She knew the kind of man she wanted as the father of her children. The integrity, the ability to be honest even when it made him look bad, the loyalty, to himself, and to those who’d betrayed him—not by framing him, but by disowning him when he’d been framed.

  She wanted the kind of man she could walk out on after sex and still have him call out to her that she was welcome back anytime.

  She knew it all before she’d even begun looking.

  She’d had the absolute best teacher.

  * * *

  Joe made it a week. Long enough to accept dinner invitations, to be patted on the back so many times it was a wonder he wasn’t bruised, to be welcomed back into all his folds with open arms—and to realize that he didn’t give a crap about any of it.

  He didn’t want to work for a man who’d had him arrested without giving him even a moment’s benefit of the doubt.

  He wasn’t all that fond of a society that had shunned him, either.

  And he was even less fond of the same world of people who welcomed him back, thinking they’d all just be friends again. Expecting him to not only understand the rules of the game, but to play by them.

  Life wasn’t a game to be played.

  It was real. And precious.

  And he feared he’d lived the best it had to offer during his purgatory.

  In the arms of his bodyguard.

  So he quit his job.

  He made some phone calls.

  A lot of them.

  Bought a plot of land in a new development up on a small mountain above a little town and then purchased a storefront on the main street of that town; got his permits and licensing for private accounting; had designers come in to make the space right; conducted interviews; had a logo, stationery and signage created; and spent a lot of nights drinking beer with two particular guys he’d grown to like a lot.

  Maybe even to love, like a guy would love a brother, if he’d ever had one.

  Then they started to irritate him like brothers. Know-it-all, think-they-knew-better-than-him brothers.

  “You need to call her, man,” Kierland said one night just before Thanksgiving. “No way she’ll refuse to come home for the holiday, and she’s going to figure out something’s up.”

  “Dad’s not going to keep secrets from her forever,” Jackson added.

  The three of them were at Kyle’s cabin, where Joe was temporarily living until his home was built in the new development Meredith Construction was building.

  “There’s no need for secrets,” he said then, speaking aloud a truth he’d figured out over the past week or so. “I’m not doing all of this for her...”

  Jackson snorted so hard beer dripped from his nose.

  All three of them laughed.

  And then sobered.

  “I’m in love with her, yes,” he said, not even feeling weird admitting the truth to her brothers before he’d even told the woman involved. “And the changes are because of her, but I made them because they were right for me. I just needed her tornado to come through my life for me to see that it was time to rebuild.”

  He heard a sound, a door in the back of the cabin, his bedroom door...

  Just as he realized someone else was in the cabin, Jackson and Kierland stood and, without even a good night, headed out the front door.

  Standing, he thought he was hallucinating at first, that he’d had more beer than he’d thought, when he saw the body in leggings and a long-sleeved Lycra shirt coming toward him. It was the curly red hair that told him he didn’t want to wake up.

  That he’d agree to live in the drunken stupor for the rest of his life if he could just keep seeing the vision before him.

  “I love you, too.”

  He didn’t want to wake up, ever. So he went with the fantasy. Stood up.

  Walked toward his ethereal angel, daring her to disappear.

  She just kept coming toward him instead.

  “How long have you known?” he asked.

  “Since you quit Bellair.”

  That long. He shook his head. “Your grandparents?”

  She nodded.

  “You know I know about Sierra’s Web?”

  “No,” she said, frowning. “I was actually looking forward to telling you that.”

  They were standing, toe to toe. Their faces inches apart.

  “Why didn’t you contact me?” he had to ask. Maybe because a part of him was always going to be that little boy who’d been sent to jail on a lie from his father.

  “I could ask you the same question.”

  “You knew I was here. I didn’t know you knew.”

  “I needed to know that you could be happy here,” she told him. “It couldn’t be for me, Joe, or it wasn’t right for you.”

  He broke. Everything inside of him just came crumbling down. More than two decades of walls, whose construction had started in a juvenile detention hall, just cracked and fell to ash.

  With tears brimming in his eyes, and a penis that was so hard it hurt, he pulled her to him. “I love you, McKenna Meredith.”

  “I love you, too, Joe Hamilton.”

  “You know we have to get married.”

  “You know I’m probably going to bark orders from time to time. For the rest of our lives.”

  “Yeah.”

  He glanced at the door. Needing to kiss her, to haul her to bed, in the worst way.

  “You think they left?”

  “If they know what’s good for them. And if they didn’t, they will,” she told him, pushing him backward toward the bedroom door.

  Not sure how much time he had before he exploded, Joe took her hand, dragged her behind him the rest of the way to his temporary quarters and, as they saw the reflection of taillights heading down the hill, he started to laugh.

  To cry.

  And to kiss her. Hard.

  “This is forever.”

  “I know.”

  “We’re going to make babies.”

  “Yep.”

  “I’m home, McKenna.”

  “I’m home, too, Joe. Finally.”

