Gourd Enough To Eat: Alphas Fall Hard, page 1
Gourd Enough To Eat
Steamy Mountain Man Romance
Alphas Fall Hard
Sofia Aves
Contents
Blurb
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
EPILOGUE
Thank you for reading
ALPHAS FALL HARD
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
READ SOFIA’S SERIES
Blurb
She should never have walked into my shop, or up my mountain. But now Cadance Webster is here, she can work for her keep, even if it means breaking a few nails in the process.
This wilderness keeps secrets for all of us, and Cadance is no exception. Hell, I might even let her in if I didn’t think she wasn’t carrying a few of her own truths that could tear my whole world apart.
Ones she’s running from, all the way right into the mountains and into my arms.
And I’ll be d*mned if she isn’t a temptation gourd enough to eat.
Copyright Ⓒ Sofia Aves 2025
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, or distributed in any form or by any means, including electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it on a website, or distribute it by any means without permission.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters, and incidents portrayed within are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or events or localities is entirely coincidental.
Sofia Aves asserts the moral rights to be identified as the author of this work.
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First Edition
EBOOK ISBN 978-1-923471-88-7
PRINT ISBN 978-1-923471-13-9
CHAPTER ONE
ELIJAH
Istared at the pink glitter monstrosity of a van that marred the Lone Grizzly Mountain the Off-Duty Rescue Ranch sat on with my mouth open, catching flies. Hands that ached with hours of work wrangling a new horse that just wouldn’t stay put forgot to hurt as I decoded the nude oversized animal decal one side.
A Grin and Bear It slogan decorated the front. I gazed at the pun, the naked bear—ha, the bare bear—all I could see. The eyesore obscured everything I loved about the ranch and the landscape, right up until a blonde bombshell of a girl hopped out of the driver’s side. She was also covered in glitter and pink, fluffy stuff as she skipped around the front to chat with Ash, who ran the place.
He gave her a hug, his arms fitting around her where she had curves in all the right places. More than a few, actually. Hell, I didn’t know jeans could look like that.
“She could rival you for a pun, gourd boy.” Anson, one of the ranch’s other workers, slapped my shoulder then cuffed at my face in play. “Fuck, man. You’re drooling.”
I jerked back with an oath. “Keep your hands to yourself," I grumbled.
Part of me wanted to watch her all day. The other part kind of admired her balls to stick a bear that big all over the front of her display—even if her display was a glitter van that looked like a pink version of the Mystery Machine, circa two thousand and one.
I swiped the back of my hand across my mouth just to check. He was right, dammit. That irked me worse than before. I turned my back on the glitter bomb and the girl who made a mess in the yard adjacent to the house, focusing on the rescue in front of us. “We have work to do,” I snapped, succeeding only in frightening the creature, and probably Anson too, from the look on the man’s face.
He turned away from the calamity in the making before me, grumbling like I had before. The sparkly new shiny thing in the yard might look like the best new distraction to come in from town, but I knew better.
Nothing good came from something so pretty. Anson could take my word for it, though right now he didn’t seem inclined to ask, and I sure as hell wasn’t about to offer my philosophy on life.
Today’s newly arrived rescue horse, Daisy Duke, nuzzled my hand affectionately.
“Wanna feed, pretty girl?” I murmured, running my hand over her nose with extreme care, all too aware of the trust she put in me, offering me that first touch. Deep scars cut into her stunning chestnut coat around her head where she’d been trapped into a halter for an extended period by a previous owner who thought they were doing the right thing but…
Yeah, well. Sometimes owners did the wrong thing even when they thought they were doing the right thing. I was just glad that my job didn’t involve talking to said owners. I figured my words would be too harsh for that end of a really blunt stick. Dusty, the local vet, lanced a pocket in her cheek earlier that looked like it was just swelling, and nothing worse. I’d stayed with her the entire time and she sort of semi imprinted onto me afterwards as her carer.
After the military shit I’d been through in the desert over the past few years, being kind to someone rather than too harsh felt…oddly good. Maybe the rescue in this case wasn’t DD after all.
“You gonna day dream about your gourds all day? Maybe you get enough time with all your curves there, huh?” Anson didn’t know when to give up.
I rolled my lips inward as Miss Daisy D gave me a fixed look that said don’t murder him in my paddock, please.
“Never, ma’am,” I muttered.
“D’you just call the horse, ma’am?” Ash Rhodes, the man who ran the Off-Duty Rescue Ranch, clapped a hand across my shoulder blades.
I stiffened. Daisy sent me a commiserating look.
“Is there a problem with how I address a beautiful lady?” I stroked Daisy’s nose. She whickered in response, nuzzling me gently.
“She’s taken to you,” Ash mused. “I know a girl who did that once. You want to look after this one for me?”
