Joe strolled down to the barn, grinning as Violet stomped ahead of him. Aggravating her was turning out to be a decent distraction. Nice of Delon to get the kid out of the way for a few days, so Joe didn’t have to watch his step. Or his mouth.
Joe’s good mood deflated slightly at the reminder of Beni. Were all kids that wise at his age? Other than scribbling autographs and patting heads, Joe didn’t come into contact with many humans under the age of fourteen. He paused in the barn door. “Sorry about the swearing. I’m not used to being around kids.”
Violet snagged a pair of halters from a hook. “When Beni isn’t behind the bucking chutes, he’s hanging around the shop at Sanchez Trucking. He can probably cuss circles around you.”
“In English and Spanish?”
“Delon isn’t Hispanic.” She snatched up a pair of leather gloves and fired them at Joe.
He caught them in self-defense. “But…Sanchez?”
“Their grandfather took his stepdad’s name. They’re dark because Delon’s mother is Navajo.”
“So that makes Beni—”
“An American.” She slapped a halter into Joe’s hand and pointed at a stout sorrel gelding. “That’s Dozer. Use the saddle on the first rack. It’s the only one that fits him.”
The horse was built like his namesake and moved with about as much finesse. Straddling him was not going to feel good on Joe’s sore thigh. “I can handle something less idiotproof.”
Violet tossed a smirk over her shoulder as she haltered Cadillac. “Better safe than sorry.”
“Expecting trouble?”
“With bulls? Always. Too much testosterone…makes them stupid.” The bite in her voice made it clear her opinion applied to males in general.
Joe grinned. Say what she wanted, he’d felt the answering flash of heat every time he touched her. His blood still hummed when she got close.
“I’d like to get this done sometime today,” she said.
“Yes, ma’am.” He gave her a lazy salute before letting himself into Dozer’s stall.
When both horses were saddled, Violet handed him a rope and slung one over her own saddle horn. At her whistle, Cole’s red heeler, Katie, popped up out of the patch of shade where she’d been keeping a close eye on the proceedings. Joe followed Violet out the back of the barn, through a corral, and down a long, wide lane flanked with square pens, built of heavy oilfield pipe that could take anything a one-ton bull—much less a horse—dished out. The pens were empty now while the rodeo stock enjoyed a few days of well-earned pasture time.
“You said you graduated from college,” Joe said as he mounted up. “Where?”
“West Texas A&M, in Canyon.”
“They teach Pickup Man 101 there?”
One corner of her mouth twitched. “I have a business degree. You?”
“I worked my first pro rodeo before I graduated from high school. Couldn’t see how sleeping through another four years of classes was gonna improve my career prospects.”
She snorted, almost a laugh. “You and Cole.”
At the end of the lane, Violet pushed the heavy steel gate wide before swinging aboard her horse. Beyond the corrals, barbed wire angled out to either side, forming a funnel that would guide the bulls into the lane. Dust billowed around them as she led the way up through a gap in the rocky bluff and onto the flat above. From there, the land stretched to the horizon on all sides, the neighboring homesteads distant glints of glass and metal in the sunlight.
“I suppose this is pretty barren compared to where you’re from.”
Joe shook his head. “The high desert is basically like northern Nevada. Not much different from here except the hills are bigger.”
She looked at him with a smidgen of curiosity. “Did you move there to work for Browning?”
“Nope. Born and raised.”
“You have family there?”
He shook his head again. “Both of my parents moved away.”
“Separately?”
“Yeah.”
For a few minutes there was nothing but the dull clop of hooves on baked earth and the crunch of dry grass. The sun beat down on Joe’s shoulders, hot but not unbearable. The aroma of the mesquite was sharp like sagebrush. The hawk circling overhead was probably a different species, but its cry pierced the air in the same way as those back home. If it weren’t for the slightly higher humidity and flatness of the landscape, he could almost imagine he was on the High Lonesome. Close enough to stir up the longing so it swelled inside him until it felt as if his rib cage would explode from the pressure.
Today should’ve been the first day of his treasured fall break between Pendleton and the circuit finals in Redmond. Weaning day, one of Joe’s favorites of the entire year, seeing the future wrapped in coats that were still downy, shining from eyes that held that certain gleam—a spark of wildness bred into their bones. Joe could trace it back through their mothers, fathers, even grandparents. He knew every colt’s breeding by the shape of its head, the slope of its shoulder. This was his family tree—planted in borrowed ground.
“I appreciate you setting Hank straight yesterday,” Violet said abruptly. “He won’t listen to any of us.”
