A Bride for the Texas Cowboy

By Sinclair Jayne

She names an impossible price...

August Wolf is back home on his family’s Texas ranch for good this time, and he has a lot to prove. He’s taken his inherited portion of the ranch as far from the family’s famed longhorn legacy as possible, but a devastating accident throws his plans and his life in jeopardy. August doesn’t have the word 'quit' in his vocabulary even when he has to reach out and beg for help from the woman least likely to answer his call – his furious and broken-hearted ex.

Last Stand is the last town winemaker Catalina Clemmens wants to return to, and August Wolf is the last man she wants to see. And work for him? Never. But when an injured August stands before her and begs, Cat sees a chance to finally have some closure on their long, fraught history, the soul searing lust and her love that still burns brightly. She names a price she knows he’ll never pay.

But August says yes… and then he ups the ante

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tule Publishing
• Release date: Sep 26, 2019
• ISBN: 9781951190194

Book preview

Author

Prologue

August Wolf wheeled a dolly of five cases of wine and tilted them expertly so that they settled next to the other cases. He paused and looked around his glaringly unfinished tasting room. Silent curses rolled around in his head, but none of them began to fit the situation.

He had made a serious miscalculation. He’d taken a ballsy risk—not for the first time but never this close to home or so publicly, or with such a flippantly arrogant attitude. It was his older brother’s Axel’s fault. Not that Axel had done anything except, as usual, be Axel: superior, confident, dully respectable and so supremely right about everything it would never occur to him that he could be wrong. Nor would he ever be tempted to challenge fate. Or color outside the lines.

So, August had to do it.

He’d made a lifestyle and a pretty damn lucrative and notorious career out of not just thinking outside the box but never even climbing in the damn thing.

So when he’d inherited his share of the family’s massive Texas cattle ranch three years ago when he’d turned twenty-five, he’d sunk serious bank into planting a vineyard.

He hadn’t done it to piss his older brother off. That had been just a side benefit.

But now he was seriously risking failure.

Impossible.

Not going to happen.

He shoved the doubt aside like he always did.

He’d had a lifetime of people pointing fingers in judgment—Axel particularly. But they’d been wrong.

And they’d be wrong this time, too.

The tasting room for Verflucht was going to open on time for the Bluebonnet Festival next weekend.

He’d work twenty-four seven if he had to. Failure was not an option.

Verflucht was on Main Street in downtown Last Stand, which was his hometown, right across the street from one of the best restaurants in town: the Carriage House. His family had fueled enough gossip, side eyes, pity and snark over the past one hundred and fifty years, and he wasn’t about to add to the list of transgressions. Not inadvertently anyway.

No way would August Wolf—a man whose persona screamed effortless success while his brand was kick-back-and-enjoy—allow his Oz curtain to be yanked back exposing him to anyone, especially Axel.

He’d worry.

Blame himself.

And offer to bail his high-flying middle brother out.

August could clearly picture Axel shaking his head self-righteously assured he’d been once again right, and August wrong, wrong, wrong.

And that would kill August.

The screech of rubber, along with the shattered glass and splintered wood, jolted him out of his funk, but just as he looked up, a wall of cases of wine crashed over him. The pillar he’d been leaning against gave way. Screams surround-sounded him, and the right side of his body was twisted hard before he slammed into the cement flooring—acid-washed a burnt umber and purple for artistic effect.

That irrelevant detail ponged around his brain as his vision grayed.

What had happened?

August struggled to make sense of anything. He tried to move, but his body wouldn’t listen or else something was crushing him. Everything hurt, and he blinked hard to clear his eyes of the dust and debris that floated in the air.

What was he looking at?

It seemed like part of the wall was gone, along with the expensive glass and metal custom garage door. Blown up or imploded. A bomb?

Another groan of metal. One half of the tasting room sign that had been mounted out front on the building less than an hour ago fell and swung back and forth like a scolding pendulum.

Axel had been outraged when he’d laughingly told his brother the name of his winery.

Verflucht.

Cursed indeed.

Chapter One

Catalina Clemmens hated pink. She especially hated wearing pink at weddings. And as a bridesmaid, she’d worn various shades of pink over the years at a lot of weddings. Today was likely the last time. She’d run out of friends. Her friends from high school had been few, but predictably in a small town had all married years ago. Same for her college friends. She didn’t have many close work friends as she changed jobs often, but Jenny had been her last single partner in crime.

She’d introduced Jenny to her groom, Simon Houghton.

