Once
Upon a Cowboy
Whisper Creek # 1
Whisper Creek # 1
By: Maggie McGinnis
Releasing June 30, 2015
Loveswept
Blurb
In
this sexy Whisper Creek romance for readers of Kristan Higgins, Susan Mallery,
and Molly O’Keefe, a red-hot cowboy uses some Montana magic to give a reclusive
beauty her happily ever after.
Yoga
instructor Jessalyn Alcott radiates peace, calm, and serenity—on the outside.
Inside, she still feels like the broken, desperate girl from the trailer park.
She’s got dark secrets she can’t share, which is why she never lets her
relationships go beyond the third date. But when she travels to the Whisper
Creek dude ranch for a friend’s wedding, Jess is enchanted by a cowboy whose
deep blue eyes, dimpled smile, and rock-hard body make it tough to remember why
she keeps running scared.
Cole
Driscoll has struggled to find his place on a family ranch where he’s always
played second fiddle. His future might be uncertain, but he’s sure of one
thing: He wants Jess by his side. Easier said than done. When it comes to getting
close, she’s full of excuses, and he longs to fix the hurt he sees in her eyes.
Now that she’s at Whisper Creek, there’s nothing he wants more than to break
down the walls around her heart and heal her pain with the power of love.
Link to Follow Tour: http://www.tastybooktours.com/2015/03/once-upon-cowboywhisper-creek-3-by.html
Goodreads
Link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23395415-once-upon-a-cowboy?ac=1
Goodreads Series Link: https://www.goodreads.com/series/145426-whisper-creek
Goodreads Series Link: https://www.goodreads.com/series/145426-whisper-creek
Excerpt
JULY 25, THIRTEEN YEARS AGO
She’d always imagined a gun would
make a louder sound, especially on a sticky summer night with only the crickets
as competition. But it was more of a pop—like a kids’ toy rather than a lethal
weapon—as Billy aimed it at the cashier and pulled the trigger.
Wait in the car, he’d said. I’m gonna get Old Man
Mack to sell me some beer.
So she’d sat in the passenger seat,
eyes glued on the store’s plate glass front window, figuring the worst he was
going to do was pull his charming I-forgot-my-ID act.
Her hand went to her mouth as Mack
grabbed his own chest, spun, and then fell behind the counter. She felt blindly
for the car door handle as she watched Billy scoop bills from the cash drawer,
but she couldn’t get out fast enough. She heard a strangled sound that must
have come from her as he came flying out of the store carrying a case of Bud
and the money.
He wrenched open the driver’s door
and tossed the case toward her, then gunned the engine before he had his door
fully closed. Gravel spit out behind them as he swung onto the pavement and
shot the car toward downtown, and she couldn’t seem to take a whole breath as
she watched the rearview mirror.
“That was Mack.” Her voice came out
in a whisper. “You just shot . . . Mack.”
“You know him?” Billy looked over at
her, then grabbed her knee. Hard. “Mack shoulda let me have the beer,
princess.”
He squeezed harder, making her
wince. “You didn’t see nothing, you got that?”
“God, Billy. We need to call the
police. He needs an ambulance.” She didn’t dare crane her neck to look out the
back window, but couldn’t get the sight of Mack crumpling behind the counter
out of her head.
Billy let out a short, maniacal
laugh that made her cringe. “People need to learn who’s in charge around here,
princess. Sometimes you gotta teach hard lessons, you know?”
Oh, she knew, all right. Mack wasn’t
the only one Billy was trying to teach lately. She felt for the door handle
again, but the speedometer was holding steady at forty. Leave it to Billy to
shoot a guy cold, then obey the speed limit all the way back to his apartment.
She dug her fingernails into her palm, desperate to be out of this
car—desperate to be as far away from Billy as possible.
She’d had her breakup speech
memorized for three weeks now, but still hadn’t had the courage to deliver it.
And now? She shivered, scared to her very core. If Billy’d shoot Mack over a
case of beer, what would he do to her if she tried to cut him loose?
“We can’t just leave him there,
Billy. What if he—dies?” Her voice cracked as she pictured Mack handing her a
piece of bubble gum every Saturday when Grampy used to bring her in for a root
beer and a scratch ticket.
“Who we gonna call, princess? The po-lice?”
He drew out the word like it amused him. Billy looked over at her again, and
she shrank toward the door. “We need to have a little talk about this?”
“No.” Their last little talk had
left her with a bag of frozen peas on her ribs and a headache that didn’t go
away for a week. She took a catchy breath. “No little talk.”
“Good.” He nodded, pointing toward
the case on her lap. “Crack me one of those brews, wouldja? I think I earned
it.”
Author Info
Maggie McGinnis, USA
Today Bestselling Author of Accidental Cowgirl and Driving Without a License,
which was a finalist for Romance Writers of America’s Golden Heart Award is a
former high school English teacher, an accomplished musician, and a certified
black belt, who lives in New England with her family.
Website: http://www.maggiemcginnis.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Maggie_McGinnis
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