He had to call her again. Stop by her office. Something.

  Travis’s wedding was in ten days. Could he ask Rosalie to go with him? Maybe he could offer to pay her, or pay for her dress, or something.

  Nope, he told himself. You’re not paying a woman to go out with you. Either she’d say yes or she wouldn’t.

  But not if you don’t ask.

  “…so I told Simon to leave her alone,” Ford said.

  “Wait,” Lee said, coming back to the conversation at hand. He really couldn’t let his mind wander in situations like this. “Simon Alvarez?”

  “Yes.”

  Lee glared at Ford and then Miss Bair. “I thought Simon and Ford weren’t going to be allowed to be together.”

  “It was lunch recess, Dad.”

  “I don’t care,” Lee barked. “You’re not supposed to be near him.”

  “He was teasing Lily,” Ford said, his eyes welling with tears. “He had her up against the kindergarten fence, and I helped her.”

  Lee opened his mouth, but nothing came out. He looked at Martha, and she stroked Ford’s hair off his forehead. “But you hit someone, baby. That’s not how you solve problems.”

  “Your mother’s right,” Lee said, swallowing afterward.

  “But it got Simon to leave Lily alone,” Ford said, looking from him to Martha and back. “And then I was able to help Lily to the office. She was having a panic attack.”

  “Whoa,” Lee said. “What?” He looked at Miss Bair, who wore a look of sympathy on her face. “Is she okay?”

  “She’s asthmatic,” Miss Bair said, giving Ford a maternal smile too. She wasn’t mad at him, Lee realized, though she certainly couldn’t condone him hitting another student. “Once the nurse got her inhaler, she calmed right down.”

  Lee nodded, suddenly so tense. “So now what?”

  Miss Bair leaned forward and put her fingertips on Ford’s knee. “What did we decide, Ford?”

  “That I won’t hit people,” he muttered. “Whether it’s to help someone or not.”

  “That’s right,” she said. “Instead?”

  “Instead, I try to get Lily away from Simon, or I start yelling for help from the sixth grade aides or the recess monitors.” He hung his head, as if this option was the worst thing imaginable.

  “Simon won’t have lunch recess for three school days,” Miss Bair said, pulling her hand back. “Unfortunately, I have to do the same to Ford.”

  “No suspension?” Martha asked.

  Miss Bair shook her head. “I can’t do that,” she said, and while she couldn’t say more, Lee heard it all. She actually agreed with Ford, and she’d do what she could to protect him. She looked from Martha to Lee. “Any questions?”

  “No, ma’am,” Ford and Lee said together, and they looked at one another and laughed.

  “I think that covers it,” Martha said, and the three of them stood. Lee took his son’s hand in his as they left the classroom, but he waited until he was all the way outside before he crouched down in front of his eight-year-old.

  “I don’t think you should hit people, bud,” he said. “But I’m so, so proud of you for standing up for Lily.” He grinned at Ford and nodded once. “Okay?”

  Ford nodded and reached out to touch Lee’s cowboy hat. “I don’t want to tattle to the recess monitors.”

  “Just stay away from Simon.”

  “But what if he’s hurting someone?”

  “Ford,” Martha said, kneeling down in front of him too. “You’ll get suspended next time, I promise. You can’t hit other children.”

  He nodded again, his chin so low.

  “Hey,” Lee said. “Chin up, son. Look at me.”

  Ford did, and he seemed so lost and looking for Lee to guide him. “Do you want the other kids to think of you as a bully?”

  “No.”

  “You can’t hit other kids, not even if you’re standing up for someone.” He smiled and tapped Ford’s nose. “Plus, if you get suspended, I’ll work you like a dog on the farm. Is that what you want?”

  Ford grinned too. “Can Queenie come with me?”

  Lee laughed, realizing that his “punishment” for his son getting suspended wasn’t a punishment at all. He exchanged a glance with Martha.

  “Come on, Ford,” she said. “Give your daddy a hug. We have to get going.”

