One Hot Cowboy Read Online Free PDF Page B

hi-how-are-ya exchange.
    No, the residents of Lonesome knew who
    your parents were, where you’d been born.
    From first word and first tooth right on up
    to and including first date and firstborn,
    Lonesome didn’t keep secrets. Didn’t need
    to. Lonesome’s families were born here,
    died here, and pretty much did all their
    living either on the surrounding ranches or
    on Lonesome’s handful of streets.
    Which didn’t leave a whole lot of room
    for a girl like her. An outsider.
    The label the town’s gossips had put on
    her was trouble .
    That label wasn’t wrong.
    She’d come out to Lonesome as part of a
    program to get kids out of inner-city Los
    Angeles and away from the tough
    neighborhoods where they’d grown up.
    Her foster parents had shoveled her onto
    the bus that promised to drive her five
    hundred miles north, away from city
    conveniences—and city noise, pollution,
    heat, and general gang-banging violence—
    to Northern California and ranch country.
    Matter of fact, she hadn’t wanted to leave
    Los Angeles. Why would she? But she’d
    gotten onto the bus because a ten-year-old
    girl didn’t have too many choices, and she
    was smart enough to realize, even then, that
    there were worse destinies than a summer
    spent in Lonesome.
    Some of the kids riding the bus couldn’t
    wait for the doors to open up and spit them
    out into rural nowhere. Those kids talked
    about horseback riding and swimming and
    county fairs, but those were just words as
    far as she was concerned. She knew all
    about words. Those other kids, the ones
    who’d been there before and were going
    back for seconds or thirds, acted like
    they’d found themselves some new
    families out there in the sticks. Whatever
    family she’d been born with hadn’t
    bothered to stick around for her. She’d
    wound up in the foster-care system
    because that was what Los Angeles County
    did with kids who couldn’t produce a
    parent. A borrowed roof still beat sleeping
    in the streets or the back of a car.
    Lonesome wasn’t going to give her a new
    family. She knew that.
    But when she’d gotten off that bus, she’d
    met Auntie Dee. By the end of the summer,
    she’d known she wasn’t ever getting back
    onto the bus. She’d stayed. The good
    residents of Lonesome might not have been
    sure about her, but Auntie Dee had been.
    She’d had eight good years with Auntie
    Dee before she’d finally packed her bags
    and left. This time, for college and a
    degree in architecture. She hadn’t been
    back
    much—and that was intentional,
    because she’d been avoiding Cabe
    Dawson even though he, of course, had no
    clue how she felt—but she’d convinced
    Auntie Dee to make the bus ride down to
    LA, and she’d shown her the city. She
    should have come back. She shouldn’t
    have let Cabe’s rejection hurt her so badly.
    Of course, truth was, Cabe probably
    would have looked her square in the eye,
    given her a happy meet-and-greet, and
    offered her a cold longneck. She was a
    friend of his brothers, and Cabe Dawson
    valued his family. It was just one of the
    many fine qualities he had. He thought her
    attempt to kiss him was just a game, just
    another attempt to push his buttons hard.
    All of which made her want to plant her
    brand-new cowboy boot in the middle of
    his equally fine ass and shove.
    Cabe had welcomed her to Lonesome,
    invited her to hang out with his brothers.
    Hell, she’d been one of the boys. Sort of.
    She’d
    spent
    summer
    after
    summer
    following the Dawson brothers around
    from one piece of mischief to the next,
    Cabe dogging their heels disapprovingly
    the whole time. He’d never looked at her
    and seen a girl. Or a potential girlfriend.
    And by the time they’d been halfway
    through high school, she’d wanted him to
    look at her. She’d made just one move.
    Once. One attempt to kiss Cabe Dawson
    and make him see her as someone more
    than his brothers’ friend.
    He’d been standing by that truck of his
    that day, looking