Dirk walked off, shaking his head as he moved down to Grady’s chute. He was coming up on Death Wish, one of the rankest and most dangerous bulls on the circuit with twenty-some outs and no rides. Grady was geared up and looking like the cat that ate the canary when Dirk stepped up to the chute.
“So, you used Chris LeDoux to get to her?” Dirk growled.
“Told you weeks ago I was staking my claim. Just had to figure out the right approach.”
Grady climbed over the rail, placing his booted foot on the bull’s back. Death Wish gave a loud snort, jamming himself against the panel, an act that would have crushed Grady’s leg had he already been in position. He waited for the bull to settle down again before easing himself onto its back. Dirk pulled the bull rope taut and handed the tail to Grady.
“You’re just using her, Grady, and I don’t like it.”
Their eyes met. “I don’t give a shit what you like.” Grady jerked his hand up and down, warming the rosin and then making his wrap. “She’s mine now, Pretty Boy…” He looked up with a confident smirk. “Just like this bull right here.” Seconds later, Grady pulled his hat down low, shifted his hips forward over the rope, and gave his nod to the chute man.
The gate flew open with Death Wish hurling himself airborne and into a spin, coming down bucking and kicking wildly, while Grady sat the bull tight as a tick. The seconds sped by while Dirk watched his buddy spurring the bull, his body still balanced and moving in perfect synchrony with the animal’s frenetic fits and sudden starts. Whatever his character flaws, there was no denying that Grady was a helluva bull rider.
At the sound of the buzzer, he looked up, released his rope, and threw his right leg over to dismount, landing on all fours and scrambling away from the bull. He’d made the whistle on the toughest bull for a record ninety-point ride. With that performance, he’d clearly go into the short round and qualify for the finals in Las Vegas.
* * *
It was during Grady’s ride that Janice’s phone jolted her. Pulling it out of her pocket, she found she’d missed three calls from home. She didn’t understand how, until she recalled switching the setting to vibrate the night before at the Outlaw Saloon. She’d done it figuring she’d never hear the ring over the band and had forgotten to switch it back when she left. Her mind had been far too preoccupied.
With a strong sense of foreboding, she walked as far as she could away from the mayhem and then hit redial. A few rings later her mother picked up. “Hey, Mama, it’s me. I saw you called. Is everything OK?”
A long pause followed. “Are you sitting down, baby girl?”
“No.” Her heart raced. “Do I need to be?”
“It might be best,” her mother replied.
Hugging the phone between her shoulder and ear, Janice turned over a nearby feed bucket and sat down on it. “I am now. Tell me, Mama, what is it?”
Her mother audibly inhaled. “We heard back from the doc yesterday. Your daddy has cancer in his pancreas.”
“What?” Janice gasped. “Oh my God! Are they sure?”
“Yes. They’re sure. They did the CAT scan and all those other tests. They followed with a biopsy day before yesterday.”
This could not be happening. He couldn’t have cancer.
“Why didn’t you call and tell me? I would have come home! I would have been there with you.”
“There’s nothing you could have done, baby, and I didn’t want to worry you until we knew for sure.”
“Where’s Daddy now?”
“They admitted him to the VA up in Helena.”
“I’ll come now. Tonight.”
“You can’t, Janice. I know you want to, but I don’t see that it’s a choice at least until after the rodeo’s done. We need the money, especially with all the medical bills.”
“But I can’t just stay here!”
“We need you to, baby girl. We need the contracts. You have to be strong for your daddy right now. He’s countin’ on you…” her mother added in a choking voice. “So am I.”
“All right, Mama.” Janice swallowed down the lump in her throat. “I’ll stay until we’re done, and then I’ll come straight home. How’s he doing? Can I talk to him?”
“He’s on a lot of pain medication. Why don’t you wait? I’m driving up to Helena tomorrow. I’ll be staying a night or two with my cousin Claire who lives up there. I’ll call you from the hospital as soon as I get there. OK, sweetheart?”
“Yeah. OK, Mama,” Janice replied woodenly.
“I love you, baby.”
“Love you too, Mama.”
“I’ll call again tomorrow. I promise. Be strong.”
“I will, Mama. I won’t let you down.”
