“You call me Red again, Mister, and you won’t need one (a room). What you’ll need is a pine box and a preacher to read about you lyin’ down in green pastures,” she said.

“Ah, honey, you’ve got a hard lesson to learn,” she whispered.

All the hair on his neck stood straight up. Her voice was always slightly husky, but when she whispered it was so hot that he wanted to make love to her until dawn rather than drink whiskey with her.

“Okay then, braggy butt, if you don’t pass out after number three then I’ll take you to dinner next week,” he said.

She slung the door to the room open and stood to one side. “If I do?”

“Ladies first.”

She stepped into the room, peeled off her coat and tossed it on the bed closest to the door, sat down on the other bed, and removed her boots. He put the brown bag and two shot glasses on the small table in the corner and sat down beside her, close enough that she could smell the remnants of Stetson and beer on his breath. He kicked off his boots, removed his coat, and tossed it across hers.

“If I’m still standing after three shots?” she asked.

He tipped her chin back and kissed her, teasing her mouth open with his tongue. “Then you can take me to dinner next week.”

She moved over and sat down in his lap, wrapped her arms around his neck, and cupped a cheek in each hand. She pulled his lips down to hers in another searing kiss. “If I’m still standing you have to cook dinner for me. Nothing frozen or prepared.”

“Deal. And if you pass out, you have to cook for me. Nothing frozen. No take-out. From scratch with dessert.” He wrapped his arms around her and slipped a hand under her shirt. Her bare skin was soft as satin sheets and warm on his cold hands.

She’d never known rough cold hands could cause her skin to sizzle.

“Deal,” she gasped.

“Anymore bets or ground rules or do we spit on our knuckles and begin this war?” he asked.

She kissed him on the cheek as she stood up and straightened her shirt.

Kissing was finished.

Battle was beginning.

She pulled out a chair and sat down at the table. “I’ll pour. Only ground rule is that all is fair in chaos and Jack.”

Wil grinned and took the other chair. “Then let the contest begin. Are we doing doubles or singles?”

She held up a glass and studied it. “These are made for doubles but let’s do singles. To this line…” she pointed to a rim halfway up the glass with the name of a bar written above it, “…that should be a single shot. So here goes.”

She filled the two glasses to the mark and tossed hers back like a gunslinger in an old Western movie. Heat, almost as fiery as what smacked her when she kissed Wil, hit her empty stomach like a blowtorch. The first one was always the hottest. It paved the way for the rest. By the eighth or ninth she wouldn’t even feel the fire.

Wil threw his back and swallowed. He had an advantage over Pearl that he hadn’t told her. He’d eaten a whole plate full of goodies before she arrived at the party so he was working on a full stomach. Unless she’d eaten half an Angus steer before she left home, she was drinking on an empty stomach. But she’d said all was fair in chaos and Jack so that meant open disclosure wasn’t an issue.

She refilled the glasses, giving him a few drops more than she put in hers. All was fair in Jack and chaos. His exact words had been to let the contest begin…

He nodded and downed his shot. “It’s a shame to be drinkin’ good whiskey like this. Jack is sippin’ whiskey.”

“Might as well like the taste.”

She sent her second one down and sure enough, the blazes weren’t nearly as hot. But like always, whiskey had a way of making other things hot; that warm gushy feeling deep down in her gut sent her imagination into overdrive. No fantasy she’d ever come up with while downing shots compared to the real thing called Wil Marshall.

She poured the third round, making a big show of filling them exactly even, and downed hers before he had time to pick his up. She didn’t feel the fire that time, at least not in her stomach. The rest of her body felt like it was one degree away from combustion, and he didn’t look like he was feeling the liquor at all. She might have met her match after all.

“Talk to me. Tell me something about yourself. Your momma got red hair like you?” Wil asked.

