Stampede of Love - A Long Valley Romance Novella - Erin Wright

STAMPEDE OF LOVE A LONG VALLEY ROMANCE NOVELLA

ERIN WRIGHT

WRIGHT’S READS

COPYRIGHT © 2017 BY ERIN WRIGHT This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be constructed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical articles and reviews. Gene Autry © 1946 – Have I Told You Lately That I Love You? Blake Shelton © 2007 – Home

This one’s for my fans. Thanks for all of your support and love.

Oh, and OwlFace? Great title.

CHAPTER 1 REX

H

E SAT BALANCED,

tense, ready, the bull shifting impatiently underneath him, the smell of shit and dirt thick in the air. The bullfighters were waiting for his signal before jerking the chute open and after one deep breath, his left hand in the air, Rex gave a single nod. They jerked the gate open and Tornado came tearing out, bucking and spinning in his signature move that had earned him his name. The cheers and roar of the crowd faded away as Rex and Tornado conducted their dance. Rex was on tonight – every move that Tornado made, Rex followed. No mistakes, no hesitation. He could feel Tornado's muscles tensing beneath him, moving, releasing, as Rex held on, only a couple of seconds left… Dirt clods were being thrown in the air as the bull twisted, slamming his hooves into the ground. The grit settled on Rex’s tongue – it was the taste of rodeo. The adrenaline spiking through his system was what he lived for. Other people could be content to work in a cubicle in a job they hated, but not Rex. Never Rex. He had been moving up the ranks, he had been winning, when it all came tumbling down. He was rebuilding now, and every ache, every pain, every time he skipped a meal so he could pay the entrance fee for a rodeo, was worth it.

Back legs in the air, Tornado was in the middle of yet another spin when the buzzer sounded. The noise in the arena came rushing back and Rex could hear it all again, a wall of sound slamming into him. He launched himself to the right, away from Tornado's kicking back hooves and rolled a few times before scrambling to his feet and dashing to the wall, throwing himself over it just as Tornado charged the fence, slamming into it with his massive horns. Safe on the other side of the fence, Rex listened for the time and scores to be read out. 8.083 seconds on the bull. He jumped back up onto the fence and looked out over the arena, pumping his fist in the air, as the cheers of the crowd washed over him. Even without being able to hear the judges’ scores, he knew he’d won. He’d only had to complete the ride, and the Sawyer Stampede Bull Riding Event was his. He’d made it. He waited for the bullfighters, waving their flags, to corral Tornado towards his chute before Rex hopped back over the fence. The announcer, a big grin on his face and an even bigger cowboy hat on his head, strode out into the arena, talking a million miles a minute, grabbing Rex’s hand and thrusting it up in the air as the crowd roared its approval. Sawyer wasn’t the biggest rodeo in the Intermountain Rodeo Circuit, but it had to be one of the loudest. Listening to them cheer as he accepted the Sawyer Stampede Bull Riding belt buckle, and more importantly, the winner’s check, Rex could feel his cheek muscles begin to ache from smiling. Damn, it was good to be winning again.

HE WALKED INTO O’MALLEY’S, the best place in town for a steak and beer according to…well, everyone he’d asked, and followed the signs to the right to head back to the restaurant area. He didn’t think a beer or three would be good on an empty stomach, no matter how

satisfying it would taste. He was still riding high on the buzz, the adrenaline from winning the Sawyer Stampede. Three days of riding, three days of risking it all, and it paid off. He had money in his pocket – enough for gas, food, the entry fee into the next rodeo in Billings, and even a hotel room tonight – and that was a feeling he was going to revel in. It’d been so damn long… He sat at an open two-man table pushed against the wall, the only open table in the restaurant that he could spot. It was dimly lit, the wall sconces not making much of a dent against the dark wood of the walls and floor. The decorating seemed to have been done by a high school teenage boy – lots of televisions showing sports, elk trophies, and sports memorabilia all jostled for space on the wall. After ordering his steak (“Medium rare and smothered in mushrooms, please, ma’am”) and a dark beer, he settled back in his chair. His body hurt and ached in places that most people didn’t even realize existed but he felt every time he rode. By the end of a rodeo, he was aching in every place he could ache – even with a perfect dismount, it was damn hard on the body to ride a buckin’ bull. The whiplash on the back of a massive beast was akin to getting into a car wreck every night for three nights running. But…God, it was worth it. The high, the pure joy of beating the bull…yeah, it was all worth it. Even better was the feeling that his body was finally under his control again. After fighting him, after hesitating, after pulling back, the last three days, his body had done exactly what it needed to. He couldn’t analyze every move while on the back of a bull – it was all about instinct. And for the last year, Rex’s instincts had been wrong. Finally, they were back. He was back. “Hey Rex!” He felt someone slap their hand on his shoulder and he turned, a smile already on his face. He didn’t recognize the man, but that didn’t mean much. Being a rider meant that people felt like they knew him, even if he’d never met ‘em. It was just part of the gig.

“You were on fire tonight! I haven’t seen ol’ Tommy’s bull get rode for all eight seconds in a long time. Where you heading to next?” He was an older gentleman, his pearl snaps on his Western shirt gleaming in the semi-darkness, his white cowboy hat contrasting sharply against his dark blue plaid shirt. “Billings, Montana. Their rodeo starts Friday night.” He smiled at the man, happy to have someone to chat with for a moment. If you couldn’t stand the publicity, you damn well better get out of the spotlight. He never could understand a person who complained about having fans. “Well then, I do hope you have a real nice drive there. It’s a bit of a hike to go that far – you ever go home between rodeos?” Rex hid his smile at the thought. To drive down to California and back up to Idaho, Montana, Utah, and Arizona every week was just nuts. He’d do nothing but sit his ass in the driver’s seat of his truck. “Nah, it’s a bit too far. I just take it slow, enjoy the ride between rodeos, and always make sure to give myself plenty of time to get to where I’m going.” The old man cackled, the wrinkles around his eyes deepening behind his thick glasses. “Them’s are words of wisdom right there, boy. Well, it sounds like your food is on its way. ‘Et up – you deserve it after today.” He disappeared as Rex’s cute-as-a-button waitress maneuvered around to sit Rex’s plate down, the cast iron serving platter popping and sizzling. “It’s real hot, sir,” she warned him unnecessarily while fishing his utensils out of her waitress pocket. “I’m pretty sure I can hear that,” he said with an easy grin, his eyes trailing down her slim form…until it came to her baby bump. His eyes flashed over to her left hand. Yup, she was married. She patted him on the shoulder with that hand and then moved away, off to help another customer. Oh well. You’re heading out of town anyway.

It’d been a long time since he’d enjoyed any female companionship, and he’d allowed himself to hope for just a moment… He took a swig of his beer and then dug into his steak. Oh God, it’s as delicious as it smells… After an amazing meal that almost didn’t give him enough room in his chair to stand up – it felt downright amazing to have a full belly after skipping meals for so long – he maneuvered up and out of his chair, dropping some cash on the table as he wound his way back through the restaurant. He could hit the sack early – sleep in a real bed for once – and then head out for Montana come morning. With five days to get there, it’d be a laid-back trip, just the kind he liked. “Rex!!!” A chorus of voices rang out when he rounded the corner into the bar. A group of men in cowboy hats were standing at the bar and at his appearance, began swarming towards him. “Your ride today was a real stunner!” “I didn’t know Tornado could be beat!” “C’mon over to the bar and sit for a spell!” He felt hands on his shoulders and back, half guiding, half shoving him towards the gleaming wooden bar that ran the length of the room. Country music thumped in the crowded room, adding to the raucous atmosphere. “Whatcha having?” the bartender asked with a smile, a white apron folded over his potbelly stomach. He also had a Western shirt with pearl snaps on underneath, an unusual meeting of restaurant employee attire and Western clothing. Rex opened up his mouth to ask for just a water – he’d won a rodeo, not the lottery, and he had to be careful with his money – when the guy to his right shouted out, “Put it on my tab, Steve!” Sure the gentleman wouldn’t want Rex to put a water on his tab, Rex relented graciously. “Well in that case, a dark beer on tap would be real nice.” He began talking up the locals, hearing about Tornado the Bull

That Can’t Be Ridden, and how his owner was gonna have to stop talking shit after church on Sunday. “He done thinks that Tornado can’t be beat, but as everyone knows, there ain’t a cowboy that can’t be throwed, and there ain’t a bull that can’t be rode.” Everyone laughed and cheered at the old rodeo adage. Rex knew that there were some bulls that couldn’t be ridden, but Tornado wasn’t one of them. He was good, real good…but he wasn’t Bodacious. Rex shoved that thought away. No need to obsess over unbeatable bulls on a night like this. He put down his drained glass, which was replaced immediately by another one, foam on top, the dark color swirling in the glass below. He decided to take a quick trip to the head. He excused himself from the crowd to head that direction when he felt a soft body ricochet off his. “What the hell?” he exclaimed as he whirled around to see… Thoughts stopped. Breathing stopped. He was staring at the most beautiful girl he’d ever laid eyes on. Blonde curly hair, huge eyes that he couldn’t quite make out the color of in the darkness, but there was no mistaking the flush on her cheeks. “So sorry, sir,” she stammered out, waving around a bit. His hand shot out to catch her just as she began to stumble again. She grinned up at him as he pulled her to his chest, a bemused look in her eyes. She was definitely drunk. She was also definitely beautiful. “Hi,” she said, her white straight teeth gleaming up at him. This close, he could tell her eyes were a brilliant blue. People didn’t have that color of eyes in real life, did they? They must be contacts… “Hi,” he said softly. Her rounded curves pressed against him felt amazing. He was used to buckle bunnies throwing themselves at

him, but as his eyes skimmed over her upturned face, he realized that she didn’t seem like the buckle bunny type. He could be wrong, of course, but she just didn’t give off that vibe. “Hi,” she said again and grinned even bigger. He couldn’t help chuckling at her witty repartee just as she looked down at the drink in her hand. “Oh!” she exclaimed in shock, which is when he realized he’d dumped her drink down her shirt. Or she had, when she’d run into him. Well, someone had, and being the gentleman that his momma had raised him to be, this meant he needed to take the blame. “Look at what I did! Here, let me get some towels for you.” He took her emptied glass from her, and, holding her arm for just a moment to make sure she could stay upright without assistance, he worked his way back up to the bar where he asked the bartender for some towels. “Do you know what that girl is drinking?” he asked, jerking his head back toward the blonde. The bartender craned his neck. “Oh, Kimber? Yeah, whiskey on the rocks.” “Can I have another one, please?” In moments, armed with a whiskey and towels, he wormed his way back through the crowd to Kimber, who’d moved over to the jukebox which was blaring The Thunder Rolls by Garth Brooks. She had some giggling girls around her but as soon as Rex made it to her side, they melted back into the crowd like magic. “They don’t have to go,” Rex shouted in Kimber’s ear over the thunder claps blasting from the speakers. “Oh, they had…” she waved her hand in the air wildly, “some place to go. That’s not here.” Right… That sounded…real believable. He grinned as he handed over the cotton towels and Kimber dabbed at her shirt and vest. When she was done, she looked at the used towels in her hand, seemingly

perplexed about what to do with them. “I’ll take them back to the bar!” Rex shouted in her ear, taking them out of her hand. She nodded gratefully. “Thank you!” she mouthed back. “Wanna sit somewhere while you enjoy the whiskey?” he shouted while holding the drink aloft. Her brilliant blue eyes went wide with surprise. “Oh, thanks!” she shouted. He smiled back, pantomiming that she should head to a table over by the front windows. Another twoseater, it’d been left empty by the big, raucous groups swarming the bar. She nodded and headed that direction, drink in hand, while he dropped the towels off with a nod of thanks to the bartender. Snagging his warm beer from the bar top, he headed back to Ms. Gorgeous, as he’d already termed her in his head. What happened after that took on a dreamlike quality later when he tried to remember it all. He recalled her laughing a lot, flashing a dimple every time, and he would never forget her curly hair trailing over her shoulder and chest like a rolling, tumbling trail of gold. Luckily, the table didn’t seem to be near any speakers, and so their flirting could plow forward, unimpeded. “Is it always this crowded in here?” he asked, looking around the bar, stuffed with people. He wasn’t the fire marshal, but he’d guess that the bar owner was hoping the fire marshal wouldn’t stop on by. They had to be above capacity. “Nah, not normally. It was the Sawyer Stampede this weekend, so there’s a bunch of people in town who aren’t from around here.” Like me? he almost said, but bit his tongue at the last moment. If she didn’t seem to realize that he’d been in the rodeo, why bring it up? She didn’t seem to be a buckle bunny, so she didn’t have any ulterior motive to wanting to be with him. Maybe he could just be… him. “I never caught your name,” he said, realizing that he couldn’t

use her name if she hadn’t been the one to tell him. That was just stalkerish and weird. “Kimber, not Kimberly.” “Well, Kimber Not Kimberly, I’m Rex.” “Rex?” She eyeballed him. “Like T-Rex? Who names their child after a dinosaur? I thought I had a weird name…” “I will say, I’ve never heard of Kimber Not Kimberly.” She stuck her tongue out at him and he winked and grinned. “Rex is…it’s a nickname.” “And you’re not going to tell me your real name, are you.” It was a statement, not a question. “Not a chance in hell,” he said with a grin. “If I guess it, will you tell me if I’m right or not?” “Not a chance in hell,” he repeated, and grinned wider. She rolled her eyes and plowed ahead. Roger… Alonzo… Maurice… Crawford… “You did hear that I wouldn’t tell you even if you were right, right?” he asked, laughing, after she guessed Lesley. “But I thought I’d bat my baby blues at you and change your mind.” She batted her eyelashes in a mockery of a southern belle, and he laughed. “Turns out, I’m immune to baby blues.” “Dammit, well I’m just screwed…” It was minutes later, or maybe hours – Rex couldn’t tell anymore – when Kimber had dragged them to the dance floor where they line danced to Cotton Eye Joe. Everyone was laughing and whooping as the lines of people moved down the aisles of the crowded bar. When the song finally finished, she collapsed against him and grinned, in much the same position she’d been in when they first ran into each other.

His breath caught as he stared down at her, her gorgeous blue eyes sparkling even in the dim lighting. He knew he was going to kiss her, and he knew she wanted to be kissed. It took every bit of self control to walk her outside, rather than plunder her mouth in front of everyone. He may not have been from around here, but she was. He didn’t want to make out with her in front of every person she’d grown up with. They made it out the back door and into the cool, summer air, and then he was pushing her against the building, running his hands over her lush curves. She moaned as his hands roamed. “Oh Rex,” she breathed as their mouths slammed together and then they were kissing and Rex was thrusting his tongue into her mouth and it was hard to think, to know anything but that he wanted her. He wanted her more than any woman he’d ever met. Finally, he realized that she was saying, “Yes, yes, yeeeesssss…” as he was trailing his lips down her neck. It was hard to put meaning to words at that moment, but even he realized what that word meant. He pulled away, the beer buzz making it hard to think. He glanced up and down the darkened alley. Which way is… He grabbed her hand and began pulling her down the alleyway, her giggles trailing out as they ran. “Going somewhere, cowboy?” she asked as they ran together, hand in hand. He tossed a grin over his shoulder at her. “Yeah, somewhere where we can get a little more comfortable.” The mountain air was cool, even in August, but he was wrapped in the warmth of the alcohol, the excitement, the desire thrumming through his veins. This girl was what he wanted. It was all he wanted. They made it to his motel room at the Drop Inn, #6 stamped into the big metal key fob in his pocket. Who has real keys anymore? His hands trembled a little as he slid the key into the lock but finally he got it in and they burst through the door, laughing as they went. He closed it behind him with a thunk, and pulled her against him,

running his hands down over her hair as he pulled her mouth to his. Finally, he was going to make her his. He inched his mouth down her neck and this time, to the open V. He began undoing the buttons down the front of her shirt, wishing for a moment that she’d decided to wear the pearl snaps that seemed to be so popular with everyone else in town. Then he would’ve been able to simply tear her shirt off. His fingers trembled from need and the alcohol and the girl. Her beauty, her laughter, her dimple… Finally, he was able to pull her shirt off and then her lacy white bra. God, she was gorgeous. She had the most generous curves he’d ever laid eyes on. She wasn’t fat; oh no, this wasn’t fat. This was padding in all the right places. Girls being girls, she probably thought she was too thick for his tastes, but he rode bulls for a living, dammit. He didn’t want some little stick that he’d crush beneath him. He unzipped and wriggled her Wranglers and lacy white underwear down over her wide hips and trim calves, then scooped her up in his arms, her moans spurring him on, and carried her over to the bed where he dropped her a little higher than he had to, just so he could see all the right parts of her bounce. Her laughter echoed around the room. “You know, if I was getting too heavy for you, you just had to say so,” she said with a fake pout. “I could’ve laid down on the bed.” “But then I wouldn’t have been able to watch your breasts jiggle,” he said, pointing out the obvious. She grinned, blushing a little. His gut told him that she wasn’t someone with a lot of experience with sex, but as he moved over and began suckling on those gorgeous tits, she arched her back and moaned and that was the last coherent thought he could put together. He began running on instinct, running his hands over her body, down to the junction of her thighs, over her long legs, began nipping on her hip bone and belly button and then… She sighed. “Oh yeeesssss…” she moaned as he moved over her

slit. He slid his tongue over her nub, tasting her as he went, and she shoved her hands into his hair. “Yes!” she shouted and her back arched and she was rigid, suspended in air, not even appearing to breathe. Finally, she collapsed into a puddle on the mattress. “Oh yes,” she murmured, and Rex rolled out of bed, grabbing his wallet from his jeans, and sliding his emergency condom out of it. He hadn’t needed to use this in a long time; thank God for his father drilling it into him that stashing a condom in his wallet was a must. There was no way he would’ve been able to drag himself away from her right now to get down to the drugstore. Properly sheathed, he crawled back over to her, where she was watching him with bleary, happy eyes. He crawled between her legs, guiding his cock, until he slid inside of her, warmth and tightness squeezing him until he was sure he was going to unman himself right then and there. He began sliding in and out, panting, wishing that it could go on forever while simultaneously wanting to spill himself inside of her right now. Her breasts bounced with every stroke and he reached down to grab one in his mouth, suckling on it, and then, he couldn’t hold back any longer. He was going…to… His back arched and his hips thrust forward one more time as he howled her name. It was the most mind-blowing orgasm he’d ever had, and it just seemed to keep coming, keep rolling over him, but finally, finally, finally he rolled off her and lay on his back, more content than he’d ever been in his life. He deposited the condom in the bedside trashcan and then slid his arm around Kimber. Spooning her like this felt right, and with a happy grin, he fell asleep.

REX AWOKE TO HELL. Or what felt like hell. More to the point, what felt like someone playing a bass drum on

his skull. He held his hands up to his skull, trying to massage away the pain, but it only seemed to make shit worse, so he dropped his hands to his sides. He felt…alone. Bereft. Why did he feel alone? He was always alone. There was something there, though, some reason why… He cautiously opened one eye, the light streaming through the motel window blinding in its brightness. He should’ve thought to close them the night before, but… Oh! Right. Hot girl. Dammit, what was her name? He searched his memory for a moment, trying to remember, but came up empty. A lot of the night before was a blank. He blinked slowly, opening up both eyes experimentally. Could he live through the pain? He blinked a couple more times. Not bad. Doable, anyway. He swung his legs over the edge while sitting up and then stopped, his body propped up on the mattress. Ho ly shit He held his hand to his stomach, not sure if he was going to lose his dinner in the wastebasket or not. What had possessed him to drink like that? He never drank like that. He’d been through enough pain on the back of a bull – he didn’t need to add more to it. But Nameless Gorgeous Woman had been there, drinking with him, and it had all seemed like a damn good idea at the time. After stumbling to the bathroom and taking a nice, long leak, and then splashing water on his face, he felt slightly more human. He looked in the mirror, scrubbing at his unruly brown hair. It was smashed up against the side of his head, giving him the appearance

of a… Well, hungover crazed man. He glanced over into the wastebasket as he walked back into the motel room proper, and spied a used condom. Thank God I at least was smart enough to use one of those. Which it was then that his brain finally caught up to the rest of him. Hold on, where is Ms. Nameless? He glanced around the room and even peered into the closet, as if she would really be crouched in the corner behind the ironing board. He felt idiotic even as he did it, but he was just so surprised that she… He straightened and slid the closet door closed. She’d walked out on him. The most beautiful woman he’d ever seen, the best lay he’d ever had, and she was just gone. Just like that. He didn’t have her phone number or her address, or even her name. She was just…gone. It was for the best, of course. He was leaving town today, and he was never coming back. He was only in Sawyer because of the Sawyer Stampede, and next summer, he was going to be back in the PBR circuit, he just knew it. He wasn’t going to be riding in the Intermountain Rodeo Circuit ever again. He was never going to see Ms. Nameless ever again. And that was as it should be, right? That was the whole definition of a one-night stand – they weren’t called one week stands for a reason. He headed to the shower. A stream of hot water, some soap, and he’d be as good as new. And he could start to forget Ms. Nameless right then and there.

