Too little – too late. That was my reaction to Rough Wrangler, Tender Kisses. For about half the book, I wondered when it would take off and go somewhere rather than focusing on the oh-so-annoying heroine Caitlin Summers, who is all blue eyes, blonde hair, pouting lips and stupid acts. Then half way thorough the book, the plot kicked in, some really hateful villains showed up, Caitlin quit acting like a spoiled priss and things got going good. But for me, first impressions remained. Caitlin was not someone I would want to know – what a flouncy, fluffy girl!

Caitlin Summers mother could not take the hard life of a rancher’s wife in Wyoming. So when Caitlin was a baby, her mother took her, left her husband, Reese Summers, and went to Philadelphia where she got a divorce, married a wealthy man, and had another daughter. When her mother and step-father were killed in an accident, Caitlin discovers that she has been left with nothing but debts. Then she gets a note that Reese, her natural father, has left her his ranch in his will. Off she goes to Wyoming.

When she arrives, Caitlin is met by Wade Barclay, one of three orphaned boys whom Reese adopted after his wife divorced him. He has left them part of the ranch as well and Wade is the foreman. Caitlin also discovers that she has to live on the ranch for a year before she can even think of selling it.

Caitlin had dreams of selling quickly so she and her half-sister could go somewhere and live and she is not happy about the terms of the will. So she proceeds to act as snippy, snotty and stupid as I have ever seen a character act. She is short and rude to Wade, condescending to the ranch hands. When she realizes she is a part-owner of the ranch, she proceeds to hire some new hands – all drunken reprobates to whom she promises an exorbitant salary. Wade manages to fix up that little contrempts, but then she goes out riding by herself after she has been told that rustlers are in the area. When Wade tells her of the danger, she says she’ll take a rifle. Has she ever shot one? Ha!

Wade’s reaction to Caitlin is one of exasperation and lust. The exasperation I can understand – I sometimes wished I could reach into the pages of the book and shake her, but lust? Well, she has blue eyes and blonde hair and she’s pretty. I guess that counts for something.

About halfway through the book, the villains show up and things begin to move and move fast. There’s Drew Raleigh, a slick guy who wants the ranch and tries to woo Caitlin, arousing Wade’s jealousy. Then Drew teams up with Dominic Trent, who tried to acost Caitlin in Philadelphia and has followed her to Wyoming because he won’t take no for an answer. These two hire a nasty bounty hunter named Smoke Jackson and bingo – we have a woman in peril.

Of course all ends happily. Wade says the magic phrase “I love you” and Caitlin becomes all sweet and nice, while my cynical self blew a raspberry and said, “Yeah, right.”

I’ve read books where characters acted snobbish and stupid at the beginning yet I’ve believed that they’ve changed by the time the book ended. This was not one of them. I never warmed up to Caitlin (and by the way, her name is all wrong for the period) and Wade never came alive for me either. When the plot kicked in and things got moving, Rough Wrangler, Tender Kisses did become very exciting, but for me it was not enough to compensate for the unlikable lead characters.