Page 1 of Tempted at Thoroughbred Lake

CHAPTER ONE

RUBYPARKMANFIGUREDshe’d already exceeded her quota of curse words for the day, but she added a few more when she rushed into her house and spotted the pair of white lace panties on her living room floor.

Since these frilly undies appeared to be an extra small and incapable of covering even one of her butt cheeks, Ruby knew they belonged to her eighteen-year-old daughter, Vivian. It wasn’t a good sign that they were on the floor, but Ruby was holding out hope that Vivian had dropped them there while carting her laundry to her bedroom.

Ruby headed toward Vivian’s bedroom now, threading her way through the old Victorian house and to the equally mazelike hall. She stopped again, though, when she spotted more underwear. A white lace bra this time.

And the black boxer shorts next to it.

Ruby forced herself to take a deep breath, reminding herself that Vivian was an adult now. In the general sense of the word, anyway. But it was a punch to her mom gut to realize that on the other side of Vivian’s bedroom door, wild sex might be going on between her “always will be my little girl” and the eighteen-year-old boyfriend of the “always will be my little girl,” Seth Dayton.

Apparently, Vivian hadn’t realized that Ruby would get home so soon. If she had, Vivian likely would have delayed sending the text that had caused Ruby to hurry back so she could find out what had prompted her daughter to message:

I have exciting news. Can’t wait to tell you when you get home.

Ruby didn’t care much for the wording of that. It was giving her a “hard punch to the gut” feeling, and over the past eighteen years, Ruby had learned that definitely wasn’t a good feeling for a mom to have.

She didn’t knock at her daughter’s bedroom door but instead decided to wait out Vivian and Seth, and that way she could take some time to settle her nerves. But she didn’t get that nerve-settling time. Ruby had barely managed one long breath when the bedroom door flew open.

“Oh, you’re already here,” Vivian blurted out, her eyes wide with surprise and her voice breathy. “I wasn’t expecting you so soon. I figured you’d stay after the Last Ride Society meeting. I got some texts from friends whose moms told them your name got picked, and I thought you’d hang around and talk to them about that.”

No, Ruby had gotten out of the meeting fast. No way had she wanted to deal with the questions and poor pitying looks. Then again, she hadn’t especially savored the notion of coming home to face, well, whatever the heck she was about to face.

Her daughter was dressed, more or less, in jeans and a top that she was still adjusting. Her cheeks were rosy. Perhaps flushed from the recent sex or because she was now aware that her mom had spotted the discarded undergarments on the floor. Items obviously tossed off during the frenzied lust journey to the bedroom.

Vivian scooped up the bra and boxers, moving them behind her back and muttering a “Sorry about that,” while her cheeks went even rosier.

Ruby glanced over her daughter’s shoulder and spotted Seth, who was also doing some adjustments to his jeans and shirt. He looked a little rosy colored as well.

“Sorry, Miss P,” Seth said, using the abbreviated name he always called her.

Ruby considered mentioning the sex. Dismissed it. Instead, she held up her phone to show Vivian the text she’d sent, and she hoped like the devil that her daughter and eternally little girl wasn’t about to say that she and Seth were now engaged. If so, it was going to have to be a really long engagement since both were heading off to college in just two weeks. With Vivian planning on becoming a veterinarian and Seth an engineer, they’d be in school for years.

“What exactly is your exciting news?” Ruby asked, speaking around the lump in her throat.

No lump in the throat for Vivian. Her daughter beamed out a huge smile, and Seth was smiling, too, when he hurried to her side.

Vivian lifted her left hand, and Ruby caught the flash of the small diamond solitaire. Then she got a flash of something else.

Oh, crap.

One Hour Earlier

RUBYPARKMANWAITEDuntil she left the Last Ride Society meeting and was in her car before she wadded up the little strip of paper into the size of a spitball and grumbled every curse word she knew. Some words she made up as well. Because this was certainly a curse-worthy situation.

Did the crappery of fate have it in for her?

Apparently so, because out of the hundreds—yes, hundreds—of names she could have drawn at the quarterly meeting of the Last Ride Society, she’d plucked the very one that could give her the most headaches.

And some sucky memories to boot.

When she had seen the name on the now spitball of paper, she had tried her damnedest not to react since she’d been standing in front of a room filled with her Parkman kin. After all, it was an “honor” to be the drawer at the Last Ride Society. Ruby had especially tried not to curse or do anything that would fuel more gossip.

Oh, but there’d be gossip.

Whispers, too, of poor pitiful Ruby, who was going to have her nose rubbed into the messy smear of memories that she would have to pore over and research all because of that “honor.”

With her frustration growing by leaps and bounds, Ruby forced herself to focus on something else other than the drawing that had been dumped on her by the society members in her hometown of Last Ride, Texas. Instead, she got to work and drove the five blocks to the “charming” three-bedroom updated ranch house that was about to go on the market. Since she was the Realtor repping the property, she would need to put up the sign and do one final check of the interior to make sure all was well for the showings she already had scheduled.

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