Ask Me to Stay (Honky Tonk Angels #4) by Ciana Stone Read Free Book Online Page A

Hannah’s problem. She knew almost everyone in Cotton Creek. She’d spent her entire life there except for her time in college. Aside from those four short years, all she knew about people and life, she’d learned in Cotton Creek,
    Sometimes she felt it had been a mistake to move back home after she’d gotten her degree in Hotel and Restaurant Management. She’d been offered a position with one of the larger hotels in San Antonio but had let her own insecurity and a love affair gone bad prevent her from taking it. Hannah had hoped to find work with a large, upscale restaurant that catered to an elite clientele. The hotel job was a starter position that promised upward mobility, but not exactly in the area she wanted.
    And the hotel manager had just happened to be her lover. A lover she’d discovered had lied to her. He had not been divorced, or even separated. She’d been broken hearted and angry for being made to feel a fool, and there was no better place to hide from her shame and heartbreak than back home in Cotton Creek.
    Now, in hindsight, she couldn’t help but think she’d made a mistake. But as her dad was fond of saying: “The past is done, the future isn’t here so you might as well pay attention to the right now because that’s all you really have.”
    Hannah wasn’t so sure the right now was all that great. She worked every other day at her mother’s bakery, and she closed the bar three nights a week. There was always something that required attention at the bar, and while Cody handled a lot, she couldn’t manage the ranch and the bar on her own.
    Besides, they were partners in the bar, and Hannah had every intention of pulling her weight. If nothing else, being tired most of the time helped keep her mind off things like her lack of a social life. She had somehow become the good daughter – she’d actually heard people say that. She was the dependable daughter, the good one, the one who never did anything disrespectful, wild, impulsive or out of the ordinary.
    Hannah Sweet, the good girl who didn’t have the courage to let loose, get drunk, laugh too loud, dance too provocatively, tell an off-color joke or take a man to her bed. She was becoming a goody-two-shoes old maid and that rankled her.
    Look at Cody and her friends.
    That thought circled her right back around to where she’d started. Trying to fit in and feeling like a robin at a hawk convention. All the other women were self-assured, strong and seemed to be comfortable with who they were and their place in life.
    Of course, half of those women were either married or committed to men who would walk through fire for them. Hannah wished for that in her life, but not as the wife of a rancher or horse trainer. She wanted a man who appreciated the finer things.
    She wanted a man like Cooper Quinlan.
    God, even acknowledging that to herself was still hard. Cody was attracted to Cooper and Hannah would never dream of competing with her own sister for his attention, both for lack of confidence and lack of will. Still, she could let herself daydream a bit, couldn’t she? What could it hurt?
    However, at the moment, she needed to finish the last batch of fritters, then get home and get cleaned up so she could meet the beer distributor at the bar. Chances were Cody was still snoring on the couch where she’d passed out last night.
    Suppressing the urge to sigh, Hannah got back to work.
     
    *****
    Cooper had just left the diner where he’d met Bronson and Wes for breakfast when he ran into Jayce.
    “Hey, Cooper. How’s it going?”
    “Fine. How about you?”
    “Can’t complain.”
    “Well, business is certainly booming.”
    “Yes it is, thanks to the new oil company. Between the new development on the outskirts of town, two convenience stores beyond the city limits, one of those suite motels and now a strip mall between here and Rock Ridge, we can’t hire enough people.”
    Cooper knew just what Jayce meant. Things were moving quicker