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Had Me At Howdy By Mary Karlik
Genre: Comedy, Contemporary, Romance, Young Adult

Platinum credit card? Deactivated. New car? Sold. Best life ever? Canceled.

Thanks to my dad losing his job, we’ve ditched Chicago for Fumbuck, Texas—population: redneck. Now I’m living on a rundown farm, scrubbing dishes, and driving a rusty pickup. Worst of all? I’m stuck working alongside a cowboy.

But this Cinderella isn’t giving up. I’ll claw my way back to the luxe life I left behind—and no one, not even infuriatingly chill, stupidly handsome Austin McCoy is going to stop me. Even if he does make feeding the chickens weirdly… enjoyable.

She thinks she’s just passing through. I’m hoping she stays.
I kind of feel for the Quinn sisters. City girls don’t belong in Spring Creek—but Kelsey? There’s more to her than designer labels and eye rolls. When she forgets to be angry, I see it—like the way her eyes light up when she feeds the chickens.

Now all I have to do is convince her the guy she really wants is me, not some rich dude taking her to a ball in Chicago.

Content Warning: This work contains a subplot involving death, grief, and an off-page instance of date rape. While these events are not depicted directly, they are referenced and may be distressing to some readers.

Excerpt:

Austin sat in the wicker rocker waiting for Kelsey. He supposed he could have gone ahead and started feeding the chickens, except the highlight of his day tended to be the moment she stepped onto the porch. In that instant, before she said hello, another side of her was revealed—a freer side. One that didn’t see every second on the farm as a prison sentence.
Not that she was bitchy to him or anything. She did her work and then retreated to the house. She was missing out on the beautiful aspect of farm life. Like the horses.
He couldn’t get her to go near them. He worked with them after the feeding and cleaning chores were done. By that time, she was in the house, probably texting her boyfriend, Dan or Don or Drew or whatever the hell his name was.
Austin had the stitches removed yesterday and now that he had full use of his hand, he hoped to change Kelsey’s view of life on the farm.
The front door opened and his muscles tensed with anticipation. She stepped across the threshold, smiled, closed her eyes for a split second, and took a deep breath.
There, that was it.
That was the moment he’d been waiting for. The instant she was experiencing the—the—splendor. Yeah, the splendor of the country. And the best part was, she was totally unaware of it. As soon as she let the fresh air out of her lungs, her smile faded and sadness returned to her eyes.
Austin wanted to grab that moment for her. He wanted to show her what she couldn’t see. In the week she’d been in Texas, he hadn’t even come close.
“Morning, Kelsey, ready to work?”
“No.” She sat across from him, like she did every morning, and drank her coffee.
“The chickens are hungry.” He handed her the pail of feed.
“They’ll live.” She set it next to her chair and propped her feet on the coffee table.
It was a silly game they played every morning. But this morning she seemed different. There was something beyond the sadness. “What’s up?”
“What do you mean?”
“I dunno. You just look different.” He tapped the toe of her tennis shoe with his boot. “You’re not all mad and ‘I hate Texas’ like usual.”
“Yeah, well I’ve resigned myself to this year long prison sentence.”
“So—you want to talk about it?”
“Nope.” She took a long sip of coffee.
Austin set his cup down and stood. “Well, I got my stitches out and can pick up more of the cleaning load so—I guess I’m gonna get started.”
He grabbed for the pail, but before he could lift it, Kelsey laid her hand next to his on the handle. “I got it.”
He let go and took a step back. “Okay. I’d like to get started before it gets hot. It’s already eighty-eight.”
“I’m coming.” She sat her mug next to his and followed him to the chicken yard. She scattered the chicken scratch across the ground. “I got a video from Zoe yesterday.”
Austin cleaned and filled the chicken waterers and filled the feeders with lay crumble. “Yeah?”
“A bunch of my friends were at the park playing in the Crown Fountain. Ever hear of it?”
“No.”
“It’s pretty awesome. Here, look.” She pulled her phone from her pocket and Austin leaned over her shoulder to watch the video.
There was a ginormous video screen with a picture of a face on it. The face was spitting real water onto the people below. Then the water stopped, the face closed his eyes, the screen turned off, and a waterfall cascaded from the top. It looked like it was at least three stories tall.
“Whoa. Now that’s cool.”
Kelsey shoved her phone back into her pocket. “Yeah. They’re going to be doing stuff like that all summer and they don’t have a clue how lucky they are.”
“Nah, this is lucky. They’re missing out on rural America. Look at you. You’re a pro at feeding chickens and gathering eggs. Just think, while they’re playing in some e-coli infested urban fountain, you are shoveling one-hundred-percent natural horse shit.”
Kelsey shook her head. “When you put it like that…”
He slung his arm around her shoulder, careful to make sure it didn’t look like he was trying to come on to her. They walked to the coop and Austin placed eggs in the empty chicken scratch pail that Kelsey held. “I mean would Zoe have a clue how to pick up a warm fresh-from-the-chicken-ass egg?”
“Unlike me, she probably would have grabbed the egg and not a snake.”
“But then I wouldn’t have had to have stitches and watch you do all the work for a week.”
Kelsey spun away from Austin and pointed an accusing finger at him. “I knew it! It was your plan all along.” Her eyes were bright with mischief and she was smiling, on the edge of laughing.
Austin slapped his hand over his heart. “You got me. I planted the snake there. If I’d only known you were such a greenhorn that I would still have to show you every little thing…”
He was a little worried he might have pushed the teasing too much, but Kelsey gave him the fake pout that girls tend to do when they’re flirting and said, “Poor baby.”
Wait. Was she flirting with him? Really?
She held the pail of eggs up and continued. “I’ll just run these little ol’ chicken-shit-covered eggs to the house and you can start slopping Winifred.” She batted her eyes at him dramatically.
Yes. She was definitely flirting.
“A Texas boy can’t say no to a plea like that, even if it does come from a Yankee.” This was new territory for him, and he felt like he was walking across those eggs with spurs on. For once, Kelsey seemed to let the anger she held at her situation go and she was having fun—they were having fun—and he didn’t want it to go away.
She grinned a big cheesy grin and headed to the house, bucket of eggs in hand

About the Author

Mary Karlik (also writing as Mary J. Wilson) combines her Texas roots with her Scottish heritage to write happily-ever-afters from Texas to Scotland.

Mary has five indie-published contemporary young adult romance novels and two fantasy novels.

Mary earned her MFA in Writing Popular Fiction from Seton Hill University, has a B.S. degree from Texas A&M University, and is currently studying Scottish Gaelic at Sabhal Mòr Ostaig in Skye, Scotland. She is also a certified, professional ski instructor and a Registered Nurse.

Mary is an active member of Contemporary Romance Writers, Romance Writers of America, and Dallas Area Romance Authors. Married to a Scott, Mary lives in both and Scotland and Texas

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