Her Candy Cane Cowboy (Cowboy Naughty List Ranch #2)
Chapter 1
Dallas
Montana is especially beautiful in the winter. The sun hits the rental car’s windshield, and I lower the visor as I leave the airport. The destination I’m heading to is the one that saved my life. Silver Bell Hollow.
If it weren’t for being sent to stay with Mary and Christopher Maas when I was a teenager, I’d have kept going down the path I was on. The one that would’ve led me to a future behind bars or worse. I didn’t appreciate them or their Christmas tree farm when I first ended up there.
The chip on my shoulder and my belief that nobody was in my corner was deeply rooted in me. I arrived braced, waiting for the lectures, for a backhand across the face, waiting for them to tell me to straighten up and live right.
I didn’t get lectures. I didn’t get hit.
I received hope and love and learned how to work hard.
Mary taught me how to heal from the things that happened to me, and Christopher taught me how to become a good man.
When I told them I’d always wanted to find my birth family because I wanted answers, they had spent long hours searching for them, not quitting until they found them.
Learning the bad details involving my birth was difficult. I learned when I was born, my grandmother had taken me away from my teen mom and thrown me away in the garbage.
But there was also good. I learned my parents had never stopped searching for me and they were overjoyed when we were reunited. In addition to my parents, I gained brothers and a slew of extended family.
So, yeah, I owe the Maas’s for the good life I have.
I try to return every year around the holidays in time for the Christmas Eve bonfire to spend time reconnecting with them and the other boys they’d taken in. We’re not blood related, but we’re family all the same.
My stomach growls reminding me that I haven’t eaten since I downed half a mediocre burrito yesterday. I never can the day I catch a flight. I hate flying. I prefer my boots on the ground, my ass in a saddle rather than in a seat thousands of feet in the air.
A roadside diner I’ve stopped at on prior visits looms just ahead, its silver siding and bright red accents making it hard to miss. I slow to pull into the parking lot and get out of the car to stretch, then hunch into my jacket. It’s cold as hell with the wind chill.
Gravel crunches beneath my boots as I make my way to the front door. The woman working the register calls out a greeting as I enter.
A singer on an antique jukebox is crooning a slow country song barely loud enough to be heard over the conversations of the customers.
Burgers sizzle on the grill and the aroma of onions and freshly brewed coffee fill the air. My stomach growls again.
I take a seat at a booth in the front where I can see out the window. I like wide open spaces and if I’m cooped up too long I get restless.
The waitress pours me a cup of coffee and after I place my order, my phone rings. It’s my buddy Marshall from back home in Lucky River, Texas. We’re as close as brothers. Like me, he’s been to hell and back. He was rescued from a place called The Gentle Children’s Home.
I take a sip of the coffee, letting it warm me from the chill outside and wait for him to speak first.
“I sent an early Christmas gift for you to the post office there.”
There’s smug delight in his voice. He thinks he’s got me. Each year, on birthdays and at Christmas, we give the other outrageous gifts.
It started as a challenge and the more over the top, the better.
The one who wins our competition gets bragging rights and then has to buy the rounds at the bar all year long.
That way, the loser has to toast the winner and thank him for the drinks, then explain what’s going on to the crowd that’s there. It always leads to a lot of laughs.
I started the competition because I learned as a kid that laughter is a good way to hide pain. If you’re laughing, no one knows how badly they hurt you.
“You can’t beat that doll.” I grin at the memory. I gave Marshall a blow-up doll not knowing he’d accidentally open the gift in front of his family.
“Wait until you see what I sent before you gloat.”
“I’ll do that. I stopped for a bite to eat but I’m almost at the town.”
He sounds way too delighted as he ends the call, but I’m not concerned. Out of all my friends and family, I’m always the one headlining the naughty list.
I finish my burger and fries and get back on the road. It doesn’t take long to reach the town and once again, I find that old, familiar comfort settling in my chest. This place, like my ranch in Lucky River, is my peace.
Christmas décor is everywhere I look as I drive toward the post office. I pass the holiday shop, the coffee shop and a group of kids clearly thrilled to be out of school for the holiday break.
The post office has frosted windows with winter scenes on them, and icicle lights hanging from the front of the building.
I park and head in. It’s crowded with people trying to ship last minute packages, and I get in line. I’m nearly at the window when an elderly clerk with the snowmen earrings calls my name.
“Dallas Sullivan!” She greets me warmly, coming around the counter to hug me. She’s always like that. Treats everyone like long lost family she’s been looking forward to seeing.
“I have a package to pick up,” I tell her as she returns to her spot and I reach the counter.
“I know. As soon as I saw your name on it, I set it aside. Give me a second.” She goes to the back then returns with a large box that has candy canes all over it.
“Let me help you with that.” I take a step forward.
“No need. It’s not heavy at all. She sets it on the counter and gives the box a nudge. Then hands me a peppermint the way she does every year.
I thank her and carry the box to the counter set up in the middle of the post office where a couple of people are filling out mailing labels.
I gently shake the box. Whatever’s in here is light and I’m running guesses through my head about what the gag gift might be.
Finally, I stop guessing and tear it open. Then I laugh my ass off. Nestled among green tissue paper is a candy cane striped dildo with a big red bow on the tip. The attached note reads, “Merry fucking gift.”
I didn’t see this one coming, that’s for sure. He put it in an oversized box to throw me off.
Still chuckling, I start to tuck the flaps back in when a short, curvy woman with shoulder length black hair and striking blue eyes barrels into the post office. She’s wearing form-fitting jeans, and a flowery blouse cut low in the front to show ample, mouth-watering cleavage.
She’s beautiful. And making a liar out of me. I’d once said to Marshall, “I will never be as head over heels for any woman the way you are with yours.”
The woman marches closer and my heart beats hard and fast like it’s knocking against my ribs from the force of the beats.
She slams her hand on top of my box and bracelets jingle together on her wrist. “That’s mine.”
“No, it’s not, darlin’ but if you really need it, I’ll let you have it.” And I wouldn’t mind helping her use it.
“Let me?” She scowls. “I had these decorations shipped here for a party. The company uses this candy cane design on their shipping boxes every Christmas.” She reaches into the box without looking inside and pulls out the dildo and shakes it. It begins buzzing in her hand.
Astonished by the sight and sound of the toy happily thrusting, the crowd waiting to send packages grows quiet.
The woman’s mouth opens and her eyes widen. She snaps her eyes at me. Then looks back at the dildo. “You…this…” She flings it back into the box.
I laugh the kind of laugh that has me trying to catch my breath because I’m the center of the biggest joke of all. Me, Mr. Never Head Over Heels got his heart reeled in. Call it fate, the universe, the answer to a prayer I didn’t know I was asking for, but this woman is the one.
She glances at the box’s label, then slaps her hand down like she’s wishing it was my face. “You think this is funny? Just wait, Dallas Sullivan. You’re getting nothing but coal this year.” With a noise like a humph sound, she spins to leave.
“That’s fine, darlin’.” I call out to her retreating back. “I’ve never been on the nice list anyway.”