A note from Kim Redford
As a holiday tradition,
imagine a big, roaring bonfire with red and orange flames leaping upward along
with spirals of pale smoke. I’ll be in my chair beside the fire, along with
family and friends, in an open meadow surrounded by the sight and scent of
evergreen trees. Bright stars twinkle in the canopy of dark sky above us. Dogs
and cats lounge here and there. Guitar and flute and voice serenade us with favorite
Christmas carols and old-time country songs that stir fond memories of our
close community of loved ones, as well as those who are no longer with us or
who are too far away to be there. We drink hot apple cider, roast marshmallows,
cook hotdogs, and make s’mores as we sing and visit while making plans for
another wonderful year.
And just so you know, there’s always room for one
more at our bonfire.
An Excerpt from A Very Cowboy
Christmas by Kim Redford
Sydney felt the heat of Dune’s gaze and glanced up
at him. He’d moved closer. She inched toward Celeste, her 1959 pink Cadillac,
but if she backed up any farther, she’d be impaled on the tinsel-wrapped
longhorns. Drat that gleam in his blue eyes. He had it whenever he was around
her, and it had a tendency to strike sparks in her.
“You want me to look under the hood?” He leaned
forward with a little quirk of his sensual lips.
So kissable. She
squashed that thought and immediately was swamped with another one that had him
looking under her skirt instead of the hood. What was
wrong with her? She definitely did not want him looking anywhere but at her
convertible. She had to get her mind back on business.
“Are you in a hurry?”
“Yes!” She was in a hurry to get away from him, or
she’d be wearing tank tops instead of sweaters this Christmas.
“You want to step away from Celeste?”
How could she when he was right in front of her? If
she made a single move, she’d be right up against his body. If she could’ve,
she would’ve looked into the distance to try to clear her mind of unacceptable
thoughts, but she couldn’t see over his broad shoulders. He totally filled her
world with his presence.
“Guess you’ve got a lot on your mind.”
She rolled her eyes. He didn’t know the half of it.
She caught her lower lip with her upper teeth in frustration.
He reached out, tugged her lip free with the pad of
his thumb, and gently rubbed back and forth as if to soothe a hurt. “No need to
worry. I’m here to help you now.”
She felt chills run up her spine at his gentleness
and concern. She didn’t mean to do it—and wouldn’t have been so bold if he
hadn’t short-circuited her brain—but she flicked the tip of her tongue over the
edge of his thumb and tasted the essence of him. All male.
“Now, why’d you go and do something I can’t
resist?” He eased his thumb across her lower lip, down her jaw, and captured
the back of her neck with his fingers to hold her head in place as he lowered
his face toward her.
She knew a kiss was coming—right on the side of
Wildcat Road in front of the whole county—and she knew she should say something
or do something to stop him, but she wanted his kiss more than anything else
she could imagine at that moment. It’d been so long since a man had held her or
kissed her that she wasn’t sure she even knew how to respond anymore.
When his lips finally touched hers—just a gentle
brush really, as if he was gauging her response—she felt swept up in a blazing
wildfire.
And yet she sought to keep her wits about her. She
should focus on business, not her own sudden need. She put her hands flat
against his broad chest to push him back, but she quickly realized she couldn’t
budge him because he was so much bigger and stronger. She felt a little shock.
She was five ten—although she’d claimed to be six feet tall since her high
school basketball days when height was critical—and sported enough muscle to
work a ranch, but he made her feel almost petite.
She intended to push him away—absolutely, no doubt
about it. Instead, she found her hands slowly sliding up his chest, making her
hyperaware of the soft cotton of his shirt as his muscles hardened under her
touch. All her senses came shockingly alive. She heard a mockingbird’s song,
caught the tangy scent of cedar trees, and Dune’s taste still lingered on her
tongue. He didn’t move a millimeter, as if he’d waited a lifetime for her to
touch him.
When she reached his shoulders, he gave her another
feather-light kiss that promised more than it gave. Not nearly enough, not now
that her mind had given way to her body. She sighed against his soft lips and
clasped his shoulders to pull him closer. He groaned—as if the ragged sound was
torn from his gut—at her response to him. She returned his kiss, teasing his
lips with the tip of her tongue until she tore another groan from him, and he
plunged inside while he crushed her against him, holding her head in one hand
and her waist in the other as if he’d never let her go.
She moaned as she thrust her fingers into his thick
hair, shivering with heat as he plundered her mouth and made her weak in the
knees. She quickly realized that she had an answer to her question. No, indeed,
she hadn’t forgotten how to give or receive a kiss, particularly one of this
magnitude.
Finally, when she was putty in his hands, he raised
his head and looked at her with eyes the color of midnight. She simply blinked
in response, unable to articulate a single word.
“If you let me into your life—even a little bit—I
promise not to disappoint you.”
Title:
A Very Cowboy Christmas
Author:
Kim Redford
Series:
Smokin’ Hot Cowboys, #3
Pub
Date: October 3, 2017
Third
in a spicy contemporary cowboy series from acclaimed author Kim Redford. Sydney
Steele needs to wrangle cowboy firefighters to model for her charity Christmas
calendar, and Dune Barrett—who she has in mind for Mr. December—is just the man
for the job.
There’s
nothing like a firefighting cowboy to keep you toasty warm this Christmas…
Christmas is coming up, and single mom Sydney
Steele is determined to make this a holiday to remember for Wildcat Bluff
County. She still has to get those pesky, reluctant—and deliciously
attractive—firefighting cowboys to pose for her charity calendar. They claim
they’re too busy pursuing an unknown arsonist to take a break.
Dune Barrett has been flirting with Sydney for
months, so he jumps at the chance to give her a hand. And when he agrees to
pose as Mr. December, she couldn’t be happier. But to really win her over, Dune
will have to convince eleven other guys from his crew to exploit their good
looks for charity…a task much easier said than done.
KIM
REDFORD is an acclaimed author of Western romance.
She grew up in Texas with cowboys, cowgirls, horses, cattle, and rodeos. She
divides her time between homes in Texas and Oklahoma, where she’s a rescue cat
wrangler and horseback rider—when she takes a break from her keyboard. Visit
her at kimredford.com.
Find
Kim Online:
Website: http://www.kimredford.com/
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