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- Herausgeber: Lorhainne Eckhart, INC.
- Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
- Serie: The Wilde Brothers
- Sprache: Englisch
You never know when you'll suddenly meet The One!
In "The One," Margaret Gordon, a once-prominent surgeon, finds herself back in her hometown after a tragic accident, seeking solace with only her horse as company. Unexpectedly, widowed Joe Wilde arrives one morning with a teenage boy and a horse that needs help, reigniting memories of their past. As they work together to tame the temperamental horse, sparks fly between them, despite Joe's belief that Margaret has always despised him. However, life's twists and turns lead them to discover that the right person they've been searching for has been closer than they ever imagined. Can they overcome their differences and embrace the love they've been missing all along?
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Seitenzahl: 263
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021
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THE ONE, The Wilde Brothers
COPYRIGHT © Lorhainne Ekelund, 2013, All Rights Reserved.
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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THE ONE
The Wilde Brothers
Book 1
LORHAINNE ECKHART
Contents
Keep in touch with Lorhainne
The Wilde Brothers
About this book
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Epilogue
What’s coming next
Uncover the Mystery of Shadow Game
Shadow Game
About the Author
Series Available
Links to Lorhainne Eckhart’s Booklist
Keep in touch with Lorhainne
Sign-up for Lorhainne’s Newsletter & Monday Blog
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The Wilde Brothers
Step into the world of the Wilde Brothers, a captivating family of Idaho, where the rugged charm of the west meets the allure of hot men and strong women in this delightful romantic family saga.
THE WILDE BROTHERS:
THE ONE: A passionate and stirring love story: After losing her job as a surgeon, Margaret retreats to her hometown — where she runs into Joe Wilde, the man she’s wanted for years.
THE HONEYMOON: In "THE HONEYMOON," Joe surprises his bride, Margaret, with an unconventional camping trip for their honeymoon, leaving her unsure about their future together.
FRIENDLY FIRE: In this gripping romance, Julia finds sizzling chemistry with Logan, a Marine veteran and the new town sheriff. But when Julia’s daughter goes missing, can Logan protect them both from harm?
NOT QUITE MARRIED: In “Not Quite Married,” Julia and Logan’s whirlwind romance faces challenges, and doubts arise as unexpected events test their love and trust in each other.
A MATTER OF TRUST: When oil executive Ben Wilde is sent to pitch a pipeline project in Kit Cove, he clashes with environmentalist Carrie Richardson, who opposes his plans. Despite their differences, a strong attraction develops between them, leading to a conflict between their feelings and their respective responsibilities.
THE RECKONING, A Wilde Brothers Christmas: The holiday season and family dynamics can be a wonderful reunion. Only the battle between two brothers, a father and son with unreconciled differences could ruin Christmas for the Wilde Brothers.
TRADED: When Chris overhears football star Jake begging his ex for a second chance, she can’t help offering him advice. And as they grow closer, their unlikely friendship sparks an attraction neither of them can resist…
UNFORGIVEN: Junior lawyer, Samuel Wilde has an unbreakable bond with his brothers—that is, until one woman comes between them, threatening to divide the Wilde family forever.
THE HOLIDAY BRIDE: Trinity Cooper Wilde longs for a quiet Christmas with her hidden baby, but a snowstorm brings Deputy Garrett Franke, the man she's sworn to hate, to her door, unaware that the baby is his. As they become snowbound together, secrets unravel, and Trinity's plan to reveal the truth faces unexpected challenges.
About this book
—“Once again Lorhainne has captured me in her writings. A wonderful book, just like the books about the Friessen men. This series is going to be just as good.” Reviewer, Petra
You never know when you'll suddenly meet The One!
In "The One," Margaret Gordon, a once-prominent surgeon, finds herself back in her hometown after a tragic accident, seeking solace with only her horse as company. Unexpectedly, widowed Joe Wilde arrives one morning with a teenage boy and a horse that needs help, reigniting memories of their past. As they work together to tame the temperamental horse, sparks fly between them, despite Joe's belief that Margaret has always despised him. However, life's twists and turns lead them to discover that the right person they've been searching for has been closer than they ever imagined. Can they overcome their differences and embrace the love they've been missing all along?