HE

HEADED

down the road out of Long Valley, the craggy mountains

and pine trees looming up on either side of the road. The sunshine was bright and cheerful, the road was clear, and Rex was whistling a tuneless song. His radio had broken eons ago, and he didn’t have the money for a replacement, so he’d long ago figured out how to keep himself entertained on long drives. If he could skip meals and sleep in his truck to come up with enough money for entry fees to rodeos, he sure as hell could do without a little music while driving. Suddenly, a gauge caught his eye. His RPMs needle was all over the place, bouncing back and forth between zero and 10,000. He flicked his eyes back and forth between the gauge and the road, not daring to take his eyes off either. What the hell…? Which is when the fuel gauge began its own crazy dance between the two extremes, and then his speedometer and the signal for high beams began flashing off and on. Oh no, oh hell no… Except the truck began slowing down and Rex was pushing on the gas pedal even as he began steering towards the shoulder of the road. He knew it was ridiculous to try and floor the gas when his truck was losing speed, but it was instinctive. “C’mon, Steg, what are you doing?!” It sputtered to a stop and died. Rex slammed on the steering wheel, uttering some curses that’d make a sailor’s hair stand on end. He climbed out of Steg and slammed the door closed behind him, walking to the front of the truck and jiggering at the latch until he could pop the top. Sliding the stick into place, he leaned over the engine and just stared blindly, already knowing what was wrong but feeling like he should look anyway. Because that’s what guys did when their trucks broke down, right? Slamming his hand down on the grille, he spun and leaned against the front bumper, dropping his head to his chest. When he’d lost it all, he’d had to sell it all – his brand-new truck, his horses, his ranch, his life. After he’d recovered and was ready to

hit the rodeo circuit again, he’d bought an older Ford specifically so he could work on it himself. He had deluded himself into thinking that if he owned an older truck and it broke down, he’d be able to fix anything that went wrong with it. But he hadn’t expected to need to replace an alternator on the side of a highway in the middle of Nowhere, Idaho. He had tools in the bed of his truck, not an entire mechanic’s shop, and certainly not a 1988 Ford alternator. Letting out another string of curses that’d burn the hairs off a Marine, he pulled the stick out of the hood, slid it into its place at the front of the engine cavity, and slammed the hood shut as hard as he could, the only way to get the latch to engage. Jiggling the hood to make sure it was secured, he slid back into the cab of the truck and pulled out his phone. The cell service wasn’t amazing but it wasn’t terrible, and he had enough of a signal to do a Google search for tow truck companies in Sawyer. One. One damn company, a Mike’s Mechanic Shop. Well, maybe he can repair my truck once he gets it there. Rex hit the green call button and listened to the phone ring and ring and ring, finally clicking over to an answering machine. “You’ve reached Mike,” a gravelly voice said. “I work Monday through Friday, 8 to 5. Leave me a message and I’ll call you back.” Rex clicked off the call and slammed his head back against the head rest, his hungover brain rattling around in his skull like a marble down a pipe. He was at least five miles out of town, and the only tow truck company around didn’t even pretend to work on Sundays. He couldn’t just sit there until eight the next morning. Fighting back another string of curse words, he pulled out his duffel bag and began slamming items into it. He changed into his tennis shoes ‘cause walking five miles in cowboy boots just wasn’t happening, and then, locking the doors behind him, took off on foot

for Sawyer. The sun was already high in the sky and although it hadn’t been hot in the cab of his truck with the windows rolled down and the wind whistling through, it was a whole different story when he was trudging up a black asphalt highway, a duffel bag slung over his shoulder. He could feel the sweat trickling down his sides already, and he’d guess he hadn’t even made it a mile yet. Yup, today was going to be one shit-fest of a day.

HE FINALLY MADE it to the edge of town and then paused. He could head back to the motel and stay another night, he could eat breakfast, he could try the mechanic’s shop again and hope the man took pity on him…his stomach rumbled, making up his mind for him. He’d long past burned through his steak dinner from the night before, and although it was true that he didn’t have a lot of money (well, any money) to be spending on food, he also knew that going on a starvation diet wasn’t exactly practical. He’d seen a diner up the street while driving through so he headed that direction. His feet were aching and his clothes were drenched in sweat. His head had settled down to a low level throb, but he still didn’t feel on top of his game. He was damn glad he didn’t have to climb onto the back of a bull that day. Just his luck to get smashed right before his truck broke down and he needed all of that thinking power. He walked into Betty’s Diner, the cool air-conditioned air washing over him. God, it felt good. A waitress with entirely too much eye make-up on bustled over. “You just sit wherever you want to, honey,” she said in a syrupy sweet voice. He nodded his thanks but made a detour to the bathroom on the way to a table. He had to clean up a bit or he wouldn’t be able to stand the smell and the sweat for long enough to eat.

His spit bath completed, he picked a booth that looked out on to the main street running through Sawyer. Hanging baskets filled with colorful flowers hung from the quaint lamp posts. A chocolate shop and a coffee shop flanked an accounting office. Miller & Nash Accounting? I didn’t think this town was big enough to need its own accountants. They must focus on cattle owners or something. The waitress appeared with a coffee carafe in one hand and a coffee cup in the other. Filling the cup to the brim, she pulled a menu out from under her arm and placed it in front of him. “The crepes with filling are real good,” she said in that same gratingly sweet tone, flashing a smile at him when he glanced up. “Well, give me a minute and then I’ll be sure to order. Oh, can I have a glass of ice water, too?” Rehydration seemed like a real good plan. While she set off to get him some water, he glanced over the menu. What was the cheapest thing on it that was also filling? He settled on a stack of pancakes with a couple of strips of bacon. After she delivered his water and took his order with a small frown – he’d obviously made her unhappy by ignoring her suggestion – he began running through numbers on a napkin. He needed enough for his entrance fee to the Northern Rodeo Association Finals, gas to get there, food, and a place to stay while his truck was being fixed. He glared at that line for a moment, hating the idea of it but unless the mechanic was willing to let him sleep in the shop, he really couldn’t see a way around it. And no mechanic would allow him to sleep in their shop. Oh, right, and enough money to fix the damn thing. No matter how he rearranged the numbers, he just couldn’t see a way of making them come out right. He worked through one napkin and then another, trying different configurations. If I slept on a park bench, I could skip the motel room… If I cut it down to one hot dog a day, I could save money on food… The waitress delivered a large stack of steaming pancakes, syrup

cascading off it in rivers of golden brown. She sat a plate off to the side with a couple of small strips of bacon on it. They were so pathetic, Rex immediately regretted ordering them. He’d been wanting the protein but there wasn’t enough there to provide protein to a small rat. He waved off her offers of, “Anything else?” while batting her eyelashes with an, “I’m good.” He knew what she was offering – when she’d come back to the table for the second time, a button on her blouse had somehow come undone, revealing even more of her generous cleavage for him to admire. Instead of appreciating the offer like any red-blooded American male would, he felt mildly turned off by it. She looked like she’d taken more than a few rides around the corral, and he just wasn’t interested. Digging into his pile of steaming pancakes, he made himself savor every bite. Based on his projections, he wasn’t going to be able to eat again until the next day, and whatever he found at that point, it wasn’t gonna be nearly as amazing as this stack of buttermilk pancakes, that was for damn sure. He may not be interested in the waitress’…wares, but the cook in the back was a wonder. If only they’d saw fit to be a little more generous with the bacon… Finally finished – even eating the curled slice of orange they’d used as a garnish – he pushed his plate away. There were no more calories to be had out of the meal, short of licking his plate, and he was pretty sure that wouldn’t go over well. When the waitress stopped back to top off his coffee and bat her eyelashes some more, he asked, “Do you know where Mike’s Mechanic Shop is?” He needed to be there bright and early the next morning, 8 am sharp. The faster he could get his truck repaired, the faster he could get out of town. “Oh sure! They’re just a couple blocks over if you go through the alleys. I’m due for a smoke break; I’ll take you there.” She disappeared into the back before Rex could respond.

Well, I guess I won’t get lost then. And having a native Sawyerite next to me when I knock on the door couldn’t hurt, right? That is, if they’re there and just not answering the phone on a Sunday. Ugh. Small towns. Where else do towing companies shut down every weekend?! She reappeared, a pack of smokes in one hand and his ticket in the other. Right. He’d almost forgotten. He paid up at the counter and, swinging his duffel bag over his shoulder with a sigh – the damn thing was getting heavier by the moment – they headed out the back door, through the kitchen of the restaurant and into the bright sunshine. She tapped out a cigarette and lit up while they walked. “Where’s your car?” she asked as they crossed the employee parking lot and headed down an alley. At his surprised look, she added, “I saw you walking up the street and into the restaurant, so I knew you were on foot. Plus, usually people with cars don’t carry heavy duffel bags around.” “My truck’s just out of town on the highway. It broke down as I was heading out this morning.” “On your way to your next rodeo gig?” Before he could answer, she added, “I saw you at the rodeo on Thursday – I didn’t get to go Friday or Saturday night, but I heard through the grapevine that you won.” “Yup.” He couldn’t think of much else to add. He wasn’t normally someone who had a hard time talking – his mom always said he could talk a tail off a cat – but he hesitated with this gal. He didn’t want to give her the wrong impression. She was a buckle bunny. She was everything that Ms. Nameless was not. She began chatting away about her job and dealing with customers between her puffs on her cigarette, and Rex just nodded as they walked. He didn’t have much to contribute, since he’d never worked retail in his life. They came out of an alleyway and there it was – Mike’s Mechanic

Shop emblazoned on the front, with a classic red Corvette as the logo. “I can—” She cut him off. “You don’t want to knock on the front door. They’re not there on Sundays. C’mon.” They checked both ways and then jogged across the street and down another alley. Rex couldn’t remember using so many alleyways since he was a kid and would ride them on his bike. Nestled behind the shop was a cheerful two-story farmhouse – white with green trim, brick pillars, and flowers dotting the yard. He didn’t know enough about flowers to know what he was looking at, but there were a lot of them and they lent a happy feeling to the place. His waitress strode up to the front door, pressing on the doorbell with a little more oomph than was probably necessary. Rex jogged up behind her, a little surprised that they were going to a residential home on a Sunday. He thought maybe they were going to go to a private shop or something, not a house. The waitress slung her arm through his, looking for all the world like his girlfriend. Rex froze, unsure of what to do. Maybe he’d been leading her on by allowing her to take him here. Maybe he should— The wood carved front door swung open, and there stood his blonde goddess. His one-night stand. The person he’d searched his motel closet for. “What are you doing—” they said simultaneously. The waitress looked back and forth between them. “You two know each other?” she finally asked sarcastically when no one said a word. Rex was frozen to the spot – there were no words to say. He searched her eyes – red-rimmed and sleepy, she looked rather worse for the wear. He wondered how many nights she went out drinking like they had last night. Was it common for her to wake up with a hangover?

There was so much he didn’t know about her. When no one spoke, the waitress dropped her arm from the crook of Rex’s arm and flounced off down the alley. The movement broke Rex of the spell and he pulled his eyes away from his gorgeous, hungover, one-night stand for just a moment. “Thanks for your help!” Rex called out after the waitress. She flipped him the bird. “Making friends all over the place?” the girl in front of him asked sardonically as she propped her hip against the doorframe. “Well, I didn’t—” “Hey Kimber, who is it?” An older man showed up at her side, graying at the temples, a friendly smile on his face. When he saw Rex, his smile got wider. “Well, look at that! The winner from last night!” Rex smiled back automatically as his brain began retrieving the name “Kimber” from its depths. Of course. The bartender had told him that name. Now that he heard it, it sounded right. Perfect. Now he didn’t have to admit that he couldn’t remember it. God bless fathers. He looked back just in time to catch Kimber storming off. She was pissed, and he wasn’t exactly sure why. After all, it wasn’t him who’d snuck out of the motel room in the middle of the night. Are all females in Sawyer this pissy? “Sorry, sir, to disturb you on a Sunday,” Rex said, deciding to throw himself at the shop owner’s mercy. He really had no choice at this point, and he’d never let pride get in the way of getting what he wanted. “I was just down at Betty’s Diner and the waitress said she’d walk me over to your shop. I didn’t realize I’d end up on your front porch. I’m just worried about leaving my truck on the side of the road. It broke down on the way out of town this morning.” “Sure, sure, c’mon in!” Kimber’s dad opened the door wider and gestured him in. “I’m Mike,” he said as Rex walked by.

“I’m Rex Kingsley, but you already know that.” “Yeah, I mighta caught that for the past three nights.” Mike closed the door behind them. “You watched all three nights of the rodeo?” Rex was surprised. Most people wanted to come for the final night – for the grand finale. They didn’t want to spend hours in the bleachers on uncomfortable benches. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Mike said with an easy smile. “Let me go change into my working clothes. I’ll be right back – you just stay put.” He disappeared up the stairs, leaving Rex alone in the living room. It was surprising to him that Mike would leave a complete stranger in his house, unwatched, unguarded, but maybe this was the way that all small towns worked. He walked over to the fireplace and began looking at the framed photos lining it. Three smiling faces, at varying ages and poses, all beaming at him. Mike, Kimber, and a woman Rex could only guess was Kimber’s mom. She had Kimber’s curly blonde hair and brilliant eyes. Hers were a deep forest green though – Kimber must’ve gotten her eye color from her father. Where’s the mom at? She was going to come walking into the living room at any moment, and he could only hope that she’d be as welcoming as her husband. Scaring a woman by lurking in her living room without any warning could go badly. He shifted from foot to foot restlessly. He didn’t want to end up on the wrong end of a flying vase and screams, but he also couldn’t see how to get himself out of the house without causing a ruckus of a different sort. He was stuck there until Mike or Kimber came back. Mike lumbered down the stairs and it was only then that Rex noticed a hitch in his walk, like his left hip didn’t rotate quite right. Once he hit the main floor, the hitch became a lot less noticeable. The stairs must be a nightmare for him. “Let’s stop by the shop and grab the tow truck. You want to ride

along?” Mike asked. “Sure!” Rex said, a little too enthusiastically. Like all little boys, he’d spent most of his childhood playing with Tonka trucks. Getting to ride a huge beast of a truck would make his week. “We’re heading out!” Mike called up the stairs. “Be back in a little bit!” “Fine!” Kimber called back down. Quirking his eyebrows for just a moment at her tone, Mike turned and gave a hearty smile at Rex. “Ready?” he asked, and they headed for the front door.

CHAPTER 2 KIMBER

K

she heard the front door close, and then flopped back on the bed. IMBER WAITED UNTIL

Oh My God How is it that other people get away with having one-night stands, but I don’t? I mean, who has their one-night stand show up the next day on their front door step with the town floozy on their arm? And really? Tiffany? Anyone but her. She squeezed her eyes tight, trying to push away the pounding in her brain. Autumn, her best friend, had convinced her that she only turned 24 once so she ought to “live it up” out on the town, but she forgot to mention that the day after, Kimber wouldn’t want to be living at all. She let herself indulge in a pity party for only a minute, and then with a sigh, heaved herself off the bed. She knew her dad would want her to head down to the shop once they came back, Rex’s truck in tow, and it was bad enough to let him see her bleary eyed and hair mussed from sleep. She couldn’t show up at the shop looking like that. After a shower, lots of water, and some aspirin, Kimber was

feeling slightly more human. Usually, she liked to eat breakfast but this morning, the thought of food turned her stomach. Wouldn’t that just be terrific – I could upchuck all over Rex’s shoes. Her phone buzzed on her nightstand. “Hey, Dad,” she said, cradling the phone between her ear and shoulder as she shoved her shoes on. “Hey honey, we’re back. Are you on your way down?” “Yup, be right there.” She shoved the phone into her back pocket and headed down the stairs, through the yard, and into the shop. She opened the back door and breathed in the smell of oil and grease and all those manly smells that said “Dad” in her mind. “All right,” her dad said, straightening up from the hood of Rex’s truck. It was a late ‘80s Ford, which surprised Kimber. Somehow, she’d pegged him as someone who’d drive something flashier. Her dad wiped his hands on a grease rag. “Give me a moment here and let me go pull the manual for your Ford,” he said towards the far side of the truck. Kimber could only guess that he was talking to Rex, although she couldn’t see him. “I don’t work on as many of them as I do Chevys – you’re in Chevy territory ‘round here.” Rex’s chuckle floated in the air. “No worries. I understand.” Her dad headed back out to the house; he kept all of his manuals there since there wasn’t enough room for them in the shop. Rex came around the side of the truck and stopped when he saw her standing there. “What’re you doing here?” he demanded. “What am I doing here? I work here! What are you doing here?” “Well, my truck needs to be fixed.” “You’re supposed to be gone,” Kimber hissed. “Don’t you think I know that?! I’m not exactly happy about this either, you know.” The back door to the shop opened. “Hey Kimber,” her dad said, flipping through the pages as he

walked, “I need you to get a price for an alternator - a 1988 year. Ford is real particular about this, so make sure you’re picking the right year.” With an angry jerk of her head, Kimber headed to the shop computer, ignoring the look her dad was shooting her way. This was twice in one morning when she’d been pissy for no reason – at least none that he could see – and if she didn’t watch it, he was gonna figure out that there was something going on between her and Rex. Between her and her one-night stand who was supposed to be long gone by now. “So, where you headed to next?” her dad asked Rex as she began pulling up the database to look up parts. It was gonna be a pain in the ass to find an alternator for such an old truck, especially since neither an '87 nor an '89 alternator would work. Who thinks that this is a good idea? Interchangeable parts, people. They’re a new invention. “Billings, Montana. Their Northern Rodeo Association Finals is this weekend.” “Well son, you have a natural talent for riding. Watching you this weekend – it was like watching an artist at work.” Kimber’s fingers froze over the keyboard. No. No, no, no, no. He cannot be a bull rider. “I rode for years myself, until my sweet wife couldn’t take it anymore. She made me realize that I have to choose a different life.” Her dad’s voice was wistful, and even though she knew the next words that were going to come out of his mouth, her heart still hurt from the pain of hearing it. “Love is worth choosing, every time. And don’t you forget it.” Rex let out a strained laugh that Kimber couldn’t read. Was he upset about being given life advice from an old man? Or was he not someone who thought that love was worth choosing? She quickly filled in the blanks and worked up a bid. She had to stay focused. It damn well didn’t matter if Rex was a bull rider or a

washing machine repairman. He was on his way out of Sawyer, and he wasn’t coming back. And she could just forget about last night. Forget. Starting right now. She pulled the bid off the beat-up black-and-white laser printer. “Here you go, sir,” she said as she handed the paper over. Her dad gave her another quizzical look, which Kimber ignored. She was starting to get good at ignoring them. “Oh thanks,” Rex said with an easy smile, and took the paper from her. Glancing over it, his face went white. Dammit, why does he have to go and make white look so damn good? “Ummm…” he said, stuttering a bit over his words, “how much would it cost just to store my truck here? You know, just for a week or two?” Even though he was facing Dad, his eyes were on the far wall, and his body was stiff. Kimber didn’t know him well – one drunken night of sex did not an expert make – but even she could tell he was trying to quell panic. Kimber’s heart squeezed with empathy, despite herself. She wasn’t supposed to care about him, but… “When’s your next rodeo?” her dad asked. “Friday, but like I said, it’s in Montana. I can’t exactly walk there.” He chuckled without humor. “If I hurry, I might be able to catch a ride with a fellow bull rider – a straggler who didn’t want to get up this morning or something.” “And then?” her dad asked quietly. “Well, then I might win enough to be able to pay for this here bill, and any storage fees you might charge. If not this weekend, then for sure by the next. I’m headed up to northern Idaho after Montana, and that rodeo’s got a real big purse, so I for sure could—” “I’ve got a better idea,” Dad broke in gently. “What if you stayed and helped me around the shop? I’m behind right now – everyone

and their dog wants their AC fixed. It doesn’t normally get hot ‘round here, even during the summer, so a lot of folks ignore their AC until a heat wave hits. And it’s done hit – weatherman said this morning that it’s s’posed to get to 95 today. “You seem to know which end of the wrench to use, and having help catching up with all of this work would be invaluable to me. You’d have to leave first thing Friday morning to get to Billings on time, right?” “Yeah.” Rex’s face, which had gone from white to red with embarrassment, began to lose its hot red color, fading to a normal tanned tone as her dad talked casually. Her dad was always one to help someone out, and he seemed to understand better than most that life wasn’t just about paying the bills. “Well then, I best get my money’s worth out of you between now and then, right?” He winked at Rex and chuckled. Kimber smiled grimly but inside, was panicking. It was all good and well for her dad to play Good Samaritan to Ol’ Willy or Tom Hankins down at the hardware store, but Rex?! Rex wasn’t supposed to be here anymore. How could she tell her dad that they absolutely could not do this, without telling him why? Of course her dad would like Rex. He was a bull rider and he was competent with his hands and he was a sex god come to earth – okay, so maybe that part didn’t matter to her dad – and he was polite and friendly with others. What wouldn’t her dad like about him? “Where you staying at?” Dad asked. Kimber’s smile felt brittle on her face. No, no, no! Dad, don’t do it! “The Drop Inn.” “Well hell, that won’t work. We have a guest room that used to be my wife’s sewing room so it’s real girly and shit, but you can bunk up there. I can have Kimber take the paintings off the walls if you don’t want roses all over the place.” No, Dad, bad! Stop! You can’t— “I can’t thank you enough, sir,” Rex said, stretching out his hand

to shake her dad’s. “I’ll work real hard for you, I promise.” Please God, strike me dead now.

