In Debt to the Cowboy (EBOOK)

Silas Miller is going through life just doing what his Dad tells him to. What he’s best at—finding properties in poor neighborhoods to buy out, tear down, and make way for the rich to use. As a son in a billion-dollar ranch family, he sees nothing wrong with that.

Until he meets Theodora Parker, that is.

“Teddy” is a hard-scrabble, redheaded spitfire, helping run her adoptive daddy’s car repair shop. While she’s hard on the outside, she has a soft spot for the elderly and disadvantaged teens of her neighborhood. With a green thumb and a knack for nursing, she has a tender heart for taking care of those in need.

But a rich cowboy wearing a suit, one who wants to buy her shop and take away all she holds dear, well she has no time for him when his car breaks down. That is until her family is in trouble, and Silas might be the only one who can help…

Now Silas must decide if he will go against his family to do the right thing. He’s drawn to Teddy in a way he’s never felt before. Can she ever learn to trust him enough to give him a chance?

TROPES
✅ Sweet Cowboy Romance
✅ Cowboy Comes to the Rescue
✅ Redemption
✅ Opposites Attract
✅ Enemies to Lovers


Author’s Note:
Miller Brothers of Texas is a spin-off series of my best-selling series Brothers of Miller Ranch. Fans have liked the Miller brothers so much I decided we couldn’t give them up just yet! So this new series is all about their cousins in Texas who own a Texan ranching empire. This series will take you on a journey with six handsome brothers who end up helping their father realize there’s more to ranching than just a profit.

Download a Miller Brothers of Texas eBook today and come on this sweet cowboy journey with me!

After purchasing, this EBOOK will be delivered instantly via Bookfunnel email.

Incredible. It was so different from the icy, measured tone she’d taken with him before. She was all heat and bravado, about twenty feet tall and sure of herself as a hurricane. It was baffling. It was awe-inspiring. It was confusing.

It was… hot.

There was silence for a long moment, the tension spiraling ever upward until finally, it snapped.

“Whatever,” the leader said, clicking his tongue. “Y’aint worth the sweat. Come on, let’s go get some food.”

And just like that, the group got back on their bikes and headed out, exchanging poisonous looks with the woman. She seemed to be completely unaffected, watching them with a bored expression before looking to Silas.

“Your car is ready,” she said flatly, lowering the baseball bat and crossing to a smaller door.

Silas stared after her, feeling a bit like he was caught in mood-whiplash.

…who was this woman?


Chapter Five
Theodora

Teddy was irritated.

Actually, that was putting it lightly. It’d been such a stressful, fraught day from start to finish, the last thing she had wanted was to come out of her garden to see five lowlifes on her father’s property.

The long day had all started when they’d gotten a call from the local charity they worked with pretty often. They’d only been told about one car that needed some help to get on the road, but when they’d shown up, they’d found out that both of the vans the charity used were in need of repair.

So that was less than stellar and took both her and Andre way longer than it should have. But then after that, there had been some peripheral cars used for smaller errands that they’d worked on, and before either of them knew it, the day was practically gone.

So coming home and going through her nightly routine had been a huge relief. Relief that quickly dried up when she heard somewhat familiar voices in the alley. She’d grabbed the bat she kept above the mechanic shop door then headed out, unsurprised to see a group of young men that she had run into before.

It wasn’t all of the mini-gang, which numbered maybe about fifteen young men in total—all in their late teens and early twenties. To say they didn’t get along with the shop was putting it mildly, but they had a loose sort of stalemate because all of their families and younger siblings loved either her, her father or the shop. If Teddy ran to their abuelas or moms and tattled, the sky would rain down on them.

But that unspoken truce didn’t cover the rich man whose car was in her shop, and that was exactly who they had cornered.

What was he even doing in the alley? Didn’t he have a lick of sense?

“Thank you for that,” he said, approaching her as she finished unlocking the door to the inside.

“Bad for business if some rich guy gets killed right outside of our shop.”

“Uh… thanks for the concern.”

She scoffed and headed inside. She was tired and cranky, and she was also irritated with the rich man for coming in and trying to poach her neighborhood. The community around her was hard built, with families and stories going back for generations. They opened their hearts and homes to her after everything had happened with her mother. Welcomed her with open arms even though she was pale and prickly and… well, her.

“Anyway, I apologize for the scheduling error. We had some emergencies come up suddenly and our fill-in for the receptionist didn’t get the memo in time. He was trying to be helpful. As an apology, we’d like to offer you ten percent off.”

