A Cowboy for Christmas

By Katherine Garbera

Annie Prudhomme never expected to be back in Marietta, MT and her family is fond of reminding her that she left them and the town behind in search of better things. A humiliating divorce that cost her everything she’d gained has driven her back home and her family isn’t about to welcome her back into the fold. She’s in town to rebuild the old home that she inherited and to move on once again.
Carson Scott never forgot Annie or the way she left. Now that she’s back in town he’s realizing that the old flame still burns hot but he can’t risk his heart the way he did last time now that he has his son to think about it. Being trapped together during a December snowstorm gives them a chance to rekindle their romance but is Annie back for good or is she just looking for a cowboy for Christmas?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tule Publishing
• Release date: Nov 2, 2013
• ISBN: 9781940296067

Katherine Garbera

Katherine Garbera is a USA TODAY bestselling author of more than 100 novels, which have been translated into over two dozen languages and sold millions of copies worldwide. She is the mother of two incredibly creative and snarky grown children. Katherine enjoys drinking champagne, reading, walking and traveling with her husband. She lives in Kent, UK, where she is working on her next novel. Visit her on the web at www.katherinegarbera.com.

Book preview

Author

Dedication

I can’t write a Christmas story and not thank my good friend Barbara Padlo who is always asking me to write another one. We both share a love of Christmas, family, and good books.

Acknowledgment

Thank you to Jane Porter who offered me a chance to do something I loved and helped me remember why I started writing.

Dear Reader

Dear Reader,

I love Christmas and the entire Christmas season. I put a themed tree up in every room in my house. I start using my special Santa mugs and every night I make hot cocoa with whipped cream and red and green sprinkles on top. I make my three Wise Men journey around the house, hide clues for my kids to find their advent gifts, and dress in sweaters that probably should never be seen outside my house. Why am I telling you all this? To explain how excited I was to be included in the Copper Mountain Christmas Anthology.

Annie Prudhomme left Marietta and Carson Scott fifteen years ago with the intention of never returning. Now that’s she lost it all she has nowhere else to go and she returns to town hoping to quietly regroup and figure out her next move. For her, staying isn’t an option. But seeing Carson on her first night back gives her a glimpse of how much she’s changed since she was eighteen.

Carson Scott moved on after Annie left town. He met and married a nice girl and had a son with her, and when his wife died his brothers circled the wagons and helped him get through it. For three Christmases he’s been getting by and telling himself that he was content with his life... until he walks into the Main Street Diner and sees Annie and knows he’s been lying to himself.

He also realizes there is only one thing he wants for Christmas and she’s not exactly the kind of woman who’s been known to stick around, or make his dreams come true.

Happy reading!

Katherine

CHAPTER ONE

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Marietta, Montana did Christmas in a big way with all the storefronts on Main Street draped in garland and twinkle lights. The Main Street Diner wasn’t any different with its rustic wreath made with layers of old ropes and decked with red poinsettia leaves and Rocking Around the Christmas Tree playing merrily on the jukebox as Carson Scott opened the door.

No one was exactly sure how the Wednesday night tradition had started, not even Carson, but he knew that his brothers had done it for him. It had been in the dark time right after Rainey had been killed in a head-on collision out on highway 89 on her way back from Livingston. He’d sat at home every night with baby Evan drinking too much Red Bull. His oldest brother Alec had insisted that they all meet in Marietta at the diner for dinner.

Alec had thick blond hair like their momma and piercing blue-gray eyes that Carson had heard more than one girl describe as colder than the glaciers in Glacier Park. But Sienna, Alec’s wife, had said that she knew how to warm him up. Which had led to a lot of ribbing by Carson and his other brothers. Alec needed to be taken down a peg or two at times.

But not on Wednesday nights. Carson showed up here after he dropped Evan off at his maternal grandparents’ house and ate chili and cornbread with his brothers. There were five of them all together and sometimes Flo, who ran the grill, gave them a hard time about being carbon copies of their dad, but that didn’t bother any of them. Their old man cast a long shadow and had a reputation for being honest and hard-working. There were worse things a man could be known for.

There were only five weeks left until Christmas and Evan was being cagey about what he wanted from Santa this year. He’d hinted he wanted a mommy that wasn’t in heaven. And the last thing that Carson was interested in was dating any woman, much less one to become Evan’s new mommy.

Isn’t that Annie waiting tables? Alec said as they entered the diner. The walls were heavy red brick and the floor solid wood. There was a counter with red leather-covered stools bolted to the floor in front of it, and for as long as Carson could remember beehive-haired Flo was standing at the grill cooking delicious food, trading gossip, and flirting with any man who entered.