ChapterOne
Margaret Gordon leaned against the splintered front steps, watching the sun rise from the privacy of her front yard. There were only two things that could have irritated her as she stood outside the older two-bedroom farmhouse she’d inherited from her grandfather—which she still found odd, him leaving everything to her and not her mother, who felt slighted. The first thing was the possibility of having her morning coffee interrupted by anyone, and the second was the sight of an uninvited guest, driving a dark blue truck spewing dust and gravel down her very private driveway.
The large four by four pulled in, stopping a few feet in front of her. Margaret froze. Instead of turning, running back into the house and slamming the door, she found herself rooted to the spot, suffering a sudden lapse of basic social skills. Her eyes widened, and she stared in horror as a tall, dark-haired man dressed in a tan barn coat and blue jeans stepped out of the truck. His wavy hair was a little shaggy, falling just past his ears and flickering almost black under the early morning sunlight. He was handsome, with a square jaw and the kind of body a woman would never tire of…and he was staring at her now with an unusual amount of interest.
When the passenger door slammed, Margaret jumped, spilling what was left of her coffee on the wrinkled jeans she’d pulled on that morning. “Shit…” she muttered, biting her tongue before she could embarrass herself further. She wiped the wet spot on her pants before fisting her hand and giving up. A tall, gangly boy fell in behind the cowboy. Obviously, they were father and son, but what did the pair want with her? Margaret yanked down her wide-brimmed cowboy hat and yanked up the collar of her grandfather’s old wool coat. She’d just climbed out of bed and hadn’t taken the time to splash water on her face or run a brush through her long, dark hair. Her first priority had been coffee, outside, in this cool April morning on her very private twenty acres that no one ever visited. She was horrified. For a minute, she wondered if she smelled, and then she worried about how bad she looked.
Margaret wished she was sitting down as she lowered her gaze, fighting the urge to press her hand over her pounding heart. She dumped out the rest of her coffee, creating a puddle at her feet, and then stared at the tall man, all muscles and arrogance, striding toward her.
“I’m looking for a Miss Gordon,” he barked.
“You found her. What can I do for you?” Margaret didn’t move, nor did she offer—in any neighborly kind of way—a cup of coffee, a hello, or any sort of welcome.
“Mister Jerow at the feed store mentioned you do some work with horses,” the man said.
Margaret watched as he stepped closer still, but the gangly boy beside him took one look at her and hung back. She guessed that was her answer: without grabbing a mirror, she knew she looked rough and untidy. She frowned. The kid appeared scared of his own shadow or, she supposed, her prickly attitude. Scaring kids was not something she wanted to be known for. As it was, Margaret Gordon, former neurosurgeon from Seattle, was already known for destroying kids’ futures. At least that was how she saw herself, anyway.
“You do work with horses, don’t you?” he said. He had a deep, smoky voice that rattled her insides.
Margaret stared at him, thinking there was something seriously wrong with her to be so affected by some backwoods cowboy, and then shook her head. “Don’t know why Mister Jerow would have told you that,” she said. Though the truth was, that since Margaret had returned to Post Falls, Idaho, in a haze of shame, she was more comfortable with animals than she was with people, because animals didn’t lie.
The man looked away, confused, and let out a harsh chuckle. “Sorry to have wasted your time,” he said. Her horse nickered from the rough bark corral her grandfather had built from the trees on the land. “That your horse?” the man asked as he wandered closer to Angel, her five-year-old Egyptian Arabian.
Margaret couldn’t believe how he walked right up to Angel and stroked her with his large hand. Angel never lets anyone near her except Margaret, and she nickered again as the man touched her forelock and rubbed her neck, turning heavenly blue eyes on Margaret. Her stomach flip-flopped and her cheeks burned. Out of the corner of her eye, she glimpsed the awkward teen, who wore baggy jeans and a dark hoodie, with the same dark hair as the man who leaned against her corral. The teen wore a baseball cap over hair long enough to cover his ears, and he shuffled his scuffed sneakers, kicking up the dust. He dropped his gaze to the ground.