“He’ll grow out of it eventually. I did.”
She raised her eyebrows, a silent really?
“Hah. Funny.”
“I didn’t say a word.” But she smirked and Joe smirked back at her. She broke off the eye contact, twisting in her saddle to search for any sign of the bulls.
She’d opted for the man pants and a baggy T-shirt. Whatever she wore underneath had some serious squashing power to hide those mouthwatering curves. She must do it on purpose. What she’d worn at the bar would be a major distraction on the ranch or in the arena. Hell, twelve hours later, Joe was still seeing pink.
“Why isn’t it Violet Sanchez?” he asked.
Her gaze jerked back to him. “Excuse me?”
“You and Delon act more married than half of the married people I know. Why not make it official?”
“We don’t feel that way about each other.”
“He stays in your house.”
She fired an irritated look at him. “Why do you care?”
“Before I buy you that shot of tequila, I want to be sure I’m not trespassing.”
Her chin came up, her cheeks flushing. “I’m not a piece of property.”
“Looks like Delon’s staked a claim.”
“We share a kid and a friendship. Nothing more.”
Right. That explained the Step the fuck away from my woman look Delon had given him. Delon had a pretty sweet deal as far as Joe could see. He got to do whatever he wanted on the road, no questions asked, and still come home to his cozy little family. “Not even an occasional booty call?”
She made a sound of disbelief wrapped up in anger. “Are you always this…”
“Curious?”
“Not quite the word I was looking for.”
He grinned. She huffed out a breath.
“Not that it’s any of your business, but no, no booty calls. It’s not worth the risk. There would be feelings, and someone would get hurt, and Beni would be the one who suffered most.”
Yeah. Joe knew all about that. His parents had splattered feelings all over the place before, during, and after the divorce. Proof positive that getting married because you were knocked up wasn’t such a great plan, either.
“How’s your future husband gonna feel about Delon camping in the spare room?”
“That’s not an issue.” She shot him an assessing glance. “What about the woman in the Corvette?”
“She’s Wyatt’s problem. I’ve already hit my quota of incredibly high-maintenance redheads.” When Violet raised her eyebrows, he added, “My mother.”
“Oh.” She jerked her gaze away, holding a hand over the bill of her cap to shade her eyes as she scanned the horizon in search of their prey. “There isn’t exactly a stampede of eligible bachelors looking to relocate to Earnest, Texas. And besides, Beni’s at a tough age.”
“It won’t be any easier when he’s ten or eleven.”
Her gaze shifted to him, sharpening. “Is that how old you were?”
Hell. He hadn’t meant to let that slip. He nodded tersely. “Ten the first time they split. Eleven when they got back together. Twelve when they did everybody a favor and made it permanent.”
“Why?”
“Personality conflict.” As in his mother claimed his father had none, but Joe didn’t intend to share that charming detail.
“It was better after they split?” Violet asked.
Joe shifted in the saddle to take pressure off his sore thigh, stretched to the limit by Dozer’s broad back and jarring walk. He preferred not to think about those days. Roxy, with her stereotypical redheaded temper tantrums. His dad, the king of the silent treatment. And Joe, left hanging between them like a human piñata, taking all the emotional whacks even though he wasn’t their target.
“It wasn’t worse,” he said.
Violet’s eyes darkened with sympathy. Joe braced himself for more questions, but she tilted her head toward the next draw. “Come on. As slow as Dozer walks, we’ll be out here until dark if we don’t kick up into a lope.”
* * *
It figured Joe would sit a horse like he was born to it. He was bound and determined to be everything Violet ever wanted in a man—except available for anything beyond the next two and half weeks. Not that she was looking for permanent. Between Beni, Delon, Cole, and her dad, her life was so full of men she wasn’t sure where she’d cram another one in.
The bulls were in the first draw, lounging in the shade of the trees above the water hole, thankfully. The next likely spot was another half mile across the flat, and she’d had enough quality time with Joe. Bad enough she couldn’t talk her body out of responding to his physical presence—then he had to go and act semi-human. Imagining him young, confused, and caught in the crossfire between his parents was a whole lot more dangerous than any hot and tinglies, damn her sympathetic heart.
As they started down the side of the draw, Cadillac pushed at the bridle, nudging her back to the job at hand. The bulls’ heads came up and they clambered to their feet, a dozen in all, from silver gray to dark red to coal black, all lean, athletic Brahma crossbreds.
“What’s the plan?” Joe asked, pulling the rope off his saddle horn and building a loop.
“You know how to use that thing?” Violet asked.
“Well enough.”
