“Fuck him, he can’t fathom the idea of sharing some of his fame,” Owen all but spits in my face, throwing his hands in the air and turning down the hall. I seered. I push my mom gently behind me before lunging at Owen’s back, the pair of us landing with a hard thud against the floor.
“Boys!” my dad shouts. It isn’t the first time we’ve thrown some punches, but this one feels different. Each punch is just a little harder than we usually throw at one another. Words cutting a bit deeper than before.
“You think that’s the reason?!” I hiss in Owen’s ear just before his elbow connects with my ribs. Rolling, he shoves me off of him. Before he can walk away, I kick his legs out from under him, and he slams to the ground with a grunt. Before I know it, his fist is slamming into my cheek. Pain explodes and stars dance in my eyes, but I blindly swing back, the crunch ofhis face and split of my knuckles letting me know I’ve landed my fist on his face.
“Dean!” my mom shrieks, reaching down and pressing a towel to Owen’s split cheek.
“I would never choose fame over you,” I sputter, rolling my jaw back and forth a few times. I stand over Owen, offering a hand to pull him up. He eyes it for a moment, considering it, then slaps it away and mutters, “You already did.”
I left,too scared to stick around. Scared that I’d lose my temper again and not have someone there to pull me back. He went off to college in Colorado not long after our argument, and we haven’t talked since. I tried going home a few times, but it always felt awkward. Owen felt like he couldn’t come home while I was there, and I hated being the reason my parents didn’t get to spend time with him. Eventually, my visits became farther and farther apart until I just stopped showing up. I know my parents love me, and that makes me hurt even more. So instead of facing it head on and repairing what I tore apart, I stay away. No attachment. It’s easier this way. I’ve acted like an asshole long enough that now it’s who I am. No friends, no girlfriends, no smiling, no small talk. Just black. Just storm clouds.
If I close my eyes, I can still see theGreen Haven Ranchsign passing overhead when you pull up the drive towards the house. Somedays, I long to be back on the ranch in Colorado, riding in the greenest pastures I’ve ever laid eyes on. The sky is endless and the stars at night seem like they run off the edge of the world. Ten acres of freedom and I haven’t been back in years. Most nights I don’t even look up at the sky, it makes metoo homesick. Other nights, I throw a pile of blankets and my sleeping bag in the bed of my truck and get lost in them until I fall asleep, dreaming of all the possibilities andwhat ifshad I stayed.
As I’m braiding Ghost’s mane, beside my trailer a flash of pink catches my attention, and I crane my neck to get a better look. The blonde turns out of view quickly and my heart returns to normal.Fuck, I need to get laid.I shake my head and continue twisting the thick strands between my fingers. I could pick Hannah Harlow out of a crowd. I’d seen her race a time or two, and every time I’d been mesmerized. The way she and her horse moved together so effortlessly felt like I was watching the clouds move across the sky. And damn, was she fast. In and out in a matter of seconds, but each movement was burned into my mind, my bones, my very soul. Something about that woman stirred something dangerous inside of me, something dark and possessive. Two years ago, the second the announcer called her name, I stopped what I was doing and leaned my forearms against the fence, waiting for her to come flying out towards the barrels. Immediately, I knew something was off, her posture stiff and foreign. Even before her horse stumbled and she flew off out of the saddle, I was already jumping over the gate and running towards her. The image of her wild hair around her and her body bent awkwardly has haunted my dreams ever since.
It took everything in me to leave her alone in that ambulance, to release my grip on her and walk away. But I was terrified of the way my body reacted to her, how perfectly she fit against my chest. I’d pushed everyone away for so long that holding her should have felt wrong, but I’ve never felt more sure of anything in that moment.She would be mine.Later that night in my trailer, I pulled her name up and learned everything about her that the internet had to offer. How long she’d been riding, her scores, where she grew up, everything. I watched countlessvideos of her riding throughout the years, memorizing how her body moved. After a couple hours, I was so worked up I had to hit the bars to find someone to take my mind off her.