“You don’t talk much, do you?” the man said from where he leaned over by her horse.
“I already told you I can’t help you,” she snapped, swinging her favorite mug and wishing she could slip back into the house and shut the door. Why wouldn’t they just leave?
“I don’t think you really answered me,” the man replied.
She couldn’t believe it—the man was smiling at her. What made it worse was that he had one of those million-dollar smiles, with a set of dimples that had her legs softening to limp noodles.
“What are you looking for?” She tried to cross her arms but was hampered by the cracked mug she held. She felt like an idiot.
“My boy’s horse, he can’t get near it. Forget riding it. Told him unless we can find someone to straighten the horse out, I’m getting rid of it. I’m not paying to feed a dangerous animal that’s of no use to me.”
Margaret watched the boy’s face hardening as his father spoke. A glimmer of hurt flashed in the teen’s eyes. She recognized that tough, pain-in-the-ass, don’t-give-a-crap attitude written all over the kid’s face. It was the same expression she had worn as a twelve-year-old tomboy sent to live with her grandfather, Carl Spick, by a corporate mother busy fast-tracking her career as a top-ten stockbroker in Seattle. Being unwanted and considered a nuisance had produced all kinds of attitude and a profound, deep hurt in Margaret. What was this kid’s story?
“That true, kid?” she asked the boy.
The kid jerked his head up and stared at her, wide eyed. He flushed as he glanced at his father. “Yeah, I guess.”
“What’s your horse’s name?” Margaret asked.
The boy’s father, still leaning against the corral, answered, “Storm. He’s twelve, a gelding, Percheron–Quarter Horse cross. Old enough to know better.” He was coming toward her, his hands on slim hips molded into a pair of wranglers, and he was digging into each step with a dusty pair of boots. Margaret wanted to shrink back and find someplace to hide—maybe because she noticed he had arms a woman could get lost in. She figured he must have an arrogant attitude, too. The kid wasn’t talking. It took Margaret a moment to realize how quickly he had shut down, instantly becoming a shadow behind his father.
“There are all kinds of horse people not more than twenty miles from here, around Spokane. They could do wonders, I’m sure,” Margaret said. “What is it you think I can do for you?”
She didn’t know why she was still talking. She wasn’t qualified to do much of anything but lie out here and lick her wounds. It didn’t help matters that she had also been falling on the wrong side of everything lately, including a three-hundred-year-old Kootenai County code. Living alone on a twenty-acre ranch in the entirely conservative northern Idaho panhandle wasn’t entirely bad if you were a single man, but if you were a single woman, it just wasn’t done. She knew that, and so did everyone else around here. What was wrong with this man? Didn’t he know who she was?
“I’m not interested in taking my kid’s horse to some yahoo in Washington State,” he said. “Look, can you just take a look at the horse? That’s all I’m asking.”
The man was in her space now, right in front of her. Holy shit, was he tall. She was five foot nine, so he had to be at least six two, six three. She sidestepped away. Maybe he was one of those guys who got a kick out of tormenting women, because he stepped closer again, matching each step she took, like a slow dance, until she bumped the steps that led into the small house. She would have fallen flat on her backside if he hadn’t reached out and grabbed her. He held her in a way that was familiar and close, stirring feelings in her that couldn’t possibly be real. No, that was definitely not a road she would go down any time soon. She’d been there, done that, another reason she was hiding out here now.
“Kind of nervous, are you? Or is it me? Do you have a problem with me?” he said.
She couldn’t look at him. Her face was burning, as she yanked herself away, pushing past him, fighting the urge to rub her arm where his hand had lingered almost possessively. She yanked the brim of her hat down and searched out the kid, who was pressed against the driver’s door, hiding behind the rear-view mirror.
“I can’t make any promises,” she said, “but I’ll take a look.”
The man was standing right behind her. “Great. Can you come by today, say, this afternoon?”
No no no, she thought. She didn’t want to go anywhere. She didn’t want to leave this property today or any time soon. What had she gotten herself into? She couldn’t do it, and she felt the icy fear paralyzing her like a surge of adrenaline until she glimpsed the boy. He searched her out with pleading eyes before jamming both hands in his baggy pants pockets and staring at the ground again. Margaret couldn’t find her voice, so she nodded, swallowing a hard lump.
