Herd That ARC Read online

  Text copyright ©2020 Lani Lynn Vale

  All Rights Reserved

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Dedication

  This one is dedicated to all those Wrangler Butt lovers out there. :P

  Acknowledgments

  Golden Czermak- Photographer

  Ellie McLove - My Brother’s Editor & Ink It Out Editing- My editors

  Cover Me Darling- Cover Artist

  My mom- Thank you for reading this book eight million two hundred times.

  Kendra, Lisa, Kathy, Petra, Laura, Mindy, Barbara & Amanda—I don’t know what I would do without y’all. Thank you, my lovely betas, for loving my books as much as I do.

  Table of Contents

  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

  Epilogue

  Other titles by Lani Lynn Vale:

  The Freebirds

  Boomtown

  Highway Don’t Care

  Another One Bites the Dust

  Last Day of My Life

  Texas Tornado

  I Don’t Dance

  The Heroes of The Dixie Wardens MC

  Lights To My Siren

  Halligan To My Axe

  Kevlar To My Vest

  Keys To My Cuffs

  Life To My Flight

  Charge To My Line

  Counter To My Intelligence

  Right To My Wrong

  Code 11- KPD SWAT

  Center Mass

  Double Tap

  Bang Switch

  Execution Style

  Charlie Foxtrot

  Kill Shot

  Coup De Grace

  The Uncertain Saints

  Whiskey Neat

  Jack & Coke

  Vodka On The Rocks

  Bad Apple

  Dirty Mother

  Rusty Nail

  The Kilgore Fire Series

  Shock Advised

  Flash Point

  Oxygen Deprived

  Controlled Burn

  Put Out

  I Like Big Dragons Series

  I Like Big Dragons and I Cannot Lie

  Dragons Need Love, Too

  Oh, My Dragon

  The Dixie Warden Rejects

  Beard Mode

  Fear the Beard

  Son of a Beard

  I’m Only Here for the Beard

  The Beard Made Me Do It

  Beard Up

  For the Love of Beard

  Law & Beard

  There’s No Crying in Baseball

  Pitch Please

  Quit Your Pitchin’

  Listen, Pitch

  The Hail Raisers

  Hail No

  Go to Hail

  Burn in Hail

  What the Hail

  The Hail You Say

  Hail Mary

  The Simple Man Series

  Kinda Don’t Care

  Maybe Don’t Wanna

  Get You Some

  Ain’t Doin’ It

  Too Bad So Sad

  Bear Bottom Guardians MC

  Mess Me Up

  Talkin’ Trash

  How About No

  My Bad

  One Chance, Fancy

  It Happens

  Castiel and Turner

  Snitches Get Stitches

  F-Bomb

  KPD Motorcycle Patrol

  Hide Your Crazy

  It Wasn’t Me

  I’d Rather Not

  Make Me

  Sinners Are Winners

  If You Say So

  KPD Motorcycle Patrol

  Hide Your Crazy

  It Wasn’t Me

  I’d Rather Not

  Make Me

  Sinners are Winners

  If You Say So

  SWAT 2.0

  Just Kidding

  Fries Before Guys (2-11-20)

  Maybe Swearing Will Help (3-10-20)

  Ask Me If I Care (4-14-20)

  May Contain Wine (5-12-20)

  Jokes on You (6-9-20)

  Join the Club (7-14-20)

  Any Day Now (8-11-20)

  Say it Ain’t So (9-8-20)

  Officially Over It (10-13-20)

  Nobody Knows (11-3-20)

  Depends Who’s Asking (12-8-20)

  Valentine Boys

  Herd That

  Crazy Heifer (2-21-20)

  Chute Yeah (3-24-20)

  Get Bucked (4-21-20)

  Herd That

  His Wranglers fit him like a glove. A really tight, leaving nothing to the imagination, glove. Codie wants nothing more than to shove that Wrangler-covered butt straight into the mud.

  Ace Valentine has a smart mouth, a devil-may-care attitude, and those wicked eyes aimed directly at her.

  She doesn’t know what to do with that kind of attention. Especially not from the sweet-talking man that has no problem charming every woman that enters his orbit—everyone but her, at least.

  Ace isn’t sure why Codie Spears had her panties in a twist when it comes to him, but every snub and insult she hurls his way brings him closer and closer to falling for her.

  He’s not sure what it is about the town’s bad girl that draws his attention, but every encounter they have leaves him wanting her until there’s nothing else left to do but have her.

  The only thing is, she’s been convinced by everyone around her that she’s not good enough. Tell a person that she’s a piece of trash enough times, and eventually she’ll start to believe it. It’s going to take a lot of smooth-talking and gentling on his part to get her to see that she’s worth it. And once he has her where he wants her? Well, she’ll make a mighty fine rancher’s wife.