  And with that, they spent the rest of the night, two souls becoming one, body, mind and heart.

  Knowing that love would protect them both, no matter what came, for the rest of their lives.

  * * *

  You’ll love other books in Tara Taylor Quinn’s

  Sierra’s Web miniseries:

  His Lost and Found Family

  Reluctant Roommates

  Tracking His Secret Child

  Her Best Friend’s Baby

  Cold Case Sheriff

  The Bounty Hunter’s Baby Search

  Available now from Harlequin Romantic Suspense and Harlequin Special Edition!

  Keep reading for an excerpt from Coldero Ridge Cowboy by Amber Leigh Williams.

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  Coldero Ridge Cowboy

  by Amber Leigh Williams

  Chapter 1

  She drove so fast, the hounds of hell might’ve been chasing her.

  It had been so long since Eden Meadows—or Eveline Eaton, as she was known in her hometown of Fuego, New Mexico—had driven down this long stretch of country road. The high desert stretched far into the black of night. It was a new moon tonight. The only things lighting up the shrubby plain were her headlights.

  She pushed the rental car to the point of redlining. There were no taillights in front of her, no headlights in her rearview. Streetlights? Forget about it. She was alone with her grief and a sudden thirst for recklessness.

  Her heart pounded at her ears. Panic nipped at her heels. If she let it, it would take over.

  She choked it back, breathing in and out in a steady wash. She was calm. She was collected. She was in control.

  At least that’s what she told herself as she stopped watching the speedometer and kept her eyes over the steering wheel. The dash marks next to the center line streamed together in a yellow blur.

  She hadn’t driven in years, not since she’d left home to live in the Big Apple. Definitely not since the accident that had left her scarred and in therapy for almost a year.

  Signs flicked past like flies on either side of the road. The turn for Fuego was near.

  The Eaton family cattle ranch, Eaton Edge, was in the middle of nowhere. For once in her life, she preferred it that way.

  I am in control.

  Forget the grief. Forget the fear. She tightened her grasp on the wheel and lowered her chin, listening to the engine whine. She pushed the rental to its max.

  Knowing she had a good five hundred feet before she needed to break for the turnoff, she pushed the car that last little bit. Just to prove—to herself, to whoever and whatever was looking down at her—that she could.

  She didn’t have to live with fear anymore.

  Eveline didn’t see the shape until it was in front of her headlights.

  She slammed on the brakes automatically. What looked like an animal stalking across the road on all fours suddenly stood up on thin legs—all too thin—and turned to look at her. The beam of the headlights reflected off its eyes, piercing her straight through.

  The face was an animal’s. But the stance...

  She screamed, tires skidding on old pavement. She yanked the wheel, trying to avoid whatever it was—

  She heard a thwunk against her rear quarter panel a split second before the car flew off the road.

  She screamed again as it bounced hard into and out of the ditch. She was flung back against the headrest, then forward. Her seat belt locked, saving her from face-planting into the wheel.

  She didn’t have time to scream at the fence post looming toward her. Lifting her hands to shield her face, she felt every muscle in her body brace for impact. The car seemed to drop out from under her. It yanked to a stop, as if someone had tied a lasso around it and dropped it back like a roped steer.

  Eveline sat frozen in the driver’s seat with her hair in her face. Then a long, shaky breath escaped her. A sob chased it, followed by others. She wanted to lower her head to the steering wheel and shake.

  However, that face...those eyes... They made her head swivel back to the road.

  What had it been? Why hadn’t it run?

  Why had it felt like it was staring into her soul?

  Eveline shuddered once, then again—so hard her bones rattled. She gripped the wheel until her knuckles felt like they were going to pop out of her skin.

  She was afraid to move.

  The memories that plagued her dreams reeled like a bad movie in her head.

  The smell of asphalt, brake dust... The sound of metal dragging across pavement incessantly until the car finally stopped skidding across the eight-lane highway...and came to rest in oncoming traffic...

  The panic she’d been trying to outrun sank its teeth into her. She curled in on herself, wrapping her arms over her chest. She swore she felt the scars on her shoulder and neck burning, like they, too, remembered everything.

  Everything—with far too much clarity.

  “You’re okay,” she breathed. She tasted tears and covered her face. “You’re okay...” She didn’t believe it, but she said it.

  She’d frickin’ say it until she believed it.

  Isn’t that what she’d done for the better part of twelve months?

  Nothing was broken this time. She was just in shock.

  “Talk yourself down,” she coached. “Think your way through...”

  Her thoughts were a jumble of instability. She couldn’t wade through them if she tried.

  She clawed at the door of the car to get out, then stopped, jumping when the shadows outside the car seemed to move in a furtive rush.

  Her teeth chattered. The creature was imprinted on the backs of her eyes. She couldn’t get out. There was no way she was getting out. Not when that thing might still be out there...

