Free Forever Cowboy (Montana Brides Book 5) by Leeanna Morgan

old barn fit with the image you’ve been cultivating?”
    Alex raised his eyebrows. “You mean the one that involves lots of fast cars and fast women?”
    Heat scorched Emily’s cheeks. “I guess I deserved that.”
    “I guess you did.” Alex pulled open the monster front door and turned left.  
    Emily quickly glanced around before following Alex. The entranceway opened into a large living room. Rich timber floors and white painted walls gave the inside of his home a bright, contemporary feel. Not quite the drafty old barn she’d been expecting.
    He opened a door at the end of a corridor. “I gave up fast women a long time ago. But the cars…they stayed with me.”
    Emily’s eyes opened wide. Everything inside the garage sparkled under the fluorescent lights. From the paintwork on the three sports cars, to the white floors, it was a sight to behold. “I don’t know much about cars, but I’d say this isn’t your average garage?”
    “Maybe not,” Alex said with a good dose of pride thrown into his voice. “Jacob looked after my Mustang, Camaro and Shelby until we’d finished the garage. It didn’t feel like home until I knew they were here. But I didn’t bring you inside to see my cars. Come with me.”
    Emily followed Alex back down the corridor and into the living room. His limp had gotten worse. “You need your pills.”
    “I’m getting there.”  
    A rock-face fireplace sat in the middle of the room, surrounded by big comfy sofas and cushions in a rainbow of colors. Large windows brought the spectacular view of the Bridger Range inside. He’d converted the old barn into a beautiful home. Emily couldn’t help but feel a certain amount of admiration for what he’d achieved.  
    “I can’t stay too long,” she said.  
    Alex disappeared through a wide doorway to the right of the fireplace. She heard cupboard doors opening and the faucet running. She walked into the kitchen and stared at Alex.
    He was standing in front of a big white sink set into a dark granite bench and cherry wood cabinets. The kitchen, dining and family room were bigger than her entire home. Bigger than anything she’d ever owned. No expense had been spared in creating an area that could easily become the center of his life. And maybe hers if she’d listened to what he’d had to say two years earlier.
    He finished the glass of water and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “I wanted to show you what you can do with an old building. The library doesn’t need as much work as my home did, and that’s a good thing.”  
    Emily looked around and started seeing some of the clever things he’d done with the barn. A wrought iron wagon wheel had been suspended from the ceiling above the dining table. Half-melted candles, wide and squat, sat on each spoke, ready to light the area below in a soft glow.
    On another wall, he’d mounted three gold buckles in separate frames. They were surrounded by photos of the rodeo; bull riders, bulls and rodeo clowns.  
    He pointed toward the wall beside the back door. “I found the coat hooks in the tack room and brought them in here. I didn’t want a mud room, so we made storage cupboards out of some original timber and put them along the wall.”
    Everywhere Emily looked she saw something that made her smile. Something that made her wonder if she could do the same thing with the library building. “It must have taken a long time to finish.” And cost a fortune, she thought. Barn conversions like this one didn’t happen all the time and they definitely came with a big price tag.
    “About six months. We built a separate shell inside the barn walls and had to get it closed in and waterproof before winter hit. I couldn’t do much while I was riding, but between rodeos I helped the construction crew. You could create something like this for your boutique.”
    He was dangling a carrot the size of Easter Bunny in front of her nose. She thought about the old library building. The