Chapter 45
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
Rodeo day in Meagher County smelled like a downright delightful combination of livestock and fried dough.
Reckon it wasn't everyone's cup-a-tea, but I loved every fuckin' whiff of it.
The fairgrounds were already hummin' by the time Rhett and I rolled in—trucks and trailers linin' the dirt lot, the thud of hooves in the warm-up pens, the tinny crackle of a PA system runnin' sound checks.
Kids chased each other between the food stalls while their mamas hollered after 'em.
A couple old-timers leaned against the rail of the main arena, coffee in hand, judgin' everything and everyone with the quiet authority of men who'd been doin' this since dirt was new.
I backed the trailer into our spot and cut the engine. Rhett was already out, hat low, movin' with efficiency. He treated competition the same way he treated everything else—seriously, and without a lot of fanfare.
Speed was loaded in the back, along with Rhett's horse, Duke.
Both animals were calm, which was a good sign.
Rhett and I'd entered our first competition at the ripe old age of thirteen.
Didn't have my own horse back then, so Maribel had been my girl for years.
Speed was my high school graduation gift from Dad, and he'd been ropin' with me for goin' on seventeen years now.
He knew the drill better than I did. All I had to do was not fuck it up.
I looked at the time on my phone. "Not a lotta time to warm the horses up."
He leveled me with a look that said and whose fault is that?
Fair. We were runnin' about twenty minutes late on account of Calvin insistin' she was fine stayin' home, then changin' her mind, then changin' it back, then finally climbin' into Sassy's car without a word—jaw clenched, arms crossed, givin' off enough don't-touch-me energy to keep a grizzly at bay.
She hadn't said more than six words to me this morning. I was tryin' not to take it personal.
Tryin'.
I'd told her I'd pull out of the rodeo a dozen times by now. Told her it wasn't worth it. Every time, she struck that viper tongue like I'd suggested she wear a dress to the grocery store. Told me I wasn't gonna be a pussy-whipped chump on her account. Which, for the record, I absolutely would.
She wasn't havin' it, and she wasn't havin' me either.
Not right now, at least.
But Calvin and I'd figure our shit out.
I had faith in that.
We'd get through today.
Denny and Wyatt would get the hell on outta Larkspur, and things'd go back to normal 'round here.
I unloaded Speed and led him toward the warm-up area behind the main arena. Speed's ears pricked forward as we entered. He knew. Could probably feel the energy in the air the same way I could—that low electric hum that came with competition, even the small-town kind.
I swung up into the saddle and settled in, adjustin' my stirrups and checkin' my rope.
Header's rope—thirty-two feet of medium-soft nylon, broken-in just the way I liked it.
I'd been buildin' my loop since I was ten years old, standin' in the backyard ropin' a plastic steer head bolted to a hay bale while Dad shouted corrections from the porch.
Keep your elbow up, Bro. You're droppin' it again.
The memory hit warm and sharp, the way they always did.
I walked Speed in slow circles, lettin' him limber up, feelin' out his stride.
He was movin' easy—relaxed but alert, that perfect balance you wanted in a head horse before a run.
The animal was built for this. Tall, strong, quick off the mark.
My job was simple. Get out of the box clean, run the steer down, throw a legal catch, dally up, and turn left to give Rhett his shot.
Header was the easier job. I knew it, Rhett knew it.
Ropin' two tiny hind legs on a runnin' steer while your horse was cuttin' and adjustin' underneath you?
That was the tough shit. I left the tough shit to the man who did everything the hard way on principle.
We were the third team in the draw. Slim and Tommy were fifth. The bet was two hundred dollars and braggin' rights through 'til next summer, which—in a town the size of Larkspur—was worth more than the cash.
I moved Speed into a trot, then an easy lope, buildin' loops and tossin' them at nothin' to get my arm loose. The rope hissed through the air on every throw. Muscle memory. Rhythm. The particular calm that settled over me when there was nothin' to think about except the next five seconds.
A familiar voice cut through the warm-up noise.
"Lancaster! You plan on ropin' that steer or you gonna let it run off on you like your former fiancée?"
I pulled Speed up and looked over the rail. Hank was planted in the front row of the bleachers, one cloudy eye squintin' against the sun.
Fuckin' Hank. 'Parently he couldn't decide if I was the one who was left or the one who did the leavin'. Changed every goddamn day.
Sittin' beside him was John Calvin. Hadn't seen him since our little impromptu visit to Livingston—which was followed by me fuckin' Calvin's tits.
"Mr. Calvin!" I trotted Speed over to the rail. "Wasn't expectin' to see you out here, sir."