CHAPTER 3 REX

“S O THERE I AM, flying through the air, and I land on my ass, rolling

head over heels backwards. I’m staring up at the sky, the whole world swimming around me, and Jack says, ‘Well son, I guess that’s one way of doing it.’ I don’t try to break wild horses anymore.” Mike burst out laughing, and so did Kimber. Rex grinned at them, feeling a certain…lightness in his chest that he hadn’t felt for a while. Which really, he shouldn’t be feeling because he was broke, his truck was broke, and he had nothing to point to that would tell him that the future was going to change for him. But…he also hadn’t spent the evening with a family in a long time. Bull riders say that they’re a family and sure, there’s some camaraderie between the riders that in a pinch, he could ask for help. But there was a difference between that and sitting down to a real meal at a real dining room table with a real family. Living in his truck, eating food out of gas stations…it got tough to want to keep going sometimes. He always did, of course, because he was finally living the dream – he was clawing his way back up the rankings and was going to get his happy ass back into the PBR circuit. He was going to ride Bodacious again, and win this time. This though…this normal life with their normal problems in their normal house…it was a world he’d almost forgotten existed. Kimber stood up and began clearing the plates.

“Let me do that,” Rex said, grabbing the plates from her hands, their fingertips brushing up against each other. He felt a spark of electricity shoot through him at her touch. Her tongue flicked out, moistening her lips, and she gave a jerky nod. “Sure,” she croaked, and then cleared her throat, smiling brightly, looking at anything but him. “That’d be nice. Thank you.” He carried the plates into the kitchen, along with the demolished pot roast and potatoes. He eyed the remains as he carried the platter, wondering if there was any room left in his stomach for more. It had been, quite possibly, the most satisfying meal he’d had in a long time, and that included the meal the night before at the bar. Had it really only been a day? It had been one hell of a day, that’s for damn sure. As they cleared the dirty dishes off the table and Rex began loading the dishwasher, he could hear strains of Gene Autry drift through to the kitchen. Have I told you lately that I love you? Could I tell you once again somehow? Have I said with all my heart and soul how I adore you? Well darlin’, I’m telling you now. Rex’s palms itched to reach out and pull Kimber against him and slow dance right then and there in the kitchen, but her cheeks were red and she was avoiding his gaze and he knew she wasn’t a big fan of him being there. He knew that if it were up to her, he’d be out on his ass on the street. He couldn’t push his luck, not yet. As she bent over to slide the leftover green beans into the fridge, he admired her shapely ass, sticking up in the air. Do they only make women like this in Sawyer, Idaho? I’ve been all over the place and I can’t say that I’ve ever seen a more beautiful woman in my life. The air was crackling with the words unsaid between them but Rex didn’t dare break that barrier and then, finally, the kitchen was

clean and the dishwasher was humming along and there wasn’t another damn thing to do to clean up. He wanted to find an excuse to stay in there with her, to pull her into his arms and kiss her like he hadn’t taken the time to do the night before, but she was slipping out of the kitchen and up the stairs and Rex was left alone, staring after her. He didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t chase after her, up to her bedroom; he was pretty damn sure her dad wouldn’t appreciate that. He couldn’t stand in the kitchen and mope. And it was only 7:30 at night – he couldn’t go to the guest room and just sit. The polite thing to do would be to sit with Mike. He trudged towards the sound of the music and found Mike in the living room, drinking a beer, listening to Gene croon. “There’s beers in that mini fridge over there if you want one,” Mike said with a jerk of his head towards a small fridge tucked into the corner. Kimber – and it could only be Kimber, since Rex was pretty sure the mom was no longer in the picture – had put so many house plants on it, he hadn’t even realized it was a fridge until that moment. Wiggling the green vines out of the way, he pulled out a dark beer – at least Mike had good taste in beer – and sat down in the other recliner. A quiet settled over them – the kind of quiet that comes from being around someone who was comfortable in their own skin. Mike didn’t see a need to talk, so Rex sat and listened to Gene twang about being back in the saddle again and sipped a beer and was…content. “My Iris died five years ago in June,” Mike said, apropos of nothing whatsoever. “Lung cancer. She’d smoked for years and years – we both had – and then, the coughing started and…well, it never really stopped. When the doctor said ‘lung cancer,’ I stopped smoking right then and there. I tell you, I wanted nothing more than to chew my way through a pack of cigarettes when I heard that diagnosis, but I didn’t. We threw them all out. For years, we’d jokingly called them ‘cancer sticks’ but suddenly, that wasn’t so

funny anymore. “Kimber got her hair and her smile from her mom, of course. I mean, look at me,” Mike said, and gestured at himself. “She sure as shit didn’t get her good looks from me!” He laughed and Rex chuckled too. To be fair, Mike was a distinguished looking gentleman – he’d never win any beauty contests but he sure wasn’t ugly. But Rex could appreciate self-deprecating humor. It made him like Mike even more. “So what’s your plan?” Mike asked, out of the blue. “Plan?” Rex echoed dumbly. “Yeah, you make it to Montana and northern Idaho, and then what?” Movement in the doorway caught Rex’s eye. There was Kimber, a glass of what looked like white wine in her hand. She crossed over and sat down on the couch, tucking her legs beneath her as she sipped her wine quietly. She was so damn beautiful, Rex had a hard time breathing around her. As the silence stretched out, Rex realized that he’d forgotten to speak. He dragged his eyes away from Kimber’s lips, wet with wine, and forced himself to focus on the question. Anything other than what it would feel like to suck Kimber’s lower lip into his mouth. “Uhhh…” he stammered, focusing his eyes on Mike. Only Mike. “Well, I’ve been riding since I was a kid, although of course, I’ve decided to focus on bulls instead of wild horses since that last flight through the air when I was 17.” Mike smiled encouragingly. Kimber wasn’t moving, and Rex wouldn’t let himself look. “I want to win the PBR World Championship,” Rex said bluntly. Yeah, it was the biggest championship in the US, but it’s what he wanted. It’s what he’d wanted for years. His whole life. And he wasn’t going to let anything stand in the way of that. “Well, that’s a real fine goal,” Mike said, nodding slowly. “They’re a level above us here, so are you trying for points so you can

move to that level next season?” “That’s the plan, sir.” “I watched you all three nights. You’re a natural. You’re better than any other guy in the Intermountain Rodeo Circuit. Why were you even here to begin with?” “A bull and I had a run in at the beginning of last season,” Rex said with a pained smile. “It’s taken me a bit to get back into the swing of things, and because I couldn’t finish out the season last year, I lost too many points to stay in the PBR. I got moved down to the Intermountain Circuit. But next year, I’ll be back up there again.” “Well, it hurt my ol’ bones just to watch you, but I can’t help wishing I was in the saddle again anyway. I don’t regret choosing Iris over bull riding, but sometimes, it’s fun to dream.” He stood up with a big stretch, tossing back the last of his beer. “Goodnight honey, goodnight Rex,” he said, and kissed Kimber’s forehead as he passed her by, his gait a little more unsure than it had been before. He headed up the stairs, leaving Gene Autry twanging in his wake. The silence between them grew more painful with each passing moment. Unlike the comfortable silence with Mike, the silence now was sparking, awkward, and sexy as hell. Rex shifted in his chair. It was now or never. “Since I’m going to be in town a little longer than planned, I should explore it. Want to go for a walk with me?” His eyes drifted over her face, flushed with wine or attraction or something else entirely, he wasn’t sure, down to her wet, full lips. “Yeah, sure,” she said after a moment’s hesitation, and threw back her wine.

CHAPTER 4 KIMBER

S

and felt the flush of alcohol run through her. She hadn’t planned on drinking again tonight, but she needed liquid courage to sit down in the living room with her dad and her one-night stand and pretend like there was absolutely nothing wrong. Absolutely not a thing. Other than not being able to breathe, think, or speak properly when he was in the room, everything was fine. She’d contemplated hiding up in her room for the rest of the night but her and Dad always spent the evening in the living room, hanging out and chatting. If she’d hidden up in her room instead, he’d know something was wrong, and she couldn’t have that. He’d start asking questions and then he’d see it on her face and oh God, she couldn’t let her dad know. They headed out through the back door and into the warm summer night air. It was warmer tonight than it had been last night, or maybe it was just the alcohol. Some bullfrogs croaked in the stream that ran behind their house and crickets filled the air with their chorus. They wandered down the dark alley, past the Madison’s house and the old Smythe mansion that had been abandoned back in the 70s. She tilted her head back and looked up at the stars. Even here in town, she could see them, gorgeous and thick and sparkling HE PUSHED TO HER FEET

in the night sky, only blotted out in the west by the full moon, beaming brightly down on them. With a deep breath, she started. “Wh—” “Ho—” They laughed and Kimber felt a bit of the tension ease from her shoulders. Just a little bit. “You go first,” Rex said graciously as she steered them towards the lake. Sawyer was built around the edge of a beautiful lake appropriately-if-not-creatively named Sawyer Lake, and Kimber figured Rex didn’t have a chance to check it out while he was in the rodeo. And anyway, who doesn’t like moonlit lakes with waves lapping on the shore? She was going to ignore the fact that this would appear to be a romantic destination to anyone else. Because it wasn’t romantic. Nope, nope, nope. “So, Tiffany?” She tried to keep her voice light and cheerful. She was going to ignore the fact that just saying that woman’s name twisted her stomach around. “Tiffany? Who’s Tiffany?” Who’s Tiff— “The waitress?” She was keeping her voice even and light, right? Okay, maybe that last sentence was a little more sarcastic than strictly necessary. “Oh!” Rex said with an easy laugh. “I didn’t catch her name, sorry. What about her?” “Well, you seemed rather…comfortable with her this morning. On the doorstep. When she was there. With you.” She was ignoring the fact that she sounded jealous because she wasn’t jealous, she was just…confused. Trying to figure out how Rex could hook up with the town slut in the few hours between when she’d left his motel room and when he was supposed to be leaving town.

“Well, she was my waitress this morning, at Betty’s Diner. She offered to walk me to your dad’s — to your house. She’s not really —” He cut himself off and then said, “I needed the help and she was offering it.” He shrugged. They reached the edge of the lake, the waves lapping, the full moon shining so brightly, it was almost daylight. Kimber stared out across the lake, listening to the night chorus around her. The crickets, the owls, the squirrels chattering…it was peaceful and beautiful and home. “Last night wasn’t me,” she said, staring into the darkness. “My friends took me out for my 24th birthday yesterday. I don’t normally drink very much, and I’ve never had a one-night stand. Before you, that is. Except, you came back today. You were supposed to leave and not come back.” She felt him slip his arm around her shoulders. “Well,” he said softly, “I’m honored that I’m the exception, not the rule.” She turned slowly in his arms and looked up at him, his eyes dark and searching in the moonlight. He reached up and stroked her cheek and she closed her eyes, leaning into his hand, feeling his fingertips dance over her skin. “What about kissing cowboys by the edge of a lake in the moonlight? Do you do that very often?” he whispered. “I definitely don’t do that,” she whispered and slid her arms around his neck, pulling him down to her, their lips searching, tongues touching tentatively and her heart was in her throat, pounding hard and she thought that maybe she’d shoot sparks out of her fingertips because her whole soul was alight with pleasure and— No! He is a bull rider. Bull riders get hurt. You know that better than anyone. You can’t trust him. You can’t kiss him. You can’t fall in love with him. She pulled away and was already turning to run when she tossed over her shoulder, “You can let yourself in when you get back to the house,” and then she was running. Running from him. Running

from the past. Running from her feelings. “Kimber! Wait! Where are yo…” But he was far behind now and she couldn’t hear him anymore and she was sprinting through the dark streets of Sawyer like the hellhounds of the devil were nipping at her heels. She had to get away. She had to protect her heart.

SHE WOKE up feeling a lot less groggy than she had the day before. The alcohol had finally cleared out of her system, and she felt…human again. Mid-stretch, she sniffed it out. Yummm…pancakes. Fluffy pancakes and bacon were the only things her dad could cook, but he was damn good at them. She hopped out of bed and was just putting her robe on when she remembered. Rex. He was here. Probably downstairs in the dining room right now, eating her dad’s pancakes and bacon. She considered hiding up in her room, but a rumbling stomach and the knowledge that she couldn’t hide for four days forced her to face the reality that whether she wanted it or not, she would have to deal with Rex. She closed her eyes and let herself remember, for just a moment, what it had been like the night before, down by the lake shore. The romance of the warm summer night enveloping them, the owls hooting softly as they flew by, the waves lapping on the beach, Rex’s arms around her, his lips on hers… I am so screwed She took a quick shower and got dressed in her cute jeans that showed off her ass just right, but drew the line at wearing make-up

down to breakfast. Usually, she got ready for the day after breakfast, so her dad was already going to be giving her wet hair a strange look when she sat down at the table to eat. She didn’t need to give him anything else to wonder at. Shoulders back, she headed down the stairs and into the kitchen, to find…Rex at the stove? He had her dad’s apron tied around his waist. Why was Rex cooking? Her dad cooked this meal. She smelled it with her very own nose. “Hi, honey!” her dad said from his seat at the table. “I was just wondering if I should go upstairs and wake you up.” Her eyes flicked between her dad at the table, reading the local newspaper, and Rex at the stove. Rex was moving easily around the kitchen as if he belonged there. Which he most certainly did not. She glared at him. He smiled back harmlessly. “Rex here makes a real good pancake,” Dad said jovially, completely missing the glares his daughter was shooting at the pancake-maker. “You always say that my pancakes are the best, but I think that’s just because you haven’t tried Rex’s yet.” Rex shrugged modestly. “If you’re a bachelor, you need to know how to cook a few things, at least.” He eased strips of bacon off the frying pan and onto a platter, covering them with paper towels to keep the heat in. Feeling like she needed to say something or it’d soon be obvious that Rex had literally stunned her into silence, Kimber jumped in. “Well, I’m sure Rex’s cooking isn’t as good as yours, Dad.” She smiled oh-too-sweetly at Rex as she pulled a plate from the cupboard and began dishing up her food. “You won’t get an argument from me on that,” Rex said with an easy smile and shrug. “I just figured that since y’all were nice enough to let me stay the week, I could do my part and help pay you guys back for your kindness. I make no guarantees about the edibility

of the food I’m serving you.” Kimber smiled blandly at him and sat down at the table, feeling pulled in a hundred different directions. Rex was so damn kind and funny and thoughtful and sexy as hell and damn good in bed, and it just seemed petty of her to be so pissy with him. But on the other hand, he was a one-night stand, a bad decision made under the influence of about seven too many whiskeys, and he was supposed to be gone. He was just supposed to be a happy memory that she could pull from on lonely nights. He wasn’t supposed to stick around. And he sure as hell wasn’t supposed to be a bull rider. Looking back on it, it was so obvious it was painful, but that night at O’Malley’s, she’d missed all the signs. She hadn’t exactly been at her best. The cowboy hat and boots, the fact that he was a stranger in town the weekend of the biggest rodeo of the year, and the fact that half the guys in the bar had seemed hell bent on buying him drinks. Oh, and the giant gold buckle in his Wranglers. All cowboys have giant gold buckles that were probably spotted from the International Space Station, they were so damn large. Yeah, she should’ve realized something was up. She’d gone to the rodeo with her friends, of course, but they’d spent most of their time wandering through the booths of items for sale and watching the women’s barrel racing. She didn’t watch bull riding events on principle. A principle that was now coming to bite her in the ass. She took her first bite of her food and almost moaned in appreciation. She caught herself just in the nick of time, thank God. Nothing like giving an orgasmic groan at the breakfast table with her dad sitting right there. But damn, Rex was a good cook. “So what else do you cook?” she asked lightly, digging into her stack of pancakes. If she could keep him talking to her, then she could keep her internal warring thoughts at bay.

It was a plan, at least. Not a good one, mind you, but at least it was one. “Not much else. I can make a real mean steak, of course – they don’t let you ride bulls if you can’t cook a steak,” he said with a chuckle, “and my hamburgers are pretty good, too. I’ve mostly taught myself how to cook cheap foods well – Ramen, hot dogs, and mac and cheese are all my specialties.” She wrinkled her nose at him which made him laugh. “I know, not exactly the gourmet food of the gods, but sometimes, you eat what you can.” She stared back down at her plate, swimming with maple syrup, and pushed a piece of bacon through the brown goodness before eating it. She really didn’t know what to say to that. She’d lived at home her whole life. The closest she’d come to wondering where her next meal was coming from was to complain to friends that she didn’t have enough money to drive to Boise to eat at the new highend sushi restaurant. #FirstWorldProblems, Kimber. She wanted to ask him why he was so damn poor – driving a broken down late model pickup truck, not being able to pay for the repairs, and now admitting that his diet had consisted of shit food her mother never even let Kimber eat, despite her begging for it. All the other kids in school got to eat hot dogs, but Kimber never did. Her mom told her that she wouldn’t feed Kimber food that she couldn’t identify what was in it. And then after her mom died…well, it seemed sacrosanct somehow. She couldn’t eat those foods even when the cooking was up to her. But she couldn’t ask him why he was so damn poor because it was too damn personal and she couldn’t ask him to tell her that sort of thing. She wasn’t his girlfriend. She was just a passing bit of fancy on his way through to Montana. Passing bit of fancy? Damn, Kimber, you sound like a heroine

from the 1800s. “I like hot dogs myself,” Dad said, pushing out his chair and carrying his plate to the sink. “Iris didn’t like ‘em but I’d buy them and sneak them into the kitchen when she wasn’t looking on occasion.” “You did?!” Kimber just stared at her dad in shock. Her mom had been dead for five years, and he was just now bringing this up? “Yeah. I didn’t think you liked them, so I’d just buy them down at the Shop ’N Go and hide them in the back of the fridge.” He rummaged around the refrigerator and pulled out a half-empty package of hot dogs triumphantly. “I’ve never had a hot dog, so how should I know if I like them or not?” Kimber asked, and then began laughing. “I can’t believe you’ve been hiding them in the fridge all this time!” “Yeah, I guess I just got in the habit with your momma, and then I just kept going with it.” “Rex, you think you can cook us some hot dogs tonight?” Kimber asked him with a grin. “You say you’re pretty good at whipping them up – wanna show it to us?” He grinned back. “Hot dog cook extraordinaire – that’s gonna be my title on my tombstone.” Her stomach flipped at his grin and she wanted to run her fingers through his shaggy dark brown hair and kiss her way up his stubblecovered cheeks and… Her eyes dropped back down to her plate. He’s leaving, and you’re going. Stop smiling at him. Her dad left the kitchen to get ready for the day, leaving Rex and Kimber together in a strained silence that started to get painful. “Listen, Kimber, I—” “This is just business, and nothing more,” Kimber said, cutting him off. “You’re here to get your truck fixed. When that’s done, you’ll be gone. There’s nothing more to discuss.” She pushed away from the table, and walked away. Walked

upstairs to her bedroom to finish getting ready for the day. Walked away from Rex. Walked away from the questions and promise in his eyes.

