A Cowboy Wedding for Christmas
(Part of the Santa’s On His Way anthology)
Mile High #4.5/Tyler Family #1.5
[Lindsay Tyler & Cal Barton]
Open your heart to the holidays with these stories of unexpected love . . .
A BABY FOR CHRISTMAS * Lisa Jackson
The uneventful Christmas Annie McFarlane expected is suddenly anything but. First, there’s the adorable baby left on the snowy doorstep of her Oregon cabin. Second, there’s the extremely attractive, yet extremely angry man claiming to be the father. Liam O’Shaughnessy may be intimidating, but this is one precious gift Annie isn’t giving up so easily . . .
WHAT THE COWBOY WANTS FOR CHRISTMAS * Maisey Yates
When Meg O’Neill’s longtime boyfriend lets her down, again, on Christmas no less, she braves an Oregon blizzard to get to her best friend Noah’s comforting arms. But this time Noah’s not telling her what she wants to hear—he’s telling her the truth, from his heart. And his words just might be the gift Meg’s been wishing for all along.
SNOWED IN * Stacy Finz
Rachel Johnson has found the perfect spot for her second Tart Me Up bakery in Glory Junction, California. Except she’s in fierce competition with hunky bar owner Boden Farmer. Worse, while the icy rivals await the city’s decision, they end up catering the same Christmas Eve mountaintop wedding—and getting snowed in. But sometimes a loss of electricity generates a different kind of heat . . .
A COWBOY WEDDING FOR CHRISTMAS * Nicole Helm
Big city art teacher Lindsay Tyler isn’t just back home in Colorado for her brother’s wedding at the Barton Christmas Tree Farm and Ranch. She’s back for good. She just hasn’t told anyone yet—including Cal Barton, the ex-boyfriend she left behind. Will it take a Christmas miracle for him to welcome her back with open arms? . . .
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Excerpt
Chapter 1
Lindsay Tyler remembered exactly what she’d said to her oldest brother when he’d asked if she’d feel weird about him getting married at her ex-boyfriend’s family’s Christmas tree farm.
Why would I care about that?
No matter that Cal still lived in her head as the paragon of boyfriend-ness that no other man she’d dated had come close to. It had been years since she’d decided she wanted more than Gracely, Colorado, and Cal Barton.
Why would I care about that?
As she turned onto the lane that would lead to the Barton Ranch and Christmas Tree Farm, she realized why she would care. Too many memories, sweet and increasingly nostalgic with time. There had been years of her life when she’d been so sure she’d marry Cal, move into the house at the end of this lane, and that would be it.
But he hadn’t wanted her more, and she hadn’t been willing to sacrifice seeing a different world for him.
A different world that hadn’t fit her like the glove she’d expected it to. A different world that never quite lived up to home. Oh, she was glad she’d done it. Six years of independence and learning to be Lindsay Tyler outside of her wonderful but overbearing family. She’d needed that.
But coming home . . . Well, it was the right step now. Adult, twenty-four-year-old Lindsay needed home. And for good.
She still couldn’t believe herself. Instead of traveling the world or being a famous artist, she was going to student teach and then ideally get a job in the fall where she’d once been an elementary school student.
It was such a joke after all her grand proclamations when she’d left the Tyler Ranch. An embarrassing one. So embarrassing she still hadn’t told her family she wasn’t just coming home for Christmas vacation. She was home for good.
The thought of telling them made her a little sick, so she was more than happy to fall into wedding plans for her oldest brother and his soon-to-be wife. Even if it meant driving up to the Barton house.
The arching sign over the entryway to the Barton Ranch and Christmas Tree Farm read just that in block red and green letters and had for something like a century. She’d always liked that, that Cal had roots just like hers. Old and settled into the land, but unlike her family’s straightforward cattle ranch, Cal had this amazing, festive, and unique history.
Cal was none of those things, which had always pleased her. Her gruff, taciturn cowboy whose smile was mostly just for her because he didn’t smile for much else.
She needed to get over the nostalgia train and focus on what was ahead of her. Her brother’s wedding. Christmas with her family. And, at some point, swallowing her pride and telling them she was back for good.
Merry Crappy Christmas.
She pulled up behind a line of her family’s trucks. The Barton house was decked out with an impressive light display. Before Cal’s mother had abandoned the family, Cal’s dad always spent days and days getting it just right. After that, the task had fallen to Cal and his sister, much to Cal’s consternation. He’d bitterly resented the Christmas tree portion of his family’s legacy, especially after his mother had left a second time, but Gracely depended on Barton’s for a festive Christmas tree getting experience, and Cal couldn’t say no to the influx of cash in the cold winter months.
She really had to stop thinking about Cal. Tonight was about Shane and Cora’s wedding. The coming days were about celebrating that and Christmas with her family. Being on Barton property didn’t really matter.
