Blue Collar Cowboy (BA’s Cozy Cowboys #15)

Chapter 1

Chapter One

“Momma, no. It’s Cowboy Christmas. The middle of the damn season. I don’t have time to come home.”

“Don’t you cuss at me, son. And you can come home after the weekend is over. You won Denver this year, and you placed third in the all-around in Houston. That gets you into the NFR no matter what.”

Cam clenched his jaw, holding in the string of curses that wanted to pop out. There were a lot of disadvantages to his mom being an old rodeo wife, dammit. She knew all.

“But I’m having a damn good season, Momma. I’m sorry Mitch is laid up, but I don’t have the time.”

Not only did he not have time, but he just didn’t fucking care. Mitchell Gonzales had people—friends there in town.

Hell, Cam had how many brothers and brothers-in-law who could go and help? Tons. They didn’t need his happy ass.

“Son, that man has got daughters under the age of twelve. One of them is just fixing to start kindergarten. They are just little girls. They need help.”

“Well, Momma, I’m not the one who got his wife pregnant.” In fact, if he and Mitch had stayed together, the chances of them having babies would have been zero.

Zero.

That hadn’t happened though, had it?

“Son, I’m going to pluck you bald-headed.” Momma was building up a head of steam now, her voice rising. “I did not ask you whether or not those little girls were your responsibility. What I said was the man has a dead wife, three little girls, and a broken back. The least you could do is—"

Oh, he didn’t think so. “Momma, do not yell at me.”

“Fine. Just because I know I raised you better.”

He rolled his eyes so hard it hurt. “Momma, there’s an entire town of people there. I’m working.”

“You’re playing in the damn roping pen. Do not bullshit me! Leanne, come and talk to your brother. He’s being stubborn!”

He heard a rustling and a bunch of clearing of throats, and then Leanne’s more modulated tones hit his ear. “Hey, Bubba.”

“You talk some sense into her. There are a zillion relatives who could go help Mitch. You don’t need me.”

“You know this has less to do with Mitch and more to do with the fact that she misses you and wants you to come home. Susan’s fixin’ to leave for Mesa State in August.”

Leanne’s logic didn’t make him feel any better. “Sister, there are seven of us. Seven. She has five children there at her beck and call. Five children. Eight if you include in-laws. And how many grandchildren? There’s got to be at least…”

“Fourteen. My Elizabeth was number fourteen.”

He shook his head. Then he sighed and asked the question he wasn’t sure he wanted to know the answer to. “So, what happened to Mitch?”

“He was working on a roof, fell off, broke two bones in his back.”

He winced. “That sucks.”

“Yeah. It took a little while for anybody to find him, and—”

“What about his family? His wife’s family?”

“They both were disowned for being queer, then they got married and when everyone wanted to make nice again, they told them to fuck off. It was great.”

“Whoa.” That would have taken a lot for Mitch. He’d loved his folks dearly, and to just walk away? Damn.

“Yeah, it gets better. Mitch’s mom ended up getting early-onset Alzheimer’s, Brett ended up driving toward Leadville and killing them both.”

His eyes went wide. “What? You are not serious.”

“As a heart attack. Poor Mitch had to identify the bodies, and of course, Allison’s folks didn’t take with her marrying a rancher-slash-roofer.

” Man, Leanne was warming up. “So, after she died, they went on a thing to get the kids from Mitch, took him to court and everything. It was a wild mess, and now they don’t have anything to do with the kids.

In fact, I’m not sure the little one ever so much as met them.

You know, Allison died having her, right? ”

“Yeah. I mean, I don’t know the details because—”

“She had an aneurysm, totally unexpected. I mean, she just died. They did an emergency cesarean, and there he was trying to explain to number one and two that momma was gone and trying to raise number three and make a living…”

Cam just didn’t get it. Of course, he wasn’t bi, so he didn’t have that worry really. But three kids…that wasn’t an accident.

“Well, that’s terrible. And I’m sorry he doesn’t have anybody there to help him, but surely—”

“Bubba, you’re the only one who doesn’t have a nine-to-five job, including Momma.

And I know what you do is important. I’m not saying that, but Momma’s right.

You won a couple of stock shows this year, you’re going to make it to the NFR just fine, you’ve got tons of money coming in from sponsors and stuff, so you can take a couple of months off after this weekend and come help. ”

Jesus Christ on a sparkly crutch. He didn’t say that out loud because she would simply yell at him for blasphemy, and he was sure he was on speaker anyway. But still. “Sister, I don’t think Mitch would want me to be the one to come help. You know, we haven’t spoken since I left town.”

“Well, maybe it’s time you started. I can’t imagine that you two actually hate each other. You were always such good friends.”

He blew out a sigh. “Do you have to be on her side?”

“I kind of do. You know how I feel about this town. I love it here. I know you never did, but it’s a good place, Bubba. And this man could really use some help.”

Her tone was so earnest, and she meant it. He knew it, and he hated it. But… “Look, I’ll try to get home after this weekend and see what’s what.” He’d come home and try to talk to Mitch, and he could prove the man wanted nothing to do with him. Then that would shut everybody up.

“I really appreciate it. So does Momma and everybody else. I know it’s ridiculous, but he’s so sad and so worried, and you were his best friend.”

He rolled his eyes like dice.

“I was more than his best friend, sister.” He thought he needed to get that right out there.