“I know you won’t.”
Janice disconnected the call with a dull feeling of unreality. He couldn’t be dying. He was only fifty-four. Her next thoughts were of her mother. What would they do? How would she and her mama go on without him? She just sat there stunned and staring down at the phone in her limp hand for what felt like hours. She looked up only when a scuffed-up pair of boots broke into her line of vision. Her gaze tracked upward over Grady’s lean body to settle on his face.
His gaze met hers and then drifted to the phone, his habitual grin fading. “Bad news?”
“Yeah. You might say that.” Janice bit down hard into her lip, drawing blood in her struggle against the sob that threatened to break out. “M-my ol’ man…it’s cancer,” she whispered. “Pancreatic. He’s gonna die, Grady.”
She didn’t know how it happened, but suddenly her face was buried in Grady’s shirt. His arms came around her, holding her tight, stroking her back, and murmuring soothing words as she let loose the wave of fear and anguish she’d tried so hard to hold back.
“Don’t worry ’bout a thing.” His voice rumbled in her ear. “Whatever you need. I’m here for you, baby doll.”
“Y-you mean that?” She hiccuped.
“Said it, didn’t I? You goin’ home now?”
“I can’t. I have to stay in Cheyenne until the rodeo’s done—or at least until I know if my bulls are needed for the short round. After that, I’m headed straight home.”
“I’ll go with you.”
“What about the rest of the circuit?”
“Doesn’t matter. I just scored ninety points, which means I’m only one ride away from qualifying for the finals. Even better, the payoff here will take me all the way to Vegas. As long as I finish in the money here, I don’t have to ride again if I don’t want to, which means I can take you home.”
“Thank you, Grady.” She gazed up at him through bleary eyes. “I thought I knew you, but sometimes you really surprise me, you know that?”
He tipped her chin and his mouth brushed softly over hers. “Yeah, Sweet Cheeks. I’m just chock-full of surprises.”
* * *
Dirk’s bull was being loaded four chutes down. The rider beside him was Seth Lawson, the same young cowboy who’d been with Grady at the Outlaw last night—the one who’d been Grady’s shadow since they’d arrived in Cheyenne.
“Who’d you draw?” Dirk asked, but then instantly recognized the animal as one of Janice’s bulls.
“Magnum Force,” Seth replied. “Heard he spins like a son of a gun.”
“Yeah, you heard right,” Dirk replied.
“You rode him before?” Seth asked.
“Yeah,” Dirk replied. “You might say that. I backed him once and even made the whistle, but then got hung up on my rope. Walked out of the arena with a concussion, bruised ribs, sprained wrist, and dislocated shoulder.”
“Shit!” Seth replied with a nervous grin. “I’m up next. Grady was s’posed to spot me, but he’s disappeared.”
So had Janice. She never missed a ride on her bulls, but she was nowhere around.
Climbing the panel, Dirk scanned the bull pens and the surrounding area. His gaze lit on a couple locked in an embrace. It was Janice plastered to Grady. He clenched his fists, his blood pounding a throbbing pulse in his ears as Grady kissed her. He’d tried to play interference, but the snake had still gotten to her.
She’s mine now, Pretty Boy… Just like this bull right here.
How could he not have seen it coming? Janice’s earlier brush-off made perfect sense now. The idea of the two of them together, especially after Grady’s behavior only the night before, made him want to pound him into the ground. Fuck! How had he let it happen?
Seth’s voice broke into his thoughts. “That right there’s the biggest reason for ridin’ bulls—the all-you-can-eat pussy buffet.” A big smirk stretched his mouth as he jerked his head toward Grady and Janice. “Since Grady’s…er…occupied, will you spot me?”
“Sure,” Dirk replied absently. Seth popped in his mouth guard but shook away the helmet offer before climbing over the rail. “You not gonna wear the helmet? This SOB’s damned unpredictable,” Dirk warned.
“Grady doesn’t wear one,” Seth said, tugging his Stetson lower on his forehead.
“He’s been doing this a lot longer than you.”
“I plan to keep my head out of the way.”
Dirk shrugged. “It’s your head.”