She stepped out of her car, finding her footing on the slick, snowy ground. The quiet of rural Colorado wrapped around her like a warm blanket. No matter that coming home involved swallowing her pride, she was happy to be here. Happy to be back where she could see the stars spread out like a canvas of joy above her, where she could go outside to feel perfectly alone and perfectly safe.
“I’ve missed you,” she whispered fancifully into the dark. She carefully walked up to the porch stairs, then crested the gorgeous wrap-around porch that was lit up to blazing with glowing white lights. Wreaths hung in every window and two small Christmas trees sat in pots at the corners of the porch. It was the picture-perfect place to have a Christmas wedding. That was for sure.
Footsteps and grumbling interrupted the picturesque quiet. Lindsay lifted her arm to knock on the front door, but then the source of the noise came around the corner and Lindsay forgot to hit her fist against the door.
Because bathed in the warm glow of the Christmas lights, the cowboy hat low on his head, was a man who could have been any ranch hand or friend of Sarah’s.
But he lifted his gaze.
“Cal.” She said his name on a whoosh of breath, because he’d always taken away her breath a little bit. Something about the midnight black hair and the shock of summer sky blue eyes.
And now he wasn’t just tall and lean. He was broad. Sturdy. She’d always thought he was the most handsome man in Gracely County, but now that she’d spent some time outside of Gracely she understood the truth.
He was one of the most handsome men ever, anywhere.
Crap.
“You seem surprised to see me on my own porch,” he said, and she didn’t remember his voice being that low and deliciously raspy. She didn’t remember that hard, mean line to his mouth geared at anyone except his stepmother.
To be on the receiving end was more of a blow than she expected it to be. Still, she cleared her throat and forced her mouth to curve. “No, no. I just . . . You look so much different than the last time I saw you.”
“Funny,” he returned, giving her a quick once-over. “You look exactly the same.”
Which shouldn’t sound like an insult considering he’d once considered her the prettiest girl in Colorado—his words. But the way he said it now . . .
Well, humph.
“Well, I, uh, my family is here. I’m meeting them. Shane’s . . . wedding.”
He grunted in assent, moving for the door. Except she was standing in front of it, her hand still raised and ready to knock.
Cal. Cal was standing there in front of her, and she didn’t know what to say or even feel. She’d avoided him at all costs on visits home for six years. At most, she’d seen him across the street in Gracely proper once or twice, but Cal was happiest on his ranch and she’d avoided anything and everything to do with the Barton ranch.
Now he was right there. Right. There. He clearly wasn’t the boy she’d loved six years ago, but somehow standing on the same porch with him made her feel like that girl again. Naïve and so desperately in love.
“Darlin’, either knock on the door or get out of my way.”
Darlin’. He only ever pulled out that drawl with people he hated, but that didn’t make sense. It had been six years. Surely he didn’t still hate her. “I . . .”
“Did I sprout devil horns?”
“No. No. I just . . . No.” Heat infused her cheeks and she finally got herself together enough to step out of the way, drop her hand, and not be a complete and utter dope.
Cal moved into the space she’d evacuated and pushed the door open. She could have done that. She should have done that. Instead, she followed timidly after him into the warmth of the Barton house.
Not that her face needed to be any warmer.
“Straggler,” Cal announced simply, gesturing vaguely at Lindsay. Her family were sitting in various seats around the Barton living room, Cal’s sister, Sarah, standing in front of all of them.
“Lindsay!” Sarah squealed, and rushed over to envelop her in a tight hug. “Oh my gosh, you look amazing.”
Lindsay laughed uncomfortably, though she hugged Sarah back. “Me? You’re all grown-up.”
Sarah beamed and released her. “Come on in. You didn’t miss much. We were just chitchatting waiting for you to get here.” Sarah ushered her to a couch where Molly and Gavin were sitting.
Lindsay took the seat in between her siblings. “So, let me guess, you’re the driving force behind the Barton Christmas Tree Farm as a wedding venue?”
“Er, well, sort of.” Sarah looked back at Cal, who was standing there stoically in the corner. At his sister’s glance he shook his head and disappeared down a hall Lindsay knew would take him to the Barton kitchen. “It was Cal’s idea,” Sarah said, overbrightly. “But I do most of the work on that front. But Shane and Cora’s wedding is going to be our first.”
“It’s perfect,” Lindsay said, grinning at her future sister-in-law, Cora. She didn’t let that grin or cheerfulness die, even though her head was anywhere but on weddings or Christmas.
No, her thoughts were full of Cal.
***
Cal tossed a frozen meal into the microwave and took out at least some of his irritation on the microwave buttons.
Tylers in his house. Since he was alone, he could scowl. He had nothing against the Tylers in theory. Deb Tyler had been like a mother to him growing up, and Shane and Gavin were good ranch neighbors and decent men.
