Hold Me, Cowboy: A Stranded with the Rancher Christmas Romance

One

Creative photography, Madison West muttered as she entered the security code on the box that contained the key to the cabin she would be staying in for the weekend.

She looked across the snowy landscape to see another home situated far too close to the place she would be inhabiting for the next couple of days. The photographs on the vacation-rental website hadn’t mentioned that she would be sharing the property with anyone else.

And obviously, the example pictures had been taken from inventive angles.

It didn’t matter. Nothing was going to change her plans. She just hoped the neighbors had earplugs. Because she was having sex this weekend. Nonstop sex.

Ten years celibate, and it was ending tonight. She had finally found the one. Not the one she was going to marry, obviously. Please. Love was for other people. People who hadn’t been tricked, manipulated and humiliated when they were seventeen.

No, she had no interest in love and marriage. But she had abundant interest in orgasms. So much interest. And she had found the perfect man to deliver them.

All day, all night, for the next forty-eight hours.

She was armed with a suitcase full of lingerie and four bottles of wine. Neighbors be damned. She’d been hoping for a little more seclusion, but this was fine. It would be fine.

She unlocked the door and stepped inside, breathing a sigh of relief when she saw that the interior, at least, met with her expectations. But it was a little bit smaller than it had looked online, and she could only hope that wasn’t some sort of dark portent for the rest of her evening.

She shook her head; she was not going to introduce that concern into the mix, thank you very much. There was enough to worry about when you were thinking about breaking ten years of celibacy without adding such concerns.

Christopher was going to arrive soon, so she figured she’d better get upstairs and start setting a scene. She made her way to the bedroom, then opened her suitcase and took out the preselected bit of lace she had chosen for their first time. It was red, which looked very good on her, if a bit obvious. But she was aiming for obvious.

Christopher wasn’t her boyfriend. And he wasn’t going to be. He was a very nice equine-vitamin-supplement salesman she’d met a few weeks ago when he’d come by the West estate. She had bought some products for her horses, and they’d struck up a conversation, which had transitioned into a flirtation.

Typically, when things began to transition into flirtation, Maddy put a stop to them. But she hadn’t with him. Maybe because he was special. Maybe because ten years was just way too long. Either way, she had kept on flirting with him.

They’d gone out for drinks, and she’d allowed him to kiss her. Which had been a lot more than she’d allowed any other guy in recent years. It had reminded her how much she’d enjoyed that sort of thing once upon a time. And once she’d been reminded...well.

He’d asked for another date. She’d stopped him. Because wouldn’t a no-strings physical encounter be way better?

He’d of course agreed. Because he was a man.

But she hadn’t wanted to get involved with anyone in town. She didn’t need anyone seeing her at a hotel or his house or with his car parked at her little home on her parents’ property.

Thus, the cabin-weekend idea had been born.

She shimmied out of her clothes and wiggled into the skintight lace dress that barely covered her backside. Then she set to work fluffing her blond hair and applying some lipstick that matched the lingerie.

She was not answering the door in this outfit, however.

She put her long coat back on over the lingerie, then gave her reflection a critical look. It had been a long time since she had dressed to attract a man. Usually, she was more interested in keeping them at a distance.

Not tonight, she said. "Not tonight."

She padded downstairs, peering out the window and seeing nothing beyond the truck parked at the small house across the way and a vast stretch of snow, falling harder and faster.

Typically, it didn’t snow in Copper Ridge, Oregon. You had to drive up to the mountains—as she’d done today—to get any of the white stuff. So, for her, this was a treat, albeit a chilly one. But that was perfect, since she planned to get her blood all heated and stuff.

She hummed, keeping an eye on the scene outside, waiting for Christopher to pull in. She wondered if she should have brought a condom downstairs with her. Decided that she should have.

She went back upstairs, taking them two at a time, grateful that she was by herself, since there was nothing sexy about her ascent. Then she rifled through her bag, found some protection and curled her fingers around it before heading back down the stairs as quickly as possible.

As soon as she entered the living area, the lights flickered, then died. Suddenly, everything in the house seemed unnaturally quiet, and even though it was probably her imagination, she felt the temperature drop several degrees.

