The Texan Meets His Match (Lake Howling Book 2) Read online

  Table of Contents

  TITLE PAGE

  DEDICATION

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  THANK YOU!

  SNEAK PEEK

  OTHER BOOKS BY WENDY VELLA

  THE TEXAN MEETS HIS MATCH

  By Wendy Vella

  Annabelle Smith has never had it easy, but she's a survivor. So when her brother cleans out her bank account, she reluctantly turns to the one man she'd vowed to stay away from. Ethan Gelderman is a hot, sexy Texan, who has more numbers in his black book than most men have socks, and placing her trust in him is one of the hardest things she's ever had to do.

  Lake Howling is home to Ethan's closest friends, and it's also where Annabelle "firebrand" Smith lives. Sassy, beautiful and pricklier than a cactus, she's never made it a secret that she wants nothing to do with him, but he sure as hell wants something to do with her. Lord knows, it’s going to be hard to earn her trust, but Ethan’s never backed down from a challenge yet, and he soon realizes trust is just the beginning of what he wants from Annabelle.

  The Texan Meets His Match is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  The Texan Meets His match published by Wendy Vella

  Copyright © 2015 Wendy Vella

  ISBN KINDLE: 978-0-9941157-2-0

  DEDICATION

  This one is for two very special people in our lives, Kim and Harry.

  No words can thank you enough for your support and love.

  You guys rock

  Love you xx

  CHAPTER ONE

  “Hey, Tex, I just saw Ella a few minutes ago. She looked pissed about something.”

  “Wants me to marry her, Roy, and I couldn’t do it. Couldn’t break the hearts of American women by committing to one.” Ethan found his usual smile for the man who had been his doorman for the past three years.

  “You’re a saint, man. I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating.”

  Ethan slapped Roy’s shoulder and made his way out the entrance of the building, letting his smile drop when he was alone. Raising his arms, he stretched and then sighed as he lowered them. Heading left, he took the path that would lead to the coffee he so desperately needed.

  ‘You go cold on me whenever I mention taking our relationship further, and I won’t stay with a man who cannot commit to me, Ethan.’

  Ella’s words had pretty much mirrored those of the other women who’d wanted him to take their relationship further, and his response had been the same also.

  ‘I’m not ready to commit to anything at this stage in my life, Ella. Can we not just continue on as we are and see where it takes us?’

  Of course she hadn’t wanted to continue, and had stormed loudly from his apartment, leaving him alone, without the regrets he was fairly sure he should have.

  Ethan knew the fault was his and not Ella’s or any of the other women who’d walked out of his life, but as the reasons why he couldn’t commit probably involved his family, he’d chosen to ignore them, because that was a place he never went, even in his head.

  Inhaling, he could smell the approach of fall in the air and his eyes sought the water that lay in a large blue body to his right. People were walking or running around the edge of the lake, which was always a hive of activity even at this hour. Shaking his head at such excessive behavior, he headed into town.

  He’d lived in Brook for two years and had never once regretted his move from Texas. After leaving the army, this place had been the next biggest city to Lake Howling, and as that was home to his closest friends, he had settled here with his bird, and started taking people on tours around the beautiful Oregon countryside that surrounded him.

  Born and bred a Texan, he’d never lose his love for his home, but this area was coming in a close second. The mornings were starting to cool and soon fall would give way to winter and they’d be shivering in their beds for a few minutes longer.

  “Commitment-phobic is what I am,” Ethan muttered, disgusted with himself as he remembered the hurt he’d put in Ella’s eyes. Why could he not find that one woman who would make him want a picket fence and babies?

  ‘Love will bite you in the ass when you least expect it, boy,’ he remembered his uncle Mitch once telling him, but he was still waiting.

  Jogging across the road, he headed for his favorite café, almost tasting the first mouthful of coffee, hot and black. He saw her then. Annabelle I’ve got attitude so don’t mess with me Smith. She was striding down the sidewalk, that beautiful body of hers in motion like it always seemed to be. Her golden brown hair swung above her shoulders, and an emerald scarf was tied in a large floppy bow just above one ear. Spine straight, Annabelle didn’t stroll anywhere; she went from A to B without stopping at Z along the way.

  Stepping up his pace, he moved in behind her, happy to watch her walk while she talked into her cell phone. It was just when she opened her mouth that he wanted to run and hide, and usually after she had blistered his ass over something.

  She was from Howling, and close with Ethan’s buddies, so they spent a bit of time together socially. Like him, she wasn’t into relationships; in fact, Ethan had never seen her with a man, so he guessed she kept her private life to herself.

  “I’ll never forgive you for this. Never! I’ve bailed you out so many times, saved your ass from prison, paid for whatever I could, but no more. I don’t want to ever see or hear from you again. This…this, to take everything, I can’t forgive you for that. So now you’re on your own. Don’t call me, no emails, just stay the hell away!”