He spotted Seth, bracing his arms on either side of the rider’s body while Seth’s buddy tightened the bull rope. Seth settled down onto the bull, glancing up at Dirk with a nervous grin before releasing the panel and giving his nod.
Seth’s ride didn’t last long. Within three seconds, he pitched face-first onto the bull’s horns. He went instantly limp. The bull spun, hurling Seth from his back to land headfirst in the dirt—but his left spur was caught in the flank rope, trapping Seth beneath the bull for a deadly pummeling as the animal continued to buck, kick, and spin. The next seconds unfurled like a repeat of Dirk’s own nightmare.
Without thought, he leaped over the fence to join the bull fighters, but the bull had already dragged Seth’s unconscious body half the width of the arena before anyone could get in close enough to cut Seth loose. The announcer and barrel man distracted the crowd with jokes and antics while half a dozen men fought to free the unconscious rider. Once they’d cut the cowboy loose, the bull fighters coaxed the enraged animal back through the cattle chute and into the pen while the medical team sprang into action, surrounding Seth’s inert, bloodied, and barely breathing body.
Dirk had seen plenty of bad wrecks before, but this one made his blood run cold. He stood helplessly looking on as the medical team swiftly transferred Seth onto a stretcher to carry him out to the waiting ambulance. As they passed, Seth’s eyes flickered open to stare directly into Dirk’s. Their gazes met for no more than a second but Dirk read the terror and helplessness before Seth’s expression went utterly blank. A long and shuddering breath followed. Then he went perfectly still. The efforts at revival were frantic and fruitless. Seth was gone. He’d slipped away before their very eyes.
Everyone would later say the kid died doing what he loved, but he shouldn’t have died at all. Seth Lawson should never have been on that bull. Dirk watched utterly numb as they carried him out. The smells, the sounds, and the look in Seth’s eyes were forever etched in his brain. A long moment of silence followed Seth’s exit, but then the announcer called the next rider. As always, the show must go on.
Minutes later, Dirk lowered himself onto his own bull, mechanically going through the motions, wrapping his fist in his rope and sidling his hips right up to his hand just as he had a hundred times before. Normally his heart would be pounding in anticipation and his blood fired to beat Grady, but everything had changed. He felt completely numb. The thrill was gone.
Fearing his head wasn’t in the game—a damned dangerous thing while forking an eighteen-hundred-pound bull—it took all his concentration to tune out the distractions and blank his mind to all but the bull.
When the gate swung open, the animal came to life beneath him, hurling himself into the air and transforming into a furiously bucking cyclone. He clung like a burr to the wildly pitching animal for the longest eight seconds of his life. When the buzzer finally sounded, he released his hand and threw his leg over for a clean dismount, landing on both feet. His boots had barely hit the dirt before the bull spun around to face him, dropping his shoulders as if to charge, shaking his head and spewing snot. While Dirk’s instincts told him to run for the panels, he just stood there, boots rooted in the dirt.
The bullfighters moved in shouting and waving their hats, but the silent showdown continued with bull and rider just staring one another down. Taken with a sudden crazy impulse, Dirk tipped his hat in salute. As if on cue, the animal gave a loud snort and turned away, trotting quietly back into the chutes. Dirk watched until the gate closed, then looked up to find Janice staring down at him, mouth agape. Their eyes met. He tipped his hat again and walked out of the arena.
* * *
Dirk found himself in the warm-up area behind the pens without even remembering how he got there. Hell, he hardly remembered the ride. It was as if he suddenly viewed himself through someone else’s eyes. While the other riders laughed and jawed, he wordlessly stripped off his vest and chaps, throwing them into his rigging bag.
“What the fuck was that exit all about?” Grady demanded.
“I’m done,” Dirk said.
“Whadaya mean done?”
Dirk released one spur from his boot, and then the other. “Done as in retired.”
“Retired? Old men and pussies retire. You sayin’ one kid gets killed by a bull and you go all chickenshit? You know the risks. He did too. Hell, the danger is more than half the reason we do it.”
“It’s why you do it,” Dirk said. “I’m done now. I haven’t lost my nerve, I’ve just gained some sense. You might call it an epiphany.”
“An epiphany? What the fuck’s an epiphany?”
“It’s a ‘shit, I finally get it’ moment.”
