Heidi Hormel - The Bull Rider's Redemption

BACK IN THE RING

Clover Van Camp meets her match when her plans to turn a struggling Arizona town into a Wild West resort are blocked by the hunky mayor, retired bull rider Danny Leigh. To make things more complicated, this isn’t the first time the two of them have tangled…

Danny knows Clover usually gets her way, but this time he won’t back down. He’s got a few things to answer for and a town to save. Besides, reconnecting with his former fling has benefits, as long as he doesn’t get distracted by their mutual attraction. Will Danny and Clover let their ambition keep their hearts divided?

“Clover Van Camp doesn’t have a boyfriend!” Danny teased.

Clover shook her head. “Nope, I’ve been focusing on work. What about you?”

“Nah. Between my business and being mayor, I just don’t have the time.”

“Didn’t you say you could always make time for the ladies?”

“I said that in an interview when I was twenty-one and just won a buckle!” Danny laughed. “So…you kept up with me?”

She may have followed his career…a little. She blushed. “I followed everyone I knew from bull riding.”

“Good recovery.” He laughed again, his blue eyes bright with humor. “Well, I’d better get going.”

“It was good to visit.” She smiled.

“Same here.” He didn’t move, his gaze on her face.

Her breath quickened just a little. Danny grinned as he put out his hand for a shake. As she grasped his strong hand she felt that old flush of heat and desire working its way through her. How could that be, more than ten years after that summer?

She tugged him toward her…and Danny didn’t hesitate.

Dear Reader,

Danny Leigh was nearly shouting at me to tell his story. The trouble was that where his story started is not where it ended up. He and his first love, a Texas cowgirl with New York blue-blood roots, taught me that changing horses midstream isn’t easy, but it makes the destination that much sweeter. Of course, I got Danny back, torturing him just a little in this Angel Crossing, Arizona, book. Bwa-ha-ha.

At the heart of this reunion romance are two people just trying to do the best they can: Mayor Danny working to improve his town by remaining true to its roots and Clover Van Camp planning to transform the community into a Wild West resort with jobs and prosperity for one and all. Of course, the residents of Angel Crossing aren’t going to let this battle play out without putting in their two cents every chance they get.

I have so many more stories to tell about Angel Crossing and I can’t wait to do that. When I look back on how this all started with The Surgeon and the Cowgirl, I do wonder what the inspiration fairies were drinking.

If you want to know more about my inspirations and musings or drop me a note, check out my website and blog at heidihormel.net, where you also can sign up for my newsletter; or connect with me at Facebook.com/AuthorHeidiHormel; on Twitter @HeidiHormel; or Pinterest.com/hhormel.

Yee-Haw,

Heidi Hormel

The Bull Rider’s Redemption

Heidi Hormel

www.millsandboon.co.uk

With stints as an innkeeper and radio talk show host, HEIDI HORMEL settled into her true calling as a writer by spending years as a reporter (covering the story of the rampaging elephants Debbie and Tina) and as a PR flunky (staying calm in the face of Cookiegate). Now she is happiest penning romances with a wink and a wiggle.

A small-town girl from the Snack Food Capital of the World, Heidi has trotted over a good portion of the globe, from Tombstone in Arizona to Loch Ness in Scotland to the depths of Death Valley. She draws on all of these experiences for her books, but especially her annual visits to the Grand Canyon state for her Angel Crossing, Arizona, series.

Heidi is on the web at heidihormel.net, as well as socially out there at Facebook.com/authorheidihormel, Twitter.com/heidihormeland Pinterest.com/hhormel.

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To my hometown for giving me

too much inspiration—I’ll never have

the time to write all these books!

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Dear Reader

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

Just like riding a bike, my aunt Fanny. The weighted edge of Clover Van Camp’s sequined, tailored gown and her three-inch stilettos were parts of a life she’d left years ago, when she’d gone to college and finally convinced her mother that statistics class would get her further in the fashion industry than pageants. This was a one-night only return to the stage as a beauty queen. Her mother had promised.

Clover handed the award to the man in the cowboy hat and Western tuxedo with buttons straining over his middle. She stood behind him as he spoke about his philanthropy to the crowded Phoenix ballroom. Her smile was pleasant, masking a desperate desire to move her pinned and sprayed head of “naturally tousled” red hair. La-di-da and fiddly dee, she said to herself, the joys of being a vice president of events for her mother’s fashion house. The clapping prompted her to step forward to direct the winner to the spot for his photo with the Junior League’s president. As she maneuvered him into position, his hand squeezed her sequined, Spanxed butt.

“What the hell?” she yelped, pushing him and knocking him off balance and into the Junior League president. Clover watched as the pinwheeling man and woman sprawled onto the wooden floor, as Grabby Hands’ white Stetson rolled off the stage. Crap. What was it with her and cowboys, gowns and trophies? That was exactly how she’d “fallen” for tall, blond, blue-eyed Danny Leigh years ago. She’d handed him the Junior Championship Bull Rider trophy and, in trying to get herself close to him for the picture, she’d stepped on his cowboy boot with the thin heel of her stiletto, skewering his foot and sending him into a jig that had them both tumbling from the platform.

Now in the Phoenix ballroom more than a decade later, this audience laughed politely, and Clover went on as if nothing had happened. She’d learned how to tape her breasts for the best cleavage and how to smile through anything on the pageant circuit. Good thing, too. She figured tonight’s spectacular cleavage (thanks to her taping skills) might make the cowboy forget she’d knocked him to the ground.

Two hours later and on the way to the airport for a red-eye flight back to Austin, Texas, Clover finally read the text from her mother: WTH. U punched award winner?

No punch. Accident. Will explain at office.

By then Clover would have a better, and more PR-friendly, explanation than that Grabby Hands should have kept his mitts off her. She’d already salvaged the situation to the best advantage for her mother’s brand—Cowgirl’s Blues. In two days, everyone would be talking about the new jeans that lifted butts and flattened tummies, not Clover’s stumble. Oh, the glamour of working in the fashion industry.