Page 14 of Dusty Spur Ranch Cowboys

I pass Larsen’s General Store and glance at the display window. Still selling the same ugly rooster statue that’s been sitting there for six months.

Nobody wants it.

Tommy keeps insisting it’s handmade art. The entire town keeps insisting it’s hideous.

At this point, the argument has become a community tradition.

A grin threatens at the corner of my mouth before fading.

This is what I like about Colter Creek. No matter what’s happening, the town keeps being itself.

It’s always the same until someone like Arizona blasts through like a hurricane, leaving a path of destruction behind her.

CHAPTER THREE

Arizona

By noon, I’m convinced Colter Creek has assigned somebody to follow me around with a clipboard.

It’s the only explanation that makes sense.

I’ve been here less than a day, yet somehow the entire town already knows who I am. Not in the vague, “I heard there’s a singer in town” kind of way, either. People know my actual name.

Walking down Main Street turns into a running commentary.

“Morning, Arizona.”

“You settling in okay, Arizona?”

“Heard you’re playing at The Silver Bit.”

“Heard you’re staying at Mrs. Porter’s place.”

“Heard you’re from Arizona.”

That last one nearly makes me laugh. Nothing gets past these people.

By the time I reach The Buckhorn Diner, I’m craving coffee and ten consecutive minutes where nobody knows anything about me.

The second I step inside, the bell above the door jingles and three people look up.

There goes that dream.

An older man sitting at the counter lifts two fingers from his coffee mug in greeting. A woman in a corner booth pauses mid-conversation to study me with open curiosity before whispering something to her husband.

Across the room, a little girl with crooked pigtails stares so hard she forgets to chew her pancake. The kid isn’t even trying to be subtle.

The Buckhorn itself is exactly the sort of place I’d write into a country song. Red booths line the walls beneath framed photographs and faded rodeo posters.

The scent of coffee, bacon, and fresh pie wraps around me the second I walk in. Somewhere overhead, an old country song plays through speakers that have probably survived three decades and at least two owners.

I barely make it into a booth before a woman with silver hair piled into a towering bun appears beside me carrying a coffee pot. “There she is.”

I blink up at her. “Uh…”

“You must be Arizona.”

I already know arguing is pointless. “That obvious?”