Mr. Good-looking stuck out his large, calloused hand. “Great,” he said. “I’m Joe Wilde. My son’s Ryan. We’re five miles up the road. I’ll draw you a map.”
Joe Wilde. Of course, she thought. He was one of the five Wilde boys she knew from childhood, all of whom had run the school and the county with their shenanigans. She had thought against hope that it might be him, the boy who’d haunted her childhood, teasing her mercilessly and christening her with a horrible nickname that had stuck with her until she moved away to attend medical school. The icy reality set in that unless he had suffered some sort of head injury, it would only be a matter of time before he realized who she really was. Then again, he only knew her as the “orange giant”—and every other crude version of the name that the kids had whispered in the sterile school halls. She doubted very much that he knew what her real name was.
Joe ripped an envelope in half from inside his truck and drew out a rough map. “Here, it’s easy to find,” he said. His fingers skimmed hers as he handed her the paper, invading her space again, standing right beside her. This time, he touched her shoulder as she struggled to decipher the pencilled lines and accompanying chicken scratch that would’ve made any doctor proud. She stiffened and smelled something pleasant before realizing it was him, not aftershave or cologne. She wondered how in the world soap and water could make a man smell that good. He might as well have been pressed right against her, as his heat was seeping into her as if they were two Eskimos pressed together under a bed of furs.... Stop it! she barked silently to stop her mind from going down that road.
She sidestepped again and dropped her hand, crumpling the paper. She went to step back but then tripped on his foot, dropping the mug. It shattered across the steps. He grabbed her and lifted her, knocking her hat off, and her mousy brown hair fell loose in disarray past her shoulders.
He set her down and then bent over to pick up her hat, brushing off the dust as he handed it to her. She snatched it away, stuck it on her head, and raced straight for the front door.
“So we’ll see you this afternoon around two?” he shouted to her retreating back.
She didn’t turn around as she stumbled up the two steps. “Yeah, uh-huh,” she managed to mutter as she opened the door and slammed it behind her.
* * *
Joe stood outside the old log house with single-paned windows, the Spick house, watching the closed door Margaret Gordon had slammed in his face as if he were a leper and she couldn’t get away from him fast enough. Just what the hell was the matter with the woman, anyhow?
She had always acted as though she had a stick shoved up her ass. All through school, she’d gone out of her way to avoid him, though she had mile-long legs that he had often pictured wrapped around him. Her long, thick, dark hair framed the most gorgeous smoky brown eyes and a cute round face. To top it off, she had a light smattering of freckles on her nose and cheeks that she never tried to hide with a pound of makeup. Her skin was flawless, and those lips—he dreamed of taking them for a test drive.
It was obvious the woman thought he was lower than a dung beetle. To tell the truth, he was embarrassed that his son had watched that woman try to emasculate him. Just what the hell was she doing, living out here all by herself, anyway? Last he heard, she’d hopped the first bus to Seattle for medical school. He’d seen her a few times over the years, and she had always had the same snobbish, stuck-up attitude, walking around as if she was better than everyone, looking right through him as if she didn’t see him.
He’d seen her in town a few months back. She was tall and gorgeous, with a set of breasts he dreamed of running his hands over, feeling the weight of them. He had pictured what they’d look like, full and creamy with dark red nipples. Well, at the time, he’d nearly gone over and asked her out, but his common sense had kicked in, and he remembered that she had fought over money with her mother when her grandfather hadn’t even been cold in the ground. Carl Spick would’ve rolled over in his grave if he’d seen the way his granddaughter and daughter acted, like two selfish money-grubbers. Joe didn’t need a woman like that in his life. Even now, he could barely make ends meet. With the economy in the toilet, he’d all but given up on ranching. He’d sold off the last of his cattle the year before Carl died and had started taking out trees here and there in the back, milling the lumber himself.