He blinked at her like he was surprised. That irritated her too. He was always looking at her like she had grown another head. She knew that she wasn’t what people pictured when they thought of a mechanic, but that didn’t mean he needed to stare at her.

“Oh no, that’s fine. You were helping out a charity. It’d be pretty terrible of me to complain about that, or demand compensation.”

That wasn’t what she expected. She had to admit, she had a pretty unimpressed view of the wealthy for the most part. “Huh.”

“You sound surprised.”

He was smirking in a charming way, but instead of soothing her, it just made her feel on the defensive. He was just so… so… pretty. No. That wasn’t quite the right word. Handsome. She was usually too busy to care about such things. The last time she’d had a crush or really noticed a man was in high school, with Marquis White. He’d been in her shop class, and she’d always gotten so tongue-tied around him, even when they’d finally gone on a date.

But the man in front of her, although he was the complete opposite of Marquis, was undeniably attractive.

Add that to the list of irritating things. It would be easier if he was some ugly, scheming old sleaze. If his outsides matched his insides, maybe she could get some good hits in with the baseball bat and blame it on the wannabes she had chased off.

No, she could never hurt someone outside of self-defense. It was one of the tenants Andre had made sure to teach her ever since she had shown a proficiency for putting school bullies in garbage cans. There was a responsibility that came with strength, and she couldn’t abuse it.

Even if the handsome, rich man was clearly coming to her home to wreck everything important to her. He wasn’t the first, and unfortunately, he wasn’t going to be the last.

“Probably because I am,” she said.

“And why is that?”

“You know.”

He leaned against the counter, flashing her a mega-watt smile that he should have to carry a license for, because it felt like a weapon, she didn’t have the right comeback for. “No, I don’t. You could explain it to me.”

Was he… flirting with her? That wasn’t right. Guys like him didn’t flirt with women like her. So that just left mocking. Well, if he wanted to dish it out, she could give it back just as politely. “Because you’re rich, and the rich are always greedy, right? Always wanting more, more, more, until you have everything and nobody else has anything.”

That smooth expression slid from his face and he looked genuinely confused. Was she the first person to not kiss up and to tell him the truth instead?

“Is that really how you see me?”

She fixed him with the most level gaze she could. “How else should I see you?”

He didn’t answer that, and she figured the conversation was done. She really wanted to get to bed. Having the handsome man in her space made her feel off-center. Like she was mad at herself for even noticing that chiseled jaw or those dark, dark, umber eyes that seemed to stare right down to her soul.

“If you head out to the desk, I’ll drive your car out and we’ll handle the payment and get your receipt.”

“Of course,” he said without any other comments.

Good. The sooner he was out of her hair, the sooner she could get in a bath and go to bed, signing off the attraction as a weird blip that she’d forget about in a couple of days.

It only took a couple of minutes to get everything all set, and then she was sliding his credit card and handing him his keys. She could practically smell the lavender bath bomb that she was going to use. They were expensive, so she didn’t have many of them, but it was definitely a bath bomb sort of night.

But as she handed the man his keys, it seemed like he wanted to tell her something.

“Yes?” she asked expectantly.

“This doesn’t have to be a bad process, you know. For you, your family. Or the… community.” He pulled out a small square of paper from his wallet then wrote something across the back. “If you ever need anything or want to discuss what you would need to be happy with a transition, please give us a call. If my family chooses to move forward, I’m sure we can compromise. You know, do the best for everyone.”

She took the card from him, glancing at it before shoving it into the pocket of her jeans.

Huh. Was he feeling guilty? Good. He should. She’d seen what happened when businesses came in, suddenly interested in low-income neighborhoods. They always built something that drove property taxes and prices up until no one could afford to live there anymore. And then all the people who lived there for years would vacate only to have the empty space snatched up by whatever wealthy folks that wanted to get in on a “promising new developmental area.”

“You keep telling yourself that,” she said. She didn’t need to beleaguer the point. He knew how she felt and that was that. She was honest to a fault, but she felt no need to argue with him right outside her father’s mechanic shop.

He didn’t say anything again, although he did hesitate. With one last look at her, he got into his car and finally drove away. As he disappeared, she couldn’t help but hope it was the last she would see of him.

But she also knew it was only going to get worse. The sharks were circling her home, and it would be only a matter of time before they got hungry.