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“Hey Vin!” Carly called out. A picturesque blonde with wavy

hair down to her full ass, and brilliant green eyes, Carly was

definitely one of the reasons for the mostly male clientele at Mick’s.

She was also most assuredly off limits.

Mick reached across the bar to grip Vin’s hand firmly, his six

foot four inch muscular frame rippling with each movement. “Hey

man, good to see ya. How’s the groom holding up?”

“Anxiously waiting for me to tell him what the hell I have

planned,” Vin said, a smile spreading over his face. “Anyone else

here yet?”

“The Gillian brothers are in the back with Daniel and Bran. A

couple of others. Looks to be a good turnout.” Mick topped off a beer

and passed it to him. “Give that to D for me, and tell him his drinks

tonight are on me.”

“Will do. Thanks.” With a quick turn, Vin headed back to where

he’d left his brothers waiting with a blindfolded Drannon. “Hold your

hand out, D.”

“Seriously? Can we do away with this damn rag now?” Drannon

complained. “I know we’re at Mick’s. I can smell Carly’s pizza

sauce.”

Vin snagged the blue bandana from his brother’s eyes. “That was

Hawke’s idea. He seemed to think you wouldn’t know where we

were going even though this is the only party place within a thirty

minute drive of the ranch.”

“That’s what you’re supposed to do for the bachelor,” Hawke

protested. “Hell, it’s not like I’ve thrown a lot of these parties.”

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Drannon took a deep drink of his beer, and then smiled. “So

what’s the plan?”

“Poker. All night long,” Vin announced. The relief on his face

was comical and was quickly followed by anticipation.

“Let’s get this party started!” Roman said, clamping his hand

down on Drannon’s shoulder and directing him through the doorway

next to the bar.

While the main part of the bar was fairly generic, the private

room was quite plush. Vin knew that Carly had done a renovation on

it recently, and he made a mental note to tell her he approved. Four

dark wood tables were set up with eight chairs each around them, and

removable poker tops had been prepared with cards and chips

already. Alongside one wall was a scaled down bar and four bar

stools with two large screen televisions hanging behind it. On the

opposite wall sat the largest couch he’d ever seen. Anyone sitting on

it would have an unobstructed view of the televisions while the poker

tournament was going on.

“Wow. This place looks awesome,” Drannon commented as the

other men in the room called out greetings.

“Carly did a bang-up job, didn’t she?” Luke Gillian was the first

to reach them. He rose from his seat and gave Drannon a quick hug.

“Good to see you, D.”

“You too, Luke. It’s been a while.”

Luke nodded, “Not my fault you never leave the ranch these

days.”

Drannon laughed. “Tell the truth, if you had a woman who

looked like Lacy at home, would you leave the house more than you

had to?”

“Hell, no,” Luke agreed. “I’d be living in blissful poverty

because I’d barely have the energy to go to work in the mornings.”

Luke’s younger brother, Mark, was next, followed by a dozen

others. In all, there were nearly thirty guys in attendance when the

poker games started. Vin observed instead of joining the game

because he wanted to make sure everything went off without a hitch.

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Claiming His Cowgirl

If he did nothing else right, he wanted to make sure Drannon got a

good send off before he tied the knot.

“You’re not playing tonight, Vinnie?” Abby Bricker carried

another bucket of ice and a handful of napkins into the room. He

bristled at her use of the intimate nickname. Abby wasn’t his favorite

person, but he couldn’t tell Mick and Carly who to hire, so he tried

hard to hold back his contempt.

“Nope, I’m the event planner and designated driver,” Vin said

pointedly, turning back to the game in front of him. Abby didn’t take

the hint because she moved closer to him, brushing her full curves

against his arm.

“You could join me when I go on break in ten minutes,” she

offered, batting her eyes up at him, “Even the DD deserves a break.”

“Thanks anyway, I’m here for Drannon, so I can’t be

disappearing.”

“We wouldn’t have to go far…” she continued seductively.

With an irritated sigh, he spun around to face her. The quick

motion threw her off balance and she stepped back into the bar top

behind her with a startled cry.

“Abby, I’m only going to say this once. I’m not interested. I

know what you did to Roman and Franki. I was at the fair on the

fourth of July and saw the whole thing. Don’t think you can weasel

up to me and gain my favor.”

Her face flushed pink and her eyes narrowed. “Fine, whatever.

It’s not like you were my first choice, either. God, I’ve stooped low if

I’m willing to fuck a felon.”

She stormed away, leaving him staring after her, mouth hanging

open. It wasn’t the first time someone had been turned off by his

status as a former felon, but her quick about-face had surprised him.

“Don’t pay any attention to her,” Daniel Kroft said, reaching

over him to pick up a napkin and a fresh beer. “She’s been a bitch

since the day she was born. I still can’t believe your brother let her

sink her hooks into him.”

Daniel was the ranch foreman, and Vin considered him a

member of the family. He’d been born at the ranch, unlike its owners,

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so he had as much stake in its success as anyone. The years hadn’t

been nice to the average-looking man, but he made up for it with his

kind heart.

“Roman wasn’t all that smart before Franki came along,” Vin

agreed.

“I heard that,” Roman called out, flipping him off.

“It’s the damn truth,” Bran agreed from his spot next to Roman.

“You’re the only person I had to put in the drunk tank two nights in a

row. How stupid is that?”

