Page 1 of Tempting Bo (Montgomery Dreams #2)

BO

Several things become rapidly apparent when I blink my bleary eyes open against the harsh morning light.

I’m not home. The walls are painted a pale green instead of the plain white of my room, and there’s a lack of old movie posters and framed family photos. The sheets are purple instead of the understated gray I’ve had since high school.

Now that I’m paying attention to the sheets, they rub against my skin. Against all my skin. I’m naked as the day I was born, my clothes scattered around the room haphazardly.

The third and most horrific realization is that I’m very much not alone.

I don’t make a habit of sleeping around, but it’s not the concept of waking up naked next to a hookup that has my blood running cold.

It’s the mess of golden ringlets on the pillow next to me, and the long, bare leg tossed over my hips atop the blankets.

In a panic, I spring out of the bed and stare in disgust at the woman, nuzzling her way into the pillows and making sleepy noises before falling still again.

My dick is out, and Savannah fucking Ward sleeps in the bed I was just in.

I want to fucking vomit.

I rack my brain for any explanation of how I ended up here, and come up with…

nothing. The last thing I remember is having a few drinks at a party with some friends.

Savannah was there, but I don’t remember talking to her.

Everything gets hazy after my second drink.

The rest of the night is one massive black hole.

What the fuck ?

I haven’t gotten drunk enough to black out since high school, and even that was only once. I don’t drink like that anymore, and I sure as shit had no plans to get blasted last night. The ranch needs me today, and working hungover is the worst thing in the world.

Wait.

Fuck .

The sun is well above the horizon already, which means I’m late.

Dad and I were supposed to help Mom check out the new foals before fixing some of the fencing in the back pastures.

We’re at least an hour behind schedule because of me, and I have no doubt my ass will be handed to me on a silver fucking platter.

I scramble into my clothes, keeping my movements as quiet as possible.

This morning is already a wreck, and I can’t handle actually talking to Savannah on top of everything.

I need to figure out what the hell happened in the first place, and go from there.

There’s no way I would sleep with her, even if the world was fucking ending.

I can’t stand her, especially after all the shit she pulled with Oakley and Jamie.

I pick a loose strand of her pink rug off my jeans before pulling them on and searching for my belt. It never comes off unless I’m at home, which only serves to make me more confused about what the hell happened.

My belt and my flannel are both in a heap with Savannah’s skirt, peeking out from beneath the bed. The way my stomach turns has nothing to do with my hangover and everything to do with the pure disgust coursing through my veins.

I can't actually have slept with her. There’s no way.

I wouldn’t.

My keys and wallet sit on the vanity table by her bedroom door.

I snag them after tugging my boots on and book it outside.

My truck’s in her driveway, and that’s even more confusing.

If I was so drunk I don’t even remember last night, driving without crashing would have been impossible.

I would never get in my truck if I was that fucked up. I know better .

When I unlock the door, the driver’s seat is pushed way further forward than I ever drive. A sliver of a memory flashes across my mind for half a second.

“Come on, dude,” Savannah says, rolling her eyes as the world swims around me. “Your sister and I have a beef or whatever, but I’m not trying to watch you get killed because you drank too much. Stop being stupid and let me drive you home.”

That makes even less sense than me deciding to drive drunk. No way in hell would I let Savannah drive my truck.

I climb in and shove the seat back to its proper position, unease and a creeping sense of dread sitting heavily at the base of my skull.

Thankfully, my phone sits in the passenger side cupholder.

As soon as I get the truck started, I search through my contacts.

Evan doesn’t drink, so if anyone knows what the hell happened last night, it’ll be him.

We usually hang out together all night when we go out.

He’s got to have answers for me.

I wait impatiently for Evan to pick up, the dull buzzing of the dial tone setting my teeth on edge as I gnaw at my thumbnail. He finally answers when I back out of Savannah’s driveway.

“Bo? Everything good?”

Equipment whirrs in the background, and he probably stepped away from work to answer me. I almost never call anyone, and it’s usually nothing short of an emergency when I do.

