The Italian Rancher's Bride (ePub)

Gorgeous finance advisor Kristina Collingwood appears to have the perfect life. She is smart and successful, with a reputation for picking winners in the market. Her career has been meteoric. She thrives on a frenetic pace of a life that has her jet setting around the globe advising wealthy investors in the capitals of Europe. In the process, she has become independently wealthy on her own account. The last thing on her mind is to bag a rich husband. She doesn't need a man to look after her, and besides, she is too busy to think about settling down. Not yet, anyway, but maybe one day. Having been orphaned in her early teens, and with one failed romance behind her, she has learned to become self-sufficient and does not trust easily.

On a weekend trip to visit her cousins on their Californian mountain ranch, her world is turned upside down when she meets their Italian rancher neighbor, Alessandro DeSanto, a man with a godlike physique, an unusual foreign accent and an impossibly impish grin. He is intent on expanding his ranching empire and is driven to succeed, thriving on the hard physical work and the outdoor life. His sheer forcefulness and determination, which some mistake for arrogance, mask his painful memories of his past. He's a strong-willed man who decides what he wants in life, sets his goal and then grabs it with both hands. To him, success is inevitable.

Alex instantly falls for Kristina's natural charm and beauty. Initially, she finds his direct approach refreshing, and can't help but be attracted to him. But despite his magnetism and disarming good looks, she soon finds that his "arrogant" attitude reminds her of the city sharks. She is afraid to show her feelings until she can get to know him a little better. Kristina's misgivings prevent her from admitting, even to herself, that she is falling in love. She has to overcome her mistrust of men and her fear of being hurt again.

Alex perceives her diffidence as aloofness, and begins to realize that she will not throw herself at his feet, despite the fact that most women do. As he struggles to reconcile her apparent lack of interest in him with the fireworks of emotions they both so obviously feel every time they are together, he must discover if she would ever give up the excitement of her fast paced, jet-setting career in the city and settle for a rancher in the mountains. At the same time he is battling to put to rest his ghosts, and is too proud, or too afraid, to open his heart.

Then a meddling "other woman" appears, and Kristina, not willing to become a pawn in a three way love battle, decides to forget this smart, handsome cowboy-rancher and compensates by throwing herself headlong in to her work.

But it doesn't end there. The attraction for both of them is too great, and unexpected twists of fate see them meeting again.