  Ford wrapped his skinny arms around Lee, and he held his son just as tightly. He whispered, “I love you, son. You be good for your momma, and you obey your teacher.”

  “Yes, sir,” Ford said.

  Lee stood and watched Ford link his hand in Martha’s. She met Lee’s eyes, and so much was said between them. Then they went to their car, and Lee went to his truck.

  He drove back to the farm alone. He made dinner for himself, and he ate it alone. He hated being alone, and he wanted to do everything in his power to change his single status.

  He got out his phone and let his thumb hover over the icon for the dating app he’d once used. He couldn’t tap on it; he just couldn’t.

  He only wanted to go out with one woman, and she was Rosalie Reynolds.

  Therefore, the following afternoon, Lee went through a similar routine as the previous night.

  He changed his shirt. He washed his hands. He loaded himself into his truck. He drove to town.

  Everything blurred around him, because when Lee focused on something, it was all he could see. All he could think about. All he could taste. And right now, that was a certain curly-haired brunette with gorgeous eyes. She’d rendered him mute once, and he was determined not to let that happen today.

  He swallowed as he flipped on his blinker, scanning for the Curious Kids office. A small sign sat on the roof announcing the location of his destination, and he dang near stomped on the accelerator to get away.

  “No,” he coached himself. “You’ve come all this way. You’re just going to go in there and tell her how stunningly beautiful she is, and then you’re going to ask her to your brother’s wedding.”

  The pit in Lee’s stomach roared at him, but when there was a break in traffic, he made the turn into the parking lot.

  No one sat in front of Curious Kids, and Lee took the spot directly outside the door. He killed the engine. He got out of the truck.

  It was almost like his mind was moving through a checklist. Do this. Do this. Do that.

  Go inside, check.

  Find Rosalie, check.

  She stood from the smaller of two desks, off to his left. With a smile on her face, she said, “Lee Cooper,” in that melodic voice he couldn’t get out of his ears.

  Ask her to the wedding.

  Wait.

  Tell her how gorgeous she is.

  No.

  Say you can’t stop thinking about her.

  Creepy.

  Do something.

  Lee couldn’t do anything. He felt like he’d entered the presence of an angel, and he stood there, frozen and mute.

  Sneak Peek! Surly Cowboy Chapter Two:

  Rosalie Reynolds had never been happier for her self-imposed dress code when she came to the office. She currently wore a pencil skirt that fell just below her knees, and she felt every inch of herself as Lee Cooper’s gaze moved from her low heels and up along her skirt to the bright candy apple red blouse she’d chosen this morning.

  She wasn’t sure why she’d gone with red. Maybe she thought it accentuated her lips, which always seemed a bit too pale pink to her. Or maybe she’d been told a time or two—or twenty—that red complimented her darker skin tone and hair. She wasn’t sure.

  What she knew was that her phone blared at her again, the sound of an airhorn she hated but had also set. It was her sister, Natasha, and Rosalie’s heart bobbed in her throat. She’d been texting her sister about perhaps joining a dating app now that James had made the move to California and he was good and truly gone from her life.

  The face of her sweet daughter flashed through her mind. James would never be good and truly gone, but Rosalie also wasn’t dealing with him on a daily basis anymore. Part of her languished in indescribable sadness, and the other part kept urging her to move forward with her own life.

  Maybe with Lee Cooper, she thought, her face burning as the cowboy’s eyes finally latched onto hers. His were just as foresty as she remembered, and she itched to see some of that deep, red-gold-brown hair.

  “Can I help you?” she asked as professionally as possible. After all, he’d shown up—unannounced—at her office. The last time she’d seen a Cooper, it had been his brother, William. He’d been the one to bring the faulty game back and make the trade. “Is everything okay with your new disk?”

  Rosalie cocked her head as her phone yelled at her again. She honestly didn’t have time for Handsome’s staring. Her heart told her not to send him away, but she wasn’t sure what else to say. Natasha’s notification went off again, and Rosalie swiped her phone from the edge of her desk. She tapped out a quick, With a customer. I’ll text you right back, and looked back to the gorgeous, if not a little…strange cowboy.

