Paying Their Piper with Passion and Love [Loving in Silver 6] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour)
Authors: Lynn Stark
Tags: #Romance
Loving in Silver 6
Paying Their Piper with Passion and Love
The daughter of one of the wealthiest men in the world, Piper Barrows is guarded accordingly. Her only freedom is when she travels to rodeos to protest the treatment of the animals being used. That’s where she meets Merck Rushton, a hot cowboy. Everything is uneventful until she is attacked at a rodeo by an unscrupulous stock contractor.
Her father restricts her life even more. She can go nowhere alone. It’s a life in a gilded cage. Even having her quirky pets and a drop-dead gorgeous bodyguard in the form of Jace Hunter can’t lessen her heartache.
When Piper can no longer bear being trapped without having a life, she escapes and heads for a place she had been very happy at on visits. When she gets to Silver she discovers the freedom she has always craved and two men to love.
Genre:
Contemporary, Ménage a Trois/Quatre, Western/Cowboys
Length:
88,622 words
Loving in Silver 6
Lynn Stark
MENAGE AMOUR
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
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A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK
IMPRINT: Ménage Amour
PAYING THEIR PIPER WITH PASSION AND LOVE
E-book ISBN:
978-1-62740-028-2
First E-book Publication: June 2013
Cover design by Christine Kirchoff
All cover art and logo copyright © 2013 by Siren Publishing, Inc.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED:
This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.
All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.
PUBLISHER
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
Letter to Readers
Dear Readers,
If you have purchased this copy of
Paying Their Piper with Passion and Love
by Lynn Stark from BookStrand.com or its official distributors, thank you. Also, thank you for not sharing your copy of this book.
Regarding E-book Piracy
This book is copyrighted intellectual property. No other individual or group has resale rights, auction rights, membership rights, sharing rights, or any kind of rights to sell or to give away a copy of this book.
The author and the publisher work very hard to bring our paying readers high-quality reading entertainment.
This is Lynn Stark’s livelihood.
It’s fair and simple. Please respect Ms. Stark’s right to earn a living from her work.
Amanda Hilton, Publisher
My thanks to my husband for helping make all of this possible for me.
PAYING THEIR PIPER WITH PASSION AND LOVE
Loving in Silver 6
LYNN STARK
Copyright © 2013
“You could feed that damned bull sunshine and roses for the rest of his life, lady, and he’d still be the mean, crush-you-into-the-ground rank bull that he is today.”
Merck Rushton glared at the woman he towered over by more than a foot. Hell, it was probably closer to two feet. She was all of about five feet tall with the face of an angel and a voice which sounded like silver bells on a warm summer breeze. Her silver-blonde hair was a mass of twisting curls, but her brows and eyelashes were considerably darker. She was stunning.
His gaze ran over her from head to toe. She was petite with pert little breasts under her T-shirt and a sweet little ass. Under other circumstances he would have asked her what she was doing after the rodeo, but as it was he wanted her as far away from him as he could get her.
“I don’t doubt that, being a bull, he’s aggressive, Mr. Rushton. What I am protesting, questioning, is the need to tighten straps around him, throw a rider on him, and then subject him to a blaring PA system, bright lights, a noisy crowd, and a jangling bell? Wouldn’t it be better to let him live in a pasture where he could just enjoy life?”
Merck managed not to roll his eyes and sigh. Or laugh. Her naiveté was refreshing, but irritating as hell, too. It made it nearly impossible to explain to her, or those of her kind, what was really in store for these animals if they weren’t lucky enough to be given a career.
“I’m sorry, lady, that’s just not how the lives go for these bulls. If they don’t have potential as a rodeo bull, then their future is questionable. Nobody’s going to feed an animal which doesn’t pay its way.”
Gray eyes burned a hole through him. The sweet little pink lips tightened as she glared up at him. He idly wondered if her neck was getting stiff and if she would let him massage it. His cock twitched at the possibility of touching her.
“How would you like it if I pulled a strap tight around your private parts and rode
you
?” she snapped, obviously running out of patience with him and her inability to convince him to change his “evil” ways.