John looked up at me from under bushy white eyebrows. "Hank broke me outta the joint. Told him I'd only come if there was funnel cake."
Hank grunted. "There's funnel cake."
"Then here I am." John's sharp eyes swept over Speed, then me, then the arena. "You gonna win?"
"Plan to, sir."
"Good. I got five dollars on you."
"Ha!" Hank shouted. "I got ten against."
Hank had exactly one job as a supportive community member, and TBH, he was failin' at it.
"Hank!" I pressed a hand to my chest.
"What? It's a smart bet. You're up against the Birmingham boys in the finals and they've been ropin' together since the womb."
"First of all, they ain't twins. Second of all—"
"Quit jawin' and go warm up your horse." Hank flicked the toothpick to the other side of his mouth. "Christ, you're as chatty as your old man was."
I smiled at the intended insult. I'd take any comparison to my dad as a compliment. "Yes, sir."
I tipped my hat to both of 'em and rode back toward the warm-up area, a grin on my face that I couldn't shake. John Calvin at the Meagher County rodeo, sittin' next to Hank, five dollars on me. If that wasn't motivation, I didn't know what was.
Calvin was gonna lose her shit when she saw her granddad. In the best possible way.
Rhett appeared at the rail on Duke, already warmed up because of course he was. He gave me a nod that meant you ready?
I gave him one back that said born ready, asshole.
We made our way toward the stagin' area behind the chutes. The first two teams had already run—decent times, but nothin' that scared me. Back here was different than the arena—tighter, quieter, all business.
I backed Speed into the header's box. The box was small, just big enough for horse and rider, with three walls of metal fencing and the open end facin' the arena.
The barrier rope stretched taut across the front of my box, attached to the steer's neck on one end and the release mechanism on the other.
Break the barrier early and we'd eat a ten-second penalty that'd bury us.
Speed shifted beneath me, side-steppin' in the tight space. He did this every time—couldn't hold still in the box, had to move his feet, had to feel the ground. I let him. Kept my reins easy and my seat quiet. You didn't fight a horse in the box. You let him settle himself.
Across the chute, Rhett backed Duke into the heeler's box. He sat still as stone, rope already built, eyes on the chute gate.
The steer banged against the inside of the chute. Metal rattled. The animal's head poked through the top, wild-eyed. A Corriente—lean, fast, horns curvin' up and out. Perfect target if I did my job right.
Speed's ears locked forward. His whole body coiled. I could feel the engine revvin' underneath me—twelve hundred pounds of quarter horse muscle waitin' for the signal.
I adjusted my loop. Checked my dally hand. Took a breath.
This was the part I lived for. The seconds between the settle and the storm. Everything quiet, everything focused. Just me and my horse and the gate and what came after it.
Somethin' flickered at the edge of my vision. Past my shoulder, behind the chute, in the narrow gap between the back of the box and the stock pens. A shape—quick, there and gone.
Speed felt it before I could process it. His head snapped right. His body torqued beneath me—a full-body flinch, the kind of violent sideways lurch that only came from genuine fear.
In all the years we'd been doin' this, Speed had never spooked in the box. Not once. Not in thunderstorms, not with firecrackers, not with the loudest, wildest stock Meagher County had ever run through these chutes.
"Woah—woah, easy—"
But he was already gone. His hindquarters swung hard into the wall, the metal panel clangin' loud enough to ring through the stagin' area. He reared—not high, but sharp—and my weight shifted at exactly the wrong angle.
The chute banged open. The steer broke.
The barrier snapped and Speed lunged forward on instinct and I was already off-center, already losin' the saddle, my left foot slippin' the stirrup as Speed's first stride launched crooked out of the box.
For one suspended second I was airborne. The arena tilted. The sky swapped places with the dirt. The crowd noise went distant and cottony, like someone had stuffed my ears with gauze.
Then the ground came up fast and mean and caught me with everything it had.
My shoulder hit first. Then my hip. Then the back of my head, hat flyin' off somewhere behind me.
The impact punched every bit of air from my lungs and replaced it with dust and a white-hot bolt of pain that started at the base of my skull and radiated outward until I couldn't tell where my body ended and the dirt began.
The world went very bright.
Then very dark.
Then somethin' in between that didn't have a name—just sound and pressure and the vague awareness of hooves thunderin' somewhere nearby that I hoped to Christ weren't comin' my way.
The last thing I registered before the dark won was Speed's whinny—high and sharp and panicked, the sound of a horse that knew somethin' was wrong.
He wasn't the only one.