“Bull Rush” by Maggie Rawdon is coming on September (and my ARC just got delivered yesterday!) I’m so excited to dive in, but I’m just as excited to show y’all an excerpt today!
What to expect:
🖤 Divorce of Convenience
🖤 Indecent Proposal
🖤 Hate to Love
🖤 Morally Grey Hero
🖤 Former Football Player
🖤 Forced Proximity
🖤 Dark Western Romance
🖤 Small town
Excerpt:
“Why would you even want to do this?” she asks without looking at me.
“Nostalgia.” I’d rehearsed this answer, knowing she was bound to ask.
She lets out a huff, and her eyes flick over me, then dart back to the door.
“You’ve never been nostalgic in your life. It was always forward movement with you.
Always what was next week, next year, next century. Now, suddenly, you like long walks down memory lane?”
“Yes, but it’s also my home of record for the authorities, and I don’t feel like refiling paperwork right now. F*ckin’ hate bureaucracy.” It’s not a lie, just not the whole truth. She tilts her head as if acknowledging that she can understand that much about my predicament.
“I can give you a room in the inn,” she bargains, turning back to me with a hopeful look.
“Nah. I don’t want to be up at the crack of dawn because your ladies are headed out on one of their daily adventures. I want my house. My bed.”
“Fine. Then I’ll move into the inn while you play house. It’ll keep me closer to everything.”
“It’s all or nothing.” I press my luck, and now I have her attention. Her eyes search my
face, and they harden.
“You’d do that? Try to take the ranch and inn away from me? When you never wanted them in the first place?”
“I told you. I’ve had a lot of time to think over the last few months. Reflecting on what I might have done differently if I’d been in a different place.” I offer her a crumb of honesty, but somehow that uneasy admission makes her angrier.
“You get nostalgic and want a do-over, so you just get to crash in here and take everything I’ve spent years working on? All because things got a little rough out there, and now you think you can come home to hide. Pretend you can put it all back like nothing happened. Fuck the rest of us, right?”
I bite my tongue to keep from responding. It took two of us to get where we did when things fell apart. She was every bit as stubborn as I was when it came down to it. But I’m making a big ask right now, and I know it. I deserve some part of this lashing, even if she doesn’t need to be quite so heavy-handed.
“I want a place to stay out of view, serve out the rest of this parole, and have some sense of stability while I figure out what’s next. I’m offering you all of it and a million dollars for the inconvenience. Ninety days and you get it all for the rest of your life. That’s like winning the lotto compared to what I could do.”
“And you f*ck off forever after? I don’t ever have to hear from you or see you again? Your lawyer isn’t going to show up someday pointing to some loophole where you take it all back?” Her arms tighten around her middle.
“If that’s what you want.”
“It is what I want. I don’t even want to be standing here having this conversation with you now. If it were up to me, you’d fuck off immediately and stay f*cked off.”
I bite my tongue to keep myself from pouring gasoline on this fire.
“Yes. I f*ck off forever after. No loopholes.”
“I want it in writing. Tell your fancy f*cking lawyer I want everything in black and white. And I want you to sign it in blood. Anything less and I won’t do it.”
The average person would probably be terrified of her temper, but I love seeing it flare again. Anger means she’s still invested enough to feel something for me. Apathy is the real danger. Right now, I still have a shot to fix this. It might be one deep down in the bowels of hell, with rapidly dropping temperatures and the smell of snow, but I’ll take it.
“Is that a yes then?” I have to bite the inside of my cheek to keep the smirk off my face.
“No.” She practically hisses the word. “I have to think. Talk to Curtis. Make sure my lawyer can’t get me out of this first.”
“Your lawyer?”
“I have one.” Her eyes narrow and sweep over me before she looks away again. “Not to mention I’m still hoping this is a nightmare I’m going to wake up from any minute now.”
“Afraid not, sugar.”
She flicks me another look before she turns to leave the stables.
“One last thing…” I call after her, and she pauses but doesn’t turn around to look at me.
“I just want to be clear. When I say I want my bed back, I mean with you in it.”
I see her bristle, and she flips me the bird over her shoulder before storming out. I turn back to Wolfsbane and run my hand over his neck.
“You notice she didn’t say no,” I mutter under my breath, smiling as I hear the door to the stables slam shut in her wake.
***
REVIEWS OF MAGGIE RAWDON’S BOOKS:
“Personal Foul” (Plays & Penalties #3) — ARC
“Reverse Pass” (Plays & Penalties #4) — ARC
“Pick Six” (Seattle Phantom Football #1) — ARC
“Overtime” (Seattle Phantom Football #2) — coming soon
“Wild Card” (Seattle Phantom Football #3) — ARC
“Play Fake” (Plays & Penalties #1) — coming soon
“Delay of Game” (Plays & Penalties #1) — coming soon
“Before the Chaos” (Queen City Chaos #0.5)
buried in a bookshelf 