Lenora Worth - That Wild Cowboy

It was just a kiss…

Producer Victoria Calhoun couldn’t care less that famous cowboy Clint Griffin doesn’t even remember it. The kiss meant that much to her, too. And all that baggage doesn’t mean she has to like working with him—if you can call it work, watching him parade around on her reality TV show. She won’t fall for his charms again, even if Clint is trying to convince her he’s much more than his swagger. Even if the way he looks at her makes her want to believe him. She’ll do her job and get out with her heart intact. Her heart, though, seems to have its own ideas….

Young or old, Clint Griffin still had it

Victoria tried to compare this man to the young cowboy who’d messed with her head all those years ago. No matter how she looked at him, he really did still have it.

But she hadn’t come here to gawk.

“No, no.” She pulled her hand and the camcorder away before he could grab it. “That’s not how this works, Mr. Griffin.”

“Call me Clint and come on in.”

Victoria wondered at the sanity of entering this house without her crew, the sanity of making any kind of deal with this man, verbal or otherwise. Would she come out later all giggly and dazed like the woman who’d just left?

A forbidden image shot through her sensibilities.

Job, Victoria. You need this job, remember? Her boss had hinted at a nice salary change if she nabbed Clint Griffin.

“I’ll wait for you to…uh…get dressed so we can talk.”

He looked down and let out a laugh. “Mercy me, I am half-nekked. Sorry about that.”

He didn’t look sorry, not the least little bit.

Dear Reader,

I’m so happy to see this story in print. We all love cowboys, and although they might change through the centuries, they will never go out of style. I think it has to do with their code of honor (even when they act like rascals) and their need to take care of everyone around them, especially “helpless” women.

My cowboy is a Casanova, but underneath that playful, good-time exterior, he has a heart of gold…and that heart is hurting. He’s acting out because of something that happened in his youth, something he never quite got over. But my heroine will show him the path to happy trails. It will take a lot more than a Texas-style reality show to bring these two together. For once in his life, Clint doesn’t know how to handle a woman. Victoria becomes his biggest challenge. But allowing her to bring in a television team to shoot a reality show might be his undoing, since being a star brings him all kinds of unwanted attention. Clint knows some secrets need to remain buried.

One thing I love about this story is the gift of a big, lovable, fighting family. Clint loves his family, but they sometimes drive him crazy. He’s the man of the house and he’s trying to please too many women. When he meets Victoria, he’s shocked to find her so refreshing and down-to-earth. He feels comfortable with her, almost too comfortable. Victoria is uncomfortable around him, since she’s been burned by more than one cowboy, but she soon falls for all that charm. Victoria can see in Clint what everyone else has missed. He’s not just a Casanova. He’s a good, gentle, loving cowboy with a big heart.

I hope you enjoy Clint and Victoria’s story. I had a great time bringing these two together.

Lenora Worth

That Wild Cowboy

Lenora Worth

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

LENORA WORTHhas written more than forty books for three different publishers. Her career with Love Inspired Books spans close to fifteen years. In February 2011, her Love Inspired Suspense novel Body of Evidence made the New York Times bestseller list. Her very first Love Inspired title, The Wedding Quilt, won Affaire de Coeur’s Best Inspirational for 1997, and Logan’s Child won an RT Book Reviews Best Love Inspired for 1998. With millions of books in print, Lenora continues to write for the Love Inspired and Love Inspired Suspense lines. Lenora also wrote a weekly opinion column for the local paper and worked freelance for years with a local magazine. She has now turned to full-time fiction writing and enjoying adventures with her retired husband, Don. Married for thirty-six years, they have two grown children. Lenora enjoys writing, reading and shopping…especially shoe shopping.

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To my nephew Jeremy Smith, who has become a true cowboy.

Happy trails, Jeremy :)

Contents

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

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Extract

CHAPTER ONE

THIS WAS A bad idea on so many levels.

Victoria Calhoun stared up at the swanky stone-faced McMansion and wondered why she somehow managed to get all the fun jobs. Did she really want to march up to those giant glass doors and ring the bell? Or should she run away while she still had the chance? She really hated dealing with cowboys.

Especially the rhinestone kind.

Especially the kind that got drunk in a bar and kissed a very sober, very wallflower-type of girl and didn’t even remember it later.

Yeah, that kind.

But it had been a few years since that night in downtown Fort Worth. He hadn’t remembered her then and he wouldn’t remember her now. They’d danced, had some laughs and shared some hot kisses in a corner booth and then, poof, he’d moved on. Like two minutes later.

I’ve moved on, too. Enough that I don’t have to stoop to this just because some sexy, sloshed cowboy kissed me and left me in a bar.

Victoria decided she was pathetic and she needed to leave. She’d have to make some excuse to Samuel but her boss would understand. Wouldn’t he?

In the next minute, the decision was made for her. The doors burst open and a leggy blonde woman spilled out onto the porch while she also spilled out of the tight jeans and low-cut blouse she was wearing. The blonde giggled then started down the steps to the curving driveway, but turned and giggled her way back to the man who stood at the door watching her.

The man wore a black Stetson—of course—a bathrobe and...black cowboy boots with the Griffin brand, the winged protector, inlaid in deep rich tan across the shafts. It looked like that might be all he was wearing.

Guess if you lived on a five-thousand-acre spread west of Dallas, you could pretty much wear what you wanted.

Victoria wanted to turn and leave but the sound of her producer’s voice in her head held her back. “V.C., we need this one,” he’d said. “The network’s not doing so great. The ratings are down and that means the revenues are, too. Sponsors are pulling away left and right on other shows and soon the bigwigs will be cutting shows. The ratings will go off the charts if we nab Clint Griffin. He’s the hottest thing since Red Bull. Go out there and get me some footage to show our sponsors, while I keep pushing things with his manager and all the bothersome lawyers.”