Here he was again, all because Stan Jerow had told him Margaret was still here. He had insisted that Margaret was who Joe needed for Ryan’s horse, that she could work magic with any animal. Her grandfather had said Margaret had a special connection to them, a certain touch. Whatever was going on with his horse, Ryan’s horse, Margaret would figure it out. When he’d driven in and seen her in that ratty old hat and wool coat, he’d felt poleaxed. He would never have believed a woman could make anything that frumpy look sexy. The way she had walked, all sexy in those faded blue jeans, along with the fact that she didn’t need to curl and primp just to step outside, had all his good sense taking a hike, which was the one and only reason he had worked her until she agreed to come and see Storm. Whatever he was thinking with, it sure in the hell hadn’t been his brain. As he bent over and picked up the broken mug, he reminded himself that he had until that afternoon to pull his head out of his ass, have her look at the horse and then send her on her way.
ChapterTwo
She’d changed three times, not that her small closet held many clothes. She didn’t even have many outfits, since she had basically lived in scrubs during her residency. Since her encounter with Joe, she had shampooed and used the good conditioner on her hair in the small shower bath, and she’d spent the entire morning arguing with herself and racing around the small two-bedroom house. She’d also found the pieces of her pink and gold mug placed in a neat pile off to the side of the top step—and in a thoughtful way so she wouldn’t cut herself.
It wasn’t as if Joe Wilde had asked her out on a date, and this certainly wasn’t a beauty pageant. She was going to see a dusty and dirty horse, and she’d be traipsing through horse shit. It wasn’t lost on her that Joe Wilde hadn’t changed one bit. He was still the same arrogant ass she’d gone to school with, always planning and scheming. He’d manipulated her into going over to see the damn horse, and in front of his kid, for God’s sake! He was lower than a skunk. Deep down, she had silently, miserably suffered through her entire adolescence with a major crush on Joe and she was furious that he still had that effect on her.
After moving away, she’d been too busy with medical school to allow Joe to invade her every waking thought, and the crush had faded—sort of. When she returned after her grandfather died, she had seen him at the funeral. After all these years, she still recognized him. Even the devil himself would have had the decency to offer condolences, but not Joe. She had expected more from him, but he was still the same selfish jerk he’d been in school, leaving without saying one word. Even in town a few months back, she had pretended not to see him and hurried the other way, fearing the snake was just waiting to make a joke of her again. When he had driven up this morning with his kid and his devilish charm, she’d frozen.
Now, as she gazed in the mirror, about to apply a hint of makeup, reality hit her like a blast of frigid air. The man had a kid with him, his kid, so of course there had to be a wife. How pitiful. Drooling over a married man—how low had she sunk? To him, this was a game, and he was winding her around his finger. Why, she could just imagine the laugh he was having at her expense now. Joe Wilde: just the name said it all, just an average Joe, a redneck nobody from a small town in the backwoods USA. Hell, she was better than that. She had gone to medical school and worked herself to the bone, spending years surviving on catnaps and bad coffee, just to end up right back here.
She tossed her makeup back in the drawer and yanked a brush through the curls she’d spent the last hour styling into her hair. Short of washing it again, she didn’t have a hope of getting rid of them, and she didn’t have time to redo anything. She glanced at her small bedside clock and the rumpled unmade double bed covered with half the clothes in her closet. It was one forty-five, time to go. Margaret stomped her feet into her comfortable square-toed boots, the old ones that were cracked and faded, and caught a glimpse in the hallway mirror of the pristine crispness of her freshly ironed white shirt and brand-new jeans. She didn’t have time to change again, and the last thing she wanted was for Joe Wilde to think she’d dressed up and primped for him. The excuse that she had done it for the horse sure wouldn’t fly, so she grabbed an old brown sweater and shrugged it on, slung her cloth purse over her shoulder, and set the wide-brimmed hat she always wore on her head before hurrying out the door.
Angel nickered, and Margaret called to her: “I’m sorry! I won’t be long, and then I’ll take you out.” She rubbed the white star just above Angel’s eyes and then peeked over the corral into the red plastic water tub, half full. She took off at a jog around the square house, which her grandfather had built for his bride from the trees on the property. After her residency, when she’d passed the boards, she had bought herself a used black Lexus that now sat in the backyard. She had kept it even after returning to Post Falls, a town where all the residents drove pickups—another one of those damn codes she was breaking.
