Another cowboy is ready to ride
No, that’s not innuendo. Why do you ask?
This is just one of those boring announcements about how I’m wrapping up a new book and letting you know it’s available for pre-order now over on the Amazon.
If you click the link after June 18, 2025, you won’t be pre-ordering anymore, you’ll be able to download your own copy or add it to your Kindle Unlimited library. (Because I’m sure to forget to come back an update the text on the button.)
The Cowboy’s Friendly Wake-Up Call is Lance O’Leary’s book.
Lance is the youngest of the O’Leary brothers, who own the Delta O Ranch in Slow River Valley. He’s the last to get his story, but he was– by far– the first to fall.
The tropes are in the title: this is a classic friends-to-lovers tale of a guy who’s been in love with his best friend since they were kids. It’s just taken best buddy, and die-hard tomboy, Mercy Jean, a little longer to catch on.
I’ve always loved those scenes in movies where the boy sees the girl dressed up for the first time– you know, those slow motion scenes of the girl walking down the stairs for prom– when her long time “just friends” or otherwise totally platonic guy suddenly sees her in all new light and is instantly and forever smitten.
*swoon*
I think it’s the “finally being seen– really seen” inner fantasy that hooks me.
In Lance and Mercy’s case, Lance has been smitten since they were kids. He’s always known Mercy’s the only girl for him, he’s just been sure she didn’t feel the same way. So the “tomboy in a dress” scene in this book isn’t the moment he falls– it’s the moment he breaks.
I had a blast writing all of the O’Leary brothers, but there was something a little extra fun in it for me with Lance– whose family has known about his “secret” crush on his BFF forever and may have decided it was time to give this couple a little push to get them started.
That involved his brothers finding reasons they couldn’t attend the big shin dig. Then his own mother cancelled the reservation for the second hotel room, knowing full-well they’d have to share one bed– would Kimberly O’Leary do that to her baby boy? You bet she did.
Will it work?
Of course it does (it’s not a spoiler– I promised you a happy ending right up front!) but you need to read the book to see how it goes down.
(Was that more innuendo? Certainly not. Not from me.)
Hey yeah, I know, I’m not great at keeping my notes from the author cave up to date. So the other O’Leary brothers didn’t get posts of their own– and I only barely got the website looking like it’s appropriate to invite company into at all. Seriously, it’s looked like a dorm room with dirty laundry strewn all over the place, empty beer cans, and take-out food containers that should have been thrown away weeks ago, for the last nine years. Yeah, nine. How embarrassing it that?
Lance’s older brothers all have books of their own already. You don’t have to read them in order, but you should definitely read them!
Slow River Valley Ranches: The Men of the Delta O Ranch