CHAPTER 5 REX

K

to drive him absolutely insane. A whole day of being around her out in the shop. Of smelling her shampoo, of seeing her smile and chat with the customers who came in. Of listening to her laugh at other people’s jokes. Of her not looking him in the eye. Not once, not ever, not even a little bit. When she was forced to talk to him – something she did almost anything and everything she could to get out of – she stared at the far wall while she did it. Being around her was like touching a live wire. She did something to him. Shots of electricity would race through his body and he couldn’t breathe and somehow, she didn’t seem to feel anything. She didn’t pay any more attention to him than she would a bug on the wall. Except, she might actually look at the bug straight on before she smashed it. Kimber was laughing. “Well Dad, my hot dog virginity has been popped. What’s next – are we going to eat macaroni and cheese?” Rex’s dick stiffened and he’d never been so glad for tablecloths in his life. Neither Kimber nor Mike seemed to think that her wording was particularly sexual, but all Rex could think as he stared at her was how much he wanted to kiss his way up her thighs. How much IMBER WAS GOING

he wanted to bury his mouth in her pussy. How much he wanted her. Having her talk about virginity being popped was not helping the situation. He shifted in his seat, trying to find a more comfortable position in his too-tight Wranglers. “You know something that your mom ate that she always told me that she shouldn’t?” Mike asked, laughing. “Poptarts. She said that she never could figure out what the filling was made out of, but she was pretty sure it wasn’t actually strawberries or blueberries or whatever it was that they claimed on the outside of the box. “And yet? She loved ‘em. Ate ‘em like candy. Always felt guilty as could be when she was done, but she couldn’t help herself.” They all laughed and Rex watched Kimber’s mouth and his dick hardened more and he just wanted to scoop her up in his arms and carry her upstairs with him. Being around her like this was the most exquisite form of torture he could imagine. Amazingly awful. As they sat in the living room that night and chatted about everything and absolutely nothing at all, Rex realized that he needed to up his romance game. He’d spent so long focusing on the bull riding circuit, so long paying attention to his rankings and his winnings and how he was going to even get to the next rodeo, that he’d forgotten what it was like to be in a relationship. Kimber had told him that she wasn’t someone to have a onenight stand, but what he didn’t say was that he didn’t either. Buckle bunnies didn’t do much for him, and any woman who was actually worth being around wanted nothing to do with him. They wanted a white picket fence and a man who was home every night and didn’t risk life and limb every weekend. In other words, they all felt exactly the same way that Kimber did. He wanted her, like he’d never wanted any woman before. As she climbed the stairs ahead of him to bed that night and he watched her generous hips sway right in front of his face, he started to wonder if maybe God wasn’t playing a game on him. If God wasn’t pointing

and laughing and saying, “I wonder how long Rex will take this torture before he breaks!” Kimber slipped into her room and closed the door and Rex just stood there, staring at it. He wasn’t so sure he wasn’t going to break into a million little pieces.

“WELL, I’m usually the one who does the test driving to make sure that the vehicle is fixed, but I think in this case, it should be you two,” Mike said with a wink to Rex. Rex took the proffered keys with a big grin. He’d wondered how much Mike had picked up on, but he couldn’t imagine that Mike was totally oblivious to the lightning storms that crackled between him and Kimber. He was pretty sure that everyone in a ten-mile radius could feel it. It had been three whole days of working together and so far, she hadn’t relented one bit. It may have been difficult to breathe when she came in the room, which meant that he pretty much didn’t breathe all day long, but she somehow had managed to keep him at arms length throughout. Stubborn did not begin to describe his Kimber. Well, not his. Not yet. He turned to Kimber with a triumphant grin, and she shot him a dirty look. It was fair to say that she wasn’t exactly keen on going, but she also couldn’t figure out a good reason to say no. It was all over her face – damn, she’d make a shitty poker player – and he couldn’t help enjoying her conundrum for a moment. She’d been torturing him with her beautiful eyes and sexy ass and gorgeous tits and amazing laugh for what felt like years. A little torturing in return was only deserved at this point. When she saw his smirk, she knew she was beat. With a grumble under her breath that only she could hear, she swung around and headed for Steg, climbing in on the passenger side without a

backwards glance. “Good luck,” Mike said cheerfully, and headed back to his tool bench to get started on his next vehicle. Rex was torn – to have the father openly back his play for Kimber was nice, even if unexpected, but his attitude of, “You’re going to need every bit of luck I can send you,” wasn’t exactly encouraging. He climbed into Steg and started the engine, draping his right arm along the bench seat and…accidentally…into Kimber’s hair as he turned to look out the rear window and back out of the garage. Her arms were crossed and she had a pinched look on her face, as if she’d just taken a bite out of a lemon. He stroked his hand through her curls lightly, which only made her face pinch more. Not exactly romantic, but hell, she was in the truck with him, right? Now it was up to him to make it count. They pulled out on to the road and began heading out of Sawyer, towards Franklin. It was a larger town and a tourist trap to boot, so Rex figured that was as good a destination as any. “Good job, Steg,” Rex said, patting the steering wheel. The gauges were all back to normal, and pushing on the gas pedal actually made Steg do what it was supposed to do. All good signs. “Steg?” Kimber said in the silence. “Yeah, Steg. It’s my truck’s name,” Rex said and shot her a grin. Three… Two… One… “Like the dinosaur?!” Kimber finally burst out. Oh yeaaaahhhh…He tried to hide his triumphant smile. He knew she’d be able to put that one together, and that despite her wish to be anywhere but there with him, that she wouldn’t be able to resist asking him if her guess was right. She couldn’t give him a cold shoulder if she was talking to him. “Yup, like the dinosaur.” “What is up with you and dinosaurs?” she asked, turning in her

seat to face him. He felt like he’d just won first place in a rodeo. She was looking at him. Not the far wall, not the floor, not her dad. And talking to him, to boot. She wasn’t happy, but this was progress. He’d take it over a cold shoulder any day of the week. Unfortunately, answering her question also meant revealing some parts of his life that he’d rather not talk about. Admitting to it was embarrassing. But she was worth it. Her talking to him was worth it. It was time to swallow some pride. “When I was a kid, and blessed with an unspeakable name—” “Literally, apparently,” Kimber interjected and he shot her a smile. “Yeah, literally. Anyway, I got teased a lot in school, and I wasn’t the biggest kid in class, so that teasing included more than a few trips to the boys’ bathroom.” At her confused look, he added, “The toilets, in particular.” Her lips formed a perfect “O” but she only waited patiently for him to keep going. “It wasn’t until high school and hormones that I ended up with anything even vaguely resembling muscles. I’ll never be the tallest guy in a room, but I’m no longer the weakest. “But in the meanwhile, as a kid, I got obsessed with dinosaurs. They were big and rough and tough and didn’t take shit from anybody. I wanted to be a dinosaur when I grew up. Other people want to be doctors or firemen – I wanted to be an extinct species.” He chuckled. “Of course, being nine, my favorite dinosaur was the T. Rex. I started telling everyone that I’d only answer to T. Rex; it was my mother who pointed out that this wasn’t exactly a name that tripped off the tongue. So we decided to shorten it to Rex. My mom’s a pretty kickass woman; you’d like her if you met her.” The smile that had been playing around the edges of Kimber’s lips disappeared and Rex knew he’d screwed up. She’d been listening and smiling encouragingly and he’d gotten her to at least look at him, but

now, he was back at square one. Don’t talk about meeting families! “She sounds like it,” Kimber said gently and he looked at her again, out of the corner of his eye because he didn’t want to admit to peeking and she was smiling again. She was smiling. Rex felt like he’d won a prize – the gold medal at the Olympics. He plunged on. “I think my mom always wondered where I came from, because she is an English teacher – she’ll be retiring in a few years – but in the meanwhile, there she is, trying to teach English to high school seniors and here I am, holding on for dear life on the back of a bucking bull. I’m not quite sure she ever knew what to do with me.” He chuckled. “She’s obsessed with English literature from the 1800s, but couldn’t quite convince me to feel the same way. However, I will say, her rendition of The Christmas Carol is the best I’ve ever heard.” “She sounds lovely,” Kimber said with a quiet smile. He realized that he was babbling on about his mom, a person that Kimber no longer had in her life. He needed to shut up or change topics or something else real quick. Searching frantically for a new topic, he blurted out, “So, have you always worked for your dad?” The valley was wide here, and green pastures full of lowing cows stretched off into the distance, only stopped by the mountains that rose up on both sides to stretch towards the brilliant blue sky. It was a gorgeous part of a state that had too many pockets of lava rock and sagebrush. But not here. It was gorgeous here. “Yeah. I hadn’t planned on it – I had always thought I’d go off to college, like everyone else. I didn’t think I’d go far, maybe just Boise State University or something, but I never expected to stay here, in Long Valley.” She grew quiet for a moment and Rex just let her be. Whatever she wanted to say, she could say it in her own time. Finally, she continued, “It’s hard being the only child of the best mechanic in town. Everyone else got that choice of whether or not to go to college; where to work after they graduated. My mom had been

my dad’s right-hand…woman,” she chuckled for a moment, “for years. I never knew what it was like to have parents who worked elsewhere. They were both dedicated to the shop. “So when my mom died, it more than broke my dad’s heart. In some ways, it hurt his soul, and I don’t know if he’ll ever recover. He misses her like he’d miss losing a leg. When she died, all of my choices in life disappeared. I will work at my dad’s shop for the rest of my life. He needs me. He can’t do it all on his own, so…there I’ll be.” She visibly brightened, a visual effort on her part. She was trying to put a positive spin on it. “I love my dad and we get along great. For some people, working all day with their dad and then going home with him to the same house at night might make them absolutely crazy. But not me. Dad and I get along terrific. Not everyone gets to be as close to their father as I do.” She sent him a brilliant smile that was almost real. It almost reached her eyes. She was trying too hard. Rex wondered if she realized this; if she realized how unhappy she was. Somehow, he guessed she didn’t. She’d spent the last five years telling herself something, and at this point, probably didn’t even know the truth anymore. “Well, let’s pretend for a moment that your dad had someone else to work for him in the shop,” Rex said impulsively. “What would you do as a job?” “Teach,” she said without hesitation. “I have some friends who teach over in the elementary school, and I’ve spent some time in the classroom with them. I love those kids. They come running up to me, giving me giant hugs, calling me Ms. Kimber. They get so excited when I come into the classroom.” Rex forced the thought of getting noogies in the boys’ bathroom out of his head. Not everyone had an awful time in elementary school. And maybe if he’d had an adult like Ms. Kimber-NotKimberly around, his childhood would’ve been a lot more fun.

Or at least a lot less wet. “What grade?” he asked. “Fourth or fifth. Old enough to be learning something interesting, but young enough that they still like you. When they get into sixth grade or above, they start to become these know-it-alls who are too cool for the teachers. You’ve lost me then.” She laughed. “God bless middle school teachers. I think they should earn hazard pay. I couldn’t be a middle school teacher if my life depended upon it.” As she began describing her favorite students (Isabel and Hannaly) and the days that she went to volunteer (every other Friday), he could hear the lilt in her voice. She was happy – genuinely happy – when she talked about the students. She cared. She loved them. The world needed more Ms. Kimbers, that was for damn sure. When they got to Franklin, Kimber told him to keep driving straight until the road curved to the left. “You’ll run out of road. Either you turn with the road, or drive into Wolf Bends Lake.” That seemed simple enough. As they slowly inched their way through town, the narrow streets thronging with people, Rex looked around him in awe. “Where are all these people coming from?” he asked. “It’s the Huckleberry Arts & Crafts Festival. It happens once a year but it draws in thousands from all over the area. If you’re a craftsman, you want to come to this show. It doesn’t officially open until this weekend but a lot of the vendors have gotten into the habit of coming early.” He could see the blue waters of the lake sparkling through the pine trees ahead, and then the road was curving left. They drove another block, until they came to a Lions Club park. “Pull in here; then we’ll have beachfront parking.” Sure enough, there was parking right up front. Rex was surprised to see it, but Kimber just shrugged. “The Franklin city council was smart and put in a lot of parking spaces scattered throughout the town. This way, not everyone is

trying to park in one large parking lot and then having traffic jams in and out of the place. Here in Franklin, small parking lots are stuffed in every nook and cranny.” They climbed out of Steg and stretched. It was a 30 minute drive to Franklin and every moment of it was enjoyable with Kimber by his side. He grinned at her across the hood of his truck. “Race you to the lake!” he shouted, running as he tossed it over his shoulder. “Cheater!” she squealed and took off after him. He chuckled to himself and slowed down a little bit. It wasn’t fair to beat her by that — She tore past him and landed – splat! – into the lake with both feet, then grinned back at him triumphantly. “District high school 100-yard champ right here,” she informed him in a serious tone of voice as he came up beside her. He stared down into her brilliant blue eyes and laughed to himself. “That’s what I get for thinking I can take advantage of a poor helpless soul such as yourself,” he said seriously. “I never should’ve tried to cheat and take advantage by starting out ahead of you.” “Exactly,” she said with an emphatic nod of her head. “That was really in poor tas—” He scooped her up into his arms and went wading out into the cold lake, his cowboy boots squishing with every step in the soft sand. “Rex!” she hollered. He pretended to drop her, and she flung her arms around his neck. “That’s better!” he said, grinning down at her. She pulled her arms away, so he pretended to drop her again. She squealed in his ear – really, he deserved that – and threw her arms around him again. He stared down at her and she was laughing up at him and then their eyes seemed locked together and the world faded away and the boat tearing past, throwing up waves in its wake, all disappeared. The water sloshed up around his legs, up his thighs, but none of that

mattered. All…that mattered… He leaned his head down and kissed her, his lips moving over hers gently at first, and then deeper and faster. She gave as good as she got, the little noises in the back of her throat egging him on. He pulled her tighter to him and angled his head so he could get better access and her sighs of pleasure mixed with his and the world was just gone. He could stand there all day in the Wolf Bends Lake and kiss her and life would be complete. Finally, small noises around them started to infiltrate their cocoon and Rex realized that… He pulled his head away and Kimber laid her head on his shoulder, hiding her face in embarrassment. He looked back towards the shoreline, and there were crowds gathered, whooping and hollering their encouragement. “God, please just kill me now,” Kimber said to his front breast pocket. “Well, I appreciate you thinking that I’m God,” Rex said with a smirk, “but unfortunately, I’m the kind of god who doesn’t answer prayers. At least, not ones like that. Now, ‘Oh God, yes, harder!’ is the kind of prayer I’ll answer, but otherw—” She pounded her fist against his chest and pulled her head far enough away to be able to stick her tongue out at him. He just grinned and began carrying her, down the beach and away from their crowd of onlookers that had only seemed to grow in size and raunchiness. “So how many people do you know in Franklin?” Rex asked casually as he carried her down the beach, boots squishing with every step, looking for an appropriate place to put her down. Preferably one with enough privacy to continue what they’d just been doing. “Too many,” Kimber mumbled against his shirt. “Well then, I guess we just have to hope that most of the crowd back there were tourists.”

He felt her giggle against his chest and realized that it was a feeling that he enjoyed, very much, and would endeavor to figure out how to make her repeat it again sometime soon. Very soon. “Yeah, but sometimes? Tourists’ vehicles also break down and then they show back up on your doorstep, despite thinking that they were on their way out of your life.” She was looking up at him now, a serious expression on her face. “And is this a good thing or a bad thing?” he asked softly, putting her down on a fallen pine tree that was lying partially in the water. She looked down at the water and splashed in it with her foot. “Sometimes, you just don’t know right away,” she said, looking out over the water, no longer looking him in the eye. “Sometimes, you have to wait and see to find out if it’s a good thing or not.” “Fair enough,” he said, and shrugged. “Some of the best things in life are free, and are also worth waiting for. I am as stubborn as a mule on a cold winter’s day, and also as patient as a Buddhist monk. I can wait.” She stared across the gorgeous blue lake for a moment and then turned back to him with an oversized, compensating-for-something smile. “Ever had a square ice cream cone?” At his shake of the head, she continued, “You’re in for a real treat. They’re just across the street.” She pushed off the log and then surprised him by taking his hand as they squished their way back up the beach, towards the busy street and the parking lot. Yeah, some things are worth waiting for…

THEY WANDERED DOWN A SIDE STREET, away from the crowds of the Huckleberry Festival and towards the Franklin Smokejumpers Base. Rex had never heard of smokejumpers, and Kimber told him a little bit of the history behind the base – that there were only six in the whole country, and that the Franklin base had a reputation, even

among those six bases, to be the toughest one in the crowd. She had suggested a tour of the base, and he eagerly agreed. Bull riding was one hell of an adrenaline rush – he could only imagine how amazing it’d be to jump out of an airplane, into a wildfire. The sweet mountain air, not too hot even during the height of summer, surrounded him. The street opened up, giving them a view of the mountains to their right as they walked and the city to their left and behind them. It really was the perfect mountain retreat, far away from the crowds of California. If this idyllic paradise were somehow plopped down in the middle of California, the masses of people would rush it and ruin it within a week. Having it in the high mountains of Idaho kept it from being overrun by camera-toting tourists. “Man, there are just too many tourists here,” Kimber said with a grimace. He couldn’t help but bust out laughing. “What?” she asked quizzically. “I was just thinking that there were hardly any tourists here,” he said with a grin. “Really? Oh Rex, they’re everywhere!” Kimber said. “I mean, I can’t point and be rude, but look over there,” she said with a jerk of her head towards a group walking on the other side of the street. “And over there,” she said, jerking her head the other direction. “I’m just used to Sawyer, I guess, where we really only get tourists for the rodeo and our once-a-year music festival. Franklin gets them year-round, so even if the Huckleberry Festival wasn’t happening this weekend, it would still be crowded. And boy, do the property taxes show it. It’s so expensive to live here. Dad and I could never afford it. Franklin can keep the tourists.” Rex was saved from having to figure out an appropriate response to this by their arrival at the smokejumper base. It was time to learn.

AFTER

THE TOUR

of the base, which Rex found to be even more

interesting than he’d thought it was going to be, and some browsing in antique shops where the owners seemed to believe that their old junk was made out of pure gold, it was time to head back. The topic of him leaving the next morning was hanging over them, heavy and hard and depressing. Did she want him to come back after the Montana rodeo? He could stop in Sawyer on his way to the next rodeo in northern Idaho for a couple of days. Help Mike with the vehicle repairs and get him caught up fully… He shook his head at himself. He knew why he wanted to come back to Sawyer between Montana and northern Idaho, and it didn’t have a damn thing to do with fixing people’s cars. “What?” she asked as she climbed into the passenger seat of Steg. “What?” he repeated, startled. “You were shaking your head like you were upset with something,” she pointed out. Damn, she’s observant… “Oh, just thinking about how much fun we had today,” he said and smiled. A painful, stupid smile that wouldn’t fool a small child. She looked at him quizzically for a moment and then nodded her head. “Okay,” she said and he knew she didn’t buy it and he knew she knew he knew she didn’t buy it, but they pretended like it was fine, that everything was fine, and they headed back to Sawyer, and Rex wondered if he was going to lose her; if he ever really had her to begin with. That night, they climbed the stairs and Rex watched her fine ass sway in front of him and wondered what she’d do if he reached out and cupped it. Would she jump five feet up in the air? He rather wished he could see her boobs bounce, actually, and was a hairbreadths away from doing it, when he forced himself to shove his hands in his pockets instead. He had to behave himself; forcing himself on someone when they weren’t expecting it and may not want it…it was seriously uncool.

