Her Cowboy Billionaire Best Friend's Brother Read online

  Her Cowboy Billionaire Best Friend’s Brother

  Christmas at Whiskey Mountain Lodge, A Hammond Brothers Novel, Book 3

  Liz Isaacson

  Contents

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  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

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Sneak Peek! Her Cowboy Billionaire Beast Chapter One

  Sneak Peek! Her Cowboy Billionaire Beast Chapter Two

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  Chapter One

  Gray Hammond checked his teeth one more time in the rear-view mirror, though he hadn’t had anything in them when he’d left Wes’s house. Gray never went anywhere without all the proper pieces in exactly the right place—at least he hadn’t for the past twenty years.

  Now that he was done at HMC, he had no idea what his days would hold. Probably a lot of time spent in pants with an elastic waistband and hours on the farm his parents refused to sell. A frown marched through his eyebrows at the thought of them on that piece of land, with all those animals, none of which they could take care of. His father tried, but he was almost eighty years old, and Gray had started talking to Ames about staging an intervention.

  If there was a brother who would take such a thing seriously, it was Ames. The man took everything seriously, and most of the time, that grated on Gray’s nerves. And he was the lawyer in the family. He, by profession, took things seriously.

  But an intervention with Ames involved would have steps and rules, and Gray had told him his concerns for a reason. Their parents simply couldn’t stay on the farm much longer.

  Ames and Cy had gathered to the farm in Ivory Peaks for the holidays, just to give Gray and Hunter a break. Gray felt like he needed a vacation from his life, and he was having a hard time not to take one. The only thing anchoring him in one place at the moment was Hunter. Hunter’s school.

  He couldn’t just pack a bag and board a plane and come back to his life when he felt like it, the way Wes had after he’d retired from the family company. He couldn’t move to Coral Canyon at the drop of a hat for a woman, the way Colton had done.

  Gray loved his son very much, but he alone knew that his life wasn’t entirely his own. “It’s fine, Lord,” he said to himself. “I don’t mean to complain. I love Hunter, and I’d rather he be with me than his mother.” He let out his breath, hoping some of the negativity he harbored inside would go with it. A bit of tension released from his shoulders, and he added, “Guide me to what I should do next.”

  Gray’s future was wide open, he knew that. Hunter would keep getting up in the morning and going to school. There would be science fair projects, and math homework he didn’t know how to do, and a brand new challenge for both of them—junior high. Multiple classes, dances…girls.

  That last one Gray barely knew what to do with himself. His first marriage had been one long fight, and when it had finally ended, he hadn’t even recognized himself anymore. He’d tried a couple of relationships since, and both of them had been nothing but disaster after disaster. He should’ve known he couldn’t date in the greater Denver area—at least not anyone who used the Internet or drove down the freeways. His surname was everywhere there, and the two women he’d been out with since Sheila’s departure from his life had been after only one thing: Money.

  That had hurt Gray, sure. But the worst part was knowing that Hunter had started to bond with Maddie. She’d known it, too, and she’d exploited the boy to get money from Gray for her. He’d never been so angry in his life. And having to explain his failures and shortcomings to a seven-year-old?

  Gray hadn’t dated in years. Four years, to be precise. Which was why he still hadn’t gotten out of his truck either.

  Elise would likely be here already. He’d pulled in right at the time they were set to meet, and he’d been sitting in the vehicle for at least ten minutes. She hadn’t called or texted yet, but he knew he was probably causing some anxiety in her soul too. And he didn’t want to do that.

  “Help me,” he begged as he got out of the truck. The chill in Wyoming in December was not to be trifled with, and Gray flipped up the collar on his coat to keep the wind off his neck. Someone had cleared the sidewalks, but he had to traverse snow and sleet to get there. His leather cowboy boots kept the dampness off his feet, and he hurried the rest of the way to the entrance of the restaurant.

  He’d let Elise pick where she wanted to eat, because he didn’t live here and didn’t know what was good. By the level of noise and the amount of people waiting inside the reception area, he knew this place must be popular.

  Glancing around, he searched for the beautiful blonde who’d first caught his eye at Colton’s house. Elise was light everywhere Gray was dark, and he wondered if their opposites extended to other things. He hadn’t spoken to her a whole lot over the months, little things here and there. The woman loved memes, and whenever Gray saw one he thought she’d like, he sent it to her.

  They talked about Colton and Annie, her work at the lodge, and Bree. He did know she loved to bake and was good at it, and that she could literally cultivate any plant back to life. But most of what he knew about Elise hadn’t come from her, but Colton.

  Her best friend.

