Spicy Romance & Recipes #5

By Mimi Riser

Another hot historical from the Spicy Romance & Recipes collection, where every volume serves up something different...something daring...something to really sink your teeth into... Volume 5 contains the novella “Cowboys & Courtesans” – a rip-roarin’ m/m/f ménage romance set in the Wild West – plus scrumptious southwest recipes for chili, tamales, margarita pie, and more...
“Cowboys & Courtesans”: Passions collide and secrets crack open when two lonely mavericks tango with a dancer billed as Salome, the Courtesan of Kings... A man who’s seen too much evil, Isaac Strong doesn’t believe in love. Joey Parker does, but considers love a lost cause for a young wrangler living a lie. The sultry Sal, a performer in more ways than one, believes in instant attraction and Romeo & Juliet style grand romance. Or maybe not. Is “true love” really true for Sal, or merely a game of seduction to be played and won before moving on to the next conquest? Once the action hits a bed big enough for three, no one, not even Sal, is sure... Move over, Matt Dillon and Miss Kitty – the Wild West has never been wilder, and Dodge City will never seem the same!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mimi Riser
• Release date: May 5, 2016
• ISBN: 9781310205156

Mimi Riser

Mimi Riser is a longtime author of fiction and nonfiction, including several series and spanning a variety of genres (with flavors ranging from sweet to spicy hot). Her books celebrate the upbeat, the offbeat, and “beating the odds.” She began life in the urban northeast, but now resides in the rural southwest with her best friend & husband Rob.

Book preview

Stunningly passionate and intense… a compelling story full of surprises and secrets that capture the imagination and leave readers in awe of the author’s storytelling abilities. ~Romance Junkies

SPICY ROMANCE & RECIPES #5

Cowboys & Courtesans

As a man who’s seen too much evil, Isaac Strong doesn’t believe in love. Joey Parker does, but considers love a lost cause for a young wrangler living a lie. The sultry Sal, a performer in more ways than one, believes in instant attraction and Romeo and Juliet style grand romance – or maybe not. Is true love really true for Sal, or merely a game of seduction to be played and won before moving on to the next conquest? Once the action hits a bed big enough for three, nobody, not even Sal, is sure.

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MIMI RISER

www.mimiriser.com

Smashwords Edition:

Copyright © 2016 by Mimi Riser

All rights reserved.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes: This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

(Disclaimer: This novella is a work of fiction. All names, characters, locations, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination, or have been used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, locales, or events is entirely coincidental.)

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Chapter 1: The Romance

Cowboys & Courtesans

Dodge City, 1883…

Isaac Strong wrinkled his nose. God knew he was no stranger to stink, but out in the open air of the range ugly odors dissipated faster and seemed easier to stomach. Here in the confines of town the combined smells of animal and man were enough to stagger an ox.

Whew.

Dodge reeked to its rafters from the cattle filled stockyards near the train tracks. Inside the Silver Whistle Saloon on the south side of the tracks—the wrong side for the unwary, unwise, or unarmed—it stank even worse from the crush of unwashed cowboys and the pungent perfume of the whores bent on relieving them of their wages. Booted feet stomped time to the off-key tinkle of an upright piano while lamplight cast a garish glow over figures clad in dusty denims and gaudy gowns. Hoots, hollers and loud laughter added to the sensory assault.

A few of the cowboys were Isaac’s trail mates who’d ridden in with him that day after grueling weeks in the saddle driving three thousand head of longhorns up from deep in Texas. The rest had arrived earlier with other herds. All were thirsty for hard drink and ravenous for rowdy fun.

Except Isaac. He’d already had his day’s fun buying fresh clothes, then visiting a bathhouse and a barber. Trimmed, pressed, and polished, he now wanted only a solid meal and a soft bed, and he’d been told he might find both at the Silver Whistle. The back of the saloon doubled as a restaurant and the upstairs offered rooms for rent.

The big question was whether or not any of those rooms were open to the son of a slave. Trail dirt scrubbed off but not the rich bronze color of his skin. For thirty years, since infancy, he’d been free—technically—though not always in practice. To many people his skin still labeled him inferior, perhaps dangerous. Definitely unfit for polite society.

Which was why he had such high hopes for the Silver Whistle. There was nothing polite about this place. Provided his money was the right color, he doubted anyone here would care what the rest of him looked like.

He was wrong.

Grumbles began the moment he started toward the bar to inquire about food and a bed—foulmouthed mutterings calling him an ape and much worse. The problem, Isaac surmised by the tone of the taunts and the accents of those who uttered them, was that some of the crowd were former Confederates, men who’d lost everything in the war and blamed him and his breed as