He had to be good. They reached the top of the stairs and headed left, while Mike headed right. “Goodnight,” he tossed over his shoulder as he closed his door behind him. Kimber was almost to her bedroom door, her hand outstretched for the knob, when Rex’s self control broke. “Kimber, wait,” he said. He reached out for her, pulling her back to him and she was gasping in surprise, opening up her mouth to ask him how dare he or what was he thinking or yes please, I want this – Rex didn’t know and didn’t wait around for her to say it but instead pulled her against him and his mouth swooped down over hers and she melted against him, and whatever she was going to say simply died away. A small part of Rex’s brain knew to stop, to pull away, to ask her what she wanted, but it was small and growing smaller. Instead, he listened to her whimpering noises and knew that no matter what she would say if he asked her, her body was saying something else. He walked her backwards, fumbling for the doorknob behind her, finally getting it twisted and opened and through the door and pushed the door closed behind him a little too hard but he couldn’t think about what Mike was hearing or thinking right now. He needed Kimber. He needed her like he needed oxygen. She was a necessary part of life. He breathed in deep, smelling the lilacs wafting through the air, and wondered how she made her room smell so amazing. He pushed the thought away. He had an incredibly beautiful woman on his hands. He could ascertain scent origins later. His fingers skipped down the buttons of her shirt as her hands ran underneath his t-shirt, stroking his abs and back, gasping and begging and pleading for him as he moved his mouth away from hers and down the side of her neck. He couldn’t manage the last few buttons and kissing the hollow underneath her jawbone at the same time, and so he simply ripped at her shirt, tearing it away, buttons zinging through the air and

rattling as they fell. She laughed, a happy, joyous laugh, and he couldn’t help but respond to her laugh with one of his own. He pulled away and met her eyes and their gazes locked and the laughter died away. “I don’t know what you want from me,” she whispered in the electric silence buzzing in the room. “Just to be. For tonight, just be mine. Let’s let tomorrow take care of itself.” She bit her lip – the most erotic thing Rex had ever seen a woman do – and then nod. One, single, hesitant nod but it meant she was his. For tonight, she was his. He stripped off his jeans and boxer-briefs in one swift move, and then peeled off his t-shirt. He didn’t want clothing to get in the way, not tonight. Except, as he rid himself of his t-shirt, he saw her wiggling her hips and moving her shorts down her generous thighs and felt like he’d been sucker punched right in the solar plexus. How did God make so much sexiness show up in one well-proportioned package? She stepped out of her shorts, leaving them lying in a puddle on the floor, and stood still for just a moment as he let his eyes drink her in. She had on nude-colored panties and a matching bra, built to hold a magnificent chest like hers, and although he’d never thought himself a nude fan – he’d always favored black or red lace over anything else – the all-nude underwear gave the visual impression that she was naked, because as light and soft as her skin was, it just blended right in. Her legs, shapely and dimpled as they were, flowed down to the tiniest feet and ankles he’d ever seen. How had he missed this fact the last five days? How had he not realized that even her feet were damn gorgeous? “Rex, if you don’t—” “Shhh…” he whispered, placing a finger against her lips. “I was

just admiring the most gorgeous woman I’ve had the pleasure to see naked. It takes time to give each curve as much admiration as it deserves.” She grinned against his finger, then quickly opened her mouth and nipped at it. “But I want to do my admiration with my fingers and mouth,” she informed him when he reflexively pulled his hand away. He laughed. “Fair enough,” he said, and scooped her up and carried her to her four-poster bed. “Now this bed,” he said as he laid her down, “looks like it has some real possibilities to it.” He leered down at her and each of the bed posts in turn. She giggled in response, a sound that was almost as erotic as her nude underwear. “You naughty, naughty cowboy,” she said in the worst-best impression of a schoolmarm he’d ever heard. “Only when you’re around,” he admitted cheerfully. Beginning at her delicious toes, he worked his way up her muscular calves and to her soft thighs. They were pale and soft and dimpled and gorgeous. And damn delicious. And then he was finally to the juncture of her thighs, covered up by her nude silk panties and rather than pull them off like he wanted to, he leaned over and breathed out, letting his hot breath flow over her. “Oh God, oh yes, oh please,” she murmured, her back arching. He wanted to make her moan; he wanted to make her come. He wanted to make her all his. He licked and sucked on her through the silk and she was thrashing and then wrapping her legs around his head, muffling the sounds and the world and all that was left was her. She tasted so damn good. He wondered if she realized how amazing she tasted. How amazing she looked. And then her thighs were squeezing his head hard and she was

rigid, gasping, squeezing, and Rex just held still, waiting for her orgasm to pass, not wanting to intrude, wanting her to enjoy every last moment of it. Finally, her body collapsed back onto the bed, her thighs falling bonelessly to either side of him, and she had the most amazing look on her face. A look of pure happiness. The best part was, he would be able to remember all of this come morning. Last time had been nothing but a haze of pleasure when he tried to pull it up and replay it in his mind. This one – he'd remember every moment of this. He curled his arms underneath her, reaching back to the clasp on her bra, and then, undoing it, was able to set her gorgeous tits free. A rubenesque painting of cream and pink, he could spend all night just licking across one breast and over to the other. He began to do just that, pulling and licking and sucking, when she moaned, "Please, Rex, I need you. I need you inside of me. Now.” And how could he resist a request like that? He pulled her silk panties out of the way, hearing a small ripping noise when he did so and he knew he probably owed her a new pair of panties but he'd worry about that later. Right now… He nestled himself between her thighs and then pushed forward, into the warmth of her, and began thrusting in and out, harder and harder and he was in heaven and hell and purgatory and he wasn't going to last much longer but he couldn't stop, not now, and… His back arched and he came with a shout, pumping, thrusting, spilling his seed into her. When he finally came back to himself again, he rolled off her and snuggled her against him, her back to his chest. She felt so damn right in his arms, he never wanted to let her go. The silence became a living thing then – thrumming, growing, breathing between them. He wanted to talk to her about what they had between them; where it was going and what Kimber wanted, what he wanted, but it was too new. Too fragile. He didn’t dare risk

it. It was better to just let the silence hang between them. He drifted off to sleep then, his world right there in his arms, but no way of knowing if she was there to stay.

CHAPTER 6 KIMBER

K

IMBER AWOKE ALONE,

but not sure why that was so strange. Why did she feel lonely? And why was she sticky down – Oh. Right. I remember now. And oh, what a memory to have! Unlike their first drunken time in the hotel room, when he was simply Rex, a man she didn’t know and didn’t intend to get to know, she could actually remember last night. It wasn’t just a hazy, out-of-focus thought, so close, almost there, but not quite. No, she would never forget last night. The strains of the song, Unforgettable by Nat King Cole drifted through her mind. Truly. But… Today was the day that he rode out of town. Rex the Bull Rider was leaving her and no matter how amazing he was with her dad out in the shop, working as a mechanic, she had to remember that he was a bull rider. She, more than anyone, should know how dangerous that was. She, more than anyone, should stay away. What had she been thinking last night? That I wanted to kiss him more than I wanted to breathe… Yeah, that. Hormones will get ya every time. She hurried through her morning shower and then downstairs. No matter how much she knew she shouldn't want it, she did anyway.

She had to see Rex one last time, before he walked away. For good this time. She walked into the living room and saw Rex there, staring at the family picture she treasured above all else – her mom just months before being diagnosed with lung cancer, her dad, and her, all grinning up at the camera. Her with her dad’s eyes and her mom’s blonde hair. Mom, what would you have told me to do? Why did you have to leave me? I miss you so damn much sometimes… “Hey, good morning!” Rex said with an easy smile, turning when she came walking in. His hair was still damp from his morning shower and she wanted to lick her way up his neck and… She jerked her eyes to his, trying to casually smile back. “Hey. Where's Dad?” “He ran out for a bit. He said he’ll be right back.” “Oh, that's good,” Kimber said, the strain in her voice noticeable even to her. Why did her dad have to leave her alone? She wanted him as a buffer between her and Rex – a nice big, comfortable barrier between them that was impenetrable. She turned away to walk into the kitchen – anything to get out of the most stilted conversation of her life – when Rex grabbed her arm and pulled her against him. “After a night like last night, I would’ve thought you’d have a more…friendly greeting than this.” He smiled down at her and she just bit her lip and stared up at him and the feelings were warring inside of her – she wanted him, she wanted to kiss him, she wanted to laugh with him, but he was a bull rider and she had to stop conveniently forgetting that – “What’s going on in that head of yours?” he asked gently, stroking her damp hair out of her face. “I don’t know…” she admitted. “I’m…not sure what’s between us or where this is going, and I’m not sure where I want it to go. I’m kind of a mess right now,” she said with a self-conscious laugh.

“I have to leave today for Montana, but that rodeo finishes Sunday morning. I can book it right back here and be back Sunday night. You know, your dad’s not caught up on AC repairs for vehicles in the shop yet, and, well, I know how dirty the floor gets. I can manhandle a broom with the best of them. I have to leave again next weekend for the fair up in northern Idaho, but until then…why not stay here? Just for one more week. Let’s see how it goes.” He held his breath and she stared up at him and bit her lip anxiously and then she realized – she was torn because she wanted that. More than anything, she wanted him to come back and okay, he was a bull rider so yeah, maybe she was being stupid, but she wanted him in her life. At least for right now. “Yeah, let’s do th—” Except he was kissing her joyously and she was kissing him back and her heart was happy and she ignored, for just a few minutes more, the fact that he was a bull rider.

AUTUMN SHOWED up on her front door step that evening. “Hey lady,” Autumn said, after knocking and then walking in. “Hi Mike!” she said, spotting her dad in the easy chair. “Hi, how are you today?” Mike asked. Not waiting for an answer, he added, “Wanna beer?” “No, thank you, not tonight.” Her gaze swung back to Kimber’s, drilling into her very soul. Kimber gave her a weak smile. “You and me, we’re going upstairs.” She grabbed Kimber’s hand and began hauling her up the stairs and to her bedroom. Kimber knew what this was about. She knew this was coming for the past week. She never ignored her best friend for this long. Autumn had texted and called, which in Autumn’s world, was akin to shouting, “OH MY GOD, PICK UP, IT’S AN EMERGENCY!” since she wasn’t much for talking on the phone. But Kimber had ignored it all, and now it was time to pay the piper.

Autumn shut the door behind her, brown curls bouncing as she swung around and said, “All right, spill. Ever since that guy dumped your drink all over you at O’Malley’s, you’ve become unreachable. What’s going on?” “Rex.” “Rex? Like, a T-Rex?” Autumn was just staring at her and Kimber had to laugh because they were so damn alike. “That was my first question, too,” she said wryly. “No, Rex as in Rex Kingsley. Rex the Bull Rider. Rex, the man I think I’m in love with.” “You. You are in love with a bull rider.” She said it like she’d say, “In love with a serial killer,” and really, Kimber couldn’t blame her. “I knoooowwwww…” she sighed, flopping backwards onto her bed and staring up at the ceiling. She looked at the texture, finding the blob that if she stared just right and tilted her head and closed her right eye, she could almost imagine was her mom’s face, looking down at her. Watching over her. “I didn’t mean to,” she said weakly. Autumn snorted. “Yeah, I don’t doubt that. But seriously, Kimber, what the hell are you going to do with a bull rider?! They’re a fun lay and I hope you did that, and often, but you can’t get serious with one. There’s no future with bull riders.” “I knoooowwwww…” she wailed, staring at her plaster mom, willing it to come to life and tell her what to do. Okay, maybe not that because that’d just be creepy, but something. “So where is Rex the Bull Rider right now?” “Montana. Going to another rodeo.” “Of course he is.” Her tone was just this side of total sarcasm. Autumn moved so she loomed over Kimber – large and in charge. “Okay, this is what we’re going to do. We’re going to go back to O’Malley’s. Tonight. We’re going to find some nice farmer boy for you, and –”

“Is his name going to be Almanzo?” Kimber interrupted. “What? Oh, a Laura Ingalls Wilder joke. Very funny.” Autumn had never gotten into the Little House on the Prairie series like Kimber had. “Come on, up you go,” Autumn ordered, holding out her hand to help Kimber up. “Let’s get you into some make-up and your sexy jeans that show off your ass, and get on over to O’Malley’s. We’ll find you your very own Almanzo, just you wait.” Which made Kimber laugh even as her heart twisted a little inside because…she didn’t want her very own Almanzo. She wanted her very own Rex, just without the bulls. With a sigh, she took Autumn’s hand and let her pull her up off the bed. Autumn was usually right. She should listen to her and at least give it a shot.

SHE SHOULD DEFINITELY NOT LISTEN to Autumn. Not ever again. On any topic. Okay, maybe some topics, like which jeans really did make Kimber’s ass look good, but on the topic of finding love at O’Malley’s Bar & Grill? A big, fat nope to this. Friday night, and this was the best O’Malley’s could do? There were the town drunks lining the bar – Sawyer was a pretty nice town, but even it couldn’t escape having a few town drunks whose sole ambition in life was to keep a barstool from floating away. Kimber immediately dismissed them. And then… Well, there wasn’t much left. A few couples who’d made O’Malley’s their destination for their date night, and an older gentleman, at least in his 50s, who Kimber didn’t recognize, but truly, she wasn’t so desperate as to hit on men her father’s age. After a survey of the bar leaving even Autumn incapable of finding

someone cute to hit on, Autumn suggested, “Wanna grab a bite to eat? Maybe it’ll get more exciting later on. It is only seven o’clock.” So the town drunks can get even more drunk? “All right,” Kimber agreed with a sigh. She really did owe Autumn some fun time together, and what was she going to do otherwise – sit at home and mope? They went around the corner and down the hallway into the “grill” part of the bar. During rodeo and fair week, they served great food like steaks and prime rib but as soon as the crowds left, their fare dropped back down to hamburgers and onion rings. Which, Kimber liked and she had the thighs to prove it, but sometimes she wished that Sawyer were big enough to have real restaurants that served real meals in the evenings. Betty’s Diner was pretty good, but they closed at two every day. Someday, someone was going to come along and give O’Malley’s a run for their money, and Kimber couldn’t wait to see the day. The meal passed quickly, Autumn’s dark green eyes and brown curls bouncing as she talked about the latest drama with her boyfriend. Which was to say, more of the same. Someday, Autumn was going to break up and stay broken up with Johnny, her on-again, off-again boyfriend of five years. He wasn’t worth a bucket of warm spit in Kimber’s estimation, but Autumn always seemed willing to give him another chance. It was…maddening. After finishing and paying up, they headed back into the bar area. Kimber held her breath as they came around the corner, although to be honest, she wasn’t sure if she was hoping to see a cute, available young guy, or not. When they cleared the corner, Kimber surveyed the room, and saw to her regret and relief, that there wasn’t a single new person in the joint. She turned to Autumn to tell her that she was ready to go home, when the front door opened and in came a group of guys. Young guys. Hot young guys. Autumn grinned at her triumphantly, her

brilliant white teeth glowing in the dark atmosphere. “We’re in luck!” she hissed in Kimber’s ear, dragging her to the jukebox, smiling invitingly at the guys as they walked across the bar. Well, Autumn sashayed as Kimber stumbled, her elbow in the grip of Autumn’s fist. Autumn came to an abrupt stop in front of the digital jukebox – even O’Malley’s had entered the digital age – as Kimber crashed straight into it. Straightening, she glared at Autumn, who was busy flipping through the choices. “A line dance might be a good way to get all hot and sweaty with them,” she mumbled to herself. “Or a slow dance might be better, so they can hold you close and –” “Excuse me,” a man’s voice said behind them, and Kimber and Autumn spun around, Kimber still holding her elbow gingerly. “Hi,” Autumn said breathlessly, obviously liking what she saw. A cowboy right around their age, a white Stetson on his head, a buckle the size of a dinner plate on his belt, flashing pearly whites right at them. Well, right at Kimber. She gave him a hesitant smile. His blond hair, curling out from underneath the brim of his hat, looked soft and inviting. His dark brown eyes looked like they were balls of melted chocolate, staring down at her like she was his next meal. So why did she not feel attracted to him at all? Why did she want nothing more than to run away – far, far away? “I’ve gotta go, I’m sorry,” she mumbled, ducking under his arm outstretched towards her – asking her to dance? Wanting to take her hand and kiss it? She wasn’t sure and she didn’t want to find out. She ran out the front door of O’Malley’s and across the street, down an alleyway, her legs pumping, her heart pumping, just wanting to go, be far away and she heard Autumn’s voice behind her but she ignored it and kept running… Finally, she slowed down, forced to by her burning lungs, and she started walking aimlessly through the nighttime streets of Sawyer.

She remembered the last time she’d walked the streets of Sawyer at night, and the kiss at the edge of the lake in the moonlight…Oh God, she was falling in love with a bull rider. A bull rider. There wasn’t a damn thing wrong with the cowboy in O’Malley’s tonight. Not one damn thing. His teeth were straight and his ears were fine and his voice was deep and his hair was thick and he was… handsome, if she thought about it. But he wasn’t Rex. Mr. Rex Kingsley whose real name wasn’t Rex. Rex, who drove an old Ford he called Steg. Rex, who’d sucked on her toes. Rex, who hadn’t used a condom. Oh God. Oh God. She came to a complete stop in the darkness, staring sightlessly down the dim alleyway. She might be pregnant. He’d been careful that first night, when they’d both been drunk off their asses, but the night that they’d both been as sober as a Mormon, it hadn’t occurred to either one of them to use a condom. I might be pregnant. With a bull rider’s baby. Momma, I am your daughter. It was time to go home and cry because honestly, she could think of nothing else to do.

CHAPTER 7 REX

R

the Adams’ driveway and stared up at the house in front of him. A simple, two-story Craftsman with a nice front porch, brick pillars, and lots of flowers in the front yard. There was nothing about it that stood out to the world. Nothing that anyone would find remarkable. But for Rex, who’d been a drifter for so long, it’d somehow come to mean home to him. His mother would have a conniption fit if she heard that – really, what mother likes to be displaced so easily? – but here was Mike and stability and home-cooked meals and…Kimber. He’d loved the Northern Rodeo Association Finals in Montana, as always. It was a fun one to ride in, and coming in second meant he had enough cash to get to the rodeo up north this next weekend. It also meant that he had a good shot at getting back into the PBR rodeo circuit next year, which was, of course, the goal that meant the most to him. But this was the first rodeo where he was looking forward to it ending almost as much as he was looking forward to competing in it. The downtimes – the week days during the season – were times of travel and fast food and sleeping in his truck. By no means were those his favorite days of the week. The weekends…the dust, the dirt, the cowboys, the bulls, the screaming fans – that’s where his heart was. EX PULLED INTO

Except this time. Oh, he still loved the dust and the dirt and the other cowboys and the bulls and especially the screaming fans, and okay, he loved the adrenaline rush too, but… Well, it was Sunday night and he’d made it back to Sawyer in record time. He’d driven all day and his ass ached and he wasn’t sure if he ever wanted to see the inside of Steg ever again, but he was here. He was home. He climbed out of the truck and hurried up to the front door. If he spent much more time navel-gazing in his pickup, the neighbors would be sure to call him into the police as some weird stalker. He hesitated on the front step, unsure of whether he should knock or not, when the door swung open and Kimber launched herself at him. “I—” kiss “thought—” kiss “that you’d never—” kiss “come inside—” kiss. “Let a boy breathe,” Mike said, laughing, as he pulled his daughter away and gave Rex his own hearty hug. No, I’m quite okay with not breathing, if Kimber is the reason for it, but he wisely kept those thoughts to himself. When he’d asked Mike on Friday morning about coming back today while waiting for Kimber to come downstairs, Mike had been enthusiastic about the idea. Rex hadn’t been able to decide if it was because Mike really liked having someone in the shop with him, or if he realized what was going on between him and Kimber, and he approved of it. But that greeting from Kimber just now probably wiped any question Mike had about their relationship from his mind. And he didn’t seem to be up in arms about it… “Sir, I sure appreciate you allowing me to come back here to work for you again this week,” he said formally. “I think we’re way past ‘sir’ now, don’t you think? And anyway, if I hadn’t allowed you to come back, I think my daughter here would’ve kicked my ass.”