But no matter that he might like each person individually, they were all blood ties to the one person in the world he expressly did not like.
Lindsay Tyler.
Pretty as ever, too. He hadn’t been lying when he’d told her she hadn’t changed. She looked exactly the same as she had the day she’d effectively shoved a dagger into his heart.
Since he was not a man prone to hyperbole, the fact he’d even think that comparison proved what a betrayal it had been. Cal Barton was well acquainted with desertion and betrayal.
The microwave dinged and Cal scowled at it. A burst of laughter from the living room invaded the quiet of the kitchen.
He wasn’t a particularly fun-loving guy, but the laughter normally wouldn’t bother him in the least. Especially if it meant Sarah was building a little side business for herself. Except this laughter was Tyler laugher and he was almost certain he could pick out Lindsay’s tinkling laugh in the midst of all the other people’s.
He plopped himself onto a kitchen chair and attacked the microwave meal. It was only half-hot, half still cold. He choked it all down anyway. The sooner he was done with dinner, the sooner he could head back outside. He didn’t have any necessary chores left, but there were always extra chores to be scrounged up when he didn’t want to be around people.
Especially Tyler people.
He would have avoided dinner altogether, but when he did that Sarah scolded him and pecked at him like she’d decided to be his mother, and he’d rather avoid watching her childhood issues bleed out all over him.
After all, he had plenty of his own.
He got up from the table and tossed the remnants of the meal. More laughter from the living room, and with all the damn Christmas lights twinkling around him, he really just wanted to punch something.
He hated Christmas.
He hated Lindsay Tyler.
He hated this ugly, black feeling inside of him. He always wondered if it was the same one that had caused his mother to leave them. Twice.
Always on Christmas.
Cal needed to get out of here, but instead he stood and stared at the cabinet of liquor. It was tempting. A Barton Christmas tradition, after all, to get drunk and wax poetic about the woman who’d left you.
But Cal had decided a long, long time ago to be nothing like his father. That liquor cabinet was a reminder.
“You could have said hello.”
Cal glanced back at his sister. She was only nineteen, and Dad had let wife number three (marriage number four since he’d married Mom twice before moving on) talk him into traveling the world, leaving Sarah without the means or opportunity to go off to college.
She was stuck here, and Cal was determined she have something. Something that would fulfill her. Something that would make her happy.
Something that will keep her here.
“I did say hello.”
“No, you didn’t. You said exactly one word, which was ‘straggler,’ and then you stomped back here.”
“I did not stomp. That’s called a manly cowboy swagger.”
She snorted in disgust but grinned nonetheless. Then her smile died. “You know I’m going to ask her.”
“I know.” He didn’t have to like it to know.
“She’s going to say yes.”
“Of course she is. I don’t know how long she’s in town, but Lindsay would never refuse you. No matter what . . .” Which was why he hated Lindsay Tyler after six years, because he knew with everything he was that she was a good person. Pretty and good and helpful, and they belonged together.
But she’d needed more than him and this, and how could he ever forgive her for that?
The fact Sarah needed some help with graphics and whatnot for advertising the Christmas tree farm as a wedding venue had nothing to do with him. Asking for Lindsay’s art help had nothing to do with him. So, he wouldn’t stand in Sarah’s way. No matter how much he didn’t want Lindsay hovering around, even for a short period of time.
“Okay . . . Well . . .” she trailed off, then shook her head and went for the pantry. “The chocolate ones went fast.” She grabbed a cookie tin and opened it. She took two out and placed them on the table. “That’s for being a good little rancher boy.”
“Ha. Ha.” But he took his sister’s cookies, because she was a hell of a baker. Whether it was Christmas or old bad memories swirling, he found himself swayed by an unusual wave of sentimentality. “You’re really good at this. The whole entertaining thing. I’m not. I never will be. Lindsay or no. So, just ignore my manly cowboy swagger and focus on this thing you’re really good at.”
For a second she looked like she was about to cry, which horrified him enough to start edging toward the back door. But she straightened her shoulders and blinked a few times.
“You’re not that manly,” she offered gravely, before bursting into laughter as she headed back out to her waiting guests.
On a sigh, he ate the Christmas cookies and listened to the faint laughter of another family in his living room. Tylers. The whole lot of them. Up in his house and ranch for the next few days.
Christmases were never very merry around the Barton spread, but it couldn’t be worse than waking up to finding Mom or Dad gone, so he supposed he’d survive.
He’d just do everything in his power to avoid Lindsay. It shouldn’t be a problem. She couldn’t possibly want to see him any more than he wanted to see her.
So, that was settled, and he’d eaten his dinner and talked to his sister, and now he could go back to the solitude of the barn and do something that didn’t feel like a knife being shoved in his heart.