Welcome Back to Cowboy Point!
When we last visited this tiny Montanan mountain community ten miles up from Marietta and around the back side of Copper Mountain, it was late spring going into summer.
And everyone knows that there are really only three seasons in Montana: Winter, July, and August.
The community really comes alive in the summertime, and because there’s so little of it, they like to make sure they get out into all the sunlight on offer. There are food trucks and craft stands, the weekly market that showcases farmed goods and artisan creations from all over the far-reaches of the hills above Paradise Valley. Summer is when the few restaurants in town stay open late and keep the patios packed with live music and extended hours to match the northern skies that stay bright long into the evenings.
One warm summer night, Wilder Carey runs into the much-younger Cat Lisle in the roughest bar down in Marietta and figures he’ll save her from herself and the bad decisions she seems determined to make.
This is not his usual MO.
Wilder’s more of a live and let live kind of a guy. He, for example, enjoys carousing at will, tied to nothing, as the older of the Carey twins and the only one who stayed in town. He doesn’t like commitments of any kind—he’s got all he needs in that arena with his family, and has always found that mornings-after give the wrong impression.
He’s not a man who gets involved.
There’s absolutely no reason, then, that he should involve himself with a woman who looks like she just wants to find a bit of trouble on a weekend night, like anyone else. Like him. In fact, he’s more likely to volunteer to be that trouble himself than to act like he’s suddenly come down with a case of chivalry and escort her out.
Not to mention, she’s a Lisle.
The Careys and the Lisles haven’t gotten along since they first crossed path up on Copper Mountain when folks who made the trek out this way still had mining aspirations. Legend has it that there was a high-stakes poker game and canny Ebenezer Lisle won the General Store—the only building around in those days—from crusty old Matthew Carey with a well-timed royal flush.
The Lisles claim it was down to good, old-fashioned luck.
The Careys know that the Lisles aren’t lucky—they like to cheat.
They’ve all been mad about it ever since.
When Wilder was in high school, he and his twin brother Ryder expressed their historic, inherited feelings about the old feud on the football field where Cat’s older brothers also played—and jockeyed for position. These days they all simply ignore each other when possible or, when forced, offer each other the sort of chilly greetings that make it clear they loathe each other in a very small town way.
The point is this: what Wilder should do is leave Cat Lisle alone.
But he doesn’t.
And that’s how the summer heats up in Cowboy Point, until ending an Old West feud is the least of Wilder’s problems.
Because Cat intends to love him forever, and what’s he supposed to do with that?
Especially when her grumpy, over-protective brothers—who already hate Wilder and always have—find out…
About the Author.
USA Today bestselling, multi-award-nominated, and critically-acclaimed author Megan Crane has written more than 145 books, and shows no sign of slowing down. She publishes romance as Megan Crane and M.M. Crane with an exciting backlist of women’s fiction, rom-coms, chick lit, and young adult novels. She’s also won a large and loyal fanbase as Caitlin Crews with Harlequin Presents, Harlequin Dare, Harlequin Historical, and contemporary cowboy books. And for paranormal fun, Megan partners with Nicole Helm to publish as Hazel Beck for her witchy rom-com novels.
Megan has a Masters and Ph.D. in English Literature, has taught creative writing classes in places like UCLA Extension’s prestigious Writers’ Program, and is always available to give workshops (or her opinion). She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her comic book artist husband, though, at any given time, she is likely to either be huddled in a coffee shop somewhere or off traveling the world. Preferably both.