Kimber turned about 17 shades of red, which Rex couldn’t help but laugh at. She pursed her lips together and glared at him before breaking into a laugh. “It’s true,” she said happily. “I know. So why don’t you two lovebirds go on outside and do something together? Enjoy the nice weather. I’m just going to sit a spell and listen to some music.” With a wink, Mike headed to his easy chair in the corner, snagging a beer from the mini-fridge on his way. They went back out into the deepening twilight, Kimber’s arm slung through his. He felt so…happy. So at peace with the world. She was right where he wanted her to be – by his side. “So tell me how the rodeo went!” she said as they wandered down the alleyway. He steered them towards Sawyer Lake, a repeat of their last walk together, since it was one of the few places in town that he could find without assistance. “Second place, for starters. I drew one great bull and two middlin’ ones that didn’t give me the score that I needed to win the whole event, but I lasted eight seconds on all three, so I’m happy about that.” “The bulls didn’t give you a high enough score?” she asked, drawing her eyebrows together in puzzlement. “I thought your daddy was a bull rider.” Rex laughed. “How is it that you don’t know anything about the scoring system?” “It’s a…sore topic for my family,” she said, growing quiet. “Not something we talked about much.” “Huh. Your dad sure liked to talk about it with me. Well anyway, when you ride a bull, half of the final score comes from the bull’s performance, and half comes from yours. So you want to ride a bull that’s hard enough to give you a high score, but not so hard that you can’t complete the ride. If you don’t last all eight seconds, you don’t get a score at all.” “I knew that much,” she said with a grin. “Despite my mom’s

best efforts, I at least know a couple of things about bull riding.” “Like what?” he challenged as they reached the shoreline of the gorgeous mountain lake. The pine trees rimming the lake and the hills on the opposite shoreline caused twilight to come a little early, and although the sky was still streaked with gold, it was getting harder to see Kimber’s face. He wished he’d picked a more well-lit place to walk; after not seeing her for two days, it was almost painful to be so close but to be missing the small movements, like her nibbling on her bottom lip or scrunching up her nose with laughter. “Well…that y’all are crazy.” “You don’t exactly have to work hard to figure that out,” he broke in with a saucy grin. “That’s true.” Her teeth flashed white in the darkness. “Ummm…that you draw your bulls and choose who you’re going to ride.” “Sometimes. It actually depends on the rodeo. Some of them, you’re just assigned a bull to ride. Others, you get to choose, and they let the choosing happen based on points. Every rodeo you ride in, you get points. The more points, the closer to the front of the line you get to be when it comes to picking time. If they let you pick your own bull. And then, some are a mix – you draw names out of a hat, but the people with the most points get to pull their names first, then on down the line.” “Well now, something I didn’t know.” He could just make out her smile in the darkness. “I’ll admit, it isn’t the most complicated of sports. Basically, you just have to be dumb enough to get onto a bull, and stubborn enough to stay on for eight seconds.” “You’re sure good at talking your chosen profession up.” She bent over and he wondered for a moment what she was doing, and then he saw small splashes in the lake before a big splash at the end. “A rock skipper, are you?” he asked idly, trying to find a rock of his own to throw. He squinted in the dark, picking rocks almost as

much by feel as by sight. “Yeah, it was one of the things that my dad loved to do with me. I wasn’t dumb enough to get onto a bull, so he wasn’t entirely sure what to do with me for the longest time. I think he wanted a boy, but alas, he was stuck with me. “So, when we’d come down here to the lake, he’d show me how to pick out rocks, and how to flick my wrist just right so,” another rock went skipping across the water, landing with a final splash out in the middle of the lake, the ripples spreading out in the moonlight, “so that the rock would seem to fly. That’s what he told me – that he could make rocks fly. And then he taught me how.” “What did you learn from your mom?” Rex asked, trying to flick his wrist just right as he let the rock go. It went skittering twice and then dropped out of sight. He had a lot to learn before he became a champion rock skipper. “Gardening. My mom always said that my dad could keep any combo of metal and oil alive, but living things, he was just about plumb worthless over. She taught me the difference between iris’ and tulips, and how to prune a fruit tree, and how much water to give a bush. The yard you see now – my mom started that. If you look at old pictures of the house when Mom and Dad first bought it, it was nothing but a house sitting in a big ol’ patch of grass. Cute house, boring as hell landscaping.” They started walking down the edge of the lake, the waves lapping quietly, endlessly, in the still of the night. He heard an owl hooting and then a dark shadow fly overhead. It was so damn peaceful, it was almost disconcerting. He wasn’t quite sure where he fit in, being a California boy and all. Sure, he rode bulls but a part of him was just as much a city slicker as any California surfer dude. “What did you learn from your parents?” she asked, startling him with her perception of where his thoughts had gone. “Not bull riding,” he said with a laugh. “My parents couldn’t

understand what on earth the attraction was for me. They wanted me to do something boring – something normal. Be an accountant or a stock broker or something like that. Wear a suit and tie to work every day. “But my dad – he works as a crabber off the coast of Alaska every fall and early winter, and so he should’ve realized the adrenaline rush that comes from living on the edge. He wanted that life for him, but not for me. I couldn’t do it though. I couldn’t go work at Apple or something.” He chuckled at the thought. “Computers aren’t really my friend. I think I would’ve died if I’d gone to work for Apple, no matter how many of my classmates did. I like using my hands. I like making stuff – doing things. A world of nothing but computers and numbers just doesn’t work for me.” “It’s these same parents who gave you the awful name that you refuse to use, right?” “The one and only set of parents I have,” Rex agreed wryly. Her topic change wasn’t exactly subtle. “So are you ever going to tell me what it is?” “My real first name? Oh hell no. That’s top security clearance right there. That’s strictly on a need-to-know basis. That’s—” “What if I need to know?” she teased him. “I’m pretty sure I do. It’s a driving need. It’s simply going to make me crazy if I don’t find out—” “Speaking of crazy,” he said, pulling her tight against him, staring down at her blue eyes, dark in the moonlight, “if I don’t kiss you, I think I might go crazy right,” he moved his lips closer to hers, “this,” he was so close, he could feel her warm breath spilling into his mouth, “minute.” He flicked his tongue over her lips and she whimpered, squeezing her eyes shut as she leaned up into him, letting his tongue inside her mouth, moaning with joy and pleasure. He finally tore his mouth away from hers and blazed a trail down her cheek and throat, murmuring, “I’ve missed you so much, this whole weekend, I just wanted to be back here. With you. I’ve never

felt that way, Kimber, never.” He finally pulled back as she let out a mewling sound of pain and lust and desire and he ran his fingers through her hair, brushing the soft locks out of her face. Slowly, painfully, she opened her eyes and gazed up at him, and even in the darkness, he could tell she was almost cross-eyed with pleasure. “I want to take you back to your house and make love to you all night long, Kimber-not-Kimberly,” he whispered. “Will you let me?” “Yes, Rex-is-not-your-real-name,” she whispered back, grinning saucily up at him. He grabbed her hand and took off running towards her house. It was time to go home.

CHAPTER 8 KIMBER

T

in a blur of happiness and joy and flirtations that a blind man would’ve been able to spot from a mile away. Luckily for Kimber, her dad was not blind, and often found ways to leave them alone for hours on end, as he suddenly remembered friends he needed to go visit in Franklin, or parts he needed to buy in Boise. As awkward as it was to date a guy living in the same house as her, even if not the same bedroom, while also having her father live there too, it wasn’t as bad as it could’ve been. Her dad loved her and only wanted the best for her, and openly and happily approved of Rex. Flirting her way through the day wasn’t a bad way of spending time at work either, Kimber decided. Never had working on billing been so much damn fun. Rifling through the paperwork in front of her, she realized that she needed to get the mileage for the Silverado Chevy that Rex was working on. She passed him, admiring his ass sticking out of the hood, and slid into the driver’s seat. Scrubbing at the dirty dashboard, she leaned forward, squinting at the— Hooonnkkkk… She flailed backwards off the horn just as Rex’s head hit the hood of the truck and he let out a long and rather colorful curse. She stared, horrified, through the windshield. That had been a hell of a HE WEEK PASSED

thunk just then, and she probably really hurt him and— He peered around the side of the hood and stared at her. One look at her, though, and his pained expression turned into a smile, and then a laugh. “Wh-what?” she asked, still staring in horror at him. She felt so dumb – how many times had she gotten mileage from a vehicle? She knew better than to get within a mile of the horn. “The look on your face,” he said through gasps of laughter. “Really, I’m okay, I promise.” He sauntered over to the driver’s side door and leaned on the frame, staring down at her. “But if you want to kiss it better, you’re certainly welcome to.” He leaned forward, proffering the crown of his head to her, and with a grin, she kissed it, smacking her lips loudly. “Kissy, kissy, make you feel better,” she murmured. He raised his head and whispered, “You could kiss me somewhere else, and that’d make me feel even better, you know.” She grinned saucily at him. “Really? Where? I can’t think of a single place to kiss you that would make you feel any better than on top of your—” He leaned forward the remaining inch and began kissing her, putting his weight on— Hoonnnkkkk… They jerked apart and then as one, turned and stared at the offending horn. “You don’t have to honk every time you kiss,” Mike said casually, wandering through with a parts list in his hands. “I’ve learned to wear blinders around you two.” Kimber felt the heat spread to her cheeks at her dad’s comment, and knew she was about the color of a tomato. Whoops. She thought they’d been so sneaky about their stolen kisses. Of course, announcing those kisses to the world every time by leaning on a horn didn’t exactly make them sneaky…

Much too quickly, Thursday morning rolled around, and Rex was standing, hat in hand, saying goodbye once again. She hated that he had to leave on Thursday this time, instead of Friday. Losing that one day was…painful. “You’re coming back on Sunday, right?” she asked, staring up at him, trying not to cry at the thought of spending another weekend alone. “Yes, I promise. This rodeo ends on Saturday night, so I’ll leave just as soon as my event is finished, drive as far as my coffee supplies will allow me, and then drive the rest of the way on Sunday morning. I’ll be back midday.” He stroked her hair out of her face, then swooped down for a kiss…that quickly devolved into much more. Kimber threw herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck, never wanting to let him go, never wanting to say goodbye, and then she heard throat clearing in some distant realm of her brain and she slowly, ever so slowly, came back down to earth. Dad was standing there, studiously staring off into space. Once he saw they’d at least quit lip-locking for the moment, he stuck out his hand to shake Rex’s. “Good luck, son,” he said, which made Kimber want to cry again. Am I this hormonal because I’m pregnant? She shoved the thought away. She was several weeks away from being able to know for sure, and until then, she was doing a damn good job of ignoring that possibility at all costs. No, she was teary because she didn’t want to say goodbye to her boyfriend and her father was calling him “son” and life was wonderfully awful. That’s why. “Thank you, sir,” Rex said, clutching his Stetson to his chest as he shook Dad’s hand. “Thank you for your kindness and help.” “You just come on back in one piece,” her dad said sternly and then grinned. “Or I’ll hear all about it from my daughter.” “Yeah, I would, too,” Rex said with a wink in her direction, and

then he was gone, headed out the door for Steg. And Kimber went to her room and cried and cried…because she was sad, dammit. She was not pregnant. She was not her mother.

FRIDAY AROUND NOON, the shop phone rang. Kimber stopped searching for a Chevy 1994 transmission long enough to pick up the phone. “Mike’s Mechanic Shop, how may I help you?” she asked on autopilot, cradling the phone between her chin and shoulder as she clicked over to a new website. Maybe Throck’s Auto Parts would have – “Kimber, oh thank God.” Autumn’s voice was thick with anxiety and worry. “Are you at the shop right now? Of course you’re at the shop right now. I didn’t bother calling your phone ‘cause I knew you wouldn’t answer. You have to go to YouTube right now. I’m going to send you a link and you’re going to go to YouTube and you’re going to watch this video right now!” “What?! What the hell is going on? What’s wrong?” “I’m sending it right now. Tell your dad you’re sick and have to go to your room. Don’t watch in front of your dad.” And then…the phone went dead. Kimber pulled the phone away from her ear and stared at it for a moment. First, Autumn almost never made phone calls, and when she did, she never called the shop. She probably had to look the number up online to even make that call. And secondly, Autumn didn’t get panicky easily. Not like this. Kimber’s phone buzzed. A YouTube video link. She stared down at it, dread coiling in her stomach. She didn’t want to know. She didn’t want to see what was in there… She reached towards her phone tentatively, apprehensively, like she’d approach a wild animal out in the woods. Oh God, did she want to—

“Hey Mike, hey Kimber!” said Declan Miller, pushing through the shop door, interrupting her thoughts. She jerked her head up and plastered a smile on her face, waving at him in greeting before going back to staring at her phone. Declan began talking to Dad about fixing an old farm truck and how much would it cost to get a new transmission put in and she could feel Mike waiting for an opening in the conversation to ask Kimber to help him come up with a quote and she couldn’t do it – she couldn’t wait – she had to know – she had to know right now— She snatched up her phone and said breezily, “Hey, I need to go check up on something. I’ll be back in a minute,” and she ignored the confused look on her father’s face – she did not just go “check up on things” during the work day – and darted out the back shop door and up to the house. Taking the stairs two at a time, she busted through the bedroom door and threw herself down on the bed, opening up the video with trembling hands and a pounding heart. The pounding heart was mostly because of her running, something she’d gotten out of the habit of doing, but it was true that it was at least a little bit due to… fear. What could have Autumn this riled up? And then the video started. A bubbly blonde who looked like she’d had her Wranglers spray painted on to her size two waist, said, “Hey y’all! Welcome to the Top Ten PBR Wrecks of 2015, where you can see the worst bull riding catastrophes this year.” I’m surprised she even knows the word ‘catastrophe’. She was using sarcasm as a defensive shield because she knew what was coming and like a train wreck that she couldn’t look away from, she was glued to her phone’s screen. The first two bull rides gone wrong had her moaning in empathy but as soon as the 3rd video started, she knew this was The One. There was Rex, sitting on a bull in a chute, balancing, adjusting his grip, and the announcers were droning on about how calm

Bodacious is in the chute, unlike so many bulls out there, and then with a sharp nod, the gate was flung open and the bull was out, kicking and bucking, dirt flying, and the announcers were talking about how this was one of the hardest bulls to ride in the PBR Circuit, that it’d been several years since anyone had ridden him successfully and then the bull slammed forward, hind legs in the air and Rex was going down, down, slamming his head into the skull of the bull, ricocheting off and then… “Oh, he’s getting thrown ass over teakettle!” the announcer said excitedly and Kimber hated him for that excitement, hated that he could see Rex being hurt like that and not be horrified… Rex looked like a limp doll, being tossed around, and Kimber realized frantically that Rex was unconscious, he couldn’t defend himself, he didn’t know that he was being… Oh God, stomped. Rex was in the dirt and the bull was stomping on him and the crowd was roaring and the announcers were sputtering, “Oh, it looks like Bodacious is doing some real damage; they better get the bullfighters out there to draw him away,” and Rex was just lying on the ground, lifeless, and Kimber began crying, deep, hacking sobs that tore her soul in two and she couldn’t watch anymore, not now, not ever, and she clicked her phone off and buried her face in her arms and sobbed, from a deep well that seemed endless.

CHAPTER 9 REX

A

from the rodeo staff, Rex hopped in his truck with a triumphant grin. Another successful rodeo, another check in his pocket. At this rate, he was going to be able to get back into the PBR for sure…as long as something didn’t happen, of course. He pushed the thought away. There was no point in borrowing trouble. He’d been through “something” before and survived. He could survive again. He pulled his phone out and called Kimber’s cell. He couldn’t wait to hear her voice and tell her how the ride had gone. But the phone just rang and rang, then clicked over to voicemail. He’d never even heard her voicemail message before, because she’d always been so quick to pick up. “Hi, it’s Kimber Adams. I hope you have something fun to say, so say it!” He grinned into the phone, turning left on to the highway, pressing the gas pedal to the floor. “Hey darlin’, it’s so good to hear your voice. I’m sorry you couldn’t pick up and hear the news in person – won another rodeo. This time in first place. With any luck, I’ll be back in the PBR for sure next season. “Give me a call back when you want and we can talk. I have a lot of miles to put on Steg before the night is over, and I’d love some FTER COLLECTING HIS CHECK

company. Call me.” He hesitated for a moment but he wasn’t about to say, “I love you” for the first time to her in a voicemail message. He wanted to see the look on her face when he said it to her. “Miss you!” he lamely ended with, and hung up with a sigh. It was going to be a long drive home if she didn’t call back. He checked the time – she was an hour ahead of him since northern Idaho was in a different time zone than southern Idaho, something he would never be able to understand. Maybe that’s why she wasn’t picking up? He pushed down harder on the gas pedal. He just wanted to be home. If home was where the heart was, his home was wherever Kimber was. And it was about time he told her that.

HIS JOINTS ACHED, his ass hurt, and he was pretty sure he was going to start seeing double any moment now. But finally, Sawyer was in view. He came out of the canyon, with the valley spread out before him, and he knew it was just minutes until he was at Kimber’s house. The Adams’ house. No offense to Mike – he was a great guy and all – but he sure as hell didn’t drive into the wee hours of the morning and then back at it again just four hours later, just so he could see Mike the Mechanic. There were things that you did to thank your mechanic for fixing your vehicle, but driving like a hyped-up coffee addict was not one of them. He pulled out his cell phone and pulled up his songs list, belting out one of his favorite songs by Blake Shelton: Another summer day Has come and gone away In Paris and Rome I wanna go home Baby surrounded by A million people I

Still feel all alone I wanna go home I miss you, you know… He couldn’t stop grinning. He was there, he was almost there… He turned on to her street, then up the alleyway, past the shop, and into the driveway. He jumped out of Steg, his legs unsteady underneath him after hours of being cooped up, but once he got his sea legs back, he headed up to the front door. This time, he wasn’t going to hesitate. He’d lived with the Adams for almost two weeks now – he didn’t need to stand at attention on the front porch like a door-to-door salesman off the street. It was only a little after ten, and being a Sunday and all, it was possible Kimber was still in bed. He imagined snuggling up to her, waking her up with kisses on her adorable, freckled nose. That was a hell of a homecoming, and just what he wa— He stopped, hand on the doorknob, staring into the Adams’ living room. There was Mike and Kimber – dammit, she’s awake – but there were no squeals of joy. No running and throwing arms around him. Not even smiles. Kimber looked up at his entrance and just froze, rooted to the spot. Tears were streaming down her face but at his entrance, she gasped, dashing at her eyes with the backs of her hands while dashing up the stairs, her feet thundering out her progress. “What the hell?” Rex asked, swiveling back to Mike. Mike wasn’t making eye contact though, and all hope that something tragic had happened that didn’t have a damn thing to do with him died a swift and painful death. Mike was staring at the far wall. “Maybe you oughta give her some time, boy,” Mike said, his mouth tight, his shoulders tighter. He looked as welcoming as a saguaro cactus. “She needs some time to think about things. She’ll call you when she’s ready. Now go on out of here,” and he was

reaching past Rex, reopening the front door and waving him back out, closing the door in Rex’s face, and Rex was just standing there, staring, nose almost touching the door, in shock. Mechanically, he turned around and walked down the porch steps and down the alleyway, following the now-familiar path to Sawyer Lake. He had nothing to do; nowhere to go. Only a head full of questions and a heart full of pain. Kimber, what’s wrong? What did I do? It was two hours and 37 minutes later that his phone rang in his pocket. He didn’t even pretend not to be counting. Not counting implied that he didn’t care, and Rex cared. He cared a damn lot. He’d spent the last two hours and 37 minutes trying to come up with some logical reason why Kimber was acting the way she was, and so far, had come up with a whole lotta nothing. Almost dropping his phone in his haste, he pulled it out of his pocket and stared at the screen. Kimber’s cell phone. It was her. “Hel-hello?” he finally got out around the boulder that’d suddenly taken up residence in his throat. “Can you come up to my room?” she asked without preamble. Her voice was flat. Steely. Cold. “Sure,” he said, having already swung around and started heading towards the house. “Kimber, what’s goin—” The line went dead. She’d hung up on him. Panic, already thrumming through his veins, went into high gear. What the hell was going on? If only he could think of something. He hadn’t touched another girl – hadn’t even thought about another girl – since he met Kimber. He didn’t have some deep, dark secret he was hiding. He wasn’t secretly a foreign agent for another country, he wasn’t the father of seven illegitimate children, he wasn’t even an alien from another planet, come to earth to abduct a wife. He was just Rex Kingsley, a bull riding drifter who’d fallen in love with the smartest, most beautiful girl he’d ever laid eyes on. Who apparently hated his guts.