Annie who? he asked. He was holding the door open for his younger brother Hudson who had a shopping bag from The Mercantile in one hand and his Stetson in the other.

Prudhomme. Is there another Annie you’d care about? Alec asked.

I thought she’d left town for good, Hudson said.

Annie. Here. Wow.

Why?

How?

When?

It didn’t make sense. He ate here every Wednesday with his brothers. She hadn’t been here last week. Why was she here now?

Carson craned his neck around his brothers’ shoulders to look at the waitress. Goddamn it. She hadn’t changed. She was still the same slim pretty girl he remembered. She wasn’t tall but had long legs and dark brown hair that hung to her shoulders and curled slightly at the ends. He stared at her until she turned and he met those pretty gray eyes that he had thought he’d never see again.

He hardened his heart. If there was one thing he knew without even talking to her it was that this was a temporary move. He doubted she was back to stay. That wasn’t her style and Marietta wasn’t her town.

At eighteen it had felt like he’d never love again when she’d left Marietta – and him – all in the same cloud of dust. But at thirty-three he knew that was a lie. He had loved again and married and had a chance for real happiness. But now he wondered –was that another lie he’d told himself to make Annie’s leaving him okay?

Yup, he said, answering his brothers as he turned back to the laminated menu, trying to be blasé when inside he wanted to go and talk to her. Go and find out why she was back and what it meant. Had life turned that ballsy, sassy girl he’d loved into a bitch or tamed her?

But he kept his head down studying the laminated menu like his sanity depended on it. It wasn’t as if he didn’t know what he was going to order. He always got the same thing when he and his brothers came into town to eat on Wednesday nights. His son was visiting his maternal grandparents at their home on the modest section of Bramble Lane. Rhett and Lily had moved out to Marietta after Rainey had died to be closer to Evan and they said having Carson around made it hard for them to bond with Evan.

The thing Carson was proudest of was his son and how well he and the six-year-old had grown up together after Rainey died.

Yup? Alec asked.

That girl— Hudson said.

I know. I’m surprised she’s here too, Carson said trying to play it cool. But the thing with brothers was they always knew when he was bullshitting them. But let’s face it... everyone ends up back here eventually. You said Pop wanted some help with something?

Alec’s brother nodded. He’s determined we need to get that old red barn renovation finished by the New Year. I could use some extra help to finish the work.

I’ll send my hands over tomorrow. Is he still planning to sell it?

You know Pop, if you can’t ranch it then it’s a bad investment. And he bought it for Trey to live on with his wife but they aren’t interested in settling down here.

What’s his hurry then?

Lane has a friend who is looking for a place out this way.

You do? Carson asked Lane. I thought all your buddies were career military.

He’s retired, Lane said. Like me.

Is he like you? Carson asked. Lane had lost the bottom half of his left leg in an IED explosion in Iraq and now had prosthetic leg.

Why? Lane asked.

Just wanted to know if we should make the halls and bath a little bigger in the house, Carson said. Maybe we should anyway

Nah, he’s still got both his legs, Lane said.

How old is he? Alec asked.

Barely thirty but all that fighting has taken it out of him, Lane said..

We were lucky to get you back when we did, Carson said.

Thanks, boys. Good to know you care, Lane said.

Ah, they all care about youngest Scott boy, Annie said coming over to their table.

She walked toward them wearing the traditional Main Street Diner white apron over her own clothing. There was something almost defiant in her manner. It had to stick in her craw that she’d left here to make it big and now she was waiting on all of Marietta.

Her brown hair swung around her high cheekbones with each step she took. A pair of faded denim jeans hugged her legs and the tips of her worn brown boots were scuffed. Her smile didn’t reach her eyes and she’d managed to chew off most of her lipstick.

Hellfire. It had been fifteen years and one look at Annie was all it took to get him hot and bothered. It wasn’t that she was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. She had an attitude bigger than the Montana sky, but she’d always just had something that made him stand at attention.

We care about all the Scott boys, Alec said pointedly. Even Carson here when he was dumb enough to fall in love with a girl intent on leaving.

Sorry, she said.

There was something her eyes that made her seem... more than sorry, almost sad and he cautioned himself about feeling anything for her, even pity.

Really? Carson asked.

More than you can know, she admitted. But you boys didn’t come here to hear about my mistakes. You want dinner, right?

We sure do. Did Flo make her jalapeno cornbread today? Hudson asked.

Yes she did, Annie said, taking a pen from the pocket of her apron and holding up her notepad.

Chili and cornbread for me and root beer, Alec said.

Same, Hudson said.

Same again, Lane said.

She looked at Carson and for a moment he remembered the last time he’d held her in his arms, but he’d known then she was leaving. She