With her teenage daughter Juliet Rogers, successful New York City based romance novelist Karen Rogers, in the lead up to Christmas, heads back to her Louisiana country home for the first time in twenty years following the sudden death of her father, Pete Rogers. Beyond Pete’s death, it is not a good time for Karen as she already owes her editor new material, she not telling her editor that she has a major case of writer’s block. Juliet, who never met her grandfather or knew about her mother’s Lousiana past, has no emotional attachment to this trip, she who would have much rather spent Christmas in New York City with her friends in the comfort of big city life. Karen not so much left but ran away from her past in leaving twenty years ago. Now, she wants to sell Pete’s ranch as quickly as possible to run away once again to put this part of her life permanently behind her. It won’t be that easy for Karen as she not only learns from Pete’s best friend, Judge Brandon Lawrence who is administering the legal aspects of the estate, that the ranch operation is deep in arrears on many payments - money Karen doesn’t have - but that there is no known will. In addition, Hugh Anderson, with who Karen has a turbulent history (the two who were once engaged before she ran off), who Pete treated like a son, and who had long helped Pete maintain the ranch, has a proverbial “back of the envelope” written, albeit undated, agreement from Pete for half the ranch, which Karen, in her turbulent relationship with Hugh, intends to fight. Meanwhile, Juliet, beyond striking up a friendship with Nan, the daughter of the stable owners down the road, has made a connection to one thing in rural Louisiana, namely Pete’s horse, Rodeo. It is partly through Nan and partly through Rodeo that Juliet meets and begins to fall for Monty Anderson, who happens to be Hugh’s nephew, and who Hugh took in and treated as his own after Monty’s parents passed. Juliet and Monty end up getting caught in the feud between Karen and Hugh, Juliet and Monty who get around the edict not to see each other in Monty secretly teaching Juliet to race Rodeo in the annual Christmas Stampede barrel riding competition, all in an effort for Juliet to raise the money herself in the form of the first place prize money to be able to keep Rodeo in light of all Pete’s debt.