And Simon had been promoted yesterday, taking Catalina’s job as cellar manager of Erratic Rock Vineyard after she’d been fired, which made today’s wedding all kinds of awkward.

The Willamette Valley, Oregon wine industry was incestuous and tricky to navigate at the best of times. Jobs weren’t so hard to get, but Catalina didn’t find them particularly easy to keep.

She had enviable skills. Encyclopedic knowledge of winemaking and experience around the world. Her palate was unparalleled. No one worked harder. But diplomacy—not so much.

Her big mouth and strong opinions earned her no favors in an industry still bursting with toxic masculinity and competitive egos—not those of the winemakers so much as the new big tech, pharmaceuticals and petroleum titans. These new players had descended on the bucolic Willamette Valley bursting with bank and arrogance and looking to spin an elegant and glamorous fantasy into a reality that wasn’t buffeted by the capricious whims of Mother Nature.

Good luck with that!

But no one wanted reality to intrude. These owners and CEOs never expected to be told no or that they were wrong. Catalina left the crowded, boisterous room with the pink and gold paper lantern lights hanging from the ceiling and walked out on the back deck overlooking a sprawling vineyard that spilled down a hill and stopped just a few dozen yards from the Yamhill River.

The quiet of the night, and the cool breeze off the Van Duzer Corridor that made this site and many others so ideal to grow the famed but finicky pinot noir grape, released some of the tension that had been building all week.

Almost done.

She’d made her toast.

Just cake cutting and then drunk dancing.

She’d happily skip that and be home and in bed before the damn bouquet was tossed.

A primitive and humiliating ritual.

And wrong for her as maid of honor to skip.

Last single woman over twenty-five standing.

But what was worse—embarrassingly worse—was that Catalina wanted the dumb dream. The husband. Kids. Home with a garden bursting with herbs, vegetables and fruit trees. She even wanted goats she could milk and she wanted to make artisan cheese she’d serve her fantasy family—maybe even sell the extra at the farmers’ market. Or barter. She wanted to cook nourishing meals for her family. Volunteer in their schools and run carpool to different sports and activities as her children followed their passions.

She wanted all the things she’d never had growing up.

She wanted love.

And tonight was not the first night she was scared she’d never have it.

She tried to swallow around the lump in her throat. Her eyes stung, and she blinked them furiously as she willed the stupid tears back to the depths of her bruised soul. She wasn’t yet thirty-two. She still had plenty of time. But she also had so much she still needed to accomplish to build the life she wanted, especially as it seemed that each step forward resulted in two steps back.

And she’d been dealt another one-two punch this week. On Wednesday, she’d caught her so-called boyfriend, Josh Stevens—more of a convenience to fill up the huge ball of loneliness that seemed to have swallowed her heart—balls deep in her intern against a nicely aging barrel of chardonnay from the Annaleigh block.

That slap to her self-esteem along with losing her job should have upset her far more than both events did.

Josh hadn’t made her feel part of something. He’d just reminded her of what she was missing. And her job had bored her further because she could do it in her sleep, and she hated being relegated to one area of the wine business.

She wanted to be her own boss, but the handful of ‘orphan vines’ acres she’d cobbled together and tended on her own dime to make her own wine were not nearly enough to support herself.

Yet.

She was in her early thirties. Healthy. Well educated. Smart. Talented. Creative. Independent. Funny.

She litanied all the reasons she should celebrate herself instead of feeling discouraged in her pink bridesmaid dress, alone, unemployed, and about to be homeless.

Catalina, Catalina, Catalina, she heard her name chanted.

God no.

Go get her. Jenny’s imperious bride’s voice cut through the open sliding glass doors.

Catalina mentally gulped. There was no avoiding that voice or that command.

Two women swept down—Betsy Highland, daughter of a famed winemaker, and Jessica Santos, one of the youngest head winemakers in the Willamette Valley—seized her and dragged her to the front of what was not even a crowd.

Jenny was drinking from her flute of bubbly. Her husband’s arms were around her and his face was buried in her neck. They swayed even before the music started.

This time next year I’m going to be dancing with one of the funniest, awesomest, sarcasticest, best damn up-and-coming winemakers in the valley. I don’t care what anyone else says. Jenny held her flute high, and shimmering pale gold droplets splashed on her hand and dripped down. She laughed and licked at her hand as Simon leaned down and opened his mouth as if he too wanted to drink from her spill.

Jenny was drunk.

Where was I?

Catalina Battlina, someone shouted.

Catalina rolled her eyes and kept the smile pasted on her face. Why was speaking her mind something to earn her a nickname like she was some kind of raging warrior? Why was devotion to her craft something she got fired for?

