Taming Travis (Wishing Well, Texas Book 4) Read online

  Taming Travis

  by

  Melanie Shawn

  ‡

  Copyright © 2017 Melanie Shawn

  Kindle Edition

  All rights reserved. This copy is intended for the original purchaser of this book. No part of this may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without permission in writing from Melanie Shawn. Exceptions are limited to reviewers who may use brief quotations in connection with reviews. No part of this book can be transmitted, scanned, reproduced, or distributed in any written or electronic form without written permission from Melanie Shawn.

  This book is a work of fiction. Places, names, characters and events are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locations, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Disclaimer: The material in this book is for mature audiences only and contains graphic content. It is intended only for those aged 18 and older.

  Cover Design by Wildcat Dezigns

  Copyedit by Deanna McDonald

  Proofreading Services by Raiza McDuffie

  Book Design by BB eBooks

  Published by Red Hot Reads Publishing

  Rev. 1.0

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Coming Soon to Wishing Well, Texas

  Excerpt from Whisper Lake Romance

  Other Titles by Melanie Shawn

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  Travis

  “One smile from a good woman is worth more’n a dozen handed out by a bartender.”

  ~ Walker Briggs

  Never take sand to a beach. That’s always been my philosophy when it came to bringing a date to a wedding. And for the past twenty-seven years that I’d been on this planet, it had worked out well for me.

  Well, at the very least, the past twenty-five years. I had documented proof. There was photographic evidence of two-year-old me kissing the flower girl at one of my aunt’s weddings.

  As I looked around the crowded reception of my brother Trace’s wedding, the realization sank in slowly that my philosophy had hit a snag. The problem arose from the fact that I’d been playing at the same beach which—instead of an ocean or lake—was the size of a kiddie pool, and I’d built just about every castle I could with the grains available to me.

  Wishing Well, Texas was my home. I was born and raised here. I loved it. But it was the size of a postage stamp. And my family made up half the population. Or at least with eight siblings, it felt that way.

  Over the past year, two of my brothers and my only sister had all found their happily ever afters and were either hitched or about to be. When I finally decided to settle down, this was definitely the place I would be doing my settling. But until then, I planned on having as much fun as possible. But my well of fun may have dried up in Wishing Well.

  Turning away from the festivities, I rested my elbows on the bar top and sighed. When the bartender walked by I lifted my hand. “Jack Daniels. Straight.”

  A harsh slap on my left shoulder caused a sting to vibrate through my body like the steel of a church house bell being rung. I did my best not to flinch. My injury was just that, my injury. It was no one else’s business. I sure as hell didn’t want people asking me about it or worse, finding out how I acquired it. If the truth came out not only would I never hear the end of it, I knew that it would come with some insistence on modifying and/or limiting my work load.

  “Two sons down, six to go.” My dad’s baritone voice boomed in the small corner of the reception hall and was amplified over the music and chatter. “The boys and I are taking odds on whose going to be next.”

  The “boys” my dad was referring to were all in their fifties. Jasper Reed, Owen Calhoun Sr., Rowan O’Sullivan and my dad, Walker Briggs, had been friends most of their lives. All of the men had families of their own and one of the “boys” favorite pastimes was gambling on their collective offspring.

  “Where am I ranking in the standings?” I asked as I rolled my shoulder as inconspicuously as possible to try to relieve some of the white-hot pain searing through it.

  My dad stared at me blankly before his head fell back and a raucous laughter burst out of him. When he straightened he wiped the tears from beneath his eyes. “You got me there son. For a split second I thought you were serious.”

  I was. Instead of pointing that out I offered who I thought would be at the top. “Lemme guess, Wyatt’s at the top of the leader board.”

  Out of all the Briggs brothers, my second to oldest had always been the most romantic of the bunch. His relationships were always serious and lasted for years and there was almost never a large gap between them. The family had started referring to him as a serial monogamist when he was in his mid-twenties, and he was creeping up on his mid-thirties now and had yet to like anyone enough to put a ring on it.

  “Yep, that’s right. Wyatt’s in first place.”

  “Hey, now! What’s going on here?” Jasper Reed, the sheriff of Wishing Well, approached us in full cop mode. “No cheating! No insider trading!”

  My dad held his hands up as he declared his innocence. “Now then, Sheriff, I was just shootin’ the breeze with my son, nothin’ more.”

  Sheriff Reed smirked. “You tell him he was at the bottom of the pack?”

  No. He didn’t.

  “Didn’t have to.” My dad’s laughter returned. “Who else would be there?”

  Sawyer, for one and Cooper for two.

  I knew I’d be in the bottom three, but I sure as hell didn’t think I’d be coming in dead last. Sawyer was a confirmed bachelor, as in he confirmed his bachelor status any and every chance he got. Maybe it was because he was the oldest of nine kids and had, by default, been saddled with the most responsibility, or maybe he just liked his freedom. I’d asked what his aversion to wedded bliss was, but my eldest bro wasn’t the best communicator, especially about his feelings—which I assumed he had, but had never witnessed myself.