The five-mile drive to Joe’s farm down the backcountry gravel road added a few more nicks to the midnight black of her sports car. The entire way, her foot trembled on the gas pedal as she argued with herself to turn around, go home and lock the door. She swore and told herself to suck it up and get the meeting over with. Don’t agree to anything he asks, she warned herself.
She slowed and pressed the brake as she rounded a bend in a cloud of dust, stomping the clutch and throwing the gear into neutral when she saw the house number staked at the side of the tree-lined road. Tiny branches and early spring leaves hid a portion of the rotted sign, which seemed to have been painted in red by a two-year-old. The narrow driveway flanked by heavy brush resembled a mud bog similar to those from monster truck shows. She would need a four by four to get through, but where could she leave her car on this narrow gravel road, and how far up was the house? In this part of the country, people had large spreads and mile-long driveways, houses always hidden way out back.
She pressed her head back against the headrest. If she turned around and went home, Joe would just show up again and catch her off guard, and she didn’t want that. No, she needed to get rid of him once and for all, set him straight. She didn’t work with horses. She couldn’t and wouldn’t help him, and she planned to say just that, telling him to leave her the hell alone. Margaret stomped the clutch and backed up, the wheels scraping the gravel. She gave herself a quick pep talk, because she would need to get enough speed to sail through the mud. She was determined not to think of the worst-case scenario: If she took it slow and easy, she’d sink faster than a rock in water and would be spinning her wheels to the end of time. The thought of being stuck anywhere in Joe Wilde’s clutches was enough of an incentive for her to rev the engine a couple of times, her foot hitting the accelerator as if she were at the starting line of the Kootenai County stock-car races, with testosterone pulsing all around her.
“Well, here goes,” she muttered. She stomped the clutch, slipped the gear into second, and pressed the gas. The car jolted forward, the wheels grinding into the slick muck. It skidded sideways and, in a panic, Margaret cranked the wheel hard to the right and slid the other way. The radials spewed clumps of mud onto the windshield. Out of nowhere flashed a metal post, and she screamed, twisting the wheel, giving the car more gas. The car whipped around like a Tilt-A-Whirl, the front dipping down as the back end hit the post with the sound of grinding metal, jolting the car to a standstill. The shoulder strap dug into her shoulder, and Margaret gripped the leather steering wheel, sitting in a daze, her ears still ringing from the sharp sound of bent metal. The engine sputtered before her foot slipped off the clutch, and the car jerked forward and stalled.
“Well, that’s just great.” She yanked the handle and pushed open the door before thinking twice about stepping into the mud, which was now level with the floorboards. She crawled over the center console to the passenger side and slid down the window. The metal post was surrounded by the back panel of her car. Thick mud splattered the sides, and more paint had chipped away. She had almost made it another few feet to where the mud ended and the rest of the driveway began.
Margaret scooted back in her seat and slammed her door shut. She thought she could make it, so she cranked the engine and shifted into first, but the tires spun. She reversed and the same thing happened, the wheels spinning her sideways and deeper into the mud. Just the thought of being found here had her jamming the stick shift again into first, then second, giving it plenty of gas. Mud splattered her face and inside the car from the open passenger window, and she stopped again. “No!” she cried, taking in the mud everywhere, over the seat and the places on her white shirt where her brown sweater hung open.
“Hey, what the hell are you doing?” a man shouted.
Her driver’s door was jerked open, and she glanced over all the mud and up into the questioning blue eyes of Joe Wilde. She didn’t know how she did it, but her foot somehow slipped on the clutch, and the car jerked forward, knocking Joe on the shoulder. All six feet of solid muscle landed on top of her.
* * *
Joe couldn’t believe what he’d found. He’d heard a car spinning its tires, and when he jumped into his big blue truck and stopped at the end of the driveway, he realized his mistake. He watched the black sports car spinning its wheels, the back end skidding from side to side, the driver crazed and wide eyed. What the hell was the matter with the woman? It was springtime, and the winter runoff created mud at every low point. His driveway, like most around here, wouldn’t dry out until summer.