They both realized what she said at the same moment. The double entendre was glaringly obvious. The hot color rushed into her cheeks as he grinned like a lascivious wolf.
“Would that be with or without the bell, Miss Barrows?”
“Oh, fuck, that didn’t come out right! Excuse me one moment,” she told in a strained voice, her eyes looking everywhere but at him.
As she spun around on her high-heeled boots, her shapely ass twitched in her fancy jeans. Merck watched her go, twice as interested in the pretty little pest as he had been five minutes before. If he could get her to stop preaching at him, he thought they could have a lot of fun together. It would be fun of the hot, sweaty, tangle-up-the-sheets kind, of course.
It had been a while since he’d been with anyone and his balls were starting to suffer for it. Shaking his head, Merck grinned and turned back along the aisle between the pens holding the bulls. It was a real shame that Miss Barrows was a pain in the neck. With all that passion, as misguided as it was, he’d like to see what other passions she possessed.
Chuckling at his own nonsense, he went looking for a friend wanting to sell a young animal which was showing a lot of promise as a potential bucking bull. An hour later he had a new bull. The animal was eighteen hundred pounds of real bad attitude and he was currently without a name. He grinned as he looked at the white-and-red-spotted bull.
“Sunshine ‘n’ Roses,” Merck said with a grin, talking more to himself than to those standing there admiring his newest acquisition.
“What was that, boss?” Ross Bennett asked, sounding truly horrified. “Did you just call him
Sunshine ‘n’ Roses
?”
Merck nodded, pleased with his choice. It was perfect. “Yep.”
“Why don’t you just call him Daisy? Or Marshmallow?”
“Because, Ross, I’m naming him in honor of our beautiful little pest, Miss Barrows. I tried to tell her that she could feed these bulls sunshine and roses and they’d still be mean.”
Ross laughed heartily, slapping his friend and employer on the shoulder. “That’s a good one, boss! I saw the little lady running out of here like her ass was on fire.” Merck told him what had caused her swift departure, which made the man laugh so hard the tears poured down his weathered face. “Oh, man, wish I could have been there for that one. It’s too bad she’s so bent on saving these bulls from something that isn’t happening.”
Sobering for a moment, Merck looked at his longtime friend and employee. “Well, that’s not quite true. You know there are a few bad apples out there. I’m just hoping she gets discouraged and doesn’t try to take one of them on. She could get hurt.”
“Maybe you should warn her?”
Merck shook his head. “I believe that would just send the passionate Miss Barrows right out there after them. No, it’s better we police our own. We’re better able to handle it. There’s no telling what could happen if she took on the wrong man or woman.”
He sent up a prayer that Miss Piper Barrows would stop what she was doing. As irritating as she was, he didn’t want to see her get hurt. He thought about calling her father, and then thought better of it. He only knew the man by reputation, but he doubted he would welcome Merck butting into his family’s business.
* * * *
Three weeks after her last protest, when she had tried to convince the stock contractor Merck Rushton to stop supplying bulls for competitions, Piper came face to face with a man who didn’t have Rushton’s sense of ethics. Only now did she see it, recognize it, and wish she had taken his advice. She also wished she had brought some backup with her.
There was a moment of disbelief as the cattle prod made contact with her body. Disbelief, agony, and a sense of falling down the proverbial rabbit hole engulfed Piper as she collapsed into the sawdust at the furious man’s feet.
“That’ll teach you, you meddlin’ little bitch! You’re not gonna come around here and tell me how to do things.”
Piper wouldn’t have to. The moment she was able, she was calling the police. And then when her father found out, if she couldn’t keep it from him, the man was really going to wish she hadn’t caught him in the act of using the prod on a bull. He had stung it over and over again, before the animal was supposed to be readied for the next rider. Oh, her father wouldn’t particularly care about that. But no one harmed something which was his, mainly her.
The bull was amped up and furious. They were dangerous enough, but she guessed he would be ready to kill once he wasn’t confined to a pen. She didn’t envy the man who got tossed from his back.