“Yeah and what do you get?”
“That it ain’t rodeo. There’s more I want to do with my life.”
“And what’s that?”
“Dunno yet. I’ll figure the rest out on the way.”
“On the way where? You goin’ some place, Pretty Boy?”
“Yeah.” Dirk stood. “I am. I got a hankering to see the ocean. I’m leaving tonight.”
“Did you hit your head again? You’re talking like you scrambled your fucking brain.”
“Nope. I just need a change of scenery… Say good-bye to her for me.”
Grady smirked. “So it’s Janice? That’s what this is really about? You’re bowing out?”
Dirk threw the last of his gear in his bag. “Looks to me like she’s already made her choice. Might not be the best one, but what’s done is done. Just know that if you hurt her, I’ll tear you a new asshole.”
“Hurt her? Shit!” he scoffed. “I’ll treat her like a fucking queen.”
“For how long?” Dirk demanded.
“Till death do us part… I intend to marry her.”
“Oh, yeah?” Dirk rose and slung his bag over his shoulder. “Then I just hope she has the good sense to refuse. You ain’t husband material, Grady.” He took a few steps and turned around. “I mean it, Grady. Treat her right.”
“Or what?” Grady challenged.
“Or I swear to God, you’ll answer to me.”
* * *
Janice showered quickly and then threw on her Dixie Chicks T-shirt before toweling her hair dry. She’d hung up the towel and was just about to rake a comb through her hair when a rap sounded on the door. Was it Dirk? His actions in the arena tonight had unsettled her. It was as if he’d dared the bull to gore him. The thought of it had made her knees buckle. All of her anger and resentment were washed away by a flood of fear. Try as she might to deny it, she still cared for Dirk.
“Janice? You ready?” Grady called through the door. “We gotta hustle to catch the second half.”
She had no plans of going out after the news she’d received from home, but she hadn’t told Grady. She answered the door, only realizing at Grady’s stunned expression that she wore only the T-shirt. She hadn’t even put underwear on.
“Wasn’t what I expected.” He grinned. “But I can sure dig the look.”
“I’m sorry, Grady, but I’m not going anywhere tonight.”
“Hey, I’m easy to please.” He didn’t wait for an invitation before stepping into the trailer. “I’m happy to stay in if that’s your preference. I’m sure we can find plenty to entertain ourselves.” His gray eyes raked over her meaningfully.
Janice felt a surge of irritation. “No. You don’t understand. Too much has happened tonight. The phone call from home. Seth Lawson killed by one of my bulls. I can’t even process it all—”
“You saying you wanna be alone?”
Did she? She had to think about that. No, she didn’t want to be alone. “I guess not,” she replied softly. “But I’m not good company right now.”
Grady’s hands came down on her shoulders. Janice fought the urge to shrug them off. He seemed too possessive all of a sudden. “Told you I’m here for you, Sweet Cheeks, and it looks like it’s gonna be just the two of us from here on out.”
“What do you mean?” she said. “What about Dirk?”
“He’s gone.”
“Gone? I don’t understand.”
“He packed up his shit and left as soon as his ride was done.” He patted his shirt pocket. “Didn’t even wait for his paycheck. Just got in his truck and split.”
“Did he go home to the ranch?”
“Don’t think so. He mumbled something about the ocean.”
“The ocean?” Janice was truly baffled. “What ocean? There isn’t any ocean in this part of the country.”
“Hell if I know what he meant. Does it really matter?” Grady asked. “He’s split and I’m here.” He put his arms around her, drawing her closer. She fought the impulse to push away, but it felt so good just to be held by somebody—even if his weren’t the arms she craved.
“No,” Janice whispered woodenly. “I don’t suppose it matters…not anymore.”
“It’s just you and me now, and I swear I’ll take real good care of you.”
“Take care of me? How?”
“I’m going to the finals in Vegas, Sweet Cheeks, and you’re coming with me.”
Janice stared at him speechless. “I don’t understand. What would you need me for?”
“The wedding, baby doll,” he replied with his cockiest grin. “After I win the World Championship, you’re gonna marry me.”
His words had stunned her into silence, and then his mouth had followed.
Passive and accepting, she’d just let it all happen.