“Depends on how you look at it,” Roman said, taking a sip of his

soda. “It was two nights I didn’t have to spend money on gas driving

back and forth to the ranch, and I was investing in the community by

spending all my cash at Mick’s each night.”

Groans filled the room at Roman’s strange sense of reasoning.

Vin had to admit, he liked seeing the choices Roman was making

these days, and it truly was because of Franki. He’d found her in

town quite by accident one day after an all-night drinking binge.

When she admitted she was in Montford searching for her younger

sister who’d been kidnapped, he offered his help.

Within days the entire Crawley Creek bunch was in on the life-

threatening situation. Franki’s sister, Vivienne, had been taken by a

prostitution outfit. They were holding her hostage and whoring her

out to their clients.

Sadly, they hadn’t been able to save Vivi, but in the process,

they’d found Destiny and taken her in. Vin’s heart still ached for

Franki because he knew she was still grieving for her sister, but all in

all, things were getting back to normal at the ranch. If you called a

quick wedding, a new doctor in residence, preparing for foster

children, and scheduling treatment sessions for the vets who were

going to be coming to live at the ranch—normal.

Crawley Creek Ranch was once again bustling, and it was a

damn good thing. No longer were they a house full of bachelors

sitting around on the weekends drinking and playing video games.

Soon there would be more work than there were hours in the day, and

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Claiming His Cowgirl

that was just fine by him. Busy days kept him from wondering what

if and dreaming of what might have been.

His future hinged not just on his own choices, but on those of his

foster siblings. If they up and decided they no longer wanted to be in

the ranching business, he’d be forced to find a new path, and that

scared the hell out of him. Seeing Drannon and Roman both settling

in with monogamous relationships assured him that he’d always have

a place at Crawley Creek. Even if it was as a lonely bachelor.

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36

August 4 - Wedding Countdown T-minus 4 days

Lauren’s ears were still popping twenty minutes after her plane

landed in North Dakota, and she once again second-guessed her

decision to come back to Montford. It wasn’t the fact that she had

very few good childhood memories. Nor was it the fact that there

were thousands of people impacted by the recent severe weather

outbreak even though her employees were handling it all without her.

No, it had more to do with the fact that she was going to come face-

to-face with Vincent Rhone again after he ripped her heart out and

stomped on it in his eighteen-year-old arrogance.

It had been eighteen years, but the memory still hurt like hell.

She’d loved him more than any man before and more than any man

since. She was ashamed to admit that he’d ruined her for other guys.

It wasn’t like she’d been a nun. She’d dated regularly her whole adult

life, and even taken a swing at a serious relationship, but Darren

called it quits when it was obvious her whole heart wasn’t in it.

Amazingly, she was less bummed about seeing him walk away than

she was about him carting off his big screen TV when he left.

A wolf whistle grabbed her attention, and she spun away from

the baggage claim to look for the noisy son of a bitch. Hawke was

grinning ear-to-ear as he barreled through the crowded airport to

reach her. He looked damn good all grown up, with his muscular

frame encased in a skin-tight black t-shirt and well-worn blue jeans.

It wasn’t just the country cowboy apparel that drew attention to him

though. The skinny boy with an overbite had grown past his braces

and into his looks. Now he looked like some sort of GQ model on

Lori King

vacation with his long, blond hair tied back in a messy man-bun at

the base of his neck, and a pair of leather cowboy boots on his feet.

“Damn, girl! You look fine!” Hawke growled as he lifted her in

the air and swung her around, kissing her enthusiastically.

Laughing, she leaned against him while she got her balance

back. “It’s good to see you, too, asshole.”

“Where’s your bag?” He took in every detail of her full frame.

After a slight twinge of self-consciousness, she struck a pose making

his grin widen. “Cheeky.”

“Hasn’t come through yet, but it should momentarily. How was

the drive?”

He shrugged. “Boring as ever. I swear one of these days

someone will get smart and put up some sort of Billboard Bingo

alongside the highway. You know, something to keep the mind

occupied and distracted from the boring North Dakota scenery.”

“Distracted isn’t usually a term people like associated with

drivers,” She teased. “But I’m sure it’ll be the next big thing.”

After a brief argument—which she won—over who was going to

carry her shoulder bag, they headed off to the parking lot with the

rest of her luggage. Hawke laced his fingers through hers

affectionately. “So how long are you staying?”

“I booked a flight back for Monday,” she responded

noncommittally. He didn’t really need to know that she had three full

weeks off from her job because she had no plans to stay at Crawley

Creek for that long.

“Really? That soon? I thought maybe we could hang out after all

this wedding nonsense was over.” He sighed heavily. “I swear if

getting married means dealing with all this planning bullshit, I will

never get married. Period.”

“So Drannon’s pretty head-over-heels for this Lacy girl, huh? I

never thought I’d see the day when he’d say ‘I do’ again.”

“Wait until you see them together. There’s no comparison

between what he and Lacy have versus what he had with Amanda.”

“I’m glad. He deserves some happiness.”

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“Don’t we all?” Hawke mused, eyeing her. “I mean all of us had

shitty childhoods, so we should be making out like bandits as adults,

right?”

Laughing, she shook her head. “I wish it worked that way. I

don’t remember a time when I didn’t have to work to survive.”

They reached Hawke’s truck, and he loaded her stuff and helped

her into the passenger seat. Once they were on the road, she grew