Brothers of Cooper Ranch
By: Leslie North
Bella Whitmore is the heir to the Whitmore Shipping fortune. Refusing to be pigeon-holed into the socialite box, Bella has worked her entire life to show her father that she can be the son he never had and take over the Whitmore Shipping Empire. So when she wakes up, on a ranch in Montana, missing the memories of the last month of her life, you’d think that would be the worst case scenario. And it is…until she realizes the devil she’d worked so hard to avoid for the last year is now her husband.
Sawyer Cooper knows he’s a devil. Handsome, charismatic, and with an eye for feeding people’s vices, Sawyer’s reinvented himself as a shark in the business world, but very few realize that he’s actually a Cooper of the Country Coop fortune. But rather than resting on the laurels (and red-neck reputation) of Country Coop, Sawyer wants to show the world exactly how important farming can be. To do this, he needs Bella Whitmore’s help. Every bit as beautiful as her name suggests, and smarter than everyone else in the room, Sawyer knows that she could make his dreams come true, both inside and outside of the bedroom. And after a year of pursuing her, she’s finally said yes -- to everything.
But after a horseback riding accident, Bella’s brain has reset back to the beginning, and Sawyer was never good at starting a game over. Especially not after he’d already won. Now, Sawyer needs to figure out how to woo her for a second time. Because this time around it’s not just his professional pride on the line: it’s his heart.
1
SAWYER
Bella Whitmore stood on the opposite end of the art gallery and stubbornly pretended not to notice him.
Over the last year she had gotten extremely good at pretending, Sawyer thought to himself. A man less versed in their game might mistake the New England goddess's inattention for actual disregard. Everything about her drew his attention—her lush red lips poised neutrally; her slender body perfectly poured into her scarlet dress; her wineglass held effortlessly aloft, as if the expensive nectar she drank was as light as air. Her copper hair cascaded down her bare back in glossy, glamorous waves, drawing a curtain over her naked shoulder blades without ever quite concealing them.
She had a lot of nerve to show up looking so goddamned gorgeous and not deign to give him the time of day.
Sawyer Cooper liked nerve.
Their game had been going on for the better part of a year now. Function after function, they would circle each other—or more accurately, he would circle, like a wolf closing in on an unsuspecting pronghorn—and when he had all but backed her into a corner, she would finally turn to acknowledge him with a show of polite surprise.
God, their game of cat and mouse turned him on more than he had ever imagined it would. He’d been crossing paths with her since he settled in Boston, and she was one of the reasons he’d stayed so long, even enduring stuffy events like this one. He liked to keep his distance from Montana anyway—and the family business he wanted no part of. The Country Coop chain of farm stores was his family's legacy; it was an empire, all right, but in a family of three brothers, could you ever really be the undisputed king of it? No, Sawyer wanted to make his own waves in the world, and that meant divorcing himself completely from Country Coop and its redneck reputation.
Sawyer wanted a lot of things, but he had never wanted to bed a woman as thoroughly—and hopefully repeatedly—as he wanted to bed Bella. Problem was, the vixen knew it. How could she be oblivious, when Sawyer himself made it so obvious? He had done everything except outright ask her for a romp between the sheets. He still had some shred of pride, despite Bella's persistent ability to test it.
Looking like that, tonight just might be the night she brought him to his knees.
Tonight's art opening was an ever-revolving carousel of Boston's most prominent art aficionados. Of the two hundred or so guests milling about looking at the wild horse exhibit, Sawyer was probably the only one who had been anywhere near a real mustang. He was aware of the stares he was getting and quietly preened at them; he didn't mind being a part of the exhibit. Besides, he knew he looked good, and what he looked best in was the Western shirt and buckle and boots, dressed head to heel like a cowboy who had just come off the circuit. His attire tonight was a calculated choice and one that he intended to work in his favor. He could tell from the female attention he was getting that it was already working wonders with the ladies—whether or not it would work with one beautiful lady in particular remained to be seen.