I stroked Daisy’s nose while something uncertain coiled too tight in my gut, something that might shatter at a moment’s notice.
Something akin to trust, unfounded.
“You know I can’t be here most nights if she needs me,” I said carefully. “And I care in the afternoons. Not that I’m not grateful. It’s just that—” I paused, knowing his eyes were upon me. Knowing I couldn’t screw up this chance at a slice of peace, of something more than the drifter life that had taken me from one ranch to the next, following the seasons for the last few years. This was the first place I'd had a glimpse of what home might feel like again in a long time and I’d do almost anything not to jeopardise that.
Plus, I had a sense of purpose here. A sense of something more than just place.
“You like the part of you that you’ve found here. And in town. I know that,” Ash said, so easily. Much more so than I'd be able to say for myself. That rankled, but I held my silence and let the other, slightly older man finish. “I’m glad you’re here with us, Elijah Campise. Both Off duty and Forest Grove wouldn’t be the same without you.”
I ground my teeth, unsure why his acceptance, when I couldn't do the same for myself, bothered me so much. “Appreciate it.” I kept on stroking Daisy's nose long after Ash walked away, humming softly to her, unsure who was comforting who.
When I finished up with Daisy, had her settled for the afternoon, the yard stood empty, covered in long shadows, the glitter bus with its bare bear nowhere in sight.
And that meant it was time to get some real work done.
The night sky of Forest Grove hung over me as I sat out the back of Gourd for You, the patisserie I owned a fifty percent share of real estate in with Declan Evans. He baked, I carved. Gourds, mostly, by hand. None of this machine based stuff. I could control the designs if I did everything by hand, creating lacework on the outside of the hard shell. Okay, so sometimes I baked. Declan did the really hard stuff, and I made fun shapes that fit inside lamp-like gourds that grew on the property where I worked during the day.
Moonlighting as a carving patisserie chef didn’t leave me a whole lot of sleeping hours, but it kept the nightmares away that had plagued me for a whole lot of years, and Ash allowed me the time off the ranch, so I made use of it all.
The gourd I held tonight was the traditional, elongated shape. Hollow in the middle, it looked a whole lot heavier than it actually was. They could be used to carry water, but I used to use them for art. This one would hold a family of capybara pastries when it was done that would be ready for the weekend trade. Declan had the designs, and the fillings for me. Chocolate was one of his specialities, while I loved working with the intricate patterns on both the gourds and the sugary pastry.
“I'm closing up for the night. Are you gonna be out here for a while longer, yet?” Declan raked his sugar encrusted fingers through his dark hair, leaving whi
I grinned, the pressures of today having left me hours before. Carving and being out here always left me more relaxed than even being out on the ranch, where I’d thought I was happiest. Until I found this place, and Declan. His story wasn’t so different from my own. A drifter with a slightly different history, but the same end result. We bought in on the same dream and suddenly we had a shop together. He ran it full time and I came in to hope out most nights.
I nodded, leaning my head back to stare up at the night sky that the small town’s lights obscured. “You know you’re always welcome up the ranch if you want a break.”
“Now why would I do somethin’ stupid like that?" Declan drawled, looking down at me. “Just because you found some friendlies, doesn’t mean I have to share them with you.”
I huffed a laugh. “Whatever, old man. Go home and get your beauty sleep”
He shoved his hands into his pockets. “Might need that. Did you see who moved into the flat above next door? Prettiest little thing. I thought I might ask her out for a drink tomorrow night. Unless you want to crash my party.”
I made a face at him. “I promise I’ll make myself scarce. And stay up at the ranch. You gonna close early, then?” On occasion we did a roaring night trade for a tiny, small town, catching people after work when they couldn’t get away from their daily duties.
“Yeah, I thought I might.”
"Don't get all broken hearted if she turns you down,” I warned him. “I remember how your last romance went.”
Declan sent me a wounded look. “Kimberly was a fine lass, thank you muchly.”
“Except that she ran off with that banker from the city about a month later.” I looked down at my gourd, turning it around my hand. I’d finished one side, and had the next to go. Symmetry was a big thing with me.
“Yeah, that wasn’t great” Declan scratched his chin as I looked back up at him.
“Go home, D. You’re making my neck sore.”
“Whiner,” he mumbled, yawning. “See you in a few days for your bog cabybuddy thing.”
“Capybara Gourd lighting,” I corrected him, knowing he knew the name full well and was taking the piss. “Sleep well for your date.”
“Eh, she hasn’t said yes yet.”
“Have you met her?” I called to his back.
He waved, a one fingered saluted in my direction as he walked away, locking the front door behind him.