  Her voice rose on the last word and Ethan could hear the emotion in it. She then wrestled one strap off her shoulder and fired her cell phone into her bag, no doubt never to be seen again if her bag was like those of the other women he knew. She then veered left before he could talk to her and started weaving her way around the few people that were on the street.

  Shocked, Ethan took a few seconds to register what was happening, and then he followed, losing sight of her briefly as she ducked behind a building. He saw her again seconds later as she ran down to the lake.

  Before he could reach her, she’d dropped her handbag, pulled off her shoes and rolled up the hems of her pants. She was ankle deep in water when he arrived.

  “Annabelle?”

  Because he’d surprised her, she had no time to school her expression and the devastation he saw hit him like a fist to the stomach. She turned away when she realized who was standing behind her.

  They’d never hit it off. In fact, other than greeting each other they’d only ever shared insults.

  He bent to unlace his sneakers, pulled them and his socks off, then rolled up the cuffs of his jeans before stepping into the cool water to reach Annabelle.

  “Nice morning for it.” He stood beside her looking over the water to the mountains beyond.

  “Go away.” Her voice was flat and cold and her body was so stiff he was certain that if he touched her she’d shatter.

  “Having a bad day?”

  “Yeah, and it j
ust got worse.”

  She had tears on her cheeks that were running slowly down her face and into the water at her feet.

  “That was just plain mean, Annabelle, and here’s me getting my feet wet, losing the feeling in my toes and all before I’ve even had my morning coffee.”

  She didn’t speak, and Ethan thought that was maybe because she couldn’t. The tears were flowing faster now.

  “See, here’s the thing, Annabelle: I’m a toucher. I can’t stand by and see a woman in any kind of distress and not comfort her, so suck it up, baby, because I’m coming in.”

  He moved to face her, then, as if he were approaching an animal that had really long, pointy, venomous barbs, he opened his arms wide then slowly wrapped them around her body. He could feel the tension in every muscle, so he tightened his grip and hauled her in to his chest. She resisted, of course. Hell, this was Annabelle, the woman who called him the Texan Tomcat and refused to yield to his charms. She’d attacked his manhood in so many ways he’d lost count, and that was just with words.

  “It’s alright, honey.”

  “Please stop.”

  “You know I can’t do that. When there’s a woman in distress, I have to take action. It’s in my genetic makeup.” She didn’t say anything else, so he kissed the top of her head as the tears began to flow faster. The hands she had braced against his chest grabbed handfuls of his shirt. Slowly she softened and that body he’d lusted after for months sagged against him.

  Ethan realized his error the minute he hugged her. There’d always been sparks between them, but they’d kept them at bay like two dogs continually circling each other. Now he knew what she felt like. Her breasts weren’t too big, or too small, but perfect, and pressed to his chest they felt damned good. She was tall, but then so was he, so the top of her head reached his nose. She smelled of roses, the soft scent that drifted into his nostrils as he brushed the flowers in passing on a hot summer’s day.

  “It-it’s okay now, th-thank you.”

  The hands at his chest pushed so he had to release her and she took a step backwards and away from him.

  “These shoulders have to be good for something, honey, so if you need them at any time, they’re yours.”

  She lifted her head and looked at him. Brown was too weak a term for her eyes. They were flecked with gold and reminded him of a lion he had once seen, their depths ever-changing. Usually when they were turned on him they were angry or pissed off, but now she looked beaten and weary, as if just the effort of focusing on him was more than she could handle. Ethan didn’t like that. Annabelle Smith didn’t ever look like this. She was a fighter, tough and ready to blister him with a few well-placed words, but she was never beaten.

  “Annabelle, talk to me.”

  “I’m okay, really, just having a bad day.” She dropped her eyes and waved a long-fingered hand about.

  “I’ve known you for two years, and that look you’re wearing right now is a new one, which tells me that the something bothering you is big.”

  “It’s not,” she snapped at him, which made Ethan feel better, because he could handle her when she did that. “And I don’t want you opening that big mouth of yours all over Howling and telling my friends about any of this, Gelderman, you got that?”

  Before he could move, she’d walked from the water, picked up her shoes and bag, and was heading back into town.

  “Thanks, Ethan, for the hug and the kind words,” he muttered, following her seconds later.

  Annabelle walked up the hill slowly. She wasn’t going to show that smooth-talking Texan what she was feeling; only when she was on the street and out of sight did she look over her shoulder. There was no sign of Mr. Sexy, so she ran. Weaving in and out of the crowd of people, she found a café and entered. She pulled on her shoes, then ordered a coffee before using the restroom.

  Bracing her hands on the edge of the sink, she sucked in a deep, steadying breath, as she looked in the mirror before her.

  “Not your best day, Smith.” Her eyes were red, the bow in her hair had slipped and her makeup was smudged.

  Damn you, Cooper.

  Annabelle had two brothers: Zach, who was the youngest and in the Navy, and Cooper, one year her junior. Unlike Zach, who had always found trouble until he’d walked onto his first ship, Cooper had been a brother that any sister would envy until he left Howling to go to college, and then everything had changed.

