Monday Morsels: The Montana Cowboy's Triplets

HOME ON THE RANCH:

THE MONTANA COWBOY'S TRIPLETS

Cowboys to Grooms Series, Book 3

by Allison B. Collins

Hunter Sullivan inhaled air so crisp and cold he could swear icicles were forming inside his nose. He raised the collar of his jacket, wished now he’d worn a heavier coat. Might have been late March, but around here, folks still considered it winter. Clouds hung low over the snow-covered Montana mountains, and a layer of frost covered the valley floor like an ice-skating rink.

Reining Becket to a stop on top of the small plateau, he looked out over the valley he loved. He and his older brothers had grown up here, running roughshod and free, and he couldn’t imagine living anywhere else. Forget cities, big or small. This was where he belonged, living and working on the family guest ranch. The buildings and cabins spread throughout the valley, surrounded by mountains and towering trees. Some days the lake was so still it mirrored the surrounding landscape and sky.

Heaven on earth.

Well, heaven until a few days ago, when a caravan of trucks and trailers and Tinseltown trespassers invaded their ranch.

Becket snorted and stamped his hooves, ready to gallop across frozen fields. “Okay, bud, I know you want to run.” Hunter patted Becket’s neck.

His horse whinnied, and Hunter glanced over his shoulder just as two of his brothers joined him on the rise.

Hunter shot a look at Wyatt. “Why aren’t you at home with your bride?”

“Frankie’s on a video call with her dad’s office. You shoulda seen her—face made up, wearing a silk blouse on top, Scooby Doo pajama bottoms and SpongeBob slippers.”

“Dude, SpongeBob? Were they a wedding gift from you?” Luke teased.

“Johnny picked them out for her. When you take a four-year-old shopping, you get the cool clothes.” Wyatt gave a sheepish grin, but parental pride colored the words.

“You’re technically still honeymooners, right? You should go home and coax her out of the pjs.” Hunter jerked his thumb back toward the family cabins.

“I would, but I gotta head out to the south fence and fix the gate.”

“Dad was right to make you foreman.” Luke rested his hands on the pommel and rocked back.

Wyatt did a double take. “Where’d that come from?”

“Just sayin’. You slid right in when Shorty retired, and you’ve kept things running great.” Luke stretched his arm out and gave Wyatt a fist bump.

“Thanks,” Wyatt said, a note of surprise in his voice. He’d had a lot of rough years, and rarely heard praise from anyone.

“Where you headed to?” Hunter glanced at Luke.

“I wanted a few minutes of quiet before I start making rounds. Wellness checks for the animals the movie crew brought in.”

“They got you doing double duty with their livestock? Hope we’re charging `em for your vet services,” Wyatt said.

“Part of the contract, and yeah, we’re charging—” Movement to the left caught Hunter’s eye, and he saw a black horse racing at a full gallop across the frosty valley.

But the horse wasn’t on its own.

There was a woman in the saddle.

He squinted. The woman’s body was tilting to the side. It looked like she was hanging on tight. At that speed, if she fell off or got thrown, she’d be seriously hurt. Maybe even killed.

"Hey. You see that?” Luke leaned forward.

“I got this.” Hunter squeezed his knees against Becket’s sides. “Hiyah.” Becket leaped forward and stretched his neck, galloping toward the woman.

Hunter gripped the reins so tight his fingers went numb. Memories of the last runaway horse flashed through his head like a rapid-fire slideshow. His vision wavered, then tunneled, and his pulse kept time with the pounding of Becket’s hooves.

He drew closer, and Hunter saw long red curls streaming behind the woman like dragon fire. Carley? A celebrity, Carley Williams was the lead actress filming the modern-day Western on the ranch, and in the short time he’d spent flirting with her, he’d gotten the feeling she wasn’t much of a horsewoman.

“Hang on! I’m coming.”

“Back off. I don’t need anyone.” Carley pulled herself back up into the saddle.

Becket eased up next to them and kept pace with the other horse, and Hunter reached for the reins.

She knocked his hand away.

He reached out and latched on to the reins again, and it became a tug of war. What was with her? “Whoa, there, whoa. Easy.” Both horses slowed to a canter, then a complete stop, and he could finally breathe again. “You okay? What spooked your horse?”

The woman punched his arm. “You blooming idiot! Why’d ye stop me? You could have died, and taken me to hell with ye!”

This wasn’t the woman he’d been flirting with since the movie people arrived. She had the same hair as Carley and kinda looked like her. But the accent…and that punch… He rubbed his arm. She definitely had some muscles. “Your horse was out of control. Are you okay?”

“We weren’t out of control, you bampot.”

He didn’t know what bampot meant, but he figured it wasn’t studly hero. “Your horse was galloping at breakneck speed, and you were damn near close to breaking your own neck.”

“I’m rehearsing. I know what I’m doing.” Red spots of color made her cheeks glow, and her eyes flashed emerald fire.

“Rehearsing?”

She huffed, and whipped her cowboy hat off to shove her hair out of her eyes. “I’m a stunt double.”

He tipped his head as her words sank in. “You’re what?”

“A stuntwoman.”

“So your horse wasn’t out of control?”

“Are ye daft? I already said no. Rory and I have made several movies together—we know what we’re doing. We’re a team.” She scrubbed a hand over the horse’s neck, and it seemed to preen with her attention.

“Sorry.” He took his hat off, then reset it on his head. How was he to have known who she was? “But racing your horse like that is dangerous. You don’t know this terrain, which puts you both at risk. I’ve seen what happens when a horse is out of control—you can’t blame me for worrying you were in trouble.”

###


Triple threat

Stuntwoman Mackenzie Campbell is at the Sullivan Guest Ranch to film a movie, not swoon over smooth-talking rancher Hunter Sullivan. The rugged cowboy is everything her mother warned her about in a man. But when a mix-up leaves Mackenzie without a room, she finds herself bunking with Hunter and his rambunctious six-year-old triplet sons.

Devoted single father is not a side of Hunter that Mackenzie expected—it’s completely at odds with his flirty, charming personality. Mackenzie has fallen for Hunter and his boys, but that doesn’t change the fact that once filming is over, she’s moving on to wherever her next job takes her. Although her heart may not be coming with her...


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