The mountain lion sound roars out of my phone again, and this time, when I look up to see if it’s scaring the bear, I see what Junie sees.
There’s a man.
On a horse.
No, not on a horse.
Hewason a horse, and now he’s flailing on the ground, getting out of the way as the horse rears back, neighing like—
Well, like a mountain lion is after it.
The horse lands, its front hooves mere inches from the man’s back, then leaps over him and takes off at a dead run toward the trees that line the creek at the edge of the ranch.
The man rolls.
The bear turns to look at him, and I swear, there’s barely ten feet between man and beast.
“Oh my God!” I squawk.
“Run!” Junie yells at him. “Run for your life!”
My phone roars with a mountain lion roar once again.
“Off,” I tell it.“Turn off!”
“Turn it off,” Junie yells.
“I’m trying!” I yell back.
Twenty feet away from my window, the man leaps to his feet, straightens his baseball cap, and waves his sun-kissed arms at the cow-eating bear. I suppose I shouldn’t judge the bear, considering I eat beef too.
Just ... not exactly like that.
“Get out of here, Earl. Go on.Git,” the man cries.
The bear snorts.
I finally succeed in shutting off the mountain lion video on my phone.
The man waves his arms again, making his T-shirt ride up and show off a flat white stomach with a happy trail dipping below his belt and ridges right above his hip bones. His jeans are plastered to the hard planes of his thighs, his feet clad in cowboy boots, his shirtsleeves hugging his solid biceps that might have tattoos on them. He’s moving too quickly for me to tell, and really, that’s not the important part here. Also, I can’t see his face under the hat, but I can make out a copper beard.
“Did he just call the bearEarl?” Junie whispers.
She’s gone still on my back.
I’m frozen too.
There’s a man having a stare down with a bear over a dead cow right outside my bunkhouse.
A burly man who’s clearly afraid of nothing—not runaway horses, not bears, and probably not hormones either.
All three of those things are currently making me rethink my life choices.
We are very permanently and irrevocably off relationships with men,I remind my nipples, my vagina, and my brain.
Be that as it may, the view is currently incredible. Please pass the popcorn,they reply in unison.
“Don’t make me get the sheriff, Earl,” the man says.