  Chapter 1

  Save a horse, ride a… bike. Nobody wants a fat ass.

  U-Sports bottle

  Codie

  “Yes, Granddad,” I said through shivering lips. “I’m on my way. Yes, I’m okay. No, the truck’s not having any trouble pulling the trailer. Yes. No. Yes.”

  I sighed in frustration when Granddad continued asking me questions. Obviously knowing I was driving in the rain didn’t much matter to him.

  “Yes, I’ll look for Mr. Valentine,” I soothed. “I don’t know how to back up the trailer, so I’m going to ask him to do it. Do you think he will?”

  “Yes,” Granddad immediately replied. “I think he will. Just make sure to say please. He’s very formal.”

  Did I note a hint of satisfaction in his voice?

  Whatever.

  “Listen,” I said, spotting the sign for the Longview Livestock in front of me. “I’m almost there, and I’m about to turn. I love you.” />
  “Love you, too, Codie,” Granddad said in his shaky, aging voice. “Have fun.”

  I smiled at the words coming from Granddad’s mouth.

  He didn’t say ‘I love you’ very often, so when he did, it made the words all the more special to hear.

  Dropping the phone into the seat beside me, I looked in my rearview mirrors and started to slow the large one-ton Dodge diesel dually, making a wide turn into the parking lot and coming to a stop almost immediately after pulling in.

  “Where do I go?” I asked the empty cab.

  My eyes took everything in at once, and my belly started to flutter.

  “Shit,” I growled, turning right and keeping it slow as I accelerated.

  I didn’t know how to drive a trailer, and I’d had to learn almost in a trial-by-fire type way.

  Granddad had entered these cows into the show, and when he got sick, he couldn’t back out because he’d had a ‘gentleman’s agreement’ with the livestock place, whatever the hell that meant.

  I’d tried to tell him we could take them together next week, but he would hear none of it.

  Take them, Codie. You can do it; I have faith in you. Plus, if you have any trouble, an old friend that lives on the next farm over will be there to help you if you have any problems.

  Gritting my teeth, I followed the trailer in front of me to the back of the lot and swung a bitch at the very end of it, coming to a stop behind a pretty silver trailer.

  Granddad had forced me to rent a trailer, and it looked ridiculous. Nothing could’ve signaled me as an inexperienced person more than the bright red trailer with ‘rent me’ on the side of it.

  I’d tried to get Granddad to let me use his trailer, but he’d refused to allow me to even touch it.

  “That’s a fifty-thousand-dollar piece of equipment. If you wreck it, then I won’t have anything to transport Shaggy in,” Granddad said.

  Shaggy was my granddad’s prized bull, and the moneymaker of his farm at the moment.

  At three years of age, Shaggy was the reigning champion, never been ridden for a full eight seconds, prize winner who was babied by my grandfather, and likely the cause of his heart attack.

  Granddad tried to go to every event that Shaggy went to, and I loathed to admit it, but Granddad was no longer a spring chicken.

  Something he’d had proven to him four weeks ago when he’d suffered a heart attack and been informed that he needed to take it easy.

  That’d been my cue to come home, and I’d been with him ever since.

  Four weeks of listening to my grandfather whine about not being able to make any of Shaggy’s games… or bouts…or whatever the hell they were called.

  Then him saying he needed to get some work done, and sell some cows this morning, had come out of the blue.

  He’d been so distraught about ‘bleeding money’ that I’d stupidly volunteered to help him any way I could. Which brought me to now, driving a trailer full of freakin’ cows, in a fucking thunderstorm.

  Once I was fully in a stopped position, I put it into park and reached for my phone, typing out a text.

  Codie (11:11 AM): I’m here.

  Codie (11:14 AM): Where do you want me to go?

  Codie (11:16 AM): Hello?

  Growling in frustration, I snatched up my purse and hopped out of the truck, my new, pretty boots sinking about an inch and a half into a puddle of muddy water.

  At least I hoped it was muddy water.

  Placing the keys into my back pocket, I tucked the phone into my purse and started toward the big white building.

  I smiled at a man who waved at me, his eyes taking in my attire, making me blush.

  I was a city girl at heart.

  I loved Kilgore, I’d grown up in the small town, but I wasn’t a rancher like my family had been before me.

  I was a city girl who loved to wear flip-flops and high heels. I liked to wear dresses more than I liked to wear jeans, and I most certainly didn’t shovel manure unless I absolutely had to—i.e., never.

  And for the last four weeks, I absolutely had to.

  I loved horses. Had adored them since I got my first one at the age of three, but I didn’t like cleaning up after them.

  I liked riding them and feeding them treats.

  Poop wasn’t really my thing.

  Growling under my breath, I picked up my pace, trying my best to ignore the water that was saturating my chambray shirt that had the cutest little rhinestones as buttons.