“Hell, no! Momma is a blonde and a stereotypical southern belle. I got this red hair from a distant great-grandma. There’s a connection between my dad and some folks up in northern Oklahoma. Little bitty place called Corn. We went there for a couple of family reunions when I was a kid. Have a distant cousin named Sharlene who has red hair just like mine. Kinky curly and unruly. We shared a great-grandma and we were the only two redheads in the bunch.”

“What happened to her?” Wil asked.

“She writes romance books and used to own a bar over around Mingus, Texas. That would be east of Mineral Wells. But she fell in love with a carpenter and moved back to Corn. Last I heard she had a couple of kids of her own. The guy she married had custody of a niece and nephew and she adopted them so she’s got a houseful.”

“She got a temper like yours?”

“Worse.”

Wil chuckled and tossed back the next round.

“Your turn,” Pearl said. “Something about you now?”

“I like to dance. Want to go over to Mingus to the Honky Tonk sometime for a beer and a dance?”

“Hey, that’s the place Sharlene owned,” Pearl said.

“That’s why you look familiar. I saw her one time when me and Ace stopped by there for a cold beer one night after we’d been to a rodeo in Abilene.”

“Small world,” Pearl said.

By the eighth round she was still lucid and Wil was getting sexier by the minute. The room got hotter than a hooker in the front row pew of a holiness tent revival in the middle of July in Texas. She removed her lacy shirt.

He raised an eyebrow.

“I’m not cheatin’. I’m hot,” she said.

“Liquor, weather, or otherwise?” he asked with a wicked gleam in his eye.

“All damn three. I think it’s close to time for the countdown on television, ain’t it?” she slurred.

“Hell, I don’t know. All I know is that you are damn beautiful, Red, and I’d rather be doing something else than showing you I can out-drink you. Let’s have a pissin’ contest that involves sex rather than shots.” His words came out slow and deliberate.

She grinned. “You are about to lose it, cowboy. That was as romantic as a trip to the outhouse.”

He laughed too loudly. “Never was one much for words.”

She pointed her finger at him. “Don’t tell me that after all the text messages and phone calls. You are getting drunk.”

“So are you, darlin’. Too bad I don’t take advantage of women when they’re drunk. Pour us another round. Is this nine or ten?” He moved his chair close enough to hers that their shoulders touched.

“See, you don’t even know how much you’ve had. It’s nine and you’ll be snoring by ten,” she told him.

He grinned and downed the ninth one, set his glass down with a thump, and took off his shirt, revealing a gauze undershirt and showing muscles she’d only dreamed about. Would she give up before the clock struck midnight and a New Year began? He’d never live it down if he let a woman out-drink him…

She poured the last of the bottle up into the glasses and tossed hers back…Damn, that man got sexier with every single shot. © Carolyn Brown, Sourcebooks Casablanca, 2011

Sourcebooks Casablanca is kindly giving away TWO (2) copies of ‘Red’s Hot Cowboy‘ (US/Canada only – publisher’s request)

This giveaway ends Friday 26th Aug 2011.

He wasn’t looking for trouble… But when the cops are knocking on your door, trouble’s definitely found you. And this is where Wil Marshal finds himself after checking into the Longhorn Inn. It could be all a big mistake, but Wil’s not getting much sleep. Then the motel owner—who is drop dead gorgeous and feisty to boot—saves him from an even worse night behind bars. Now he owes her one, bit time…

But trouble comes in all shapes and sizes… Pearl never wanted that run-down motel, but her aunt didn’t leave her much choice. And then this steaming hot cowboy shows up looking for a place to rest. Next thing she knows, she wants to offer him more than just room service. But if he calls her Red one more time, he won’t be the only one accused of murder…

Sparks are definitely flying and before long, the Do Not Disturb sign might be swinging from the door…

All you have to do to enter is the following:

1. Leave a comment for Carolyn and answer her question above

2. Read Book Chick City’s giveaway policy

3. Fill out this form

4. One entry per person (duplicate entries will be disqualified)

GOOD LUCK!