Jude & that Barratt Man — Calle J. Brookes / C.J. Brookes

★★★★★ What kind of man abducts brides for his sons? ★★★★★      —It's 1884 Texas, not medieval Europe, for heaven's sake!Jude Finley Handley doesn't understand how anyone could think what that Hughes Barratt and his sons had done was right.Even if that damned man insisted she and her brother had stolen Finley Creek Ranch right out from underneath the Barratts—taking her four nieces as a trade was just wrong. She's going to get her nieces back, even if it means the girls left their so-called new husbands behind forever.Confronting that Barratt man right in the middle of his ranch might not have been Jude's wisest idea, though.He is bigger, stronger… they are all alone...And… Hughes Barratt is looking at her with a particular glint in his eyes that says he isn't quite finished with the Finleys, after all… ★ Act in haste, repent in leisure…★Maybe he'd been hasty, insisting Jacob Finley trade his four oldest daughters to his sons for that old ranch, but what was done is done now. The girls were married legal and proper. There is no backing out of it in the clearer light of day.Hughes had been a little drunk and angry at the time. He may have overreacted to the land theft just a tad bit.His boys would have eventually courted Finley's girls, anyway. This way, he just got things moving along quicker for them all.Besides, his boys knew how a wife should be treated—they'd protect the girls, love them, and be… honorable. Once the girls forgave them, that is. ★ There is only one problem with that…★The girls' far too tempting aunt just threatens to keep interfering! When she nearly thunks one of his boys on the head with an iron skillet, Hughes has to deal with her, too. Before she hurts someone—or herself.No other man in Barrattville could hope to handle a spirited woman like Jude.And there is only one way to deal with a problem like her: ★ Someone needed to make Jude a bride herself. ★Him, to be exact. A Barratt man always knows the woman he wants. Hughes is no exception. He wants Jude, and he'll have her.But while he's trying to convince Jude he's not the heartless beast she accuses him of being… the Finleys' past troubles ride into Barrattville.With murder on their minds. Looking for Jude most of all. Now the only thing standing between Jude and a gang of vicious killers is the one man she can never imagine trusting—with her heart, her body, her nieces… or her very life…                                                                    ★★★★★★  Jude & that Barratt Man is a Finley Creek historical romance novella set in 1880s Finley Creek, Texas. It is part of the larger Finley Creek series of romantic suspense books by Calle J. Brookes                                                                  ★★★★★★