very hot woman emerged from the twins’ little house across the street.

From the way she put both hands on her hips and marched across the road, Torren was pretty sure that they were all going to get an earful.

The woman huffed her way across his front lawn and stood over the girls, who didn’t seem to even notice her.

“Elizabeth and Sarah Cahoon, what do you two think you are doing?” Neither girl looked up from Tucker, instead ignoring the poor woman whom Torren guessed was their mother.

At least, she was putting out some strong angry mom vibes, enough to make Torren shudder.

She had the sexy mom routine down to a tee, and that made him a little hot.

“You two know that you aren’t supposed to cross the street by yourselves.

And yet here you are, bothering this poor, nice man who probably has better things to do.

” Torren cleared his throat, gaining the attention of all three females in his yard.

The woman lowered her balled-up fists from her hips and extended her hand out to Torren.

“Hello, I’m Tana Cahoon. The girls and I just moved here from Tennessee a few months back.

I was meaning to come over here and introduce myself, but I didn’t want to interrupt or bother you since you’d just moved in.

I’m sorry about them.” Tana finally stopped talking long enough to look down at her daughters, who were still oblivious to their mother’s tirade.