He hesitated on the front porch but this time, Mike made it easy for him, opening up the door before Rex could decide whether he should be knocking or not. “Go on up,” he said with a jerk of his head towards the stairs. “She’s in her room.” “Thank you, sir,” Rex said, and sure, Mike had said they were way past formalities, but that was when Kimber didn’t think he was the devil incarnate. Apparently, a lot had happened in the last three days. Things he wasn’t aware of. He took the stairs two a time, a left-hand turn, and then he was knocking and pushing open her door, breathing in the smell of lilacs that meant Kimber to him. He never did ask her where that smell came from, but right now didn’t seem like a real good time. She was sitting on her bed, cross-legged, staring at a computer screen. “What’s going on, Kimber?” he asked, the panic making his voice high and tight. “What happened? Did someone die?” Secretly, he was hoping someone had. Sure, that was a terrible thing to wish, but on the other hand, that’d mean that she was angry and sad and upset at someone else other than him. And if that made him an awful person to wish that the one person in the world who he’d fallen in love with wasn’t bloody pissed at him, well then, sign him up for the naughty list. He could skip Christmas presents this year. Her eyes lifted to his – dead and flat. Souless. Red from crying. If she’d put on Halloween make-up, she couldn’t have looked any less like the Kimber he’d fallen in love with. She pressed the space bar on the laptop and then spun the screen around to face him. “Hey y’all! Welcome to the Top Ten PBR Wrecks of 2015, where you can see the worst bull riding catastrophes this year,” a blonde bimbo said with entirely too much enthusiasm, and Rex’s heart sank. She found that tape. Oh God, she’s watched it.

He opened up his mouth to say something – what, he wasn’t entirely sure, but he had to explain it away somehow – and she held up her hand to stop him. “Just watch. Then you get to see what I saw.” They watched in blistering cold silence through the first two videos, the air so frigid between them, he wondered if he was going to get frostbite before they got to his video. His video. Like he ever would’ve had this video on the internet if he had anything to say about it. It was hellacious enough to live through it; he didn’t need others to watch it and take a gleeful thrill in watching him pert near get stomped to death. He wasn’t entirely sure which was worse – being stomped on like a rag doll, or having to watch it two years later with the girl of his dreams while endless tears rolled down her face. The one had hurt his body, but this was hurting his soul. Once his limp body had been put onto a stretcher and carted out of the arena, and once the announcers had finished wishing him well, the video cut to The #4 Worst PBR Wreck of 2015, which is when Kimber finally blessedly stopped it. “Tell me what happened after that,” Kimber said, her voice as flat and soulless as her eyes. “I was in the ICU for a little over six weeks,” he said, pushing himself off the bed where he’d sat down to watch the video, and instead began striding around the room, the walls closing in on him as he talked, staring out the window and then back again at her huddled form on the bed. “When my skull smashed into the bull’s, it knocked me out, so I couldn’t protect myself. I couldn’t roll away. It’d probably be easier to tell you what bone wasn’t broken in my body, rather than all the ones that were. “Even after I got out of the hospital, it was months of therapy before I could walk properly. The doctors all said that my body would never quite work right, but I proved ‘em wrong.” He gave her a joyless smile. “Like I said, you just have to be dumb enough to get

onto the bull, and stubborn enough to stay on for eight seconds. What happened that night wasn’t fun and I hope to God it never happens again, but Kimber, I’m fine now. My body is cooperating. It’s functioning just like it’s supposed to. I’m a walking miracle factory, truly I am.” “What is the name of the bull that did this to you?” she asked, staring him straight in the eye. Unblinking. It was creepy. And he started to feel panic well up inside of him again at her insightful question. He really, really didn’t want to answer that question, but he wasn’t about to start lying to her now. “Bodacious.” “How many times have you ridden Bodacious since this video?” He had a sick feeling in his stomach that she knew the answer to every one of these questions, but was forcing him to answer them anyway. “Five. And four before the…well, that one ride.” “And how is it that you ended up on the back of this particular bull that many times?” she asked, the anger vibrating in her voice. There it was. The question he didn’t want to answer. “I chose to ride him,” he whispered. She squeezed her eyes tight against the answer, and then quicker than one of Bodacious’ spins, she hucked a pillow at his head. “How could you?!” she cried, throwing another one, smacking him in the chest. It was a pillow, so it didn’t hurt, but the pain in her voice was real, and that hurt worse than Bodacious using him as a dance floor to show off all his best moves. “Tell me honestly now, Rex-whatever-your-real-name-is, did you choose which rodeo you went to, based on whether they’d allow you to choose the bull you’re riding, and whether Bodacious was gonna be there?” He nodded jerkily. It wouldn’t do any good to lie. “How could you?!” She broke down into hiccuping tears then, her

body shaking from the intensity. “You dumb jackass! He almost killed you, and you’ve willingly gone back for seconds five times?!” “I wanted to beat him. I wanted to show him who was boss.” The words sounded so stupid, even to his own ears. He’d been so angry for so long, pissed that this bull had beaten him into submission, that riding the eight seconds on his back was all Rex could think about. It was why he wanted back into the PBR circuit. Bodacious was only ridden in the Intermountain circuit when there wasn’t a PBR rodeo to attend, and so Rex had had so few chances to actually ride him again. One time, he drove for two days to get to a rodeo where Bodacious would be in attendance, and then another cowboy picked him before he could even get his shot at him. He’d never ridden the eight seconds on Bodacious, and oh, how he wanted it. “Do you know why my father limps?” she asked out of nowhere. Rex mutely shook his head. It seemed better to keep quiet rather than shove his cowboy boot further into his mouth. “He was thrown off a bull, but his hand got caught in the rope and he was drug around the arena before he finally freed himself. His left hip was stomped by the bull in the process. It’s held together with bolts and screws and it’ll cause him pain every day for the rest of his life. Want to know why he drinks every evening? To dull the pain. “My mother gave him a choice – either quit bull riding or quit her. She wasn’t going to marry a man who risked his life every weekend on the back of a beast.” She was staring at the far wall, emotionless, when she whispered, “She was pregnant with me, and terrified that my dad would choose bull riding over her and her baby. He didn’t, of course, and claims that he never regretted making that choice, but you know – he loves it. He hated giving it up. Every year, he stalks the Sawyer Stampede, critiquing the performance of the bull riders who compete. He’s also on the committee for the rough stock; he helps choose who’s going to supply the bulls and the calves and the wild horses for the rodeo. He’s obsessed with it – with that lifestyle.

“He’d never say it, but I think a small part of him hates that he had to give it up. He loved my mom more than he’ll ever love another person, but giving up bull riding almost killed him. It killed a part of his soul.” She took a deep breath, shuddering and painful and raw. “That’s why you need to leave, Rex,” she said, finally making eye contact with him. “I’ve already repeated too many mistakes of my parents. I’ve already screwed this up too much. You have to go, you have to leave, and you can’t come back. I won’t break your spirit the way that my mom broke my dad’s. I won’t make you choose between bull riding and your family. I’ll choose for you. “Goodbye and good luck. I hope Bodacious doesn’t kill you.” Her eyes shifted away from his, back to the wall behind him, and her shoulders, set and firm and rigid, told him that any touch would be unwelcome. Stunned, he walked towards the door, his body obeying her orders even as his mind was screaming at him to fight her. “Kimber, please,” he said helplessly. “Go,” she said flatly. “And don’t you come back.” He stumbled out the door and down the stairs, in shock, mind flying chaotically through his choices. He could kidnap her and force her to listen to him. He could quit bull riding and show her that he was happy with that choice. He could sit outside her window and serenade her with a love song. A love song that he wrote! He’d just have to learn guitar and how to sing! He choked back the crazed laughter bubbling up in him. No one wanted him singing, least of all Kimber. He passed Mike in the living room, in his easy chair, listening to Gene Autry twang away, but he couldn’t stop to talk. He didn’t have it in him to chit-chat and he was pretty sure that Mike didn’t want to hear his side of the story. No matter that he and Mike were virtually the same men, just different generations. Rex had hurt Mike’s little girl, and he wasn’t about to take the side of a stranger, no matter

how much they had in common. “Good luck, son,” Mike called out as Rex began opening the front door. Rex jerked his head in acknowledgement and then headed out into the bright summer’s day. How was it that it was so bright and cheerful and happy outside? It should be lightning and thundering and sheets of rain coming down and a tornado passing through and— He forced himself to stop. All he needed to do was get in his truck and drive. He could decide where he was going later. For now, he just had to go. Anywhere but here.

CHAPTER 10 KIMBER

Three Weeks Later September, 2017

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at the pregnancy test sitting so innocently on the bathroom counter. The bright red plus sign was not so innocent though. I can’t be pregnant. I can’t be. She’d been a week late with her period – something that never happened – and still, she hadn’t wanted to test. A test would make it real. She couldn’t touch the test. Maybe, if she just closed her eyes and counted to ten and opened them up again, the test would disappear. Or at least the plus sign would disappear. One… Two… At nine, she couldn’t help herself – she peeked. The test sat there, taunting her, the plus sign growing more brilliant in color, or at least it seemed so to her. Once. We only screwed up once. What are the odds?! And then she collapsed onto the toilet and cried. Because it seemed like the only logical thing to do. IMBER

STARED

DOWN

CHAPTER 11 REX

One Month Later October, 2017

R

EX SAT,

tensed on the back of Bodacious, one hand in the air. With a jerk of his head, a bullfighter pulled the chute open and he came shooting out into the arena, holding on tight, even as Bodacious spun, kicking, the crowd just a blur of sight and noise that faded away to nothingness as Bodacious and him danced. Forward, slash to the side, dirt everywhere, adrenaline flowing through his veins – he was Superman, he was going to make it – forward again, pitching him against the neck of the muscular beast but he held on, just one more— The buzzer sounded and the roar of the crowd returned as he threw himself clear, scrambling for the fencing panels lining the arena and the bull charged, smashing against the metal with a loud clang, as if he knew he’d been beaten and hated Rex almost as much as Rex had hated him two years earlier. They were corralling the mighty beast towards his chute as the announcer’s voice rang out. “Wow, what a ride! The first time in five years that someone has ridden Bodacious the full eight seconds! That ride goes down in the history books.”

“It just goes to show that Rex is as stubborn as they come,” said the other announcer. “If you remember, Rex was hurt in a ride two years ago by Bodacious. Says he chose to ride him this weekend. I guess he wanted to finally get his eight second ride.” “Judges are giving Rex Kingsley the score of 95.87 – 47.50 for his ride and 48.37 for the bull. Ladies and gentlemen, I think you know what that means!” The roar of the crowd, the people on their feet cheering, proved that they did. “That means that Rex Kingsley is our champion for the Rattlesnake Rodeo! With that score, he is unbeatable!” He pole-vaulted back over the bars, trotting out into the arena, arms held triumphantly up in the air, waving his Stetson at the crowd in appreciation. The two announcers made their way out into the arena and asked, “How does it feel to not only ride the unbeatable Bodacious but also win the Rattlesnake Rodeo at the same time?” The shorter of the two held his mic out towards Rex. “Real good, sir,” he said. The crowd roared with laughter and approval. “We have ourselves a humble one here,” the other announcer said, chuckling. “Well, son, you’re to be congratulated. You’re going to go far. Finally, a rider who beat Bodacious, and right here in Rattlesnake, Arizona. With this win, you’re at the top of the class in the Intermountain Rodeo Circuit. Everyone knows what that means, don’t we?” The crowd stamped their feet on the bleachers, whooping and hollering in response. “That means Rex Kingsley will be back in the PBR circuit next year!” It was almost hard to hear the announcer over the noise of the crowd and Rex waved his hat in response, which only increased the volume. The adrenaline was pumping through his veins as he scanned the crowd, a huge smile plastered on his face. Damn, it felt good to finally have made his goal. He couldn’t wipe

the smile off his face if he tried. “Of course, that means you won’t be back here again next year, but we’ll all be sure to be following your progress on TV.” He shoved the microphone back at Rex, waiting for a response. Rex just nodded, not really sure what to say. He didn’t mind riding bulls in front of big crowds, but talking into a microphone? That was a whole different ball of wax. “Uhhh…thank you,” he stuttered into the mic, and the arena erupted with laughter and cheers. To one last wave of applause and whistling, he made his way out, while the announcers moved on to the next event: Bucking broncos. Now those guys are crazy, he thought, as he went in search of rodeo officials. After a perfunctory reading of the paperwork, he signed for his winnings and pocketed the check. This was going to give him his start the next season. If he was real careful with his money in the off-season, living frugally with his parents in California and eating at home, he should be able to pay off the last of his medical bills and have a nice nest egg going into the next season. A season in the PBR was even more expensive…and even more lucrative. Each pot was bigger, but the cost to enter was higher. The competition was tougher, but he’d proven that he was just as tough. Not many bull riders came back after what he’d been through. Most of them retired to a quiet farm and lived out their lives in medical agony. But not him. He wasn’t a quitter. He checked into a local motel, cutting himself some slack after weeks of living in his truck. It’d sure be nice to sleep in a real bed and take a hot shower without a bunch of truckers in there too. There were only so many times he could take a shower in a truck stop bathroom before he ached for civilization. With a smile, he walked into the motel room, his bag slung over his shoulder. He froze. Everything about the room was the same as the Drop Inn in

Sawyer. The bedspread, the wallpaper, the ridiculous baby pink and blue duck print on the wall, straight out of the 80s. He looked down at his room key in his hand. Had he somehow ended up in Sawyer without realizing it? But no, the key fob was stamped Rockin’ Rattlesnake. He was in Arizona. They just build these motels alike. All the same vendors are used by everyone. That’s all. It’s nothing special. It doesn’t mean anything. He closed the door behind him with a soft click and walked over to the bedspread, running his hands over the quilted fabric. He closed the door behind him with a thunk, and pulled her against him, running his hands down over her hair as he pulled her mouth to his. Finally, he was going to make her his. He inched his mouth down her neck and this time, to the open V. He began undoing the buttons down the front of her shirt, wishing for a moment that she’d decided to wear the pearl snaps that seemed to be so popular with everyone else in town. Then he would’ve been able to simply tear her shirt off. His fingers trembled from need and the alcohol and the girl. Her beauty, her laughter, her dimple… He sat down on the bed with a thud and buried his head in his hands. The high he’d been running on for the last couple of hours evaporated like rain in the Sonoran desert. He’d been damn happy to have finally beaten Bodacious. He’d ridden that bull and he’d won. He’d done something no one else had in the last five years. He’d stared down the bull that almost killed him, and walked away the winner. But now, as he sat in the motel room, staring at the ridiculous duck print on the wall, he realized that all he wanted in the world was to call Kimber and tell her the news. He wanted to share it with her. He wanted…

Dammit, he wanted to be with her. He was lonely. He hadn’t realized it until that very moment, but in front of roaring crowds, stomping their feet and chanting his name, he was…alone. He had his parents, and yeah, he should probably call his mom and tell her the news. She’d be happy for him. But all of his bull riding buddies, his rodeo friends? They were transient. If he was there, they included him and slapped him on the back and chatted with him. He liked being around them. But they weren’t his best friends. He didn’t have a best friend. How was it that he was 26 years old, and didn’t have a best friend? Because you had one, and you walked away from her. He closed his eyes against the pain of those words. He felt his gut twisting inside of him. Around Kimber, he’d felt like a giant. He could do anything. He could be anyone. If she wished for a star, he could bound into the sky and steal it for her. He was the best version of himself around her. She made him want to be more, to do more, to try harder. He stood up and paced the room, the walls suddenly closing in on him. What did he want in life? Did he want to be a PBR champion? Or did he want to be Kimber’s husband? He remembered a saying then – a sampler that hung on his greatgrandmother’s wall before she passed away. You can do anything, but not everything Encircled with cross-stitched daisies, it was faded and obscure, lost among the other flowery decor crowding her walls. But in this moment, it seemed like the greatest wisdom he’d ever heard. I can be Kimber’s husband, or I can be a PBR champion. Which do I want? And in that moment, it wasn’t even a debate. He knew just what

he wanted, and where he should be.

CHAPTER 12 KIMBER

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into a sweatshirt, hugging herself against the cold. She’d always heard that pregnancy could do a number on a girl’s hormones, but as she was just about to enter her second trimester, she was starting to really believe it. Yeah, it was October and yeah, the first snow had already swirled to the ground, but Dad kept it a nice 70 degrees in the house year-round. There was no reason to be shivering like a homeless person on the street corner. She picked up a throw blanket from the back of the couch and wrapped it around her shoulders, still shivering. Maybe she should go put on her thick wool socks that she wore while out hunting with her dad. That’d help keep her— Ding dong Ding dong She paused, her hand on the railing of the staircase. It was 9:30 at night. Who was coming to their door at that time of night? “Honey, can you get that?” Dad’s voice floated down the stairs. It was probably someone whose vehicle had broken down, and they needed a tow. With a sigh, Kimber headed for the door. It was going to be a long night if she had to put together an invoice for a tow and— She pulled the door open, her greeting dying on her lips. There IMBER SHRUGGED

was Rex, hat in hand. He looked like hell, with stubble on his cheeks, his hair standing up in every direction, bags under his eyes… And she’d never wanted to kiss someone so much in all her life. Her hands automatically went to her stomach. Had he known? How? They just stared at each other, the silence crackling between them louder than any words ever could be. She reached out to him for just a moment and then stopped. Uncertain. What did he want? “Kimber,” he breathed. “I…Can I come in?” “Oh, right, of course,” she said, backing up and opening up the door wider. She shivered as the cold fall air whipped into the house. He brushed past her, smelling like coffee and sweat and dirt and… Rex. Unwillingly, her nose twitched, trying to draw it all in. Oh God, how she missed him. She closed the door behind him and then leaned against it for support. “Who is it?” Her dad’s voice drifted down the stairs again. Kimber froze and stared at Rex. She didn’t want to have to tell her dad the truth, but she wasn’t about to lie, either. “An old friend,” she called out. “Give me a minute.” She turned back to Rex. “So, what brought you ‘round these parts?” she asked casually, trying to breathe normally as she leaned against the door. She knew she looked as if she didn’t have a care in the world, but honestly, the door was holding her up. Okay Kimber, in through the mouth, out through the nose. Don’t go hyperventilating on the man now. “I rode Bodacious again. Two days ago. I made it all eight seconds. Broke its streak.” She stared at the far wall, over his shoulder, feeling like someone had punched her in the stomach. Why oh why oh why would he be bragging about something like that to her? She felt her eyes fill up with frustrated tears. He still didn’t get it, he damn well didn’t get it — He broke the silence between them. “That night, after I left the

rodeo, I realized that it didn’t matter. I’d spent two years chasing this dream of beating Bodacious and, in the end, it just didn’t matter. What did I have to show for it? A check from the rodeo.” Her gaze jerked back to his, and he grabbed her hands, pulling them to him. “Kimber, I realized – I want nothing more than to be with you. That, more than anything in the world, is what matters to me.” His dark brown eyes gazed into her soul, piercing through the pain wrapped around her, as thick as the throw blanket around her shoulders. “You. I just want you. I want to quit bull riding. I want to spend the rest of my life loving you.” “More than just me.” Her voice was quiet and scratchy, almost inaudible. He quit stroking his thumbs across her knuckles and simply stared at her. “What?” he breathed. “Rex, I’m pregnant. I wanted to wait until the second trimester to tell you, just in case…just in case something happened. I didn’t want you to know unless it was real. But it is real and I’m due in May and oh God, Rex, you’re going to be a father.” The shock was slowly replaced by a light and then a grin spread from ear to ear. “Really? Really? You’re pregnant? You’re pregnant!” He picked her up and spun her around and around, his laughter ringing out into the air. “I’m going to be a dad!” “I sure hope that’s Rex down there.” Mike’s voice floated down the stairs again and Kimber busted up laughing, hugging Rex to her as he stopped and drew her close. As they stared at each other, Rex hollered up the stairs, “Give me just another minute with your daughter, sir,” never breaking eye contact with Kimber as he spoke. “Oh, I’d hate to ruin any reunion. Y’all just tell me when the kissing’s done so I can come shake your hand.” Rex grinned down at Kimber. “You heard the man. We better get to kissing. I’d hate to disappoint him.”

“A tragedy, really,” she whispered back. It was a damn good thing tragedies were so easily averted.

