Barbara Daille - The Cowboy's Triple Surprise

A BIG SURPRISE—TIMES THREE!

The last time rodeo cowboy Tyler Buckham was in Cowboy Creek, he spent a steamy night with local beauty Shay O’Neill. Back in town for a quick visit, he’s hoping they’ll have another go-around before he heads for his next rodeo. But seeing Shay pregnant—with triplets!—leaves Tyler feeling as if his best horse has kicked him in the gut.

Shay swore she wouldn’t fall for an unreliable cowboy, and Tyler’s playboy past makes him even less likely to settle down. The whole town conspires to push them together, and Tyler insists he wants to do his duty by Shay and the triplets, but Shay knows she can’t count on promises from a cowboy. Besides, Tyler never once mentioned the word love...

“Why are you here?” Shay fought to keep her voice steady.

“Maybe I had the urge for dessert.” Tyler grinned.

“Then you’ll find more of a selection at SugarPie’s.”

“Could be. But maybe what I want’s right here.”

Once, she would have fallen for that line and hoped he wanted her. She was so over that now. So over him.

She slid open the freezer case and reached for an empty ice cream tub. It gave her an excuse to avoid his blue-eyed stare.

But Tyler stepped up beside her. “I’ll get that.”

“Thanks, but I’m pregnant, not incapacitated.”

“I didn’t think you were.” He closed the freezer door. “Let’s just say I’ll scratch your back, you scratch mine.”

He looked away, as if he’d only now realized what he had said. He cleared his throat and looked back at her. “I’ll take care of this, then you can take care of a few things for me.”

Unfortunately, his attempt to make his point clearer only filled her mind with more images and memories of their night together.

Suddenly, Shay didn’t feel quite so over Tyler Buckham.

Dear Reader,

If you’ve visited Cowboy Creek before, welcome back! And if this is your first time dropping in, have fun meeting Grandpa Jed and the rest of the gang at the Hitching Post Hotel.

As a writer, I love throwing my characters into the absolute worst situations for them. Take our heroine, Shay O’Neill, for example. She has sworn never to fall for a cowboy, and yet a smooth-talking wrangler steals her heart. For once in her life, she lets that heart rule her head. Then the playboy leaves town without a backward glance long before she discovers she’s pregnant.

Rodeo rider Tyler Buckham is in for a few surprises of his own. As he has more reasons than most men for not wanting to settle down, he avoids permanent entanglements and always takes the proper precautions. But upon his return to Cowboy Creek, he learns the hard way that even the best-laid plans can fall to pieces...

I hope you enjoy Tyler’s and Shay’s attempts to put aside their differences to do what’s best for their not one, not two, but three newborn babies.

You can find out more about the folks from the Hitching Post Hotel, as well as all my books, at: barbarawhitedaille.com. You can also reach me at my mailing address: PO Box 504, Gilbert, AZ 85299. I would love to hear from you!

All my best to you.

Until we meet again,

Barbara White Daille

THE COWBOY’S TRIPLE SURPRISE

Barbara White Daille

www.millsandboon.co.uk

BARBARA WHITE DAILLE and her husband still inhabit their own special corner of the wild, wild Southwest, where the summers are long and hot and the lizards and scorpions roam.

Barbara loves looking back at the short stories and two books she wrote in grade school and realizing that—except for the scorpions—she’s doing exactly what she planned. She has now hit double digits with published novels and still has a file drawer full of stories to be written.

As always, Barbara hopes you will enjoy reading her books! She would love to have you drop by for a visit at her website, barbarawhitedaille.com.

To Marlene and Vinnie

for the years of friendship,

fun, love and laughter...

and to Rich for all the same and more.

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

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

Tyler Buckham’s life in Texas—though he wasn’t sure you could call it a life lately—had become as dry as the Sonoran Desert. He liked the ranch he’d been working for some time now, and yet boredom and restlessness had both begun cropping up with increasing frequency. When he’d first noticed the signs setting in again, it never crossed his mind to turn to what he’d normally do: head out to another rodeo. Try for another prize. Find another buckle bunny to help fill a few empty hours.

That failure to go for what had always worked in the past proved just how stale his life had become.

As a last resort, he had given his notice and hit the road. Everybody needed a change of scenery once in a while. Running to something didn’t have to mean you were running from something else. Or so he told himself.

With an effort, he brought his focus back to the den where he now sat, and looked at the older man across the desk from him. He had met Jed Garland, the owner of the Hitching Post Hotel, last summer, when he’d come to Garland Ranch to stand up as best man when Jed’s granddaughter Tina married Tyler’s friend Cole.

Jed laced his hands across his middle. “Nice to have you back.”

“It’s nice to be back,” Tyler returned, though he felt uncomfortable saying it. He should have visited Cowboy Creek again long before this. Cole had invited him for Christmas, but he’d turned down the offer. Instead, he’d spent the holidays with his folks. Three months later, he was still kicking himself over that mistake.

“Cole will be pleased to see you when he gets home,” Jed told him. “I’ll need to have a talk with that boy, though—he didn’t so much as hint about you coming for a visit.”

“He didn’t know I was headed this way. Stopping by was a spur-of-the-moment idea.”

It was worse than that.

What would Cole and Jed and the rest of the Garlands think if they knew just how close he’d come to passing right by? Though he’d headed to New Mexico deliberately to put Texas behind him, he’d been on the fence about whether or not to visit Garland Ranch.

Fate had taken a hand, pushing him off the highway at the Cowboy Creek town limits. The gas gauge on the pickup had nose-dived, and he’d had to top up the tank. If he could have made it through to the next town, he might have left the hotel and dude ranch behind him in a cloud of road dust.

Instead, he’d given the truck its head the way he did his stallion. Like Freedom, the truck seemed to know exactly where it wanted to go. By the time he’d pulled into the parking area behind the Hitching Post, he had begun to wonder if fate had had this trip in store for him all along.

“Well,” Jed said, “when an idea spurs you on, that’s usually a good sign you should get moving on it.”

“Yeah. And here I am.” He glanced over at the Stetson he had tossed onto one of the small couches in the office. “But speaking of moving, I guess I’ll hit the road again since Cole’s not around.”