Sarah Carter, who goes by the pen name, Mims Murphy, meets Sage Tanner at Imaginings Publishing while he's posing for the cover of her soon-to-be-released romance novel. After being bulldozed into a coffee break with him by her publisher, an embarrassing incident makes Sarah furious, and she walks out. Of course, fate has a wonderful way of intervening in matters of the heart. Deciding she needs to write from experience, she signs up for "dude" lessons at Lazy M Dude Ranch. Imagine her chagrin when she discovers the owner of the ranch is none other than Mr. Tanner himself!

Sage Tanner works as a high fashion model to keep his ranch in the black. While posing for the cover of a romance novel, he meets the author, but ends up ticking her off, which ticks him off. How can a romance writer be such a prudish, stick-in-the-mud? A few weeks later when she shows up at his dude ranch, his anger vanishes and he's determined to change her mind about leaving.