Synopsis
Historical western filled with steamy romance and the rawness of a growing country.
A letter from a grandfather he’s never met has Brody Yates escorted across the country to work on a ranch rather than entering prison. But his arrival in Oregon proves prison may have been the lesser of two evils. A revenge driven criminal, the high desert, and his grandfather’s beautiful ward may prove more dangerous than anything he’s faced on the New York docks.
Lilah Wells is committed to helping others: the judge who’d taken her in years ago, the neighboring children, and the ranch residents, which now includes the judge’s handsome wayward grandson. And it all gets more complicated when her heart starts ruling her actions.
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Excerpt
What the judge called the ranch buildings looked like a small town to Brody. He stood in the wagon counting the buildings. A two-story ranch house, a long low building Lilah pointed out as the bunkhouse, a cabin she said Buster Malone, the foreman, lived in with his wife and their two children, and two large barns. That didn’t even count the smaller buildings scattered around between the other larger buildings. This looked like a town compared to the sparse little buildings that had dotted the one street in Venator.
The wagon stopped in front of the large barn. A tall man with broad shoulders, large arms, and a leather apron walked out of a small addition to the barn.
“Didn’t expect you back until dark, Judge.” The man took hold of the horse on the left side.
“I didn’t expect to come back to thievery.” The judge climbed off the wagon. “Brody, help Lilah down,” he barked.
He leaped out of the back of the wagon and held his arms up to the young woman. He didn’t usually jump when given an order, but when the order allowed him to put his hands on a pretty girl, he didn’t balk.
She blinked a few times, then slowly leaned down into his upraised hands. He caught her at the waist and lifted her down. She wasn’t a wispy girl. He could feel her body was hard from working. He’d held several girls who worked hard every day of their life. They had muscles as hard and strong as men.
He set her feet on the ground and continued to study her. He liked the smattering of freckles, it gave her a youthful appearance. She licked and opened her full rosy lips.
“You can let go of me. My feet are on the ground.”
He released her and stepped back. Glancing around, expecting a lecture from the judge for holding onto Lilah too long, he found the old man in a deep discussion with the man who still held the horse.
About the Author
Paty Jager is an award-winning author of 25+ novels and over a dozen novellas and short stories of murder mystery, western historical romance, and action adventure. She has a RomCon Reader’s Choice Award for her Action Adventure and received the EPPIE Award for Best Contemporary Romance. This is what reviewers says about her Letters of Fate Series: “What a refreshing and well written love story of fate and hope! Very well written but sometimes sizzling love scenes!”
All her work has Western or Native American elements in them along with hints of humor and engaging characters. Paty and her husband raise alfalfa hay in rural eastern Oregon. Riding horses and battling rattlesnakes, she not only writes the western lifestyle, she lives it.