  Gray wasn’t sure what he was doing, getting involved with her. If things went badly—and Gray had no reason to think they wouldn’t—he’d have to deal with Colton.

  He couldn’t find Elise among the crowd, as she had a way of slipping through the cracks. Still, he’d never had a problem locating her at the lodge or among all the guests at his brother’s wedding.

  “Hey,” a woman said, and he turned toward the voice. Elise stood there, her cheeks pink and those light green eyes making something unhitch in his chest that he hadn’t even known was so dang tight.

  “There you are.”

  “Sorry I’m late.” She glanced around, nerves pouring off of her. Gray was exceptionally good at reading a person, and he could tell she didn’t like this

  “Want to go somewhere else?” he asked.

  Hope filled those beautiful eyes. “Did you put our name on the list?”

  “I only got here myself,” he said. “I was looking for you. So no.”

  “Sure, we can go somewhere else.” She turned and left the restaurant, and Gray followed.

  “There’s a great steakhouse over on March,” she said.

  “Okay.”

  “Meet you there?”

  “Yep.” Gray separated from her and got behind the wheel of his t
ruck again. His heart beat a little faster than it normally did, because now he’d have to coax himself out of the vehicle one more time.

  “Make a right turn on Seagull,” his GPS said, and he obeyed. But when he arrived on March Street, it didn’t go all the way through. “Your destination is on the right.”

  “But it’s not,” he said, pulling to the curb and picking up his phone. He was on a residential street, with homes on both sides. No steakhouse. He looked left and right out the windows. Definitely no steakhouse.

  But this was definitely March Street. He typed in the search term “steakhouse” and got several results. Of course he would. This was Wyoming, after all, and they raised a lot of beef cattle here.

  Frustration started to lick through him as he tapped and studied the addresses. In the end, he had to dial Elise, who picked up with, “I think I lost you.”

  “I’m on March Street,” he said. “There’s no steakhouse here.” He swung his truck around to get out of the cul-de-sac. “What’s the name of the place?”

  “The Branding Iron,” she said. “And it’s not on March Street. It’s on Marks Street.”

  “Shoot,” Gray said, embarrassment moving through him powerfully. “I’ll be right there.”

  “Take your time,” she said. “They’re busy here too. I put our name on the list, and they said forty minutes.”

  “Oh, wow.” Gray’s stomach growled as if telling him he better feed it sooner than forty minutes from now. “See you in a sec.”

  Turned out that, no, he wouldn’t see her in a second. He’d somehow navigated clear out north of town, and it took a good half an hour to even get to the steakhouse.

  Something here was definitely wrong, but Gray pulled into the parking lot anyway. Easing around the restaurant, his phone started pinging, shooting out at least a dozen notifications for text messages in the space of two seconds.

  “I hate the reception here,” he grumbled. He was used to lightning-fast Internet and text messages that went through the moment he sent them. His provider didn’t operate well in Coral Canyon, and half of Gray’s messages spun and spun, never going through at all. “Oh, wow.”

  He stopped when he saw the crowds of people standing outside the steakhouse.

  And the big plume of smoke rising from the roof. When he heard the sirens for the fire engine, he got out of the way and picked up his phone.

  He’d been gone from Colton’s for over an hour now, and he barely had time to eat with Elise at this point. She’d texted several times about a kitchen fire at The Branding Iron, and that she’d gone somewhere else.

  “Be…right….” Gray dictated as his thumbs typed out the letters. Before he could finish the text and send it, he got thrown forward, the horribly loud sound of metal on metal crunching through his whole body, crackling in his ears, and imprinting on his soul.

  He gripped the wheel, his phone gone and forgotten, the text not sent. He sucked at the air, trying to figure out what had happened.

  An angry man’s face appeared through the driver’s side window. “You’ve got to move this.” He gestured furiously, and his clothing indicating he was an emergency worker. “Now.”

  Gray punched the button to roll down his window. “You hit my truck.”

  “You’re parked in a red zone, Mister,” the man said. “Now move immediately. We’ve got two more ambulances coming and another fire truck.”

  “I am not in a red zone.” Gray knew better than that, and he got out of his truck, his own anger spiking. “I moved out of the way when I saw the smoke.”

  “Just move,” the man barked, walking away.

  “Who’s gonna pay for my truck?” Gray called after him, but he didn’t break stride or wave or anything.

  Gray circled the back of the truck to access the damage, and sure enough, he was not in a red zone. Not even close. Fine, close, but at least ten feet away.

  He’d been hit by an ambulance, which had since been backed up. The tailgate had bent inward in the middle, and that whole assembly would have to be repaired. The fender hung off the truck completely on one side, and the whole thing leaned precariously to the right.