EPILOGUE KIMBER

Seven Months Later May, 2018

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a stubborn weed, feeling a weird sense of satisfaction when it popped out of the ground with the whole root attached. Just like Momma always told me – you gotta get all of the weed, root and all. She smiled to herself. She sure missed her mom some days, but the aching, throbbing pain had long ago faded away. She liked to imagine her mom was up on some cloud somewhere, smiling down at her clumsily pregnant daughter. Kimber lumbered to her feet and stretched, popping her back. Carrying another human being inside of her was sweet and amazing…and awkward as hell. No one ever told her she’d start feeling like a tanker – slow to get started and hard to change directions once she was going. “Hey, honey,” her dad said, sneaking up on her and popping a kiss on her cheek. “The flower beds sure are looking good. Your mom would be so proud of you. I appreciate you coming and weeding the flower beds for me – I could hire someone, you know.” “Well, when the little one gets here, I’ll probably take you up on IMBER PULLED OUT

your offer. But until then, I don’t mind.” She patted her stomach with a grin. “Now that I’ve trained my replacement at the shop, I want to get outside and do something anyway. It’s not good to just sit around the house. Have you seen how much my ankles swell up when I do that?” “I’m sure that Rex would be willing to rub your ankles if they swell up too much.” “Every night,” Kimber said with a huge grin. “He says it’s the least he can do, since he can’t actually help me carry the baby around. At least not yet.” Her due date was officially two weeks away, although some days, she felt like there was just no way she could last another day. She’d had to stop wearing her wedding ring months ago, as her hands had swollen up. Wedding day… She smiled as she thought about it. Quiet, small, with just a handful of friends and family, it was one of the happiest days of her life. She had just started showing when her papa had walked her down the aisle, and never had she been so proud of a fat stomach in her life. Others may be embarrassed to be showing on their wedding day, but not Kimber. She couldn’t wait for this little one to make its grand appearance. “What are you smiling about?” Mike asked as they started walking slowly back towards the house. “Just thinking about Rex’s and my wedding day. When the pastor read his real name out loud, I thought his face was never going to become a normal color again.” “The laughter from the audience probably didn’t help anything,” her dad said drily. “Probably not.” She smiled to herself. Speaking of names, Rex had been lobbying for Bronco as a name for their child – if it was a boy – because he said that it worked on two levels: Bucking Bronco, of course, but it was also close to Brontosaurus.

She tried to point out that no one would get that but him, but Rex didn’t seem to care. He also didn’t want to know the sex of the baby until the big day, and since Kimber couldn’t keep a secret to save her life, she decided not to find out either. He’d said that this baby was nothing but one big, happy surprise, and he wanted to keep that going as long as possible. Kimber figured that was as good a plan as any, although it did keep the naming debate alive and well. She could only hope she was carrying a girl, because some of the names Rex had come up with for a boy… She smiled to herself. Girl or boy, this baby was going to be loved. What a difference a year made. For a long time, she’d wanted nothing more than to be a school teacher. As much as she’d loved working with her dad, she’d felt smothered and caged by it, despite what she told others. No one, not even Autumn, had known how much she’d wanted to get out, spread her wings, do something different. Now, though, she was happy being in their new house, puttering around, creating a home for them, supporting Rex in his new breeding business. Maybe later, when the kids were a little older, she could go back to school and become a teacher. Until then, she was finally content with her life, something she hadn’t been able to truthfully say for a long time. They walked into the living room and Dad eased her down onto the couch. She settled in, placing her hands on her stomach. She looked like she’d swallowed a basketball for breakfast. Rex told her she was the cutest pregnant woman he’d ever laid eyes on, but she was pretty sure he was biased. “Your mom would’ve loved to see you like this,” Dad said with a misty smile. “She always wanted grandkids so she could spoil them. She said that grandkids would have to be a lot more fun than kids were.” “Thanks, Dad. You do wonders for the soul, truly,” she said drily.

He waved his hand in the air, brushing her comment away. “Just you wait. At three in the morning and your kid is screaming, you’re going to wish it was a grandkid, too.” “Yeah, you’re probably right.” She wrinkled her nose at the thought, and suddenly was a little happier to still have the small human inside of her kicking her in the ribcage. She wasn’t looking forward to being screamed awake at three in the morning. “Dad, do you ever regret having…me?” The guilt, as strong as ever, welled up inside of her. He’d had to give up so much to be a part of her life. Being on the other side of that equation, she absolutely knew why her mom made the choice that she did, but still…it was hard to know that her dad hadn’t truly wanted it. He hadn’t wanted to give up bull riding. She and her mom had taken so much away from him. “Regret having you? Are you kidding me?” Popping the top of his beer that he’d retrieved out of the mini fridge, he eased himself back into his favorite chair, his hip catching for just a moment until it popped into place. “You are my second-best choice in life, after your momma, of course.” “But we made you give up bull riding!” The words just popped out of her, landing with a splat in the middle of the room. She’d never directly asked him about this. She’d never dared to. She hadn’t wanted to know the answer. Her dad stared at her for a long moment, quiet and still, the beer dangling from his fingertips. “Well now, it’s true that your momma told me that it was her or the rodeo,” he finally said slowly. “But you told Rex the same thing, and he chose you, didn’t he?” “Yeahhhhh…” She hadn’t thought about it in exactly those terms before, but that was true. “And you don’t think he regrets that, do you?” “Noooooo…” Her second answer was just as drawn out as her first. Rex told her every day how much he loved her, and how happy

he was to be by her side. He was helping her dad in the shop while working to establish a bull ranch, so he could raise bulls for rodeos. He said it was his way of staying in the business without risking life and limb every weekend. It was going to take a while to buy and breed and raise bulls, but her dad was happy to have his help in the shop, and so they were in no rush. “I never regretted choosing you and your momma. Not for one second. Sure, I missed actually riding the bulls, especially at first, but having your hip stomped to smithereens does tend to put a damper on those kinds of desires. “Honey, all these years, you thought I was unhappy?” Kimber nodded, her eyes filling with tears. It was probably just the pregnancy, making her hormonal, but she couldn’t dash the tears away fast enough. He pushed himself out of his chair and sat down on the couch next to her, placing his arm around her shoulders, patting her randomly – sometimes whacking her on the head with some of his far-ranging pats. The third time he smacked the back of her head, she began laughing through the tears, which just made him pat more furiously. “Thanks Dad, I’m okay now,” she said, sniffling and laughing and patting his knee. He never did know how to comfort a girl. At her words, he withdrew his arm from around her. The physical display of affection had come to an end. He’d lasted about five minutes longer than he usually did. “Well,” he said, clearing his throat loudly, “I just want you to know that your momma gave me the best nineteen years of my life. She was one swell woman, and I couldn’t never love a woman more than I loved her. You and her – I’d be lost without you two. Bull riding was fun, but it’s not a substitute for people.” He snuck his arm around her real quick and gave her a one-armed squeeze just as Rex came walking through the front door. He’d come over to pick her up and take her home.

Home. What a lovely word. “What are you two all snuggly for?” Rex asked, noticing the tears on her cheeks. She wiped them away hurriedly before saying, “Dad here was just making me laugh until I cried.” Or something like that. “You can’t move in on my territory, sir,” Rex said with a grin at Mike. “Give the ol’ husband something to do ‘round here.” Suddenly, Kimber felt her thighs and butt grow wet and she looked down with alarm at her lap, where she saw an ever-widening circle spread out across her loose skirt. “Rex?” she said, her voice high and squeaky. “I think I found something for you to do right now!” He looked down at her lap and back up at her face. “Are you—? I think you’re—” She cut him off with a smile, panic and happiness and joy and anxiety welling up inside of her. “Why yes, Rex Kingsley, I most definitely am.” Nine hours later, in the wee hours of the morning, she lay back against the bed, bone-tired but more satisfied than she’d ever felt in her life. Rex nestled Iris Dawn Kingsley into her arms and whispered, “She looks just like you.” Kimber felt a rush of happiness as she struggled to open up her eyes and look down at her beautiful daughter. “Red and wrinkly and blonde, you mean?” “I think she has a few more wrinkles than you, but yeah,” Rex said, placing a kiss on both of their foreheads. “And the most beautiful two little women I’ve ever laid eyes on.” She settled down with a blissful sigh, cradling her sleeping daughter against her. Oh yeah, life was damn good.

BUT…BUT…WHAT IS REX’S REAL NAME?!

Y

OU CAUGHT THAT, EH?

You observant reader, you. You should be proud of yourself. Go ahead, give yourself a pat on the back right now for that. Don’t hurt yourself! Just a gentle pat. There, that’s good. Truth: I didn’t reveal his real name on purpose, because I thought it’d be fun to run a contest where y’all guess what it is, and win prizes, and just have a grand ol’ time. Depending on when you’re reading this, it’s totally possible that the contests are still going on, or it’s totally possible that they’ve ended. The good news? Even if they’ve ended, you’re still a winner, because I’m releasing a short story that takes place on Kimber and Rex’s wedding day. You remember how Rex turns 17 shades of red on their wedding day? Ooohhhh yeaaahhhhhh…You get to see all of that in action and find out Rex’s real first name. So no matter when it is that you’re reading this novella, you’ll want to go to http://erinwright.net/contest/ to either participate in the Stampede of Love contests (yes, multiple contests!), or read the totally fun and wonderful and hilarious wedding day scene once the contests have concluded. Either way, enjoy!

AUTHOR’S NOTE

T

when I watched the Netflix documentary, Fearless (find the trailer for it here). I loved the series and found myself watching it with a notepad on my lap, taking notes. Beyond that, I also grew up around rodeos, and as a teenager (gangly 13-year-old me), I decided I wanted to ride steers in the local rodeo. I won the event the first year (yahoooo!!!) and thus earned the nickname Bull Rider. Pretty heady for a geeky girl with braces and glasses. I was finally cool! (I really, really wasn’t, but don’t tell 13year-old me that…) Then the next year, my foot got tangled up in the ropes and I ended up being drug around the arena, banging against the side of the steer as it ran pell-mell, trying to rid itself of its unwanted passenger. Watching the steer’s hooves flashes just millimeters away from my face cured me of any desire to ride steers; after that, I watched from the stands. Unlike my Rex, I have a healthy fear of things that can kill me. I’m much more Kimber than I am Rex. :) As for Bodacious…he’s a real bull. (Check out his Wikipedia article here). It’s such a kickass name, I had to use it. But I used more than his name; I used his personality. Bodacious was named one of the world’s most dangerous bulls because he had a habit of jerking HIS

NOVELLA

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forward, legs up in the air, sending the cowboy on his back straight towards his skull. More than one cowboy had to have facial reconstructive surgery after a ride on Bodacious. Cowboys chasing a bull and wanting to beat it? Absolutely. This actually happens in the Fearless documentary. JB Mauney, one of the top bull riders in the world, chased Bushwacker, riding him nine times before finally making it the full eight seconds the tenth time. JB didn’t get his face smashed in by Bushwacker, though. It takes a special level of crazy to chase a bull that almost killed you, which is why Kimber reacted the way she did. Thank God for romance novels and happy endings, right? The video that Kimber watched, horrified? Yeah, I watched that video. It exists in real life. Bubbly blonde, babbling on about people being stomped on…It was horrific. I really wish I’d saved a link to it because I haven’t been able to find it again on YouTube. I’d planned on sharing a link to it so y’all could watch it and be horrified also. (I’m so sweet…) But that whole “Oh wow, these bull riders are athletes – let’s watch them get stomped to pieces!” attitude was jaw-dropping…and just plain awful. I also found that I can only watch so many bullriders-get-stomped-on videos, even for research. There are a lot of videos out there on this, and it’s a real struggle for me to watch them because it’s a real person getting severely hurt before my eyes. But I also cry when I watch an anti-cruelty-to-animals video, so it’s possible that I have a particularly sensitive soul. (I like that better than I’m a big ol’ boob, which is also totally accurate…) You may be curious as to why I decided to do the whole Rex’sfirst-name-isn’t-Rex-and-we-should-have-a-contest-to-revealhis-real-first-name thing. Well, I blame my husband for this one. He and I were brainstorming names, and he suggested Rex. “Rex, as in T-Rex?” I asked. (I don’t even know why I pretend to write fiction, since so much of my books come from real life). “No one would name their child after a dinosaur.”

“Hey, this could be a nickname because his real name is actually downright awful!” <— Again, husband’s idea. “And you could hold a contest and have people guess his real name!” <— Again, husband’s idea. He also helps me with all of my plotting for all of my novels, and he helped co-write Accounting for Love. Suffice it to say that I wouldn’t have a writing career without my husband’s support. Love you, darlin’. Oh, and my MIL. Thank you, Terry, for the downright awful name for Rex – the one printed on his birth certificate. Readers, you’d choose to go by Rex if you were in his shoes, I promise. I’ve had a few people already asking me about Autumn – if she’s going to get her own story. Of course she’s going to get her own story. Autumn needs some love too! In fact, you’re going to get a little taste of that in the wedding epilogue. Yes, I am a big tease, why do you ask? I’ve also had a few people asking if I plan on writing any more bull riding stories. Yes. Absolutely. It’s this whole world that I’ve fallen in love with, so be sure to watch for them (in amongst farmer and smokejumper and veterinarian and cop novels, also all coming down the pike. I like variety!) I’m going to wrap up with some Jasmine-the-Writing-Cat love, who is quite possibly more popular than me. Not that I blame anyone for that. If given a chance to pick between her and me, I’d probably pick her too. Here she is, helping me write emails to you, dear reader.

PS If you want to drop me a line, send me an email at [email protected]. I’m slow to respond, but I get there eventually! Thanks for taking a spin on the ol’ bull with me. You’re a rockstar, but you already knew that…

THE STORY DOESN’T END…

STAMPEDE OF LOVE is part of my Long Valley series, all set in Sawyer, Idaho. Each of my books are standalones, although characters from some books will appear in others (Declan Miller who came into the auto shop right as Kimber is getting phone calls from Autumn about the video? He’s the older brother of Stetson Miller, the main lead in Accounting for Love). Things like that are very common in my novels – I like to think of them as miniature, ongoing Easter egg hunts. :D So although I have my books numbered (mostly) and Accounting for Love is thus considered Book 1 in my series and Blizzard of Love is considered Book 2, etc, the truth is, they can be read in any order that you’d like. I do that on purpose, because I think it makes for a better reading experience for you, dear reader, if you don’t have to memorize a list of books and read them in that particular order. With that in mind, here is the preview for Overdue for Love, about a calf-roping cowboy who ends up in Sawyer, Idaho on accident, but stays for love…

OVERDUE FOR LOVE PREVIEW

DAWSON BLACKHORSE WATCHED through narrowed eyes as Chloe Bartell sashayed toward the doors of the stable. He pretended not to notice the way she paused in the open doorway, giving him a deliberate look, and wiggled, a display that was emphasized by the short, tight denim shorts that barely encased her supple cheeks. Dawson was schooled at keeping his expression blank, but he couldn’t keep his groin from tightening at the sight. Thankfully, he was standing in a horse stall that blocked her view of him from the waist down. He

allowed himself a faint twitch of his lips at her annoyed expression as she flounced off. As she stormed away, her ass cheeks bouncing as she went, he allowed himself to drink his fill of her lush frame. The sun sparkled off the long fall of blonde hair nearly touching her waist, along with the light copper hue of her skin, burnished to a warm sheen by the Arizona sun in which Chloe had languished all summer. Being the only child of a very rich father meant a whole lot of spare time to spend out in the sun in tiny bikinis and oversized sunglasses. Dawson had been able to spend a…considerable amount of time admiring that particular clothing combination. With a curse, he turned back to the stall and began mucking it out again. If he dared to touch her, that’d be the end of his job and his chance to own the Bartell Ranch. Dawson paused for a moment and used a handkerchief to wipe the sweat from his brow, not sure if it was mucking the stalls or staring at Chloe that had caused him to sweat more. He had to do something about Chloe before he gave into temptation. That would cost him everything. She was only twenty – a baby, really – and had always been sheltered by her doting and stupidly rich father. She was naïve and just had no idea what the world was really like. Could she understand how much it meant to him to own the ranch? Could she understand that he might want her but that sure as hell didn’t mean he could act on it? Hank had hired Dawson to work the ranch, and had even allowed him to work toward buying it someday, but he was under no illusion the other man would welcome a part-Navajo ranch hand into the Bartell family tree, anymore than he’d welcome in a one-eyed, snaggletoothed possum. Nope, Dawson had to keep his hands to himself, no matter how much she wiggled her ass at him. With a curse that’d burn the hair off a hog, he turned back to the stall and began heaving the straw and manure into the wheelbarrow

with a little more force than was necessary. If he couldn’t screw himself into a stupor, he could work himself into one. For now, that’d have to do.

The day passed in a blur of heat and manual labor, and it was a relief to finish around dinnertime. The heat of the Sonoran sun beat down on his shoulders as he made his way to the bunkhouse to grab a shower. It felt good to wash the sweat off and put on clean clothes before making his way to the main house, where Martha would have enough food to feed an army, or at least six hungry ranch hands. He found three of the other men seated when he entered, and the remaining ranch hands trickled in soon after. Hank and Chloe were last. That was no surprise. Thank heavens Hank didn’t make them wait for Chloe to show up before he allowed the ranch hands to eat. Either she wanted to make an entrance every night, or she had no idea how to read a watch. Her hair – curled and hair sprayed within an inch of its life – and makeup so thick astronauts were checking it out, made it damn obvious she was no stranger to primping. Dawson was sure she’d look a sight better without all that junk smeared on her face and products plastered in her hair, but he wasn’t about to tell her that. She was too gorgeous by half, and he didn’t want to give her the idea that he was paying attention to her appearance. He wasn’t sure how many more seduction attempts he could survive. Not that she needed encouragement to keep them going. When she took the seat across from him, she made sure she bent forward enough to guarantee he knew she wasn’t wearing a bra under that skimpy tank top. His eyes cut sharply to the right and he made a point of looking at Martha as she bustled in from the kitchen with a big basket of biscuits. He could not stare at her. Or her magnificent chest.

As Dawson ate, he pretended to be totally ignorant about Chloe’s stares, or the fact that she was constantly shifting positions to better display her cleavage. He was mostly successful, even when she slid her bare foot across his leg. His boots barred her from slipping her foot inside his jeans, but she was undeterred. His hand jerked and he focused on not spilling his coffee as her foot crept higher. He cleared his throat, loudly, and shot her a warning look. Apparently, it was her turn to ignore him, because she looked away, but her foot kept moving upward. He put a hand under the table to intercept her foot, reaching for it a scant second after her foot reached its goal. He jumped, sloshing coffee everywhere. With a muttered curse, Dawson slid back his chair, using a napkin to mop up the spill. “Sorry, Martha,” he said as the housekeeper came to his rescue, dishtowel in hand. She shrugged. “Just step back, son. Let me do my job.” She was gruff but had a soft spot for all her “boys,” as she called the workers. Though Martha looked nothing like his Navajo grandmother, who’d died three years ago, she reminded him of her in personality. Dawson backed away, his gaze settling on Chloe. She appeared the very picture of innocence. He barely restrained himself from rolling his eyes. Somehow, he finished dinner, aware of Chloe and Hank both watching him. The homemade strawberry cake stuck in his throat, and he gave up after three bites. “Thanks, Martha. Great dinner.” She waved off the compliments as the other men echoed Dawson. A scrape of the chairs and then he was falling into step with the others as they headed for the bunkhouse. “Dawson?” His stomach curled with dread when Hank spoke his name. He had no reason to be concerned, but he had a feeling Hank wanted to discuss more than tomorrow’s chores. Pausing, he turned on his

heel. “Yeah, Hank?” “Come into my den, will you?” The invitation was an order, and they both knew it. Dammit.

Overdue for Love can be found on a wide variety of storefronts - find your favorite storefront here!

ALSO BY ERIN WRIGHT Accounting for Love Blizzard of Love Overdue for Love Arrested by Love (Coming Soon!) Stampede of Love (Exclusive for Newsletter Subscribers)

ABOUT ERIN WRIGHT

ERIN WRIGHT HAS WORKED EVERY JOB UNDER THE SUN, including library director, barista, teacher, website designer, and ranch hand helping brand cattle, before settling into the career she’s always dreamed about: Author. She still loves coffee, doesn’t love the smell of cow flesh burning, and is quite happily ensconced with her handsome hubby in a small, charming town in rural Idaho. Find her updates on ErinWright.net, where you can find the requisite pictures of Jasmine, her kitty cat muse and snuggle buddy extraordinaire. Wanna get in touch? AuthorErinWright www.erinwright.net [email protected]