Debra Clopton: Her Unexpected Cowboy

Falling For The Cowboy

Rowdy McDermott has a plan. Stay on the straight and narrow, help the foster boys on Sunrise Ranch and forget about love. The last thing he expects is his pretty new neighbor falling literally into his arms. Lucy Calvewrt is glad the handsome cowboy broke her fall, but isn’t ready for the feelings he’s stirring in her heart. She’s heard rumors about his past, and is steering clear from the kind of man he used to be. With a little help from his boys, can Rowdy show her that people—and hearts—can change?

Cowboys of Sunrise Ranch: These men have hearts as big as Texas.

“No need to thank me,” Rowdy said.

“You’re the one helping me. Saving me from the wrath of Nana is a good thing. If there is one thing she prides above all else, it’s that her boys are gentlemen. And I have to admit I have sometimes been her wayward grandson.”

Lucy smiled. “I’d hate for you to admit you’re helping me remodel my barn because you’re a nice guy.” And he might be. But that didn’t stop her from being wary...not so much of him, but of the way she reacted to him.

“Me a nice guy?” He looked skeptical, and a grin played across his face. “I don’t know about that.”

The man’s personality, like his eyes and his smile, sparkled and drew her in.

Just because she found a man attractive didn’t mean she was going to unlock her heart, trust him and eventually marry the man.

He was her neighbor being neighborly. End of story.

Right.

DEBRA CLOPTON

First published in 2005, Debra Clopton is an award-winning multipublished novelist who has won a Booksellers Best Award, an Inspirational Readers’ Choice Award, a Golden Quill, a Cataromance Reviewers’ Choice Award, RT Book Reviews Book of the Year and Harlequin.com’s Readers’ Choice Award. She was also a 2004 finalist for the prestigious RWA Golden Heart, a triple finalist for the American Christian Fiction Writers Carol Award and most recently a finalist for the 2011 Gayle Wilson Award for Excellence.

Married for twenty-two blessed years to her high school sweetheart, Debra was widowed in 2003. Happily, in 2008, a couple of friends played matchmaker and set her up on a blind date. Instantly hitting it off, they were married in 2010. They live in the country with her husband’s two high-school-age sons. Debra has two adult sons, a lovely daughter-in-law and a beautiful granddaughter—life is good! Her greatest awards are her family and spending time with them. You can reach Debra at P.O. Box 1125, Madisonville, TX 77864 or at debraclopton.com.

Her Unexpected Cowboy

Debra Clopton

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Put your heart right, Job. Reach out to God.… Then face the world again, firm and courageous. Then all your troubles will fade from your memory, like floods that are past and remembered no more.

—Job 11:13, 15–16

This book is dedicated to all those making a new, fresh start with their lives. May God bless you

and keep you as you make a change in your life.

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

Dear Reader

Questions for Discussion

Excerpt

Chapter One

Rowdy McDermott closed the door of his truck and scanned the ranch house that had seen better days. Carrying the casserole he’d been sent to deliver, he strode toward the rambling, low-slung residence. He’d always liked this old place and the big weathered barn behind it—liked the rustic appearance of the buildings that seemed cut from the hillside sloping down on one side before sweeping wide in a sunny meadow. There was peace here in this valley, and it radiated from it like the glow of the sun bouncing off the distant stream cutting a path across the meadow.

This beautiful three-hundred-acre valley was connected to his family’s ranch. Rowdy had hoped one day to make this place his own, but the owner wouldn’t sell. Not even when he’d moved to a retirement home several years ago and Rowdy had made him a good offer. He’d told Rowdy he had plans for the place after he died.

Four days ago his “plan” had arrived in the form of the owner’s niece, so Rowdy’s grandmother had informed him, at the same time she’d volunteered him to be her delivery boy.

He knocked on the green front door, whose paint was peeling with age. Getting no answer, he strode to the back of the house, taking in the overgrown bushes and landscaping as he went. Years of neglect were visible everywhere.

A black Dodge Ram sat in the drive with an enclosed trailer hitched to the back of it. He’d just stepped onto the back porch when a loud banging sound came from the barn, followed by a crash and a high-pitched scream.

Rowdy set the dish on the steps and raced across the yard. The double doors of the barn were open and he skidded through them. A tiny woman clung to the edge of the loft about fifteen feet from the ground.

“Help,” she cried, as she lost her grip—

Rushing forward, Rowdy swooped low. “Gotcha,” he grunted, catching her just in the nick of time. He managed to stay on his feet as his momentum forced him to plunge forward.

They would have been okay if there hadn’t been an obstacle course’s worth of stuff scattered on the barn floor.

Rowdy leaped over cans of paint and dodged a wheelbarrow only to trip over a pitchfork— They went flying and landed with a thud on a pile of musty hay.

The woman in his arms landed on top of him, strands of her silky, honey-colored hair splayed across her face.

Not bad. Not bad at all.

She blinked at him through huge protective goggles, her pale blue eyes wide as she swept the hair away. A piece of hay perched on top of her head like a crown.

“You saved me,” she gasped, breathing hard. “I can’t believe it. Thank you.”

“Anytime,” Rowdy said with a slow drawl, forcing a grin despite feeling as if he’d just lost a battle with a bronc. The fact that there was a female as cute as this one sitting on his chest numbed the pain substantially.

Those amazing blue eyes widened behind the goggles. “I’m sorry, what am I thinking sitting on you like this?” She scrambled off and knelt beside him. “Can you move? Let me help you up.” Without waiting for his reply, she grasped his arm, tugging on him. “That had to have hurt you.”

He sat up and rolled his shoulder. “Hitting the ground from the loft would have been a harder fall. What were you doing, anyway?”

Leaning back on her heels, she yanked off the goggles.

Whoa— Rowdy’s pulse kicked like a bull as he looked into her sparkling eyes.

“I was knocking a wall out with a sledgehammer. It was a splendid feeling—until the main beam gave way and I flew over the edge like a ninny.” A nice blush fanned across her cheeks. “Talk about feeling silly—that’ll sure do it. But I am so grateful you were here. For a short person like me, that was a long drop. And that you got to me so quick. How fast are you, anyway?”

She talked with the speed of light and Rowdy had a hard time keeping up. “Fast enough, but clearly not as fast as you talk.” He chuckled.

“Ha, it’s a curse! I do tend to rattle on when I’ve been saved from sure disaster.” She stood up—which wasn’t all that much farther from the ground.

Rowdy wasn’t real sure she was even five foot, and knew she wasn’t when he stood up and looked down at her. At only six feet himself, he towered over her by a good twelve inches...which would make hugging a little awkward, but hey, he could overcome.