  He looked up to see if the ambulance drivers were still there, but they weren’t. Gray returned to the cab, frantically searching for his phone. He was a lawyer; he knew what to do to protect himself. And billionaire or not, he shouldn’t have to pay for damage to his vehicle that wasn’t his fault.

  He first made sure the date and time feature on his camera was activated, and then he took at least forty pictures ranging from where he was parked to where the ambulance was—and the license plate of it—to the extent of the damage to his truck.

  His fingers ached from the cold, and he’d forgotten about everything and anything else but the pictures and the icy chill threatening to overpower him.

  He finally climbed into the cab again, but it was as cold in there as outside, because he’d left the door open. His phone rang, and it didn’t connect to the Bluetooth and play through the speakers, which only made him more furious.

  “What?” he barked at Colton.

  Ohhh, Colton. Maybe something had gone wrong with Hunter. The fight left him, and Gray’s pulse pounded.

  “Where are you?” he asked. “Elise just called me crying.”

  Chapter Two

  Elise Murphy had never been so mortified in her life. Not even when Brandt had broken up with her via a text while she sat in the stand before one of his rodeos. She’d driven for two hours to be there, and she hadn’t told him she was coming.

  The text had jolted her back to reality, not this make-believe place where women as plain and quiet as Elise married bull riding champions. Just one look at Violet Everett confirmed that. She was a country music star with platinum albums. That was the kind of woman a billionaire bull rider wanted on his arm.

  Elise sniffled, because she needed to calm down before she got back to the lodge. She drew in deep breath after deep breath, horrified that she’d called Colton to ask him if Gray didn’t like her.

  “What a mess,” she said, her voice cracking and tears slowly leaking down her face again. She wasn’t fourteen. She didn’t need to ask her best friend if his brother liked her.

  A sting moved through her lungs, making breathing difficult, but she clenched her fingers on the steering wheel and kept the car on the mountain road. This Christmas wasn’t nearly as snowy as last, for which Elise was grateful. She didn’t like the snow that much, and driving in it especially terrified her.

  She’d seen Gray walk into Devil’s Tower ten minutes late. She’d followed him after counting to twenty-five, a random number she landed on because if she let herself go higher, she might not have gone inside at all.

  He’d barely looked at her, barely said two words to her, and then he’d gotten right back in his truck like he had a checklist to get done that day, and lunch with her was an inconvenience.

  She’d listened to her affirmations all the way to the steakhouse, and when he didn’t come, and didn’t come…Elise knew now that she’d started to spiral then.

  “But he called,” she said to the towering Tetons in the distance. The pine trees stood guard on the sides of the road too, never losing their needles and creating the perfect Christmas backdrop.

  The big event had been yesterday, and Elise had skipped the rowdy present-unwrapping in the main living area of the lodge. She did love watching the little children open their gifts, but for some reason, she hadn’t been able to face going this year.

  She pulled off the road, her car fishtailing a bit when she hit the snow on the shoulder going a little too fast. Her pulse picked up, but the vehicle came to a stop a moment later. With a sense of hysteria moving through her, she dug into her purse to find her phone. Her fingers shook while she swiped and jabbed, finally getting a call to go through to her mother.

  “Elise, dear,” her mom answered, her voice rich as clover honey. Elise started to relax just with the sound of it in her ears. “How
are you?”

  “Okay,” she said, but her word wobbled. “Actually, not great.”

  “Not great? I thought you were going out with Gray today?”

  “Yeah, me too,” she said, her cheeks getting wet again with a fresh set of tears. “It didn’t work out.”

  “Oh, no,” her mother said. “You were so excited about it.” She sounded genuinely upset on Elise’s behalf. “Tell me what happened.”

  “Maybe I should leave Wyoming,” Elise said instead of getting into the story. “Go somewhere warm, where rich people will pay me to design their yards. Put my degree to some actual good use.”

  “You think that’s what you want?” Mom asked. “Eh?” The Canadian came out in her whenever she asked questions, and that “eh” caused a smile to bloom on Elise’s face.

  She shook her head. “No, though I would like somewhere warm about now.”

  “Still snowing up there?”

  “Not for a couple of days,” she said. “It’s just really cold now. Clear sky. Subarctic temperatures.”

  “You could come to Vegas,” she said. “I know you’re not working around the lodge right now, while the Whittakers are there.”

  Elise let the thought roll through her mind, really examining all sides of it. “I could,” she said, because she didn’t hate the idea. “Let me think about it a little more.”