Author: Teri Anne Stanley
Publisher: Sourcebooks Casablanca
Publication date: August 27, 2019
“A
real page turner with a sexy cowboy you can root for, a sassy heroine you can
fall in love with, and an ugly dog that brings them together.”—CAROLYN BROWN,
New York Times bestselling author
At
Big Chance Dog Rescue,
Even
humans get a second chance
After
a disastrous mistake disbanded his Army unit, Adam Collins has returned home to
Big Chance, Texas. He just wants to sell the family ranch, set up his sister
and grandfather with the funds, and then ride off into the sunset.
Lizzie
Vanhook has landed back in her hometown, heartbroken and jobless. Adding to her
troubles is the unruly stray who’s claimed her as his own. Lizzie knows she’s
in over her head. Enter Adam—not only does he work with dogs, he’s also tall,
dark, handsome, and the one who got away…
Adam
wants nothing to do with other people, much less dogs. But when his old flame
asks him to help her train her scruffy dog, he can’t say no. As his reluctant
heart opens up, the impossible seems possible: a second chance with the woman
he’s always loved in a place where he, his friends, and the other strays who
show up can heal and call home,
Big
Chance, Texas.
More
praise for Big Chance Cowboy:
“Love…and
puppies… Be prepared to fall in love with this cast of characters and this
book.”
—JENNIE
MARTS, USA Today bestselling author of the Cowboys of Creedence
series_
“Big
Chance Cowboy is a tail-wagging good read. I was hooked from start to
finish.”
—DEBBIE BURNS, acclaimed author of the Rescue
Me series
Purchase Links:
EXCERPT:
Houston
was three hours and a couple of broken dreams behind her when Lizzie Vanhook
crossed the Chance County line, right about the same time the Check Tire
Pressure light in her dashboard blinked on.
Crap. She’d been
in the homestretch. There was something symbolic about an uninterrupted beeline
home, to the place she planned to find her center of gravity. Maybe start doing
yoga. Eat all organic. Drink herbal tea and learn to play the pan flute.
Flipping the turn signal, she pulled into Big America Fuel and
stopped near the sign for Free Air.
She stepped out onto the cracked gray asphalt and bent to search for the
pressure gauge her dad always insisted she keep in the pocket of the door but
came up empty.
She abandoned the driver’s side and went to the passenger door,
hesitating when she noticed the dog leaning against the nearby air pump. The big dog. It was missing some
significant patches of hair, and the rest was black and matted. Its big, shiny teeth were bared in what
she hoped was a friendly smile. Its football-player-forearm-sized tail thumped
the ground, raising a cloud of sunbaked, Central Texas dust. Lizzie sneezed.
The dog stopped wagging and raised an ear in her direction.
“Good boy,” she told it, hoping that was the right thing to say.
It was one thing to misunderstand the intentions of a tiny fuzzball of a dog
and need a few stitches. Ignoring a warning from something this size could be
lethal. It had to weigh at least a hundred pounds.
She kept the beast in her peripheral vision while she bent to
search for the tire gauge. Ah ha!
“Y’all need some help?”
“No!” Lizzie straightened and turned, the pressure gauge clenched
in her raised fist.
“Whoa there!” A sun-bronzed elderly man, about half Lizzie’s size,
held his hands in front of him in a gesture of peace.
“I’m sorry,” she said, relaxing slightly. “The dog—” She gestured
but the thing was gone.
“Didn’t mean to scare you, darlin’,” the old man said, tilting his Big America ball cap back. “We’re a
little slow today, so I thought I’d check on you.” He indicated the vacant
parking lot.
“It’s fine,” she said. She should remember she was back on her own
turf, where it was way more likely that a stranger at a gas station really did want to help you out rather than
distract you and rob you blind. “It’s been a long drive, and I’m a little
overcaffeinated.”
“No problem. You local?”
“Yes,” Lizzie said. Even though she’d been gone for years, it was
about to be true again.
The attendant squinted at the tool she carried. “You got a leaky
tire?”
“I don’t know.” She stooped to unscrew the cap of the first valve.
“The little light went on while I was driving.” Nope. That one wasn’t low. She put the
cap back on and continued her way around the car while her new friend followed,
chatting about Big Chance. He wondered about the likelihood the Chance County
High School quarterback would get a scholarship offer. Lizzie had no idea; she
hadn’t been keeping up. He speculated on the probability that the Feed and Seed
might close, now that there was a new Home Depot over in Fredericksburg. She
expected she’d hear about it from her mom and dad if the local place was
closing and wondered if her friend Emma still worked there.
It had been ages since Lizzie had spoken to Emma, and a wave of
guilt washed over her. Finally, the last valve was checked, and she screwed the
cap back on. She reached through the open window and dropped the tire gauge on
the passenger seat while she said “Everybody’s full. Must be a false alarm.”
She wrinkled her nose as she caught a whiff of the interior of her car. Sheesh. The service station probably
sold air fresheners; maybe she should invest in one. Compared to the breezy,
wide open spaces of home, her car smelled like an inside-out dead deer. She
wanted to get home, though, so she decided to deal with it later.
It wasn’t until she was backing out onto the main road that she
realized the awful smell inside her vehicle wasn’t just long-drive funk. There
was something—something big and black and furry—sitting in the middle of her
back seat, panting and grinning in her rearview mirror.
***
Excerpted from Big Chance Cowboy by Teri
Anne Stanley. © 2019 by Teri Anne Stanley. Used with
permission of the publisher, Sourcebooks
Casablanca, an imprint of Sourcebooks, Inc. All rights reserved.
About the author:
When Teri Anne Stanley isn’t writing sassy, sexy, love
stories from her home, she’s probably doing some sort of arsty-crafsty thing
and hanging with Mr. Stanley, her three favorite children, and the dogs.
Sometimes she’s masquerading as a day job science geek. She’s definitely not
cooking or cleaning. Visit her online at www.teriannestanley.com.
Teri Ann lives near Sugartit, Kentucky (which is between Beaver Lick and Rabbit
Hash. Seriously).
