Texas Bad Boys
Rosemary Laurey
Karen Kelley
Dianne Castell
ISBN 0-7582-1483-9
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These bad boys can deliver passion and pleasure with their boots on—and they’re more than happy to let a woman mess with Texas…
In Bad with Someone by Rosemary Laurey
Rod Carter was supposed to end up running the Ragged Rooster. Instead, Old Man Maddox gave the bar to his granddaughter, some prissy Brit art gallery owner right off the boat from London. Miss Juliet Ffrench—yeah, two “f’s”—knows jack-all about beer, winning friends, and running tabs, but she’s got a killer smile. All the lady needs is someone to give her an education in Texas hospitality, up close and personal…
Run of Bad Luck by Karen Kelley
Nina Harris loves photographing naked, sexy men. But when she inherits her grandfather’s ranch in Texas, and meets foreman Lance Colby, she thinks she may have met her match. Lance is pretty sure real cowboys don’t drop trou for national magazines. Still, as a Texas gentleman, he’d be more than happy to give Nina a private showing…
Come to a Bad End by Dianne Castell
Silver Gulch Sheriff John Snow thinks women have their place—in his kitchen or his bed. He would certainly never go for some women’s libber businesswoman like Lillie June. The men in town want him to close down her fancy new spa, and he’s happy to oblige. But once he meets Lillie, soothing massages, personal pampering, and one-on-one body wraps don’t seem like such a bad thing at all…
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Chapter One
“Now then, you just sign your name on each one, honey. Right here now, where I’ve marked it, and we’ll all be set and ready.”
Honestly! Pushy and patronizing didn’t begin to describe her grandfather’s lawyer. Did he really think she’d sign the lot, unread, just on his say-so? The man was barking! Juliet ffrench started reading, frowned at the second line of the first document, skimmed the rest of the pages, and looked up at the white-haired lawyer. “There is one immediate difficulty, Mr. Rankin. You’ve misspelled my name on every single document.”
“Now, wait a minute!” Gabe Rankin’s bushy eyebrows shot up toward his receding hairline. “Mildred doesn’t make mistakes like that. Here it is.” He stabbed his finger on the front page. “Juliet Amanda Felicity French.”
“ffrench is spelled with two small ‘fs.’”
That earned her a dropped jaw. “I suppose we can redo them if it really matters.”
It most certainly did. It was her name and he’d better get it right. “I don’t mind waiting.”
He conceded the point and sent Mildred scurrying to correct and reprint them all. “You know,” he said, as he sat back down in his swivel chair, “I don’t think your grandfather was aware of the strange spelling.”
“Given he barely acknowledged my existence until three months ago, hardly surprising.” Acerbic, yes, but after a transatlantic flight to Austin and driving miles in a wretched hired car, all on a flimsy promise, the least they could do was get her damn name right.
“Would you like more tea while you’re waiting?” Gabe Rankin asked.
“No, thank you.” She’d welcomed the offer of “tea” twenty minutes earlier, parched and in dire need of a good cuppa, but a glass full of ice and cold tea with a slice of lemon floating on top was not what she had in mind.
Mildred reappeared surprisingly quickly, handing her a sheaf of papers before nipping back into her office. Juliet read each page carefully, ignoring Rankin’s obvious irritation. “It’s all fine, nothing to worry yourself about.”
“My mother always told me never to sign anything without reading it twice,” she replied, with a deliberately sweet smile. Hell, if Mum knew she was dealing with a Maddock, she’d have said twenty times.
“Well, you just go ahead and read them, then.”
Interesting reading it was, too. She’d known the gist of it before she left home. The actual reality was impressive: enough dosh to keep her going for a long time and ownership of a building including a bar and four apartments. The Ragged Rooster suggested something out of a Monty Python version of Texas but she could live with it, or change it. She was the owner now.
The money was several times what she’d earned a year managing an art gallery in South Kensington, and living here couldn’t match London expenses. True, she had to stay in Silver Gulch for three years, but, heck, it was worth a try.
She’d squirrel away as much as possible and nip back home if it got too much.
She’d give it bash, she told herself as she signed her name on half a dozen dotted lines.
“Well now, then,” Gabe Rankin said, as he straightened the pages and clipped them together after giving her copies. “We need to find you somewhere to live. There’s a nice bed- and-breakfast down on the river and I’m sure Mizz Jones will be happy to accommodate you.”