  Drugs, alcohol, gambling—he had embraced every vice he could, and in doing so had pulled Annabelle and Zach into his sins. At first, they had both sent Cooper money every month, paid his debts, but eventually what they could send was never enough.

  When he followed a girl to Vegas, she and Zach had flown there to try to get him to come home, and when he’d refused, Annabelle had found counseling and rehabilitation services who would take him. Cooper had refused any help, declaring that he could clean himself up, but what he’d done was the opposite, and now he’d cleaned out her bank account.

  Cooper was a computer genius who could hack into anything, and she’d foolishly believed he would never do anything like that to her, but now she knew better.

  $25,000 had been in that account. The money for her mortgage payment, the money to buy food, and the extra she’d been saving in case of emergency and in the hopes that maybe one day she could take a holiday somewhere.

  “And now I can’t make my next payment,” she whispered to her reflection.

  She’d needed to cry again, but this time she wanted to howl, loudly. She needed that release because now she was no longer numb, she was just plain angry. How could her own flesh and blood do this to her?

  ‘I couldn’t steal from anyone else but you, Belle. If the authorities found out, I’d be arrested.’ Cooper had said those words to her as if they justified everything, but to Annabelle they were just the last step in a long line of excuses, steps toward the destruction that she had fought to save him from. No more. Now he was on his own and could go to hell for all she cared.

  Her cell phone buzzed in her bag. Pulling it out, she saw it was Cooper calling, and shoved it back in. She knew the process; he’d always done this when he’d hurt her. He would call her constantly until she forgave him, but not this time. This time she was cutting him off.

  Rubbing the sharp pain in her chest that thought gave her, she pushed aside visions of the sweet little boy he had once been, and then washed her face and repaired her makeup.

  Christ, she’d just wept all over Ethan Gelderman, and now he’d be wondering why. Him of all people, the man who was a walking ball of hormones and had more women in his life than most men had socks.

  He’d been nice to her, she had to give him that, and being held by him had been wonderful for the brief time she’d allowed it, but then reality had returned. She didn’t want his pity, or his help. She needed to sort this out for herself, like she always did. Besides, he was one man she’d always vowed not to get to close to.

  “Pull yourself together, Annabelle,” she said, drawing back her shoulders. You’ve been in bad situations before. This is just one more in a long line.

  Twenty minutes later she walked into the bank and asked to speak to the manager, in the hopes that she could secure a second loan, or top up the first. Annabelle wasn’t hopeful; because of Cooper, she’d done this twice before, and last time her bank manager had said they couldn’t do it again.

  An hour later, she stood looking at her car. It was old but tidy, and Jake kept it running sweetly. She would have to try to sell it today, here in Brook, because if she did it in Howling, everyone would know and ask her why.

  When the bank manager had said no to more money, Annabelle had simply smiled, shaken his hand and said that she would have to live with her old car for a few years longer. She was good at hiding her feelings.

  She couldn’t get hold of Zach for a loan or to see if Cooper had cleaned him out too, as he was somewhere at sea. She was on her own, but she’d been there before, and she was a survivor.
But I’m sick of surviving, a small voice inside her head said, which she ruthlessly squashed.

  Yes, she had friends back in Howling who would want to help her if she told them what was going on, but she didn’t want to go there. It was stupid, and Cooper had done nothing to deserve her loyalty, but Annabelle didn’t want people judging him when he came back…if he came back to Howling. There was also her pride; seeing the pity in her friends’ eyes if she told them what had happened would destroy her. She’d grown up with pity, and remembered the acid taste it had left in her mouth.

  Annabelle could feel the panic building inside her as she thought furiously of what to do next. If she sold her car then she would have no independence, no way to leave Howling without relying on someone else, but if she didn’t she’d have no money until her next payday, which was still two weeks away.

  “It’s a car.”

  Dear God, not him. Annabelle sucked in a deep breath to compose herself before she said, “Go away, Gelderman.”

  “You were looking at it as if it held the answers to eternal youth, which by the way you don’t need, since you have that whole younger than you are look working already.”

  “Whatever.” Annabelle refused to acknowledge that her heart beat just a little faster when the tall, handsome Texan was near. She would not let that slow drawl slide down her spine like liquid honey.

  “Need help with something?”

  With a loud sigh, which she knew he heard, she turned to face him. The problem was, he was just so damned fine to look at. Annabelle didn’t have to look up to many people, but he was one of them, topping her by several inches. His black hair was cut short, blue eyes framed by black lashes and brows. His face was made up of angles, a square jaw, high cheekbones, and a long nose, but it all fit together so well that most women usually stopped to admire him when he walked by. The man was a walking, talking magnet for the female gender, young or old, and to top that off, he had a smile that flashed white teeth and a slow Texan drawl which he always used at precisely the right time in precisely the right tone, especially if it was accompanied by his smooth good manners.