Chapter Two
Axle
One Month Later
I pull my truck through the gates of Wildhaven Storm Ranch just as the sun starts sinking behind the Teton mountains, painting the whole damn valley pink and gold. The familiar gravel road crunches beneath the tires, and for the first time in months, I feel my shoulders loosen.
Home.
Not a hotel room in Vegas. Not an arena tunnel in Cheyenne. Not the roar of twenty thousand screaming fans in Dallas while a two-thousand-pound bull tries to stomp me into the ground.
Just home.
Royce sits beside me in the passenger seat. His baseball cap is tugged low over his eyes, and he’s half asleep, which is rare for him. Usually, he’s talking my ear off after an event, replaying rides and arguing scores like it could change anything about this past weekend’s results.
Tonight, he’s quiet.
Mostly because his shoulder is wrecked, and Dr. Chaz gave him some medication to knock the edge off for the long drive back to Wyoming.
I glance over at him. “You alive over there?”
He grunts. “Barely.”
I snort. “Drama queen.”
“Fuck off. You didn’t get launched into the gate before you could even get seated.”
He pulled the most aggressive bull of the event on the last night of the finals. And the animal didn’t waste any time showing him and the crowd who was boss.
“Yeah, well, I still rode a damn mean bull.”
“You also bled on national television. Again,” he says. “My shoulder will heal, but that gash on your head’s gonna leave a nasty scar.”
I reach up to the butterfly stitches holding the skin above my right eyebrow together.
“Adds character,” I say.
Royce shakes his head slowly. “Momma’s gonna lose her mind when she sees your face.”
“She loses her mind every time she gets a look at either of us,” I quip.
“Fair point.”
The ranch house comes into view first, sprawling and lit warm against the darkening sky.
Grandma Evelyn is no doubt tucked inside its kitchen, preparing a delicious meal for the family.
To the left of it sit the massive horse barns and the training pens, and farther south are the newer buildings for the Raintree-Storm Rodeo Academy. Which still feels surreal at times.
Bryce freaking Raintree. Six-time world champion. Rock-star rider and future Hall of Famer.
My hero, though I’d never admit that to him.
And now, somehow, family. It’s still hard to wrap my head around that part sometimes.
Lucky son of a bitch just walked away as this year’s winner of the Pbr World Finals with another world championship buckle, the half-million-dollar purse, and the million-dollar bonus on top of it.
Like his ass needed another million damn dollars.
I grip the wheel tighter.
Good for him.
Really.
But I’d be lying if I said every rider on tour wasn’t already counting down the days until Bryce finally gets out of our way.
One more final.
That’s all he has left before the rest of us have a chance—one last victory, and then the throne’s vacant and ready for the taking.
And every one of us on the circuit is hungry for it.
Royce whistles low as we pass the academy cabins. “Crazy that we’ll be living over there next week.”
“Better than sharing a bathroom with your dirty ass.”
“You shared a trailer with me for the past six weeks and survived.”
“But suffered mightily,” I say.
He flips me off with his good arm.
I grin.
The truck rolls to a stop outside our parents’ place, which sits on a beautiful lot a half mile from the main house. Lights glow warmly through the windows, and before I can even kill the engine, the front door swings open.
Momma comes sprinting down the front steps, and I barely make it out of the truck before Irene Trust is wrapping me in a fierce hug.
“Oh, my boys are home,” she cries. Her voice catches a little, the way it always does after finals season.
I hug her back hard. “Missed you too, Momma.”
She pulls back immediately and cups my face in both hands, inspecting every bruise and scrape beneath the porch light.
The cut above my brow. Another along my jaw. The purple blooming beneath my right eye.
Her expression tightens more with every injury she finds.
“Axle Grayson Trust.”
I wince. Full name. Never good.
“It looks worse than it is,” I tell her.
“That’s what you always say.”
“Because it’s true.”
She gives me a look that says she knows I’m full of shit.
And I am.
My back still aches from being thrown from a bull in Tulsa three weeks ago, and my knee’s killing me again after Vegas, but I’m standing upright, and that’s a win in the rodeo world.
Momma sighs softly and brushes her thumb over the cut near my eye. “You’re going to turn my hair completely gray.”
I grin. “Wait till you get a load of Royce.”
Royce climbs carefully from the truck and promptly regrets the movement, his face tightening when his boots hit the hard ground.
She notices instantly. Her attention snaps to him as she rushes over. He tries to play it cool, but the second she hugs him, he sucks in a breath.
“There it is,” I mutter.
“Shut up,” he barks through gritted teeth.
Momma pulls back with narrowed eyes. “What happened?”
“Nothing. I’m fine,” he says.
