Prologue

B are Ranch and Christmas Tree Lot Christmas 2020

“Who the hell left this twine on the floor? Son of a—. Somebody could break their damn neck! Hello! ”

I was spreading sawdust on the thick black pad that covered the stall for Smoke, a sleek black stallion that was impatiently peering over the half door from his paddock. He snorted as if to ask what was taking me so long. The answer was the same as always—me.

I’d been the one to leave the twine on the hallway floor as I was grabbing hay flakes to put in the stalls before bringing the horses inside. By the sound of the man’s booming voice, he was damn pissed.

I stuck my head out of the stall and was about to confess when my new neighbor, Chuck Flora, came out of another stall. “That was me, Mr. Barrett. Sorry, sir. We were trying to get the stalls set up so we could bring everybody in for the night. I’ll get them picked up right away.”

Chuck lived next door to my mom and me in the trailer park and helped me get the job as a stable hand at Bare Ranch so I could make some money to use for incidentals.

Shortly after we’d moved from Denver in June, I’d chosen to quit high school and get my general equivalency diploma because I was anxious to get the hell out of one of the most homophobic and intolerant places I’d ever been—Kingsley, Texas—even if I was just going a few hundred miles southwest to San Antonio.

I stepped out into the barn hallway and glanced at the giant man standing in front of me wearing a black Carhart coat and dusty, black felt cowboy hat. “I-I-I—”

“Out with it. Who the hell are you?” The man gave me the up and down, his scowling expression nearly causing me to pee my pants.

“That’s my friend, Hermie Grassley, Mr. Barrett. Lou hired him as an extra hand over the holidays. Are your sons coming home for Christmas? Miss Elaine getting ready for the open house?” That was Chuck, quick to change the subject to save me further humiliation. He was a nice guy, and I was grateful he gave me the time of day.

“Chuck, son, you’ve worked here on holidays and over the summer for two years. You know we don’t leave hay twine in the hall. They get tangled up and cause people to fall. This is the last damn time I’m telling you not to leave twine on the floor.”

“Yes, sir. I apologize. We’ll clean it all up, I swear.”

I hurried to pick up the twine, carrying it to the trash barrel in the hallway before I went back to the stall and finished up so I could bring Smoke back inside.

My stutter kept me from offering an apology to Mr. Barrett for leaving the mess, but I’d thank Chuck for taking the blame when we were alone.

Mr. Barrett turned to me. “Where’d you come from? I’ve never seen you around town, have I?”

I shook my head. Trying to explain to him that my mom had brought me back to this wretched town after she and my father divorced would take me years, and Mr. Barrett didn’t seem any more patient than Smoke.

“Well, we do things a certain way around here, and you best learn the rules if you’re gonna stay.” Mr. Barrett turned to Chuck. “Stop by the main house before you leave. Elaine made cookies to give all the hands for Christmas.”

Mr. Barrett left the barn, grumpy attitude still intact as he complained all the way out. Chuck and I went about cleaning up the remaining stalls and hallway, making certain all the twine and hay was gone.

Once we had the horses inside for the night, we took turns washing up and combing our hair in the small bathroom by the barn office. After we were as presentable as we could be considering we’d been hauling horseshit all day, we walked the sidewalk to the huge main house.

“Chuck, th-thanks for t-taking the b-blame.” All my years of speech therapy as a kid growing up in Denver had flown right out the window when Mr. Barrett came into the barn and scared the crap out of me.

“It’s okay, Hermie. I didn’t tell you about pickin’ up the twine, and Mr. Barrett’s a stickler about shit like that. Anyway, we’ll stop by the main house, and hopefully, they’ll have a bonus for us like I got last year. I’m taking Paula Ramsey to Christmas Eve service and then out for dinner. Fingers crossed,” he did just that, holding them in the air, “I’ll finally get the blow job I said I wanted for Christmas.”

We both laughed as we approached the massive brick-and-log house at the top of the hill. It was huge, and unlike anything I’d seen up close. We lived in a single-wide trailer at Lone Star Trailer Park. There was no comparison to the house in front of us.

Chuck stopped me on the back porch. “Toe off your boots. Nobody wears dirty boots in Miss Elaine’s kitchen.”

I nodded and slid off the dirty rubber boots I’d borrowed from Chuck when I’d started working at Bare Ranch just after Thanksgiving. The job paid well, and Lou Ramsey, the ranch manager and father of Chuck’s girlfriend, was a super nice guy.

I’d never met any of the Barretts until the encounter in the barn with the patriarch, and I was suddenly more afraid than I’d been in a long time. I couldn’t imagine what the rest of the family must be like.

Chuck knocked on the back door, and we waited. A moment later, a tall, slender woman in an apron appeared and smiled through the glass as she turned the handle. “Chuck, how are you? Who’s your friend?”

“Miss Elaine, it’s good to see you again. This is Hermie Grassley. He’s savin’ his money for when he goes to culinary school in San Antonio next month.”

The woman turned to me. “Hermie, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m Elaine Barrett. So, you like to cook?”

“Y-Y-Yes.” That was all I could get out before I choked on my tongue.

“Well, I hope these cookies are up to your standards. Have a Merry Christmas.”

She held out two envelopes and two candy cane-covered tins just as another door slammed hard enough to shake the windows. “I don’t give a flyin’ fuck if Santa Claus himself has lined her pussy with hundred-dollar bills. No fucking way am I going to date Yvette Tate. I’m not telling you again, Dad. I’m not marrying into Tate Oil. I won’t be a trophy son-in-law for Willie Tate.”

Mrs. Barrett’s face flushed in an instant, but she didn’t break her smile. “Thanks for stopping by boys. Chuck, give our regards to your family.”

Mrs. Barrett closed the door and hurried in the direction of the shouting without another word. Chuck stepped over to the mat where we’d left our boots, not having gone in the house at all.

As I slid my boots on, I glanced up to look through the glass door. There, staring back at me, was a huge man with sparkling golden eyes and a sexy smile. He’d stuffed a cookie into his mouth and winked at me, which triggered a coughing fit so intense I nearly swallowed my tongue.

Chuck glanced through the door and waved before grabbing my hand and dragging me away. “That’s Decker Barrett.”

I turned to him as we hurried to his truck. “D-Decker Barrett. D-Decker Bare Barrett the c-c-center for—”

“Yeah, he’s the center for the Houston Riggers. He played for LA for a while before he went to Minneapolis. He went into free agency and was picked up by the Riggers.

“The family only comes out during the summer and on holidays. They’re pretty private, so keep the things you see around here to yourself, Hermie.”

I never told anyone about my brush with greatness, but I never forgot the sparkling eyes of Decker Bare Barrett.