“Watch that brindle,” Violet said, pointing to a black bull with orangey tiger stripes. “He’s one of Dirt Eater’s calves and he inherited his daddy’s jumping ability. Last time we brought them in, he cleared the barbed wire fence and got off down the highway.”
Yet another reason she’d wanted Cole along on this mission. Like her, he’d done this so many times he could anticipate almost every move a bull could make. As they started toward the bunch, two of the bulls waded into the water at the edge of the stock pond, belly deep. Violet gestured to the dog. “Come by, Katie.”
The dog blasted off like a rocket and bailed into the murky water, swimming out and around the two bulls. When one lowered its head, snorting, she nipped its nose. It bellowed, jumped back, and splashed out of the water. The second followed. Katie chugged after them, picking up speed when she hit shallow water and found the bottom. She paused on the bank long enough to shake off the water and throw Violet a triumphant look.
“Good dog.”
Violet kicked Cadillac up to circle the right side of the herd. She raised a hand to direct Joe to the left but he was already there, bringing up the flank and leaving the middle to the dog. Katie zipped forward to nip the heels of a bull that wheeled around to butt heads with one of his buddies.
Violet slapped her hand against her thigh, shouting, “Hyah, hyah!” until they moved out at a brisk trot. Like a bunch of teenage boys, bulls this age would conjure up all kinds of trouble if you gave them time to think. They crossed the flat without problem. Then the bulls hit the trail down off the bluff and broke into a lope, the brindle bull in the lead. Violet urged Cadillac to keep pace as they skidded down the loose dirt path.
As soon as she hit the bottom, she tapped Cadillac with the tail of her rope, pushing him into a gallop. She blew past the lead bull and swung Cadillac around hard on his hocks. The brindle hesitated. Violet swung her loop and shouted as the bull ducked left, then right, then sprinted straight for the fence behind her. She flung a Hail Mary shot as he passed. Miracle of miracles, it dropped over his horns in mid-leap. One hind leg failed to clear the top wire. Wire screeched, stretched, but held. Violet had just enough time to get the tail of her rope wrapped around the saddle horn before the bull kicked loose of the fence.
Cadillac staggered, jerked almost off his feet by the force of a thousand pounds of bovine brought to a halt. The big brown horse dropped his butt and dug in as the bull swung around, and the rope snapped taut, horse on one end, bull on the other…and four strands of barbed wire in between.
“You got him?” Joe yelled, pushing the rest of the herd through the gate.
“For now,” Violet yelled back. “Hold ’em, Katie.”
The dog plopped on her belly in the middle of the pipe-fenced lane, daring any of the bulls to try to get past her. Joe bailed off his horse and yanked open the wire gate leading out to where the brindle was slinging his head, fighting the rope. Vaulting back onto Dozer, Joe shook out his loop and eased close.
His first attempt snagged only the right horn. He cursed, coiled his rope, and rebuilt the loop. On the second attempt, it fit. He dallied the tail of the rope around his saddle horn and backed Dozer up until it was tight.
“I’ll come around to your side and help push him,” Violet said, and let go of her rope.
She loped Cadillac to the gate, out, and around. The bull squatted on its haunches, pulling hard against the rope, but he couldn’t budge Dozer.
Joe grinned like this was the most fun he’d had in a coon’s age. “You should call this one Flight Risk.”
Violet couldn’t help grinning back. “I’ll keep that in mind. Ready?”
“Ready.”
Joe reined Dozer around and kicked. The big sorrel lowered his head and grunted, metal-shod hooves carving divots as he plowed ahead, skidding the bull across the hard red clay. Violet rammed Cadillac’s chest into the bull’s butt. The bull popped to his feet, took three steps, then locked up again. Dozer kept going. After another bump from Violet, the bull weakened, still dragging, but walking now. Joe pulled him through the gate. When the bull spotted his companions clustered at the far end of the lane, he launched for the herd, blowing past Joe and Dozer. The rope burned through Joe’s gloved hand, the free end whistling as it spun loose of the saddle horn. Violet heard a pop.
Joe doubled over the front of the saddle. “Fuck!”
“What’s wrong?” Alarm shot a cold spear into Violet’s gut. “Did it catch your hand?”
Joe was too busy cussing to answer. Violet jumped off her horse, swung the big metal gate shut, and slammed the latch into place. Joe slid off his horse, face contorted with pain. He pressed his back against the nearest post and eased down, knees bent, hands clasped tight between his thighs, grinding out curses between clenched teeth. Violet dropped to a crouch between his feet, stomach churning at what she might find. Just a month earlier, she’d seen a team roper lose a thumb by catching it in his rope, and last year one of the tie-down ropers had crushed his wrist in a stray coil.
