When The Dust Settles (Timing book 3) by Mary Calmes | Cat's ARC Review & #giveaway #mmromance @Dreamspinners

Glenn Holloway’s predictable life ended the day he confessed his homosexuality to his family. As if that wasn’t enough, he then poured salt in the wound by walking away from the ranch he’d grown up on, to open the restaurant he’d always dreamed of. Without support from his father and brother, and too proud to accept assistance from anyone else, he had to start from scratch. Over time things worked out: Glenn successfully built a strong business, created a new home, and forged a life he could be proud of.

Despite his success, his estrangement from the Holloways is still a sore spot he can’t quite heal, and a called-in favor becomes Glenn’s worst nightmare. Caught in a promise, Glenn returns to his roots to deal with Rand Holloway and comes face-to-face with Mac Gentry, a man far too appealing for Glenn’s own good. It could all lead to disaster—disaster for his tenuous reconnection with his family and for the desire he didn’t know he held in his heart.

Buy links: Dreamspinner Press | Amazon

Cat gives this one 4 Meows with a 2 Purr heat index...

Glenn is a good-hearted man that runs a restaurant called the Bronc Burger, He takes in young people that need jobs, gives people second chances like ones out of jail and hires all ethnicities and genres of people.  His half brother Rand owns a big ranch that is ever expanding, nd  Glenn has promised his partner Stefan that he would go help on this cattle run as much as he doesn't want to.

When the Dust Settles is Book three of the Timing Series. This is my first n the series, I think you can read it as a standalone but I think you would enjoy it more if read in order, I felt lost a few times and it felt like I was missing some vital information. Having said that, I enjoyed the story and there was plenty of backstory to help me figure things out.

There is a lot going on in this book for it to be so short. We have Glenn rescuing Josie in the beginning from her father, The cattle run, then what happens when he gets off the run.The story felt a little rushed. Things all moved so fast especially with Glenn and Maclain that I wish the book had been a little longer. I loved all the characters and  the story line was good. I hope to see more soon.

If you like restaraunt owners, cowboys, family drama, cute dogs, funny horses, and an allover good story I think you will like this one.

Excerpt: 

IT WAS three forty-five in the morning by the time I made it out to the Red Diamond, towing a horse trailer that was in better shape than my truck. I’d driven over to the Blue Rock Stables where the owner, Addison Finch, let me keep my horse. There was no way in the world I would ask Rand for room in his stable. What was great was that Addison was the one who took care of the horses for the resort, so the walk over there at night from my restaurant so I could ride Juju was short. I had a routine down. Jog over, work out my horse, and then run the long way home to my bungalow. What wasn’t so great was I’d made my horse as nocturnal as I was, so when I got there in the early morning and loaded her into the trailer, she only had one eye open, just like me.

The house was lit up when I pulled in, so I knew people were awake. That made sense. Rand normally started his day at four, and we had at least a five-hour drive to get to the cattle.

Sitting there, I debated just calling and telling him that I’d come down with pneumonia, or the plague, or just anything to get out of the drive. It wasn’t even his fault, really; it was mostly that Rand was larger than life and everything he did turned to gold, making it damned difficult to ever measure up to him.

Rand owned the largest legacy property between Dallas and Lubbock and had made said ranch self-sufficient out of necessity. Basically, he’d been booted from not only his seat on the community board of directors of Winston—where the Red Diamond was technically located—but from the town itself when the county had been rezoned. So even though his home sat in Winston, the house was, by boundary, part of Hillman, as was the resort where my restaurant had been built. I had never understood how they figured the boundaries, because Rand’s three hundred thousand acres stretched over close to four hundred and seventy miles, well beyond one county and into the next and the next, but apparently it was where the main house sat that determined “home”—and Rand Holloway was no longer welcome in his.

The reason for the ousting had been Rand coming out and bringing the man he loved—Stefan Joss—to live with him on the Red. The town of Winston could not handle one of the pillars of the community being gay and so had taken steps to ensure they were separated from Rand and the land he called home. It had been a colossal mistake: the ranch was more profitable than anyone could have imagined, giving Rand the power and the funds to make changes in Hillman as well as to turn his property into a small self-sufficient town in and of itself. The ranch boasted hundreds of Quarter Horses, thousands of cattle, and I had no idea how many acres of land now devoted to farming. There was still only one main compound, but the ranch also now hosted more than fifty private homes and an unknown number of cowboy camps that I had neither the time nor the inclination to ask about.

He was a force to be reckoned with and everyone else, including me, paled in comparison. Since it was exhausting to try to measure up, to keep my sanity, I steered clear of him, his husband, their son, and the idyllic life they lived on the Red Diamond.

But now I was stuck because my marker had been called in, and even though I was sure they could get along without me, paying my debt so it wouldn’t be hanging over my head anymore was too much of a temptation to pass up. After this, Stef and I would be square and I’d never have to return to the Red and feel crappy about myself. We’d be even and I wouldn’t have to see Rand ever again, I’d never have to find myself desiring things I couldn’t have, coveting the idea of his life, his lover, and the peace he seemingly felt down to his bones.

I could be more pathetic, I knew that, but at the moment, sitting in my truck in the dark, not moving, staring at the house, I couldn’t imagine how. It was time to make a choice. Taking a deep breath, I made it and got out, heading for the porch.

I got no answer when I knocked on the screen door, so I opened it and stepped into the living room. Instantly an enormous Rhodesian ridgeback tromped around the corner toward me, the welcoming bark, just one, making me smile before the whimpering began. I knelt, which, with an eighty-pound dog, wouldn’t have seemed smart, but she knew me, as was evident from the whine of happiness, tail wagging, and the cold wet nose that got shoved into my face. The tongue on my chin sealed the deal.

“Hey, Bella,” I greeted, rubbing under her chin and scratching behind her ears. “Where are all your people?”

“Glenn? Is that you?”

Thankfully it wasn’t Rand calling out to me, but his partner, Stefan. And he was late determining if there was a stranger in his home, but because he’d heard no screaming, which meant his dog was not tearing me limb from limb in the living room, he had to be confident it was either me or my Uncle Tyler. No one else walked into the huge Folk Victorian home without permission. As much of a family as everyone was on the Red Diamond, this was still the boss man’s house, and since the baby was born, since Wyatt James Holloway arrived two years ago, no one walked in unannounced to Rand Holloway’s home. No one.

“It’s me,” I called back to Stef as he came out of the kitchen, dish towel over his shoulder, carrying a platter of cooked bacon.

“Hey, take this out to the table, will you?”

I moved fast to do as he asked and grab the dish, closing the distance from the living room to him, marveling as I always did at the man Rand loved. Before I met Stef, I had no idea men could be that pretty. I never dreamed that I’d meet a man with such beautiful, delicate, angelic features, golden skin, and thick blond hair that fell to his shoulders. It had been, it turned out, the final brick in the wall. Me seeing Stef, noticing everything about him, his face, his skin, the way he moved and the sound of his voice, all of it, even my long-dead desire for him, had finally made something crystal clear in my head. I was tired of wrestling with the whole question of whether I was gay. Meeting Stefan Joss, the partner of the man I’d thought was my cousin, sealed the deal.

Mary Calmes lives in Lexington, Kentucky, with her husband and two children and loves all the seasons except summer. She graduated from the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California, with a bachelor's degree in English literature. Due to the fact that it is English lit and not English grammar, do not ask her to point out a clause for you, as it will so not happen. She loves writing, becoming immersed in the process, and falling into the work. She can even tell you what her characters smell like. She loves buying books and going to conventions to meet her fans.

Website: http://www.marycalmesauthor.com/index.php

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