Are you kidding me? she asked, into the darkness.

There was no answer. Nothing but a subtle creak from the house. Maybe it was all that heavy snow on the roof. Maybe it was going to collapse. That would figure.

A punishment for her thinking she could be normal and have sex.

A shiver worked its way down her spine, and she jolted.

Suddenly, she had gone from hopeful and buoyant to feeling a bit flat and tragic. That was definitely not the best sign.

No. She wasn’t doing this. She wasn’t sinking into self-pity and tragedy. Been there, done that for ten years, thank you.

Madison didn’t believe in signs. So there. She believed in fuses blowing in bad weather when overtaxed heaters had to work too hard in ancient houses. Yes, that she believed in. She also believed that she would have to wait for Christopher to arrive to fix the problem.

She sighed and then made her way over to the kitchen counter and grabbed hold of her purse as she deposited the two condoms on the counter. She pulled her phone out and grimaced when she saw that she had no signal.

Too late, she remembered that she had thought the lack of cell service might be an attraction to a place like this. That it would be nice if both she and Christopher could be cut off from the outside world while they indulged themselves.

That notion seemed really freaking stupid right now. Since she couldn’t use the phone in the house thanks to the outage, and that left her cut off from the outside world all alone.

Oh no, she said, I’m the first five minutes of a crime show. I’m going to get ax-murdered. And I’m going to die a born-again virgin.

She scowled, looking back out at the resolutely blank landscape. Christopher still wasn’t here. But it looked like the house across the way had power.

She pressed her lips together, not happy about the idea of interrupting her neighbor. Or of meeting her neighbor, since the whole point of going out of town was so they could remain anonymous and not see people.

She tightened the belt on her coat and made her way slowly out the front door, bracing herself against the arctic wind.

She muttered darkly about the cold as she made her way across the space between the houses. She paused for a moment in front of the larger cabin, lit up and looking all warm and toasty. Clearly, this was the premium accommodation. While hers was likely beset by rodents that had chewed through relevant cords.

She huffed, clutching her coat tightly as she knocked on the door. She waited, bouncing in place to try to keep her blood flowing. She just needed to call Christopher and find out when he would be arriving and, if he was still a ways out, possibly beg her neighbor for help getting the power going. Or at least help getting a fire started.

The front door swung open and Madison’s heart stopped. The man standing there was large, so tall that she only just came up to the middle of his chest. He was broad, his shoulders well muscled, his waist trim. He had the kind of body that came not from working out but from hard physical labor.

Then she looked up. Straight nose, square jaw, short brown hair and dark eyes that were even harder than his muscles. And far too familiar.

"What are you doing here?"

* * *

Sam McCormack gritted his teeth against the sharp tug of irritation that assaulted him when Madison West asked the question that had been on his own lips.

I rented the place, he responded, not inviting her in. Though I could ask you the same question.

She continued to do a little bounce in place, her arms folded tight against her body, her hands clasped beneath her chin. And you’d get the same answer, she said. I’m across the driveway.

Then you’re at the wrong door. He made a move to shut said door, and she reached out, stopping him.

Sam. Do you always have to be this unpleasant?

It was a question that had been asked of him more than once. And he gave his standard answer. Yes.

Sam, she said, sounding exasperated. The power went out, and I’m freezing to death. Can I come in?

He let out a long-suffering sigh and stepped to the side. He didn’t like Madison West. He never had. Not from the moment he had been hired on as a farrier for the West estate eight years earlier. In all the years since he’d first met Madison, since he’d first started shoeing her horses, he’d never received one polite word from her.

But then, he’d never given one either.

She was sleek, blonde and freezing cold—and he didn’t mean because she had just come in from the storm. The woman carried her own little snow cloud right above her head at all times, and he wasn’t a fan of ice princesses. Still, something about her had always been like a burr beneath his skin that he couldn’t get at.

Thank you, she said crisply, stepping over the threshold.

You’re rich and pretty, he said, shutting the door tight behind her. And I’m poor. And kind of an ass. It wouldn’t do for me to let you die out there in a snowdrift. I would probably end up getting hung.