  Strange wasn’t the right word. It almost looked like he’d fallen into a trance.

  “Lee,” she said, really snapping out his name.

  He blinked a couple of times and looked around the office, as if he’d driven here while asleep and just now realized where he was.

  “Are you okay?” Rosalie took a step toward him, but when those delicious eyes came back to her, she paused. “I was just about to leave, so is there something I can do for you?”

  He cleared his throat, and praise the heavens, she was going to get to hear that low, growly voice of his again. “Yeah, I was just thinking about something.”

  “Okay,” she said.

  He folded his arms, something shuttering over his face. “Ford doesn’t really like the game I bought.”

  Rosalie blinked now, his statement a complete surprise to her. “Oh,” she said, her brain whirring quickly. She wanted satisfied customers, but her return policy didn’t include “didn’t like it.”

  “Well,” she said smoothly, her policies flying into place. “You’re outside of the thirty-day, no-questions-asked refund period. So…I’m sorry.”

  “You’re sorry?”

  Rosalie squared her shoulders against this surly cowboy. “Yes,” she said. “I can’t just refund everyone’s money because they don’t like something.”

  “He hardly plays the game.”

  “I’m sorry about that,” she said, breaking her eye contact with him and returning to stand behind her desk. She looked down at the papers there, but her concentration had broken completely. Handsome had a way of making her feel like the only woman in the world, and Rosalie hadn’t felt like that in a long, long time.

  She dared to look at him again, the frown between his eyes making him even sexier. She wondered what it would be like to kiss him when he wore such an unhappy look, and she could imagine a fight ensuing between the two of them for the control of that kiss.

  She shook her head and muttered, “Keep it together, Rose,” as the image of Lee pressing her against the very wall behind her and kissing her senseless continued to play through her mind.

  “What?” Lee asked.

  “Nothing.” She looked up at him again, her phone blaring out at her again.

  “What is that awful noise?” he asked. “It’s happened like five times.”

  Rosalie could handle her company being insulted. Fine. Not everyone liked her games. She understood that from a consumer standpoint. She could even handle a critique of her personally, though she worked hard to keep her imperfections concealed behind the closed doors of her house.

  But no one, not even Handsome, would criticize Natasha.

  She took one step toward him, feeling every cell in her body light up with fire. The angry kind. “That is my notification for my sister,” she said, hearing the danger in her own voice. “She has some special needs, and I need to be able to hear my phone whenever she texts.” She had a similar notification sound attached to her daughter’s babysitter, as well as her neighbor, both of whom helped Rosalie with Autumn now that James was gone.

  “So if you don’t need anything, Mister Cooper, I really have more important things to do than stand here and be insulted by you.” She’d taken several more steps toward him, and he hadn’t backed up an inch.

  The man was muscle from head to toe, and she’d seen him soften before. She really wanted him to back down now too, because then she’d feel powerful and strong. At the same time, her eyes dropped to his mouth, and wow. That was what power and strength looked like.

  She yanked her eyes back to his, and even through the lenses on his glasses, they fired at her. “Or stared at,” she added.

  “I wasn’t staring,” he said.

  “You’ve been here for at least five minutes,” Rosalie said, lifting her chin. “And have said twenty words.”

  “You know what?” Lee asked, but he didn’t finish his challenge. He simply growled—yes, growled—and spun around. He stalked the three steps to the door and went out onto the sidewalk. As the glass door swung closed behind him, Rosalie’s heartbeat shook through her veins.

  He yelled something as he got in his truck and slammed the door. Rosalie stayed very still, wondering why she wanted him to come back inside. He reminded her of a feral cat—skittish, unsure, but oh-so-wounded. She wanted to help all the strays in her neighborhood, and she couldn’t help wondering if Lee had strayed into this part of Sweet Water Falls specifically so she could see him.

