“Just because we leave the party doesn’t mean the night has to end.”
Rancher Xander Currin won’t commit to anyone after tragedy broke his heart. But when his feisty ranch hand Frankie Walsh puts herself at risk to secure her future, his protective instincts kick in. He offers her a ticket to the rich and connected at the Texas Cattleman’s Club gala. But soon combustible desires consume them both...and someone’s going to get burned.
JOANNE ROCK credits her decision to write romance after a book she picked up during a flight delay engrossed her so thoroughly that she didn’t mind at all when her flight was delayed two more times. Giving her readers the chance to escape into another world has motivated her to write over eighty books for a variety of Mills & Boon series.
The McNeill Magnates miniseries
The Magnate’s Mail-Order Bride
The Magnate’s Marriage Merger
His Accidental Heir
Little Secrets: His Pregnant Secretary
Claiming His Secret Heir
For the Sake of His Heir
The Forbidden Brother
Wild Wyoming Nights
One Night Scandal
Texas Cattleman’s Club: Houston miniseries
Rancher in Her Bed
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk.
Rancher in Her Bed
Joanne Rock
ISBN: 978-1-474-09238-8
RANCHER IN HER BED
© 2019 Harlequin Books S.A.
Published in Great Britain 2019
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
® and ™ are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.
Contents
Frankie Walsh understood that her generation had killed romance.
Sure, some people said that dating apps were responsible. And it was true the swipe-left mentality definitely smothered every last hope of spontaneity and excitement. But whether the blame rested with millennials or apps or the parenting that had let a crop of kids grow up thinking they were the center of the universe, Frankie agreed with the consensus among her girlfriends that romance was a thing of the past.
Which begged the question, why was she lingering outside the main house at Currin Ranch, heart fluttering wildly while she hoped for a sighting of her boss, Xander Currin?
Because she was ten kinds of foolish, that’s why. She’d already accomplished her errand here—a two-second task of retrieving the keys to the barn where the haying equipment was stored. Xander had kindly left them outside the back entrance on a huge wooden patio table, right where the maintenance manager had told her they’d be. One of the other hands who’d helped with the haying equipment yesterday was out sick today, and he’d accidentally taken the other set.
Frankie had volunteered for the errand so fast the other ranch hands had all looked at her sideways. If she wasn’t careful,