  She ran her hands roughly through her hair. Already she could feel the headache coming on—from strain—from being jerked around like a rag doll in the driver’s seat. The spot where her shoulder met her collarbone felt bruised. There’d be an abrasion there from the seat belt, just like last time...

  “Not like last time,” she chanted with a hard shake of her head. “It’s not like last time.” She looked around. The road was just as before. No headlights. No taillights or streetlights as far as the eye could see.

  No terrifying creature.

  She fumbled for the ignition switch, missing several times. She finally found it and tried cranking the car. The engine gurgled once, then stopped turning over at all.

  There would be no driving the rest of the way. Fuego couldn’t be that far. She’d seen the sign. She could walk it...

  A yipping noise made her jump out of her skin. It echoed off everything and nothing.

  Coyotes.

  They weren’t out to get her, she told herself. But she hated the sound of their yipping. It’d kept her awake as a child with visions of mountain lions and skin-walkers.

  Her big brothers’ idea of bedtime stories hadn’t exactly made for restful nights.

  What she’d seen in the road was the stuff of her nightmares as a child. For a moment, she felt like a child, tempted to curl up in the fetal position and whimper.

  She fumbled through her purse on the passenger seat, telling herself to get a grip. She couldn’t hide in the car all night, though it would take a miracle to get a cell signal this far out. She had installed an app at the recommendation of the person at the rental car company that might help. Time to put it to the test.

  Her hands were still shaking. It took longer than it should have to dial her passcode, then find the app. She scanned her options and saw tow truck on the list.

  Old Hyde Meechum’s face popped into her mind. He’d bailed her eldest brother, Everett, out of many scrapes over the course of his ill-fated drag racing career. He was likely only a mile or so away. If his response time was anything like it used to be...

  She toggled the tow truck request. Her heart pounded as she waited for it to go through. Glancing over the dash, she looked into the black. She really didn’t want to walk. Not only was nighttime out here in no-man’s-land not her favorite thing, the town was just that—a town. It was three hundred and fifty strong, at best.

  Small towns like to hit the beddy-bye switch early. Every business along Fuego’s main drag would’ve closed hours ago.

  Her phone beeped. She saw the message: Tow truck en route.

  An unsteady sigh left her. She centered herself in the driver’s seat and did her best to settle down to wait.

  * * *

  Eveline was so busy looking ahead to Fuego for headlights, she cried out in shock when she saw them filling the mirror above the dash. She sat up and watched them grow...then slow.

  When the vehicle pulled onto the side of the road behind her rental, she groaned. “Please don’t be a lunatic,” she pleaded. She tried pressing the button to crack the driver’s window. When it didn’t budge, she cursed and tried again. Same result.

  Trying not to think of the creature in the road, she unlocked the door and pushed it open. Her legs wobbled at the knees as she got out, but she managed to keep them steady. Her purse was in her hand. She reached inside until she felt the Taser near the bottom.

  She licked her lips. They still felt dry as she waited for the large figure that got down from the truck’s cab to come into the light. “Thank you so much,” she began to say, then stopped.

  He was a cowboy; that was clear. Tall. Wide at the shoulder. His jeans were dark-tinted. His shirt was plaid, just like all the other cowpokes she remembered. His Stetson was black and pulled low over his brow.

  All very typical. But that walk...

  Her lips trembled. “Wolfe?”

  He stopped, somewhere between her and the back of her car. Even with the light behind him, she knew.

  She gathered a careful breath. “Wolfe Coldero.” It wasn’t a question anymore. She knew it was him—as much as she knew that her reintroduction to Fuego was going to be more awkward than she’d thought.

  He came forward until the light hit what little of his face the hat didn’t shade. He stared. Damn if the man didn’t have the loudest stare in the universe. When he was younger, real young, his skin had stretched taut across the broad bones of his face, giving him a haunted look to go with the history he kept hidden.

  He’d grown into them, limbs and facial features. His jaw flared out from the point of his lengthy chin. The ridges of his cheekbones were still prominent, but muscle had grown over the rest, giving his face definition.

  She took a step back. She was caught—between the past when she’d known him and the present and the tumultuous mess that had happened between.

  When he started walking toward her again, she tripped over her feet to get back. “I...” She shook her head when he stopped coming. “I...had a bit of an accident,” she said.

  He glanced over the wreckage. His narrowed eyes swung back to her.

  She huffed a breath, lifting her hands. “I was being stupid, okay? I was driving too fast. A-a-a...thing... I’m not sure what it was. But it walked right out in the middle of the road and stopped. At first I thought it was a coyote... But then it almost like...stood up? No, it definitely stood up. On two legs. And it looked at me and...”

  She trailed off because Wolfe was looking at her like she was growing antlers out of her head. She huffed. “I know what I saw. Or...at least I think I do. Only...it had to have been bigger than a coyote. It was more the size of a mountain lion. Or... I don’t know. I just know it looked at me and I swerved. I might have hit it. Actually, I’m pretty sure I did clip it. Wait...”