OK, she could have been more polite, subtle—whatever—when pointing out how the head winemaker was screwing up epically. But diplomacy and tiptoeing around egos was not her style.

Oh yeah. I’m going to be dancing with a huge baby bump at her wedding. Jenny pointed at her with a swooping motion that seemed particularly accusing. This time next year, Jenny reiterated. I’m calling it.

And then she did a mic drop and mimed an exploding sound with her hands.

Kill me now.

Cheers! Jenny shouted and hurled the bouquet of peach-and-lavender-colored roses straight at Catalina’s chest. Let’s dance!

Jenny and Simon launched into an uncoordinated grind, and something she dimly thought she’d heard called flossing, and then Simon was dabbing, and Catalina was sure he’d poke Jenny in the eye. And all of this accompanied an Ed Sheeran song titled, she thought, Perfect.

Maybe she didn’t want to get married.

Head high, Catalina swept out of the beautiful event space of the Willows Winery. She dropped the bouquet on a startled waiter’s tray and, snagging her purse, she pushed through the double doors into a blustery, rainy Oregon early spring day.

Naturally, it had started raining.

Her phone rang.

Definitely wise to ignore that.

She was not going back into that shark tank when she’d become the chum. Not even for Jenny, who had been the only one to stick by her. She’d told Jenny she had a job interview later so she’d leave the wedding early. A lie. But it was as much for Jenny as for herself. Jenny worried about her.

No need. She was fine. Absolutely fine. She grit her teeth and glanced at her phone.

Seriously?

Like the day could get worse.

Why the hell was August Wolf calling her?

The only man she ever…best not to go down that path. The last time she’d seen him four years ago she’d hurled a bottle of Roshni Pinot Noir estate reserve at him. He’d dodged—like she’d really been trying to hit him—and then he told her to calm down.

Right.

So she’d hurled another bottle, closer this time. Screamed at him to get out. And then she’d picked up a third. Not really fair since Roshni was a client and the wine wasn’t hers to destroy, and it had recently earned ninety-four points at a prestigious judging, and the owner had basked in all the accolades and given her a raise and signed another contract.

So not cool.

But August had received the message.

Fifteen years of friendship, six years as lovers with one breakup in the middle was officially and forever over.

Still, as she hurried down the path through the rain, needing an outlet from the thump, thump of the DJ’s wedding playlist coursing through her veins, she pushed the green circle.

Unless you’re dying, the answer is no.

*

Two standby flights later, one of them a red-eye, Catalina carelessly parked the rental jeep in Jameson Hospital’s visitor parking in Last Stand, Texas. Her heart seemed to have taken up permanent residence in her throat since August’s phone call.

Catalina. I’m hurt. I need you. Can you come? Please.

She rolled the words over and over in her head as she strode toward the hospital. Catalina. He never called her that. Even when they’d been kids. It had always been Cat. And she’d loved that until she hated it.

Need. Never a word August had used before. Ever. Please hadn’t really featured much in his vocabulary either. He hadn’t needed to use that word. Most everyone was eager to offer him anything and to be associated with him and his businesses—especially women, Catalina thought sourly.

So here she was, back in her home-town of Last Stand—the last town she wanted to be in. About to dance another set with August Wolf, a man she’d vowed to cut out of her life forever.

She huffed out a hot breath. She shouldn’t be here. She knew she shouldn’t. The deep blue early morning March sky seemed to mock her. She’d talk to August.

Make sure he’s alive.

Her very empty tummy sloshed, but she ignored it.

She’d see what he needed and then be back on her way—for good this time—back to Oregon. It hit her then that she had no back to go to. No job. No apartment, as she’d been living in vineyard housing. Just her scattered orphan vineyards and a lot of business contacts—not all of them good.

But Last Stand couldn’t be a landing spot for her ever again. First her family and then August had seen to that.

Grimly, she entered the hospital and, not seeing him in the emergency waiting room, she texted August for his room number. His answer surprised her. The surgical waiting room. She wasn’t sure if that was good or bad.

Schooling her features to something she hoped was calm with a touch of indifference, she took the wide, blue-green carpeted stairs, needing to burn off some of her nervous energy. The hospital had definitely been expanded, remodeled and upgraded since she’d last lived in town after graduating high school about thirteen years ago. When she hit the top stair, her heart flipped and her stomach dropped. August sat alone on a blue vinyl couch, one leg stretched out, his jeans torn and bloody. His hair was longer than the last time she’d seen him. It was dark and wavy and tousled, and it fell to his shoulders. He was hunched over, staring at the carpet, his beautiful features twisted in pain.