  By the time I made it to the front door, though, I was soaked to the bone.

  It didn’t help matters that the weather was exceptionally cold, either.

  “Can I help you?” I heard asked the moment my feet stepped inside the door.

  I looked up to find a man wearing a cowboy hat standing in front of me.

  Not that that made him very special.

  Every man in the joint had on a cowboy hat.

  “Hi,” I chirped. “I’m looking for someone.”

  “Who might that be?” the older cowboy asked, bringing his spit cup to his lips and letting loose right there in front of me.

  I tried not to grimace at the disgusting use of the nasty product and instead focused on the area around me.

  The building looked old.

  Really old.

  The paneling on the walls was faux wood and had worn down with time.

  The floors were an off-white linoleum that looked like it’d seen way better days.

  It was almost as if the entire place was stuck back in the seventies.

  “Mr. Valentine,” I replied, finally turning back to the man, grateful to see that he’d dropped his dip cup to his leg.

  I kept my eyes firmly above his waist as I waited for him to reply.

  “What you want with him?” the man asked.

  “He’s supposed to be helping me get some cows unloaded for my granddad,” I explained patiently.

  The man smiled. “He’s at the last shoot looking at the newest bull for sale.”

  He pointed toward a rickety brown door, and I smiled gratefully at him.

  “Thank you,” I acknowledged appreciatively to him as I walked toward the door.

  “Watch your step,” he called from behind me.

  I waved my hand at him and opened the door, stopping when I realized that there were stairs on the other side of the door, with absolutely zero landing for you to walk out on to introduce you to the stairs.

  Steep ones that looked to be about three times the size of a normal stair.

  I looked down at my boots—ones that were brand new and had absolutely no traction to them like tennis shoes—and growled in frustration.

  Taking one last glance back and not finding the cowboy in sight, I climbed up the first step and closed the door behind me.

  The first four steps were the worst, and they evened up the closer to the top I got. It was worse and better, of course. Better because the smaller steps meant I didn’t have to worry about my shoes losing traction. Worse because now that I was so high up in the air, I could see the entire sale barn.

  It was about a football field in length, and about a football field wide.

  There were pens on either side of the walkway that was suspended high above the area down below it, giving each and every person there a perfect view of the entire shebang.

  “’Scuse me,” I muttered to an older gentleman that could rival my grandpa in age.

  He looked fit, though, compared to Granddad. Granddad, although in good shape body-wise, looked just worn out.

  He looked like he’d led a hard life—which he had.

  The older gentleman turned to me and immediately said, “Codie Spears!”

  I blinked, surprised by the outburst.

  “Hi,” I said. “How do I know you?”

  He grinned. “You may not remember me, but you do know me. I’m your mother’s sister’s ex-husband.”

  I
blinked. “Aunt Peggy?”

  He winced. “That’d be her.”

  I laughed then.

  “Poor guy,” I cooed. “I’m glad to see you’re still standing.”

  He grinned and patted me on the back.

  “Gotta agree with you there. Careful of that board, it’s loose,” he said as I stepped over the board in question.

  “Thanks.” I patted his hand that was still on my arm. “I’ve got to find someone.”

  “Who ya’ lookin’ for?” he asked.

  “Ace Valentine.”

  His smile fell and his eyes narrowed.

  “Whatcha’ want with him?” he questioned, his entire demeanor changing.

  I blinked in confusion at his abrupt change in attitude.

  “He’s supposed to be helping me… ahh, I think I see him.” I hurried away before he could say anything else, my eyes on the brown hat I could see bobbing up and down at the end of the walkway.

  Skirting one last person about ten feet before the man, I slowed.

  My steps went quieter, and I studied the man’s back.

  His backside.

  If his face was anything like his butt, he’d be breathtaking.

  I couldn’t begin to thank the Lord enough for the invention of Wrangler jeans.

  There was no way that the guy was cute, though. Not with a body like that. Surely God wasn’t that generous.

  From the back he was breathtaking.

  He was wearing a white t-shirt tucked into a pair of dark-washed tight—and by tight, I mean so tight I bet he had to jump and shimmy to get into them—jeans that were on the closest side to ‘snug’ as you could get.

  He had on a pair of brown boots that were nothing special, but with one glance I could tell that they were his nice ones.

  These were clean… and the man didn’t strike me as the type of man that didn’t get his boots dirty.

  His hands were rough, those I could see because he had them interlocked behind his back, making his shoulders appear even broader than what they would normally appear as.

  His brown cowboy hat nodded every few seconds, his head slanted downward to watch the pen that was underneath him.

  And what I saw in that pen made my heart start to hammer, and a gasp to escape from my mouth.

  “Holy shit,” I breathed, my eyes on the bull as I moved forward to get a better look.

  At first, I didn’t notice that I was close to the man at the very end of the wooden plank walkway.