As a teenager, Isabelle Rondeau ran away from her hometown of Callister, Idaho, with the town bad boy. Now, years later, he's left her for another woman and she's returned to Callister to rebuild her own life and connect with family for the sake of her ten-year-old daughter. In her travels away from Callister, she has become a cutting horse trainer of some renown. As the owner of two prize-winning mares and a highbred stallion, she intends to make a living in Callister breeding and training cutting horses. She's through with men. That is, until she runs into the local sheriff, a man she knew in high school and hasn't seen in eighteen years. Divorced and broke, John Thomas Bradshaw, Jr., ex-ProRodeo star, has come back to Callister to lick his wounds and contemplate his future. Somehow, he's let himself be persuaded to act as the temporary sheriff of Callister County until an election can be held. The last person he expects to run into is his old high school crush. She still has that unruly fiery hair and those mysterious brown eyes that mesmerized him as a teenager. All of the old desires return. He doesn't want to love again, but can he keep from it when he and "Frizzy Izzy" was his first love and they have so much in common? When a local is murdered on his watch and Izzy has a connection, he's forced to call on all of his courage and honor.