  And then there was Coop. Cooper Briggs never met a woman he didn’t love, and that didn’t love him back. He put the man in womanizer. It wasn’t that he cheated, technically, he would actually have to commit for that to happen.

  So how in the name of Johnny Cash was I in last place?

  It shouldn’t bother me…so why did it?

  Sheriff Reed’s wife, Loretta, joined our trio. After greeting both my dad and myself with a kiss on the cheek, she wrapped her hand around her husband’s arm and announced, “Walker Briggs, I was sent here to tell you that your wife’s lookin’ for you.”

  Setting his drink down with a nod, my dad winked. “Duty calls.”

  I watched as he did a quick search of the room and saw the exact moment that his eyes found my mom. His tell was easy. His face lit up like the lights in the Electric Parade at Disneyland. Every time he saw her, the love, the attraction he felt for her shined
through.

  My parents had been married almost forty years and in all that time, that light had never dimmed. Not when she sent him back out to the store after he’d just returned from a grocery trip because she’d forgot to put something on the list. Not when he’d just sat down to watch a game and she needed him to reach something, fix something, or find something. Not when she’d wake him up from a nap after Sunday church to help her with a project that she’d promised her ladies’ group.

  It didn’t matter what my mom did, if she frustrated, interrupted, or inconvenienced my dad, when he looked at her it was clear he thought she was the cutest thing on two legs and the rest of the world just kind of melted away. I’d seen that look my entire life. Subconsciously, it’d become the bar that I’d set for myself for any serious relationship…which was probably why I’d never had a serious relationship.

  “So what are you going to do now that you lost the other half of TNT?” Mrs. Reed asked.

  TNT was a nickname that my brother Trace and I were given when we were kids and had a few, minor incidents with explosives. To this day I wasn’t sure who had coined the not-so-clever name, but the entire town had adopted it and for some reason, still used it.

  I glanced over at my brother Trace. He was decked out in his tux, dancing with his bride. I knew that the rest of the world didn’t exist to him. As he looked down at Cara, he had the same look my dad had when he looked at my mom.

  Some people in town were surprised when Trace and Cara had gotten together, but I wasn’t. From the time we were in grade school, I’d seen my brother look at her the same way he was looking at her right now. He’d been a goner before his balls had even dropped.

  If there was one thing that I’d learned over the past year, it was that when Briggs men fell, they fell fast, they fell hard, and they fell forever. Just like my dad when he first laid eyes on my mama on the playground when he was six years old. It was game over.

  I was beginning to think it was hardwired in our DNA.

  “I think I’ll be a’right.” I grinned a grin that had made girls blush and women fan themselves since I hit puberty, and dipped my head towards the room at large. “Plenty to keep me occupied.”

  “That’s right, son.” Sheriff Reed nodded. “And don’t you forget it. I’ve got fifty bucks depending on it.”

  “Jasper Timothy Reed!” Mrs. Reed swatted her husband’s arm. “I heard a rumor that you boys were placing bets on these kids’ love lives, but I thought for sure you’d have more sense than that.”

  Sheriff Reed looked at his wife with the look. “No, ma’am. I don’t. How about I spin you around the dance floor and you can try to talk some of that sense into me?” He offered his hand with a wag of his brows.

  Mrs. Reed’s head fell back and she giggled as her husband took her hand, spun her out, pulled her back in and two stepped them onto the dance floor.

  As I watched Sheriff and Mrs. Reed, my mom and dad, and Trace and Cara swaying to the music, each couple oblivious to anyone else around them, an unfamiliar feeling crept up in my chest. It was the same feeling I’d gotten when my older brothers got a toy or a bike I’d wanted as a kid. It was the same feeling I’d gotten when my best friend Bentley Calhoun received a brand new F150 for his sixteenth birthday and I’d had to share my dad’s old pickup with two of my brothers. It was envy. Maybe even a little jealousy. I wanted what the couples on the dance floor had.

  I’d never been lonely a day in my life. I came from good stock and had good genes. I was six foot two inches of farm-sculpted muscle with a smile a mile wide and hazel eyes that alternated between shades of green and golden brown depending on my mood and what color I was wearing. And that was just what you could see with the naked eye. I’d also been blessed with my mama’s sense of humor, my dad’s work ethic, and a charm that I liked to think was all my own. Getting a girl was easy, but finding the girl seemed to be near impossible.

  “Care to dance, cowboy?” I turned and saw one of the Turner triplets holding out her hand. They were identical, so it was difficult to tell them apart, but if I had to hazard a guess, I would say it was Madison. She was the most outgoing of the three. Maisy was shy and had it bad for my best friend Bentley and I’d already played in Melody’s sandbox so I doubted there was any way it was her asking me to dance.

  “Sure thing, darlin’.” I winked as I downed my drink and set the glass back on the bar top.

