Cowboy's Vow To Protect. Carla CassidyЧитать онлайн книгу.

       Chapter 1

      All of the cowboys from the Holiday Ranch surrounded him. Their fists pummeled him. He tried to defend himself but there were too many of them. Each blow shot pain through him. His ribs screamed in protest and his aching knees finally buckled beneath him. When he fell to the ground they viciously kicked at him. His mouth filled with the coppery taste of blood, even though most of the blows were to his body and not to his face or head.

       Help! The plea screamed over and over again in his head, but there was no help coming. In complete defeat, he curled up into a fetal ball on the lush green grass and prayed for it to stop.

      Flint McCay came awake suddenly. Pain...it racked his body and for several long moments he didn’t move. He stared out the nearby window where the first light of dawn cast slivers of light.

      The dream had been so strange. There was absolutely no way the other men on the Holiday Ranch would ever beat him up. They were his brothers. It was a brotherhood forged in painful childhoods and in second chances and them all growing up together here on this ranch.

      He winced as he changed positions. No, his pain wasn’t from his fellow cowboys. It was from years of his own choices and a recent diagnosis that had unsettled him.

      He groaned as he finally moved to a sitting position on the side of the twin-size bed. When Cass Holiday had hired a dozen young runaway boys to work at the ranch, she’d made sure they each had their own rooms in the building the men referred to as the cowboy motel.

      Each man had a private room with an adjoining bathroom. The rooms were small, holding only a twin bed and a chest of drawers. It was to the bathroom Flint now headed, hoping a long, hot shower would loosen up tight muscles and ease some of his pain.

      Years of bull-riding had taken its toll on him. There wasn’t a bone in his body that hadn’t been broken or sprained over the years. Now he had a trunk full of trophies, shiny belt buckles and ribbons to show for his success, and a body that at the age of thirty-four felt more like that of a ninety-year-old.

      Thankfully, the shower helped and he dressed and headed around the building for the dining room in the back. Most of the cowboys were already there, filling plates from the buffet line Cord Cully, a.k.a. Cookie, prepared for them each and every morning. He also fed the cowboys at lunchtime and dinner.

      “Good morning, Flint,” Mac McBride greeted him as Flint fell into the line behind him.

      “Back at you,” Flint replied.

      He filled his plate with bacon and scrambled eggs, with biscuits and gravy and added a spoonful of fruit salad. He carried it over to one of the picnic tables where Mac sat with Jerod Steen, Clay Madison and Dusty Crawford.

      Flint slid into the seat next to Dusty, who had recently welcomed a baby boy into his life with his wife, Tricia. “How’s that kid?” he asked Dusty.

      Dusty beamed. “Growing like a weed. How’s the cabin coming along?”

      Several months ago Flint had bought a couple of acres of heavily wooded land with a clearing perfect for a small house. The cowboys had all pitched in to help him build a cozy, two-bedroom cabin. It was the place he’d live in when he stopped being one of Cassie’s cowboys. And whether he liked it or not that time was quickly approaching.

      “The furniture was delivered last week and all I have left is to finish putting up a porch and do some trim work,” Flint replied.

      “It sure is a sweet location with all the trees and that little brook that runs through the backyard,” Mac said.

      “Yeah, I got lucky in grabbing it before somebody else did,” Flint said.

      “Do you need some help getting the porch up?” Jerod asked. “You know some of us wouldn’t mind coming out to lend you a hand.”

      “No, thanks. I think I can handle it.” The last thing he wanted his friends and fellow cowboys