Mistletoe Cowboy (A Cowboy for Christmas #4)

Chapter 1

Chapter

One

SAGE

Walter’s drunk again…

Passed out in the stable.

Buzz—the Australian shepherd with one piercing blue and one dark brown eye—circles, whimpering and nudging him. Walter doesn’t budge an inch.

I throw a thick wool blanket over his crumpled form, resigned to the life he’s chosen now. My eldest brother. The one supposed to take over the ranch after our father’s untimely death six months back. Not drink away his life and the family’s future.

Pathetic to think that five generations of McCauley blood, sweat, and tears have come down to this.

The world may have stopped for the sleeping loser, but ranch demands never end. The life requires back-breaking work, three-sixty-five, twenty-four seven. I can’t do it alone.

I grab a pitchfork, start cleaning the stall out of habit more than purpose. The smell of hay and whiskey hangs in the air. My cracked, cold-weathered hands throb around the icy, wooden handle.

Outside, snow hangs in the gray dusk, a few flurries already starting. The horses are restless, their nickers and brays filling the gloom, hollow hoof-thuds echoing against the boards.

Not so long ago, I would’ve lashed out at the inebriated ranch foreman. But it never changes anything—not the stack of unpaid bills on the dining room table, not the man who escapes into the bottle, not the ranch’s slow decline into oblivion.

I set down the pitchfork and head to Buffalo’s stall, rubbing warmth into his neck. The big brown Quarter horse gelding has been my steady ride for as long as I can remember. Crooning to him, I talk out loud.

“The cows have already been moved to the winter pasture. But they’ll need daily feeding and watering … may fall to us if things keep going how they’re going.”

I sigh, look around, trying not to cave to the overwhelm. The shop needs cleaning, the trucks and equipment repaired and maintained. “The calving barn’s begging for a new wood stove. How do I do it all, Buff?” I whisper into his mane.

All priorities. All at the top of my list. Otherwise, I’ll be bringing blizzard-born calves into the house to keep warm. I rest my cheek against Buffalo’s soft neck, eyes squeezed shut, trying to remember a time when things felt sure, safe.

“Sage.” Ralph’s voice breaks the quiet as he steps inside the stable. His eyes skitter past me to Walter, face grim.

“Yes?” Ralph’s our oldest ranch hand, bow-legged and gray-haired, a lifetime of dust and devotion written on him.

He twists his hat in his hands, mustache twitching while he searches for words. “The boys are getting restless for their pay. Don’t mean to press you on it, but the grumbling’s getting too loud to ignore.”

My stomach churns, and I nod, unable to form words.

“With Christmas around the corner, can’t blame them. Though you know I’m good for whatever, long as I’ve got a place to hang my hat and grub to eat.”

Tears fill my eyes. Emotion flickers in his.

I shake my head, look away. “Things would be so different if Dad hadn’t died,” I say.

He shifts his weight uneasily, giving me that don’t-cry look rugged men sometimes get.

“A loss for sure, Sage. No one like him…”

“Except for Silas,” I say for the first time in eight years. My eyes meet Ralph’s.

The name hangs in the air, like it has ever since his departure.

He nods. We’re thinking the same thing, though I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know if I should do this.

“He has a life now. Far from here,” I say, stroking the horse’s neck. Buffalo and I used to barrel race together, back before the weight of this place started pressing down on me like the marble tombstones marking my ancestors’ graves in the north pasture.

“He would want to know … about anything involving the ranch.”

Ralph’s not wrong, but it doesn’t make what I’m contemplating any easier.

Just the thought of Silas, my adopted brother, puts a dangerous sting behind my eyes.

Even worse, it brings my body to life in ways that shame me.

My heart thuds, chest warming at the thought of the one man I can never have—the only one I’ve ever wanted.

“But the way he left,” I whisper, memory piling on top of me until my chest constricts.

“Excuse me for being plainspoken, Sage. But he needs to know. He’s a part of this family, too. It’s what your dad wanted.”

Recrimination threads his words. He thinks I’m like Walter, purposely keeping the ranch and its fate from Silas. But that’s not it at all. It’s my heart I’m guarding. But I don’t know how much longer I can do that without losing everything.

“Better get Walter inside. Out of sight,” I say, steeling my voice.

The old ranch hand nods, rubbing his hand over his face. “Do what I can to keep the hands happy. Some special provisions would go a long way.”

I swallow hard. If he knew how bad things were—Walter’s drinking just the tip of the iceberg: gambling, women, fights, medical bills. Instead, I whisper, “I’ll see what I can do.”

“Thank you kindly,” he says, tipping his hat in that old-fashioned way.

We haul Walter to the abandoned bunkhouse where he often sleeps off his hangovers.

“I appreciate it, Ralph,” I say, resignation making my gaze scrape the ground.

“Of course.”

My eyes pool as I nod and dart past him toward the end of a beautiful sunset.

At the large, leafless cottonwood, I sit in the old tire swing Silas built for me. The rope creaks as I sway, boots brushing the frozen ground, each soft push carrying me backward into another life.

I can still see him, shirtless that summer afternoon, the sun beating down on his tanned back, muscles flexing as he worked.

He wouldn’t stop until the swing hung just right.

I’d only mentioned wanting one once, and by the next day, it was here.

That’s who he was. Always listening. Always giving. Always making me feel seen.

I can’t remember a time I didn’t love him.

But it was here, in this very swing, that I first felt that love twist into something deeper—something dangerous.

The way my heart stuttered when he smiled.

The warmth that flared through me when his rough hands brushed mine, lingering too long.

Feelings no good girl should have for her adopted brother.

I tried to bury it, to smother every thought that made my cheeks burn. But you can’t kill what’s already taken root. And that winter, under a sprig of mistletoe, everything changed.

The fire crackled, the scent of pine thick in the air. I was sixteen, trembling with nerves, staring up at him as snowflakes melted in his hair. One heartbeat, two—and then he was there. His lips on mine. Gentle at first, then desperate. A lifetime of wanting poured into a single, stolen kiss.

It lasted only a breath, but it shattered everything. Two years older than me, the entire world against us, and yet in that moment, I knew I’d never love anyone else.

I pull out my phone and stare at the glowing screen until my reflection blurs. Hummingbirds beat around my stomach, body quaking with unnamed desire, mind roiling with mortification. This shouldn’t be so hard … or so simple.

My hands shake as I find his number, nicknamed brOTHER to remind myself of what can never be. I select it, pulse pounding faster now.

“God help me,” I whisper, already mired in quicksand.

ME

Need you to come home. Please

I stare at the screen, inhale sharply.

He doesn’t make me wait long.

SILAS

You okay?

Yes, but it’s all falling apart

Okay

I wouldn’t ask if it weren’t the ranch. I can’t do this alone

You shouldn’t have to

What have I done?

But there’s no other way. I need to save the family ranch, and whether I want to admit it, I need Silas Hawthorne to do so. Besides, he is family.

The sun dips low in the west. I sit in the swing until goosebumps cover my arms and broody twilight fades into black.

A distant owl hoots from some unseen perch, ready for its nightly hunt. The stars glimmer down on me, the moon encircled by a lacy halo of cold, making me tiny, inconsequential.

Then, white headlights crest the hill, cutting through the gloaming. My heart throbs against my ribs as they draw closer.

He came.