“Why would I go to a B and B when I own a block of flats?” A purposely bland smile met his pop-eyed stare. “They are unlet, aren’t they?” They certainly weren’t producing rent.
“I think the manager is living in one, made an agreement with Old Mr. Maddock.”
“Good, I’ll move into the other.” She stood, shoving papers into her bag and picking up the bundle of keys.
“Well, now, I’m not sure about that. . . .”
“I am. No point in paying for a B and B when I own property.”
“The Ragged Rooster isn’t exactly the sort of place for a lady to spend the night.”
Fascinating! “Is it a brothel?”
She almost saw his tonsils. “Good heavens! No! Nothing like that in Silver Gulch. It’s just a bar. A bit rowdy on weekends and when the Astros win but . . .”
“I’m staying there, Mr. Rankin, and meanwhile, I think I’ll pop over to The Ragged Rooster for lunch.”
“She has the look of Drew,” Mildred said, coming out of her office as Rankin closed the door behind Juliet ffrench.
“It’s that red hair.”
“Not just that, she has his eyes.”
Couldn’t say he’d noticed, but Mildred should know after all the talk linking her and Drew Maddock years back. “Maybe.”
“Where’s she gone?”
“To look over the Rooster and move into one of the spare apartments.”
“She what!” Mildred laughed until she coughed. “You going to call over and warn them?”
He shook his head. “Won’t hurt young Carter to get taken down a peg or two. Might just stroll on over later and see if he survives.”
Juliet left her hired car parked in the shade behind Gabe Rankin’s office and stood on the opposite corner, slap in the middle of the town. If you could call it a town, but “village” didn’t quite describe Silver Gulch either. She slipped off her jacket and let the afternoon sun warm her bare arms. At least the weather was a distinct improvement from London.
Curious about the place she was going to be inhabiting, at least for a few years, Juliet turned left and wandered down the surprisingly wide street. The town looked prosperous enough, in a slightly worn way. Several shops lined both sides of the street. There were a couple of empty premises, and on the opposite side from the Rooster was a brick building that looked like a boarded-up hotel.
At least she’d inherited a viable business, not an old ruin.
Odd that after all these years of neglect, her grandfather had thought of her on his deathbed. Most propitiously, as it turned out. She still savored the look in Alistair’s eyes when she told him she’d be out of the country for a while—she’d just inherited property in Texas.
True, she’d done absolutely nothing to correct his misapprehension about an oil well, but that was his avaricious mind at work. Serve him right for dumping her for the skinny brunette with boobs and a rich daddy.
The bitchy satisfaction of knowing he believed he’d blown it did a lot to ease her wounded pride. She would not admit to an aching heart over the specimen of humanity named Alistair Winton-Jones.
Why even cloud her thoughts with him? She was in Texas and the sun was shining on a blissfully warm April afternoon.
So much for blazing heat, arid land, and tumbleweed. Silver Gulch was surrounded by green fields, rolling hills, and a fast-flowing river. With a bit of a stretch, it wasn’t that different from the Home Counties. Not that she’d ever come across a sheriff’s office or a shop selling cowboy hats at home.
The little cluster of men holding up the wall between the hardware and the clothing store were not the sort one encountered in a London pub, either. One, in particular, was eyeing her as if he’d bought a ticket.
In a different frame of mind, she might even have returned the stare. He wasn’t half bad-looking, sexy even, with tousled brown hair and dark eyes that she was not going to meet. She was so utterly not in the mood for anything even vaguely resembling male bullshit. Gabe’s “little lady” patronage had used up her last shred of tolerance.
She crossed the road and headed for the Rooster. Might as well find out if she’d inherited more than a headache along with the money.
After the outside warmth, the air-conditioning came as a bit of a shock. Ignoring the goose bumps on her arms and the chill of the cold air, Juliet shut the door behind her. Heels echoing on the wood plank floor, she walked toward the wide counter. On her right, a row of booths filled the wall, and to her left were half a dozen pale Formica-topped tables. One was occupied by a trio of white-haired ladies. As she passed, she noticed two men in one of the booths; their dark suits didn’t quite fit the ambiance. Businessmen on their way to somewhere else perhaps? The only other person in the place besides herself was a waitress, who barely looked up from wrapping cutlery in paper napkins.
