The Texan's Cowgirl Bride

Savannah gave a short laugh at the idea of falling for anyone who worked on the produce farm, even the entire ranch. They were too old, too young, or married. Well, Luke was good-looking, but she couldn’t imagine thinking of him as anything more than a friend.

“I have my hands full without throwing a guy in the mix.”

“Yeah, right. I saw you eyeballing Cannon Russell earlier.”

“Doesn’t hurt to look a little.” And Cannon, one of the bull riders, certainly wasn’t hard to look at. A long, lean, bull-riding machine. Of course, she wasn’t the only one looking. He always had a gaggle of buckle bunnies following him around like a swarm of mosquitoes looking for a taste.

Still, Savannah couldn’t stop looking at all the guys. She blamed her sister Lizzie. After all, how could she be around Lizzie and her fiancé, Chris, see how crazy in love they were and not be affected?

“I’d give him a seven.”

Savannah pulled herself back from her thoughts and shifted her gaze to Abby. “Seven? Are you blind? He’s at least an eight and a half, probably a nine.”

“I like to leave a bit of a window on the top end of the scale in case someone ever really knocks my socks off.”

They fell into assigning hotness numbers to every cowboy who walked by. When Abby started calling out the numbers loud enough that the cowboys in question could hear them, Savannah wanted to crawl under her hat. When Cannon strolled by and Abby hollered, “Seven and a half,” Savannah shushed her and swatted her on the arm. Abby just hooted.

Savannah shook her head and called out, “Don’t mind her. Tourette’s.”

Cannon laughed a little then headed off to talk with some of the other bull riders.

“I don’t know why I hang out with you,” Savannah said.

“Because you love me.”

“So you think.”

Abby laughed again and climbed into her living quarters to get ready for the evening’s ride. Savannah downed the rest of her lemonade before grabbing her bag to change clothes, too.

When they both emerged from the trailer, the grandstands were filling up and the smell of grilling hamburgers permeated the air. Savannah’s stomach growled, but she rarely ate anything close to when she was supposed to ride. Her dinner usually came in the slice of time between when she finished riding and the bull riding event started.

They headed toward the back curve of the arena next to the grandstands, chatting with other competitors along the way.

“Mmm-mmm, your boyfriend is looking good tonight.” Abby nodded toward where Cannon was standing with Liam Parrish, a former bronc rider who now ran the company that provided the rough stock and staff for the rodeo.

“You know, the way you keep finding him, I think you might be the one who has the hots for him.”

“Not gonna lie. I wouldn’t mind sampling his wares, but I’m not fighting the gauntlet of bunnies to do so.”

“Savannah?”

She turned at her name to see a good-looking man standing a few feet away. Tall, nicely built and wearing the ubiquitous cowboy hat, jeans and boots. But he wasn’t part of the rodeo. She’d been around rodeo competitors for enough years to be able to peg one. Something about him seemed familiar, though, but she couldn’t quite place it.

He tipped his tan Stetson back a bit, revealing more of his close-cropped auburn hair and light eyes. “Travis Shepard.”

“Oh, hey.” She smiled and moved in for a quick hug, noticing that Travis had changed a good bit since she’d last seen him. Taller, built more like a man than a teenage boy, and, wow, he’d certainly grown into a looker. Suddenly feeling uncharacteristically awkward at that thought, she stepped back from him. “How long has it been?”

“A while.”

Several years, in fact. She hadn’t seen him since right after he’d gotten married and was about to ship out with the army overseas. A lot had changed since then. He’d lost his wife and had traded the military for a private investigator’s license. A flicker of something in his eyes made her wonder if he’d just had a similar thought.

“What are you doing here?” she asked.

He nodded toward the arena. “Came to watch my niece Hailey. She’s riding in the mutton busting.”

“Really? Last time I saw her and Rita, Hailey was still a baby.”

“She’s six now, and Rita’s pregnant again.”

Abby cleared her throat, drawing Savannah’s attention. When she saw the look of appreciation on Abby’s face, Savannah fought the unexpected urge to step in between her two friends, to protect Travis even though from the looks of him he was perfectly capable of taking care of himself. After all, he’d been a soldier.

“Travis and I went to high school together,” Savannah said.

She shifted her gaze to Travis, who had taken a couple of steps closer, allowing her to see his eyes better, remember the pretty pale blue. Even when he’d been an awkward teen, he’d had those striking eyes.

“Travis, this is my friend Abby. She’s another barrel racer.”

Travis smiled and nodded. “I think I’ve seen you ride before.”

“You go to a lot of rodeos?” Abby asked, interest in her voice.

“A few, the nearby ones when Hailey is riding.” He shifted his gaze to Savannah. “I won’t be surprised if she follows in your footsteps. That girl came out of the womb loving animals and not afraid of anything.”

“Sounds more like my sister Carly than me.”

Travis grinned. “I don’t know. I seem to remember you having no fear getting on a horse that was twice as tall as you were.”

He remembered her that far back? Guilt squirmed inside her that she couldn’t remember him earlier than their sophomore year. Of course, she’d been all about rodeo then and probably wouldn’t have noticed him if he’d strolled by her wearing blinking lights.

The announcer welcomed everyone to the night’s events and got the ball rolling with the opening ceremonies. As Abby and Savannah turned toward the arena for the national anthem, Travis took up a spot next to Savannah. While she should be concentrating on the words to the song and the gently waving American flag being held by the rodeo queen in the middle of the arena, she caught herself glancing out of the corner of her eye at Travis. They’d known each other for years. Why was he suddenly making her all jittery? That was just weird.

She couldn’t be attracted to Travis.

Well, why not? She’d been attracted to plenty of guys and never let them know. And though she’d only been talking to him for a handful of minutes, one glance had been enough to show her that the grown-up Travis Shepard was going to turn a lot more female heads than the teenage Travis Shepard ever had.

When the flag bearers left the arena, Savannah shifted her weight. “We should go get ready for our rides.”

Instead of moving toward where they’d left the horses, however, Abby propped her foot up on the lowest rail of the fence surrounding the arena and shot Savannah a knowing grin. “We’ve got plenty of time. We’re next to last.”

Left with no choice but to join her friend or be obvious about the fact she was trying to get away from suddenly-too-attractive Travis, she leaned her arms along the top of the fence and watched as the little kids were led out on the opposite side of the arena.

“Hard to believe we were ever that little, isn’t it?” Travis said from beside her.

“Yeah.” Wow, way to be a sterling conversationalist, monosyllabic and everything. But how was she supposed to think clearly when she’d swear she could feel his body heat radiating toward her? She was going to kill Lizzie for putting all those gooey, romantic thoughts in her head.

And then it got worse when Travis leaned close and pointed at a little girl wearing a lime-green Western-style shirt and a mini white cowgirl hat.

“That’s Hailey.”