I grinned, looked down at my gourd and concentrated on making the pattern match up to the shape in my hands, but damn if I couldn't get my mind off the girl with the curves who’d been at the Off-Duty ranch back earlier in the day, the girl with pretty curves all of her own who I knew shouldn't be about the ranch, or me, but craved anyway. The girl I’d fantasize about unhealthily for the next few hours.
My glitter bomb.
CHAPTER TWO
CADANCE
Istood outside the patisserie next to my rented upstairs room and reconsidered my life choices for all of a second. I mean, it came down to the pink glitter truck that really did stand out like a sore thumb parked out the front of our combined business and sleeping areas, and the chef in the patisserie who doubled as a cowboy during his noon moonlighting hours.
You know, the one who carved gourds and waltzed about the inside of his shop wearing jeans and an apron.
And that was all.
My mind really didn’t take that much time to decide on who to ask for help after I sucked in that delectable sight, all the pretty gourd carvings that littered his windows with their delectable, sugared treats inside.
Oh, and the knife buried hilt deep inside my flat tire. Which was why I stood outside the gourd-chef's shop at midnight, ready to beg for help.
Not because he looked good without a shirt, or because his other assets bulged as he finished carving up his current artwork. That took a significant amount of talent as well as a steady, gentle hand. Even I could see that.
Some of the larger displays nearest the window that I loitered near looked like pure lace around the edges. He’d placed lights behind and even inside some to illuminate the thinnest layers as well as the sugar encrusted pastry creations nestled inside. Tiny creatures of the woodlands featured there: squirrels, robins, a spotted deer. Even a wild turkey. And those weren't guesses. The depiction in pastry was clear, his stunning art work surrounding the mouth-watering dessert just as delectable.
And then there was the man himself.
Bulging kind of everywhere, covered in powdered sugar, the occasional fleck of paint from his alternative creation, his dark eyes focussed on the work in his hands.
And if I hadn’t already had a bit of a hand fetish…welp, I sure as all get out did by now.
Long fingered, rough and calloused and all things both gentle and firm. Swoon me sideways and pass me a gourd carving cowboy artist pastry chef, pretty please.
Clearly, this was the perfect man to ask to change my tire, once I stopped perving on him.
I blinked, but the shop was empty.
Damnit, I missed my chance.
But there he was, dressed—well, dressed. As in, wearing a shirt. A long sleeved, black Henley, done up to the neck except for those top two buttons that were left open. Somehow, being dressed was all the more sexier on him.
What did you expect, Cadance? That he’d head back to his dude ranch wearing an apron and jeans?
Maybe my ovaries had hoped that was the case, but my logical brain—that appeared to have gone on hiatus the moment he appeared in the middle of the kitchen like an oversized, cowboy wraith.
Gone was the gourd-perv-worthy chef of moments before, when I'd vague out over carving hands and bulging biceps. Okay, so I starved for male specimens to ogle. Which, naturally, was why I was in this mess to begin with. You’d think that was enough to cure me of over active ovaries to start with, but apparently not.
My mouth opened as Mr tall, dark and Gourdy strode toward the door, keys in hand, where I’d been waiting on the other side all night. I did the only logical thing I could think of in that moment.
I ran.
And hid near the side of the building where mine adjoined his. It wasn’t like I’d been practicing my speech for the past twenty minutes in my head or anything like that while I loitered out the front of his ship like a stalker instead of knocking, waxing and asking for help on the mostly deserted—okay, completely deserted— street front.
Nope. I acted like a complete stalker, unsure if I liked his display better, or him. The retail manager in me adored the display. The one hundred percent female in me appreciated the man. Could I just love both? Who knew. Instead, I cowered in the tiny space between buildings, thinking how stupid this whole scenario was.
I should go back up my stairs to my brand new rental, lock myself in, and deal with the vandalism in the morning. I was sure the locals would have a damn fine and logical reason why a knife was implanted into my tire. The distraction might cost me a day’s trade but hey, maybe I could run my wax and nail service from the street front and use it to drum up business where I’d parked earlier in the afternoon instead of running appointments as a door to door service—
An oversized hand folded around my shoulder, yanked me from my hiding place, and a serrated knife crushed my windpipe to a mere thread of breathing space. Dark eyes I barely recognized from the gourd patisserie fixed on mine in an unyielding stare.
“You’ve got three seconds to tell me why you’re out here,” he rasped, digging the blade against my throat.
I swore flesh parted and life blood drizzled like frosting over my skin.
The hulk of a man bore his weight down on me. Actually, he kind of towered. My distant view from outside his window didn’t do the enormity of this man, in all his glory, any form of justice. Any pithy words I wanted to speak in my defence of my midnight perving habits came out in a rush of breath and part of a squeak.
Holy hells, I hope he can change a tire after this.
And hot on the heels after that thought: that knife handle does not match the one jammed into my truck wheel.