This constitutes an emergency.

Waking up naked in Savannah Ward’s bed has historically been good for literally no one.

I don’t know a single one of her exes that didn’t get run straight out of town, and everyone knows she’s batshit insane since everything with her cousin and Oakley came out a few months ago.

It’s still plenty fresh in everyone’s minds, especially in a town like this.

“I—yeah, I guess,” I say, frowning as I pull out onto the main road. “Sorry to bug you at work, but I need you to tell me what happened last night.”

“What do you mean?” Evan asks, confusion clear in his voice. “We went to Jesse’s for a party.”

That sense of dread creeps closer.

“Yeah, I know that,” I say, putting effort into keeping my voice even. “Just, like, what happened there? Was it a normal night?”

Silence stretches out for too long to be comfortable, and I hear Evan’s footsteps on the other end of the line as he walks away from his work site. That doesn’t bode well.

“Bo, what’s going on?” The confusion in his voice has bled straight into concern, and it makes my hands shake on the wheel. “We were with Harry and Ian. Y’all had a couple drinks. Did something happen?”

I clench my jaw against the wave of terror that washes over me. What the fuck turned a perfectly normal night into such a trainwreck?

“Nah, nothing happened.” The lie slips through my teeth like broken glass, but I can’t tell anyone about this until it’s clear what actually happened. “I just don’t remember most of the night. I didn’t think I got that fucked up.”

The laugh I force out sounds unnatural even to me, but Evan lets it slide with nothing more than a concerned click of his tongue.

“I mean, I only saw you have a beer and a cup of that punch that was on the table,” he says. “You were really out of it by the end of the night, though.”

My stomach sinks instantly. There’s no way two drinks would send me into a blackout. And I remember having both of those. I didn’t even chug them. Hell, it took me almost half an hour to finish that punch because it was gross and weirdly salty.

“Maybe I just didn’t eat enough before,” I say, attempting to ease my friend’s worries.

I ate my usual three square meals yesterday. There’s absolutely no reason I should have gotten that drunk.

“I figured you and Harry just pre-gamed,” Evan says.

That would make sense. Harry and I do that occasionally.

It’s usually just a shot or two, never enough to get really sloshed.

The only problem with that is I went to the party straight from work.

I met my friends there, and there wasn’t a drop of alcohol in my system.

Maybe the heat just got to me? That doesn’t explain why I can’t remember anything, though.

Evan’s voice cuts through my whirling thoughts before I have a chance to really start spiralling.

“That Ward chick was trying to get everyone to go out to the lake when you were heading out to catch a cab home, but that’s the last time I saw you,” he says. “I have to get back to work, but I’ll check in on my lunch if you need anything, alright?”

Hearing Savannah’s name makes me flinch, and I have to huff out a laugh at the urge to glance behind me. She can’t be summoned by her name like some fairy tale witch.

“I’ll be good, man,” I say, not believing myself in the slightest. “Sorry for bugging you.”

We say our goodbyes as I turn onto the road that leads to the ranch, the familiar stretch of trees and dirt road. I’ve never been so anxious about going back home.

My thoughts are still too jumbled up, and I don’t remember enough for anything else to make more sense.

I’m all turned around, and now that the threat of having to deal with Savannah is dealt with, my head is fucking killing me.

I’ve never had a hangover this bad in my whole life; my mouth cottony and dry, my stomach roiling with nausea.

My whole body feels about ten seconds behind.

This may be the first time I’ve done anything to get my ass handed to me so seriously, and I don’t know where to start fixing it.

For one, I’m late—and I’m never late unless I’m in a hospital bed.

There’s also the pressure of being the responsible one of my siblings, even if I’m the middle child.

I’m the one who will take over the ranch when our parents retire, so I don’t get the same leniency about breaking rules that my sisters do.

And this?

This is a lot deeper than trying to figure out an excuse for being late and making it up to my dad.

Sleeping with Savannah would be a mistake I can never go back from. The consequences are something I never want to face.