  She sure had been thinking about him a lot. She’d almost called him after he’d gotten the second disk to make sure it worked. At the very least, she’d wanted to make sure he’d gotten it from his brother. Deep down, Rosalie knew both of those were covers simply to interact with Handsome again.

  Lee didn’t pull out, and Rosalie turned away from the door. Her legs shook as she returned to her desk. She still had some work to do, but it would be there waiting for her tomorrow. It always was.

  She bent to get her purse from the bottom drawer, and she dialed Natasha while her eyes darted back to the front windows. Handsome’s old, rusted truck still sat outside, and Rosalie wasn’t sure she wanted to leave all of a sudden.

  “Rosie,” Natasha said in her thick tongue. “You’re working?”

  “Yes,” Rosalie said. “Always working.” She wiped her hand through her hair, but her fingers always caught in her curls. She wasn’t one of those women with the perfectly straight hair that shone like sunlight off snowfall. She’d been trying to grow out her curls, but they never made it much further than her shoulders.

  “Mom says I can come visit this weekend,” Natasha said, and that made Rosalie smile. “She said I have to ask you first.”

  “This weekend is great,” Rosalie said, already feeling tired. But just like she couldn’t say no to Autumn, she wouldn’t deny her autistic sister her first trip to the beach. At least this year. “Maybe you could come stay with me this summer.”

  Rosalie had an extra bedroom, and Autumn loved Nat. James was gone, and why not? Rosalie didn’t have anything else going on in her life. Her parents might enjoy the break, and Nat would get to go to the beach everyday. Truth be told, Rosalie could use a beach day every week too.

  “Don’t tell her things you can’t do.” Mom’s voice came through the line, the Jersey accent still thick though she’d lived in Texas for almost three decades.

  “I’m not, Mom,” Rosalie said, smiling as she pictured her mother. They had the same curls, and Rosalie loved her parents with everything she had. “I miss you guys. Will you stay the weekend too?”

  “If we can come,” Mom said.

  “She said I can come,” Nat said, her argumentative tone strong.

  “I know what she said,” Mom shot back. “But she really needs to think about it. So think about it, dear.”

  “Okay,” Rosalie said. “I’ll check my calendar when I get home.” A quick glance toward the windows showed her that Handsome still hadn’t left. What was he waiting for? “But I don’t think there’s a conflict.”

  As she watched, Handsome opened the door on his truck and got out again. Rosalie’s heartbeat went wild, and she said, “I have to go, Mom. Nat, there’s a customer coming in.”

  “Text me back about that picture,” Nat said.

  “She has to go,” Mom said, and the call ended just as Handsome yanked open the glass door again.

  Rosalie took a moment to stuff her phone into her messy purse, and she tugged on the zipper. It wouldn’t quite slide, because she might have stopped by the store and bought Autumn a couple of packages of new underwear. Princess style, so the girl would remember to stop playing and go to the bathroom when she needed to.

  Her face heated as the zipper caught on the plastic, the sound unmistakable. She abandoned the idea of closing her purse and faced Handsome.

  His chest lifted and fell in the way it would had he just run a couple of miles. “Rosalie,” he said, and it sounded like a bark. “I don’t care about the game. That was just a stupid thing I said, because I couldn’t figure out how to say what I really wanted to say.”

  Rosalie’s pulse fell to the soles of her feet, but she still managed to ask, “What did you want to say?”

  Lee took another breath and blew it out. “My brother is gettin’ married next weekend. The fifteenth?”

  Rosalie did know the date, so she nodded.

  “I was wonderin’… See, the thing is, Rosalie, I’ve been thinking about you since that blasted math night months ago. Then I started thinking maybe you and I could go to the wedding together.”

  Whatever she’d been expecting him to say, it wasn’t that. She opened her mouth to reply but ended up simply fishing her mouth closed and open. Closed and open.

  I’ve been thinking about you since that blasted math night months ago.

  Warmth slid through her, and the brightness of the sun started to fill her when she thought about being on this cowboy’s arm at his brother’s wedding. Her mind misfired about when Nat was coming, and what date the wedding was on, and if she could really go out with a man right now.