  I offered her my arm and she accepted. When we walked past the table the Calhoun family was seated at, she snuggled in a little closer to me and I knew that my deductive skills had failed me. It was not Madison on my arm, but Maisy. And this dance had a purpose attached to it. It was to make Bentley jealous.

  The girl on my left had had a thing for Benny since we were in high school and he’d never done anything about it, even though I’d always suspected the feeling was mutual. I never understood why he’d never gone there. And, up until now, Maisy had always been too shy to act on it, but apparently she was tired of waiting.

  Hell, if Maisy wanted to use me to light a fire under Benny’s ass, well, I guess maybe there was a little more TNT left in me than I’d thought because I was more than happy to be the fuel that sparked that flame. Some people might consider it stirring the pot, but I liked to think of it as inspiring healthy competition. Growing up with so many siblings had instilled in me that particular perspective on things.

  Lifting Maisy’s hand up in the air, I spun her around before pulling her into my arms. And instead of heading to the middle of the floor, I stayed on the outside of the wooden square so that every time we two stepped by the Calhoun’s table, Benny would have a front row seat to our show. By the third pass I saw out of the corner of my eye that Benny’s jaw was tense and his stare fixed and hard. Good. Our little performance had garnered the audience that it had been directed at and was getting the reaction we’d hoped to elicit.

  Leaning down, I whispered in Maisy’s ear, “Looks like the fish has taken the bait.”

  Her large, brown eyes widened. “What?”

  “I know this was all for Benny’s benefit, and it worked. He looks fit to be tied.”

  “Oh…you knew…” A blush rose on her fair cheeks.

  At just the right moment I dipped her and she gasped with surprise. Then leaning down close I said, “When this dance is over, go outside for some air. If he follows, all you have to do is reel him in.”

  Panic registered in her eyes as I pulled her back to a standing position. I could practically feel her heart pounding in her chest. She nodded as she took a deep breath and replied shakily, “Okay.”

  The song ended, I lifted her hand to my mouth and kissed it. “Thank you for the dance.”

  She nodded again, looking even more flushed than before. Now, I knew that it was because she was nervous about whether or not Bentley would follow her, but he didn’t. In fact, from where he was sitting, I was sure it looked like a very intimate moment between the two of us.

  As she walked off the dance floor I casually headed back to the bar. Before I’d even made it half way, I noticed Bentley curse under his breath, grab his Stetson, and follow behind her.

  I couldn’t help the shit-eating grin I knew I was sporting. Playing cupid had always been a hobby of mine. If I didn’t think that the two of them would be a good match, I’d never shoot an arrow in my best friend’s direction. But I knew they would.

  Maybe it was because I’d watched my parents and seen what true love, what real love, was. Whatever the reason I’d always had a sixth sense about people when it came to relationships. I could look at a couple and tell you if it was the real deal or not. It was a pretty useless ability to possess, and if I’d had a choice I definitely would have preferred super strength. But since that wasn’t my gift, it was at least nice to use my powers for good and not evil.

  My eyes tracked Benny as he disappeared out of the large double doors. I was just about to turn my back to the door when my entire world stopped spinning. Time stood s
till. I froze in place, unable to move, unable to tear my gaze away from the angel that had just entered the room.

  With long blonde hair, a button nose, flawless skin and full pink lips, with the bottom lip just slightly larger than the top, she was the prettiest thing I’d ever laid eyes on. And that was saying something because I’d been a judge for the Miss Texas pageant for the past six years. But it was more than just her beauty, there was something else about her. I felt drawn to her.

  My chest tightened in anticipation as I watched her eyes search the room. It was obvious that she was trying to locate someone specific. It shocked me how much I wanted to be the man she was looking for.

  When I got caught in the crosshairs of her scan, she did a double take and blinked as her plump lips parted. From across the room I couldn’t be sure, but if I was a gambling man I would say that she gasped.

  Then, everything around us—my family, friends, the entire town of Wishing Well—ceased to exist when her mouth turned up into a smile as big as the state of Texas.

  That was all it took for my legs to start working again. Without breaking eye contact I started across the room, my heart pounding rapidly against my ribs with anxious expectation. Unfortunately, before I made it two steps Colton McCord—whose baby sister was the bride—stepped up to the mystery blonde and pulled her into a hug.

  Our eye contact broke and as I watched the embrace my stomach twisted like a dishrag being wrung out. Thankfully, they separated quickly so the pain of what I assumed was jealousy was short-lived. Looking up at Colton she began talking animatedly. It was clear that the two of them knew each other, but if my relationship radar was dialed in, I didn’t think it was anything romantic.

  Thank God.

  “Travis!” A very familiar, very irritated voice snapped me out of my love-struck haze.

  I turned and saw my mama standing next to me with her hands on her hips. When Dolly Briggs took that stance, it was never a good sign.

  “Do you have cotton in your ears? I said I need you to go in the back and look for glasses for the toast.”