Madison sniffed, making a show of brushing snowflakes from the shoulders of her jacket. I highly doubt you’re poor, she said drily.

She wasn’t wrong. A lot had changed since he’d gone to work for the Wests eight years ago. Hell, a lot had changed in the past year.

The strangest thing was that his art had taken off, and along with it the metalwork and blacksmithing business he ran with his brother, Chase.

But now he was busier coming up with actual fine-art pieces than he was doing daily grunt work. One sale on a piece like that could set them up for the entire quarter. Strange, and not where he’d seen his life going, but true.

He still had trouble defining himself as an artist. In his mind, he was just a blacksmith cowboy. Most at home on the family ranch, most proficient at pounding metal into another shape. It just so happened that for some reason people wanted to spend a lot of money on that metal.

Well, he said, perception is everything.

She looked up at him, those blue eyes hitting him hard, like a punch in the gut. That was the other obnoxious thing about Madison West. She was pretty. She was more than pretty. She was the kind of pretty that kept a man up all night, hard and aching, with fantasies about her swirling in his head.

She was also the kind of woman who would probably leave icicles on a man’s member after a blow job.

No, thank you.

Sure, she said, waving her hand. "Now, I perceive that I need to use your phone."

There’s no cell service up here.

Landline, she said. I have no power. And no cell service. The source of all my problems.

In that case, be my guest, he responded, turning away from her and walking toward the kitchen, where the lone phone was plugged in.

He picked up the receiver and held it out to her. She eyed it for a moment as though it were a live snake, then snatched it out of his hand. Are you just going to stand there?

He shrugged, crossing his arms and leaning against the door frame. I thought I might.

She scoffed, then dialed the number, doing the same impatient hop she’d been doing outside while she waited for the person on the other end to answer. Christopher?

The physical response Sam felt to her uttering another man’s name was not something he ever could have anticipated. His stomach tightened, dropped, and a lick of flame that felt a hell of a lot like jealousy sparked inside him.

What do you mean you can’t get up here? She looked away from him, determinedly so, her eyes fixed on the kitchen floor. The road is closed. Okay. So that means I can’t get back down either? There was a pause. Right. Well, hopefully I don’t freeze to death. Another pause. No, you don’t need to call anybody. I’m not going to freeze to death. I’m using the neighbor’s phone. Just forget it. I don’t have cell service. I’ll call you if the power comes back on in my cabin.

She hung up then, her expression so sharp it could have cut him clean through.

I take it you had plans.

She looked at him, her eyes as frosty as the weather outside. Did you figure that out all by yourself?

Only just barely. You know blacksmiths aren’t known for their deductive reasoning skills. Mostly we’re famous for hitting heavy things with other heavy things.

Kind of like cavemen and rocks.

He took a step toward her. Kind of.

She shrank back, a hint of color bleeding into her cheeks. Well, now that we’ve established that there’s basically no difference between you and a Neanderthal, I better get back to my dark, empty cabin. And hope that you aren’t a secret serial killer.

Her sharp tongue left cuts behind, and he had to admit he kind of enjoyed it. There weren’t very many people who sparred with him like this. Possibly because he didn’t talk to very many people. Is that a legitimate concern you have?

I don’t know. The entire situation is just crazy enough that I might be trapped in a horror movie with a tortured artist blacksmith who is also secretly murdery.

I guarantee you I’m not murdery. If you see me outside with an ax, it will only be because I’m cutting firewood.

She cocked her head to the side, a glint in her blue eyes that didn’t look like ice making his stomach—and everything south of there—tighten. Well, that’s a relief. Anyway. I’m going. Dark cabin, no one waiting for me. It promises to be a seriously good time.

You don’t have any idea why the power is out, or how to fix it? he asked.

No, she said, sounding exasperated, and about thirty seconds away from stamping her foot.

Well, damn his conscience, but he wasn’t letting her go back to an empty, dark, cold cabin. No matter that she had always treated him like a bit of muck she’d stepped in with her handmade riding boots.

Let me have a look at your fuse box, he said.

You sound like you’d rather die, she said.

"I pretty much would, but I’m not going to let you die either." He reached for his black jacket and the matching black cowboy hat hanging on a hook. He put both