August, she whispered, stunned by how broken he looked and how alone. August was always surrounded by people—his crew.

Where was his brother? His personal assistant? And everyone else who scrambled to do his bidding?

She hadn’t wanted to come. Had tried to talk herself out of it even as she’d grabbed her Patagonia weatherproof backpack that held her laptop and iPad, taken her duffel bag—which always held a couple of changes of clothes, work boots, gloves and toiletries since she often worked late at the winery—from the back of her truck, and got an Uber to the airport.

She’d been fooling herself. She wasn’t over August.

Too bad. She wasn’t going to let her history—the happiness and heartbreak with August Wolf—define her. He didn’t love her. Probably never had. And he definitely hadn’t wanted to make a life with her—marriage, children, a home together.

Get over it.

She’d moved on.

Only it suddenly didn’t feel like that. And she had to own their end before she took one more step.

August looked up, his lean, angular face devoid of expression. His cyan eyes, always so beautiful and unusual that looking into them made her feel like she’d fallen into another world, were now dark, flat. Empty. No insouciant smile kissed his lips. No dimple. No smartass comment. Silence.

A stranger.

A beautiful, beat-up and eerily silent stranger.

Catalina forced herself to stand still. Not run to comfort him. Tell him it would be all right. For a moment they were kids again. And August was lost. And she was going to be the one to find him. To save him.

You came.

His voice was flat. Like her life.

You called. She barely resisted a mocking curtsey.

Disbelief skittered across his beautiful features.

He’d doubted she’d come this time.

Catalina hated herself all over again.

*

Cat had come. His Cat. He didn’t deserve her. Never had. But other than Axel, Cat was the only person he’d ever been able to count on.

And Axel had enough burdens. And the price was too high for August to ever ask.

He stared hard at her, trying to make the whimsical image in front of him match nearly a lifetime of memories. Had he hit his head harder than he thought? He’d been offered a scan for a concussion, but he’d claimed he hadn’t hit his head. Not hard anyway. He didn’t have symptoms—not many. His head throbbed along with the rest of his body like he was a giant drum, but he didn’t have time for BS right now, and he’d been more focused on his friends and crew—Derek, Erika, Pete and Brent and Brent’s sister…what was her name. Hayley? No, Haven. All of them had been injured when the wine tour bus had crashed through the front of his tasting room, destroying much of his newly remodeled space and also his apartment above.

He wasn’t so injured that he couldn’t see the irony in that, but he sure didn’t appreciate it.

And now he had to worry about a possible head injury because Cat did not look like his Cat—his longtime childhood friend, first girlfriend and then on-again, off-again lover. It seemed like she’d always been part of his life, and he hadn’t wanted to imagine a life without her in it. But four years ago he’d made the ultimate sacrifice, which had turned into a colossal mistake for him.

And forgiveness was not in Cat’s vocabulary.

He didn’t blame her. But he’d done what he thought was best for her.

No good deed…

But here she was.

So what the hell was he going to do now?

Sorry. August carelessly shoved a shock of black hair out of his face and looked up at Cat, who looked… He wasn’t really sure how to describe how she looked. Sparkly. And over-the-top like a kid playing dress-up. Pepto pink that burned his corneas. She seemed like she’d made an unexpected and uncomfortable stab at elegant but changed her mind midway judging by the crookedly buttoned denim shirt over the body-hugging pink dress. She’d bottomed the look with a pair of mud-caked black and brown cowboy boots like she’d just come in from the vineyards.

He blinked, but she was still there.

And still fantastical.

Not dead, he joked.

Yet.

Pale, greenish gray eyes sparked and narrowed.

There was his Cat. Pissed. Unamused.

Not funny considering.

He looked down. No, it wasn’t funny. His employees were injured. Two badly enough that Derek had coded on the way to the hospital. Been jolted back to life and had been in surgery for hours.

How is your staff? The pink hem skimmed the top of her cowboy boots as she stepped closer to him.

He closed his eyes.

Man up.

Usually he had more time to prepare to meet Cat. Calling her had been instinctive. And under the influence of painkillers, which had played with his head. He still didn’t feel clear. He was nauseous as hell, and the lurid pink was not helping.

Her skin—white and luminescent like a pearl with a smattering

Reviews for A Bride for the Texas Cowboy

[Leena Aluru · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

OK. Flimsy plot, incomplete story esp with regards her family. Lots of repetitions to cover up pages.