“Royce Andrew—”
“Just tweaked my shoulder,” he confesses before she can get his full name out.
“How bad is it?”
“He got launched into a steel gate like a lawn dart on a Saturday,” I supply helpfully.
Royce sends me a murderous glare over her head.
Momma presses her lips together. “Both of you are going to be the death of me.”
Dad appears in the doorway then, chuckling low.
Boone Trust is built like the Rocky Mountains. Broad shoulders. Big arms. Thick, callous hands. Sun-weathered face. The kind of man who can calm a fretting woman with one look and scare the piss out of a grown man with another.
He leans against the doorframe. “If they ain’t dragging their asses home after finals, half dead, they ain’t riding hard enough.”
Momma turns her eyes to him. “You’re not helping.”
Dad grins.
I swear, the older he gets, the more amused he becomes by her fiery temper.
He walks down the steps and clasps my shoulder first. “Hell of a ride Friday night, son. How’s that round-winner money feel in your pocket?”
I shrug. “Should’ve scored higher. Then I could’ve given Bryce a better run for his money.”
“Could’ve busted your ass worse too,” he says.
“True.”
Then he pulls Royce into a careful one-armed hug. “Everything still attached over here?”
“Everything except my pride,” Royce replies.
Dad nods solemnly. “Good enough.”
That’s pretty much the Boone Trust philosophy on injuries.
Still breathing? Walk it off.
Momma shoos us toward the house. “Hurry. Go wash up. We’re heading out in ten.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
The house smells like Pine-Sol, coffee, and home.
I dump my duffel bag in my room upstairs. The same room I’ve had since we moved here after Aunt Miriam died. Same dark wood furniture Dad built himself. Same rodeo posters on the wall. Same navy-and-white checkered quilt.
I don’t bother unpacking. There’s no point.
Next week, Royce and I will move into one of the staff cabins full-time while we help Bryce train the young riders at the academy this summer.
Part coaching. Part ranch work. Part rest and recovery. Hoping to mend our bodies and build strength before next season starts.
I splash cold water over my face in the bathroom sink and hiss when it hits the cut over my eye.
I examine my beat-up appearance.
Still pretty.
Fifty grand for a round win in the finals softens the pain considerably. It’s not championship money. But it’s a good chunk of change to add to the nest egg I’ve built with the fistful of wins I’ve had over the last few years.
Enough to keep me coming back for more.
When I head back downstairs, Royce is already there with fresh jeans and a clean shirt, though his arm’s hanging stiff at his side.
“You need to ice that,” I say as he slides his ball cap back in place.
“I need food.”
Dad snorts from the living room. “That’s my boy.”
Five minutes later, we climb back into the truck and head toward the main ranch house—the heart of Wildhaven Storm.
The place that raised all of us.
Light spills from every window by the time we pull up. Laughter floats through the open front door before we even make it inside.
And suddenly, we’re swarmed.
“Axle!”
My youngest cousin, Harleigh, barrels into me first, like an overexcited puppy in cowboy boots. She nearly knocks me backward with the force of her hug.
I laugh and spin her once despite my head protesting. “Wildfire.” I sing her nickname before setting her back on her feet.
Her sister Charli is next.
“I heard you watched Bryce win over a million dollars last night.” She beams.
“Unfortunately.”
She gasps dramatically. “Jealousy looks ugly on you, cousin.”
I wave her off. “We took it easy on the old guy. Figured we’d let him have one last hurrah before he’s let out to pasture.”
A deep voice sounds from the living room. “I heard that.”
Bryce lounges on the couch with one arm slung over the back, looking as smug as a man who just became even richer should.
Charli smirks at me as she leans in and whispers, “He’s insufferable at the moment.”
“At the moment?” I ask. “How’s that any different from usual?”
Bryce flips me off lazily.
I grin.
My oldest cousin, Matty, emerges from the kitchen, carrying her one-year-old son, AJ, on her hip.
Ranch manager mode has softened a little since she became a mother, but she still carries herself like she’s personally responsible for keeping every living creature on this ranch alive.
Which honestly? She pretty much is. There were a few years where things around here were held together by duct tape and Matty’s unyielding will.
Her eyes sweep over Royce and me carefully. “Good to see you boys back in one piece.”
“Mostly,” Royce mumbles.
The last of the Storm girls, Shelby, appears behind her. “That didn’t sound good.”
“It didn’t feel too good either,” Royce answers.
Shelby rolls her eyes.
Then Grandma Evelyn sweeps into the room, wiping her hands on an apron. “Thank the Lord, my rodeo boys are home.”
Her hug is gentler than Momma’s but somehow hits harder.