Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 107965 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 540(@200wpm)___ 432(@250wpm)___ 360(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 107965 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 540(@200wpm)___ 432(@250wpm)___ 360(@300wpm)
When the board of directors of my company mandated that I go to a wellness facility in small-town Maine to recharge, that shouldn’t have a ladder to sneak out of the bedroom window at night and going to the local bar.Getting so drunk that the bar owner brought me upstairs to sleep it off in his bed.Waking up staring at the taxidermy moose head on said bar owner’s wall.Falling for said bar owner who was the most drop-dead gorgeous man I’ve ever seen.But Brock Hawkins was so much more than just the hot bar owner. He owned half the town, built log cabins with his bare hands, and was apparently the most eligible man in all of Meadowbrook.
He was also a cinnamon roll despite his seemingly rock-hard exterior.
And the last man I should’ve been falling for—because my time in this small town was limited.
I had to head back to my life in New York City, one that was the complete opposite from the kind Brock lived.
He was denim. I was diamonds.
The problem was, the sexy lumberjack wasn’t the type of man who was easy to walk away from. Hell, I couldn’t even part with his plaid shirt that had become a constant fixture wrapped around my shoulders most days, let alone think about erasing him from my life.
A life with Brock, though, would have to be all or nothing.
Go big or go home.
I just didn’t realize that choosing to go big might also mean getting my heart broken when Brock’s life took a turn neither of us saw coming
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
CHAPTER 1
* * *
February
Ugh. My aching head.
I lifted it from the pillow and looked around the room. Where the hell am I? This was definitely not my room at Sierra Wellness Center, and why the heck are my eyes burning so much? I must’ve left my contacts in last night. I blinked a few times, attempting to get rid of the dryness. It helped, but when my vision came into focus, I found myself staring into the eyes of…a giant moose.
“Holy shit!” I jumped from the bed and landed on my ass on the hard floor.
Clunk-clunk. Click.
Clunk-clunk. Click.
My grandfather had loved old westerns, so I knew the unmistakable sound of a shotgun being pumped and cocked. I squeezed my eyes shut and raised my hands into the air. I might’ve also peed my pants a little. “Don’t shoot! Please don’t shoot!”
“What the hell, Red?” a deep, throaty voice growled. “I’m not going to fucking shoot you.”
I peeked one eye open and found a bearded man standing on the other side of the bed wearing a pair of boxer shorts and holding a gun. He looked vaguely familiar.
“Well, then stop pointing that thing at me!”
“Sorry.” He lowered it. “What the hell did you scream like that for?”
I blinked a few times. “Who the hell are you?”
“Jesus Christ,” the guy mumbled. “You don’t remember last night?”
My eyes bulged. Last night? Oh my God. Did I sleep with this lumberjack? I looked down and was relieved to find I still had all my clothes on, boots and all.
The guy shook his head. “You’d remember it, sweetheart. Trust me.”
“What?”
“You just checked to see what you were wearing, so I’m guessing you were questioning whether we had sex. We didn’t. And if we had, you’d remember it.”
“Why is that?”
The corner of his lip twitched. “How’s your noggin?”
The pain I’d felt when I first opened my eyes came roaring back with a vengeance. I reached for my head. “Who are you, and what the heck did I drink last night?”
Lumberjack bent and lifted the mattress, casually tucking the rifle between it and the boxspring.
“Is that where that gets filed?” I asked.
His lip twitched again. “It is. And an extra dry martini, shaken not stirred, with a lemon twist, dash of orange bitters, and two bleu cheese olives.”
I felt my nose wrinkle. “What?”
“You asked what you drank last night. That’s what your prissy order was. Though that’s not actually what you drank.”
“A dry martini is not prissy.”
“In this town it is, especially the way you order it.”
“What did I drink if my order was too prissy for you?”
“Vodka.”
“With?”
“Ice.”
“No wonder my head is killing me. Why would you give me that?”
Lumberjack’s eyebrows shot up. “Because you asked for it when I told you I didn’t have orange bitters, bleu cheese olives, or lemons, and I was all out of vermouth.”
“You told me you didn’t have it? So you’re who…the bartender?”
He frowned. “Yeah. I’m the bartender. Is that below your standards or something? I also own the place.”
“I didn’t mean it like that… I just…” I shook my head and looked around the room. For the first time, I realized the moose wasn’t alone. He had friends—a deer with big antlers, a bear, and some other thing I thought might be an elk. “Did you kill all these animals?”
Lumberjack folded his arms across his broad chest. “Is that a problem?”
“I’m guessing for them it was.”
He walked around the bed and held a hand out to me—I was still sitting on the floor. I hesitated, and he shook his head. “It’s my hand, sweetheart. Not my dick.”
My nose scrunched up. “Crass much?”
“Rather be crass than condescending.”
I put my hand in his. “I am not condescending.”
“No?”
“No.”
He helped me to my feet. “If you say so.”
I brushed my clothes off. “Do you have a bathroom I can use?”
Lumberjack pointed. “Maybe while you’re in there, you can pry the stick out of your ass.”
I narrowed my eyes. “You’re rude.”
He sighed. “Just go do what you gotta do, Red.”
“Red. That’s original.” I attempted to lift my chin into the air and keep a bit of my dignity as I walked to the bathroom. But the screech I let out when I shut the door was anything but dignified. “Umm…Lumberjack?” I was afraid to move.
Footsteps came closer on the other side of the door. “Is that supposed to be me?”
“Did you know there’s a giant dog in your bathtub?”
“I did indeed.”
The Saint Bernard tilted his head at me, curiously. “You could’ve warned me.”
There was silence for a few seconds, then, “Hey, Red?”
“Yeah?”
“Oak sleeps in the bathtub.”
“Is Oak the dog?”
“Yep.”
“Does he bite?”
“He sleeps in the bathtub because he’s afraid of his own shadow. I think you’re safe.”
“Great,” I mumbled.
I had one of those bladders that got overly excited once it saw a toilet, so I didn’t have time for any more small talk. I walked to the porcelain throne and peed while the giant dog stared. Fitting. I had a moose and deer watch me sleep.