Cowboy Mountain Christmas (Dreaming) series 6-book bundle + bonus book

Ruby Barclay knows she isn’t marrying for love. Love was never the plan. After losing her parents at the age of sixteen and fighting the state for guardianship of her siblings, Ruby is a pragmatist, not a romantic. And Wesley Landry, a fellow surgeon, is her best option for a safe and stable future. That is until she catches him with the florist’s assistant moments before their wedding ceremony.

For five years now, Ethan Shuff has watched the love of his life plan her future with another man, a man not even close to worthy of her. Ethan had helped Ruby fight for her siblings. He’d driven her back and forth to med school, then to her residency. He’d only held off on telling her his feelings because she was so determined to have the perfect life, a life he wasn’t sure he could give her as a cowboy working with underprivileged kids on the side. He’d only come to her wedding to close that unrequited chapter of his life for good.

But perhaps it wasn’t as unrequited as he thought. Because when Ruby falls into his arms for comfort at the church after Wesley’s betrayal, they both feel something. He can see it in her eyes. So, when she begs him to whisk her away from the wedding on his motorcycle, Ethan is more than happy to oblige.

And even as Ruby tries to convince herself she feels nothing for Ethan but friendship, her repeated dreams of him kissing her say otherwise.

Excerpt:

Chapter 1

Ruby Barclay fingered the delicate white veil she held in her hand.

In thirty minutes, it would be on her head, and she would be walking down the aisle of her adoptive father’s church, getting ready to pledge the rest of her life to Wesley Landry, fellow surgeon and her fiancé for the last five years.

Her stomach curled like strands of spaghetti in a strainer. Her parasympathetic nervous system was obviously on the fritz.

Her hands didn’t shake. As a surgeon, she couldn’t afford for them to, but her heart was definitely not pumping in the correct rhythm, the electrical impulses interrupted by the adrenaline that flowed freely in her bloodstream.

Her adopted mom, Penny, and her biological sisters had all been helping her get ready, but they’d tromped out just a few minutes ago to make sure everything else was going okay.

She had a few blissful moments to herself.

Maybe not blissful.

Because they were giving her a chance to think that maybe she was about to make a huge mistake.

She and Wesley were not a romantic love match, but they were a match that made sense, and that’s what she wanted.

After her parents had been killed in a car accident, she’d vowed to become the best surgeon she could. Maybe a better surgeon would have been able to save their lives.

After all of her training, she was no longer convinced that was true, but it hadn’t made her change her mind about what she wanted to do with her life.

She would get the best training she could, work as hard as she could, and do everything she could to save lives and help people.

Wesley came from a long line of surgeons, and he, his dad, and his grandfather, along with several other members of his family, operated in the biggest hospital in Los Angeles.

Marrying Wesley would open doors to her that she could have only dreamed about, and she would be joining the most prestigious family of surgeons in the world.

Together, they would be the most sought-after and skilled team anywhere.

It was most definitely everything she’d ever wanted.

Deep brown eyes set above a long straight nose swirled in her mind.

She blinked and turned to the lone window in the little prayer room at the back of her father’s church, looking out at the perfectly landscaped back area, and the covered pavilion where parishioners had dinner on the grounds twice a month, and the playground where the preschool children in the church’s daycare happily entertained themselves during the week.

It was bad enough that she was in a white gown. She wasn’t going to mess around with little-girl dreams of romance or be swept away by her feelings.

She was analytical. She was strong. She knew exactly what she wanted, and she was going to get it.

Falling in love with a dirt-poor cowboy and being his cook and washerwoman and bearing his kids didn’t even begin to realize her full potential. She wasn’t going to allow herself to even consider not going through with everything she had planned today.

She turned away from the window and saw the empty brown basket that was supposed to be filled with flower petals.

Maybe she should stand around and wait for someone to come back and help her, but she hadn’t been trained to stand around and wait; she’d been trained to take charge and deal with things.

Even flower petals.

Grabbing the basket, she opened the door to the small room in the back of the church and hurried down the hall to the Sunday school room where the florist’s assistant had been camped out, unboxing the live rose displays that would be set at every table in the reception hall.

Not wanting to take any more time than necessary and feeling a little exposed in the hall—it wouldn’t do for Wesley to see her; she might not be extremely romantic, but no point in pressing her luck and threatening that old adage that it was bad luck to see the bride before the wedding—she didn’t bother to knock but yanked the door open and rushed in, twisting so her train, which thankfully wasn’t very long, and made it through the door before slamming it behind her.

She knew exactly how fast electrical impulses traveled from the eyes to the brain. She also knew it took the brain slightly longer to process the information and the reactions that came after.

However, she knew before she turned that what she was seeing wasn’t what she was supposed to be seeing, and she also knew this changed everything.

With the basket held in front of her and her eyes on the floor, she took a breath.

Had she really seen what she thought she saw?

Shuffling sounds came from the worktable, and a familiar voice said, “This isn’t what it seems like. Really.”

She’d never hidden from the truth. She’d always faced it straight on. She was a fighter.

She jerked her head up and looked her fiancé in the eye. His crisp white shirt was buttoned the whole way up to his throat, and he wore the cummerbund and tie.

His jacket was over the back of the nearest chair, directly underneath his pants and boxers.

The florist’s assistant—Ruby wondered if the girl was even out of high school—had managed to untangle herself from Ruby’s fiancé and was hunched on the other side of the table, frantically trying to pull on her leggings.

It just took a sweeping glance for Ruby to determine it was exactly what it seemed like. She’d had suspicions before, but she’d never walked in and caught Wesley in the act.

The very act.

She didn’t need to say anything. He could say all day long that it wasn’t what it seemed, but it was.

They both knew it. No question.

The question had become: what was she going to do about it?