“Let me see.” She took hold of his forearms, trying to pull his hand out to where she could examine it.
“No.”
“Yes.” She slid her hands down to his wrists, not feeling any gross deformities or blood, but he still had his gloves on. “Is it your thumb?”
“Go. Away.”
“Stop being a baby.”
His right hand snapped up, whip-quick, and clamped on the back of her head, bringing them nose to nose, eye to eye. “It’s not my hand, Violet. It’s what’s underneath.”
“What’s—oh!”
Joe’s hand was cradling his crotch. That pop she’d heard? It was the knotted end of the rope whacking him where it counted. And her hand was right on top of his.
He bared his teeth. “Still wanna kiss it better?”
Mortification rolled over her, hot as molten lava. She tried to jerk away, but the force of Joe’s grip on her nape tipped her off balance. She grabbed his shoulders and her not-inconsiderable weight knocked him sideways. They tumbled to the ground in a tangle of limbs. She scrambled to get her knees under her. One of them made contact with something solid. Joe yelped, twisting hard and fast, flipping Violet onto her back. She arched, bracing to fight him off.
“Stop!”
Violet froze. Joe was sprawled on top of her, his body rigid. Air hissed in and out between his teeth and sweat beaded on his forehead.
“Just…don’t…move,” he panted. “Honest to God, you knee me in the thigh again, I’m gonna puke right down the front of your shirt.”
Violet held her breath. If possible, she would’ve willed her heart to stop beating, in case the thud, thud, thud disturbed his stomach. Motherhood had done nothing to disable her very active gag reflex. As her head cleared, she sorted out what was where. Joe was draped over her, chest to chest, her kneecap flush against the inside of the thigh Dirt Eater had nailed. She carefully rotated her leg, removing the pressure.
“Thank you,” Joe breathed. “Just give me a minute to catch my air and I’ll get off of you.”
Her hands were still clamped on his shoulders, but she couldn’t find anyplace else to put them. The longer she stayed put, the more aware she became of all the hard, lovely muscle under his T-shirt. If it were Beni, she would rub his back to make him feel better. She imagined sliding her palm down the sleek curve of Joe’s spine. Imagined his reaction. Yeah. He would definitely misinterpret the gesture. Much like her body was beginning to misinterpret their current position, the lean length of him hot against her, his cheek pressed to her collarbone, his face buried in the curve of her neck. Each short puff of air was a hot stroke on her skin.
“You sound like you’re in labor,” she said.
He huffed a laugh that tickled her ear. “If having a kid hurts as bad as gettin’ whacked on the pecker with a nylon rope, I need to buy my mother flowers.”
“More like a new car,” Violet said drily. “And I thought it was your thigh.”
“It’s both now, thanks to you.”
“I was trying to help.”
“Uh-huh. I’m guessing this is why you’re a pickup man and not a paramedic.”
Degree by degree, the tension eased from his body, even as Violet wound up like a spring. Need coiled hot and low, and the urge to wiggle against him was almost intolerable.
“Up until then you were doing pretty good,” she said, by way of casual conversation. “I’ll have to tell Beni you can handle stock okay.”
“Gee, thanks.” She could hear the eye roll in his voice. He blew out a long, slow breath—then nuzzled his face into her hair and inhaled deeply. “You even smell good when you’ve been rolling in the dirt.”
She jerked her head away. “Do you always go around sniffing women like a damn stud horse?”
“Nah. If I were a stud horse, I’d do this.” He gave her a quick, light nip at the curve of her neck that electrified every nerve ending and shot a blue-white current straight to where his thigh was pressed between her legs.
She shoved at his shoulder. “Stop that!”
“Just wanted to see if you tasted good, too.” He pushed up onto his elbows, groaned, and eased sideways, an excruciating slide of body against body before he rolled clear and flopped onto his back, legs splayed. He lifted one hand in warning. “Stay back. I’ll be fine as long as you don’t help me anymore.”
No problem. Violet couldn’t move, paralyzed for a few breaths by the sudden, aching absence of his weight. Then she scrambled to her feet, slapping the dust from her butt and legs. “Take all the time you want, tough guy.”
His head snapped up. “You tackled me when I was already down.”
“I thought you were actually hurt.” She flipped a casual hand at him. “No, don’t get up. Katie and I can handle it.”
He made a noise like a pissed-off rattlesnake. She shook the dirt out of her hair, tugged her cap down low, and went to deal with the bulls before she lost her head and tackled him again.