37. Colt
Chapter 37
Colt
Something’s felt off all day. A twitch in my fingers. A tension in my gut I couldn’t shake. The kind that clings to your ribs like a storm coming. And it doesn’t go away when the gate swings open. If anything, it slams harder into me, riding shotgun with instinct, warning me I’m already too late.
Within two seconds, the bull twists left when I’m braced for him to go right, and I know instantly: I’ve fucked up. The momentum throws me off-balance, my weight sliding off his flank. The ride’s a bust—I’ve lost my seat. I swing my leg over, ready to dismount, but just as I lift into the air, the bull’s hips snap upward with a violent buck.
The impact sends me flying a good two feet, spinning mid-air. I reach for the rope, my only lifeline, but as I come down, my shoulder wrenches outward, and the tension snaps tight. The coarse fibers bite into my skin, locking me in place. The same rope that’s supposed to keep me safe is now the thing chaining me to eight hundred pounds of fury.
I jump in rhythm with the bull, doing my best to rotate my body and free my hand. My feet scramble to keep pace. Every time I miss his rhythm, the jolt rips through my shoulder and up into my neck.
I’ve trained for this. Spent years learning the rhythm of chaos, how to move with it instead of fight it. But there’s no balance to find this time. No timing, no groove. Just blind instinct and the crushing reality that this might be the one ride I don’t walk away from.
Four bullfighters close in. I hear them shouting, but their voices are muffled, drowned out by static in my ears.
If eight seconds on the bull is dangerous, eight seconds hung up is fucking terrifying.
I just have to hold it together until they get me out.
Hands grip my back, hauling me upward. I’m inches from freedom when the bull senses it. He whips toward the inside, veering directly at the bullfighter trying to save me. The guy’s forced to let go, or he’ll be gored.
His grip slips from my vest, and in the next second, I’m airborne again. The rope snaps taut, my hand still pinned beneath it, trapped against the top of the bull’s flank, where it cuts across my palm like a vise.
My body whips forward, feet nearly parallel to my shoulders, joints screaming as I’m slingshotted into the dirt. I hit hard, and pain detonates through me.
My arm yanks with the full force of my weight, the stretch tearing at every tendon, every socket. My legs drag behind me, boots scraping trenches in the arena floor, but there’s nothing to catch. No leverage. Just the churn of hooves and dust.
I can’t get my feet under me.
Can’t lift myself.
Hooves crash down inches from my thighs, kicking up a storm of grit that blinds me and burns in my lungs.
The bull twists again, savage and sudden. My shoulder tears open with white-hot pain, and then he rears.
All that weight comes down on my leg, the sickening crunch reverberating down my shin.
A guttural scream rips from my throat, but even that pain feels distant, muted by the sheer chaos flooding my brain.
My body’s being slammed over and over. The hooves are still too close, and with every buck, I’m jerked skyward, then slammed down like a rag doll.
I’m going to die like this.
The realization doesn’t hit like fear. It hits like grief.
I always thought I wasn’t afraid to die. I thought I’d stare it down, cowboy up, go out hard and fast.
But this isn’t that.
This isn’t courage or peace or pride.
This is devastation.
I want to scream. I want to fight. I want to claw my way out of this. Beg. Plead. Bargain with the devil himself if it means I get one more shot. One more breath. One more second to make things right.
Everything I shoved down, every feeling I tried to bury, is breaking through the cracks now. All that time I wasted pretending I didn’t care. Pretending it didn’t matter. It’s unraveling around me, and I’d give anything to rewind it. To get it back.
A flash of copper in the haze, Callie’s hair, maybe, or my mind playing tricks. Maverick’s voice, faint like a memory, yelling my name.
I see their faces, and it’s like getting kicked in the chest all over again. Because that’s what hurts most. Not the pain. The loss. The not-getting-to-go-back.
If I could just have one more chance, just one . I’d get it right.
I’d hold on to the people who matter and never let go.
I’d tell Maverick that I want more, more than friends, more than rivals.
I’d tell Callie she was the only thing that ever made this life make sense.
I’d fight like hell for them, not for a buckle or a title, but for the pieces of my heart I never should have handed away so carelessly.
I’d figure it out with Mav, because who the hell cares what happened or why it happened? I should’ve fixed it a long time ago. I should’ve said something. I should’ve fought harder. I should have chased after her .
God, just give me one more chance. One. That’s all I need.
I won’t waste it. I swear to God, I won’t waste it.
Then hands. Grabbing my vest. Hauling me up and flipping me over.
The rope slips free, and for one glorious, weightless second, I think I’m okay. I think maybe I’ll walk away from this. Then the bull turns. Fast. Brutal.
And I don’t stand a goddamn chance.
I collapse, not strong enough to stand, and he’s on me before I can move. His weight crashes into my ribs, stomps over my legs. The ground disappears beneath me, and I’m sucked under him.
My face is shoved into the dirt, lungs scraping for air, breathing in sand with every gasp.
Pain swallows me whole.
Not from the crush. Not from the bruises or broken bones.
But from the raw, agonizing unfairness of it all.
A crack rings through my skull, jarring straight down my spine.
And as the world blacks out, my final thought follows me into unconsciousness:
I never told them I love them.