“I know that. I mean, it’s not like it was a secret, and it’s not like we asked you to make it a secret. It’s not your fault he wanted to settle down, and it’s not his fault he didn’t want to be a rodeo…whatever you call that. Would it be a buckle bunny?”

“No! No, he would never have been a buckle bunny. He would just have been my partner out here on the road.”

“Oh, okay, well that’s cool.”

He shook his head, getting het up again. “Look, not everybody is like Beaver Cleaver. Some of us don’t want to get married. Some of us don’t want to be tied down to the land. Some of us are just fine with our horses and ourselves.”

“Sounds good to me. Don’t you have to board your horse when you’re not in rodeo season? Isn’t that a thing?”

“Shut up, sister.”

She giggled, the sound reminding him of when she was young, which she really wasn’t anymore. And on the phone it always made him think of when they were kids. “So, when are you going to be here?”

“I’ll come down as soon as the weekend is over. It’ll probably be Tuesday though. I’ll be at the Cody Stampede, so I won’t be too far away, but I have a sponsorship thing the day after the rodeo ends.”

“Cody, huh? Maybe I’ll come up and see you ride.”

“Sure, come on up. You know I don’t mind getting you a family ticket.”

“I’ll let you know. Momma would probably have a fit if I left now. I’ve been taking food over to Mitch, at least, and that seems to help.” She yawned, and he had to laugh at her because she sounded exhausted. She was still dealing with a pretty new baby after all.

“You just say the word.” He cleared his throat. “I love you, sister.”

“I love you too. I’ll talk to you soon. Bye.”

“Bye.” Well, at least he hadn’t had to talk to his momma again. That had been an ordeal.

As soon as he hung up, he headed over to the mini-fridge in his hotel room that looked like every other good-enough-to-not-have-bed-bugs hotel room in Colorado and grabbed a beer. What a mess.

He didn’t want to go back home to his little town in southern Colorado and deal with his family and all that baggage that came with the place.

He’d gotten out and started on the rodeo circuit because he needed to get away and because he wasn’t going to be stuck there in the mud like so many of his family.

Not that his family didn’t love it there.

Most of them did. His oldest sister Diana had gone to college, married a woman, and never moved back.

Susan might escape. A few of the cousins had escaped like he had, using the rodeo to springboard out.

But really, the bulk of them had stayed right there in town.

And man, could they give a cowboy a guilt trip.

His phone rang again, and he thought about ignoring it, but just in case it was his momma, he picked it up and answered, not even looking at who it was.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Bubba.” It was his brother, Ramsey.

“You call me to tell me I should come back to town and take care of Mitch too? Because I already talked to Momma and Leanne about all that, and I’m coming down after the rodeo is finished this week.”

“Nope. I called to see if you could get me tickets for the family section of the Cody Stampede. Leanne just texted me to tell me that’s where you were going to be this weekend. I thought I would bring the kids up. They love a corny dog and a rodeo.”

“Where’s Lizzie going to be?” Ramsey’s wife wasn’t big on the rodeo. She was an emergency room nurse, and she thought roughstock riders especially were stupid because they got hurt all the time.

“She’s going to do a spa weekend with some girls over in Colorado Springs at that big fancy Broadmoor hotel place. It’s just me and the kids.”

Yeah. All seven of them—two sets of twins and one set of triplets. Fuck.

“I’m not going to watch your kids for you while you run around and do asshole things.” Not that Ramsey would ever cheat on his wife or anything, but he would get drunk as a lord and try to ride a mechanical bull someplace and lose money.

“Nope, I’ll bring Susan for that.” Susan was the oops baby, coming seven years after Kacey. But she was eighteen, graduated from high school, and she would be plenty good enough at watching the kids one night in the hotel room. “You know how much she loves watching the bull riding.”

“I do. She’s still dating that fella from over in Montrose?”

“The bronc guy? No, they broke up. I think she’s holding out for one of them little bull rider fellas.”

“Goodie. Maybe I can get her tickets to go to Cheyenne this year.” Cheyenne Frontier Days was later in the season, and hopefully this whole thing with Mitch would have blown over by the time he needed to drive up there. He was twelve years older than Susan, and hanging out with her kept him young.

“She would love that. She’s never been up there even though it’s not that far up the road.” His family ranch was near Alamosa in a little town called Mountainside.

“Yeah, you just make sure you don’t leave her without transportation, okay?”

“Shit, once we get there, I’ll leave her with the truck and I’ll Uber it or something.”

“All right, I’ll see you then.”

Ramsey paused to clear his throat. “So are you coming down then? After, you said? To help with Mitch?”

“Yeah. Momma and Leanne wore me down. I’ll come down. I’ll talk to him. He’ll probably kick me out, and that’ll be the end of that. But at least I’ll have done what they asked me to do.”

That got him a warm chuckle. “What is it they call that? Malicious compliance?”

“You know it, bro. If you can’t beat them, pretend to join them and then get the hell out of Dodge when it doesn’t work out like they want it to.” The more he thought about it, the more he figured that was the best thing to do. Just go down, talk with Mitch, get his ass kicked out, and then leave.

“Well, good deal. I’ll see you up in Cody tomorrow then. Get those tickets.”

“I’ll call my sponsor right now. Love you, bro. See you tomorrow.” He hung up rubbing the bridge of his nose because his head was starting to ache, feeling big as a rotting melon. He would make that call to a sponsor though.

Whether it was his momma or his brother or whoever, there was one thing Campbell hated, and that was letting his family down.