I haven’t seen her in two years. Two long years of stalking every roster at every rodeo I attended, hoping she’d pop up along the way. Her social media went dark. It was killing me not to know where she had gone. And then just like that, when I was pulling my vest over my shoulders last week, her name blared over the speakers. My fingers slipped from the soft leather, and in an instant I found her. Like the wind, she tore into the arena. Even though it was a matter of seconds, for me it felt like a lifetime. I tracked every move, memorized the way her hair blew out of her braid with each turn, how her smile grew wider the closer she got to the last barrel. When I walked up those steps and she was standing across from me, I had to stare at the ground just to keep my eyes off of her. With a heart shaped face that belongs on a red carpet, plump lips, and deep, brown eyes, she was stunning. She’d pulled her hair back into a tight braid, but the loose, wavy strands that blew around her face in the summer wind told me that deep down there’s a wild child underneath her good girl persona.
When she stumbled in front of me on the stage, I didn’t even think. I just reached out and caught her. My heart never drops like that, even when I’m on the back of a bronc. That fucked me up, that and the way her hips felt under my hands. I’ll never admit to anyone that she’s the one who ran through my mind while I pulled a bunny over my cock that night. My mind was spinning with ways to get closer to the rodeo queen who has haunted me every night for the last two years.
Passing under the metal stands shaking with cheers from the crowd, I enter the chutes. A man’s voice shakes me from my thoughts.
“Excuse me, Dean?” I nod my head at him. “You’re in chute six.” Reminding me why I’m here, I pull my hat lower and roll my neck. I thrive off the chaos at rodeos, loud music, and even louder fans. My boots pound against the metal steps as I jog up them. I pass by Kasey and some of the other riders. Kasey lifts his hand and then drops it when I don’t acknowledge him. Another rider tips his head at him and shakes with silent laughter.Poor Kasey, stop being so fucking nice.I pause next to the black 6 marking my place and shake out my legs while slipping my leather gloves over my hands.
“Good to see you, Dean.” A wrinkled, weathered hand reaches out and I glance up at a familiar face. A shadow of a smile graces my face when I shake his hand.
“You too, Dave.” Usually riders like to have a team they travel with or at least a few other riders to help split travel costs and keep each other company. But since I travel alone, some of the old timers step in to help out. Dave and I have crossed paths over the years, not quite friends, but as close as one will get to me.
“Meet your ride tonight.” He nods down to the gray, spotted bronc below us. “Menace.” This time I give him a full on grin, throwing a leg over the metal gate and slipping into position.
Despite the eighty-five hundred fans in the stands, all the noise fades the moment I slip my rigging around the cinch. I run my hand up and down the rope, the heat from the friction warming up my leather glove. Dave pulls the flank strap tighter and Menace bucks beneath me. Contrary to what people may believe, the strap doesn’t hurt the horse. In actuality, you can’t force a horse to “buck”. The strap is wrapped in a soft wool, so it’s comfortable and painless. As the horse moves, the strap loosens, leading the horse to feel like it can shake the strap off by, you got it, bucking. This technique has been used for years to train horses. I may be a heartless son of a bitch, but hurting a horse would be like ripping out my own heart. “Let’s do this,boy,” I mutter to the beast between my legs, squeeze his sides with my thighs. I look up at the man outside the chute who’s waiting for my nod to open the gate. Through the blood rushing in my ears, I can just make out the announcer introducing me to the crowd. “Ladies and gentlemen, it’s an honor to introduce our next rider.” I try not to let his words fill my head, but that’s hard to do when I know I’m the fucking best. I let his words fade into the background as I close my eyes and envision the next eight seconds. Most people think that bare back riding is a solo sport, but in reality, I’m a team with the animal underneath me. We are each scored individually; him on his power, speed, and agility. Me on my spurring technique and ability to fucking stay on the horse. After the ride, both of those scores are added together.
The moment my heartbeat evens out, I tip my chin to the man on the other side of the gate, giving him a nod. In an instant, we’re moving, the fringe on my chaps slapping loudly against my leather covered thighs each time Menace meets the ground. There are two things I’m trying to focus on the most while I ride. Not the eight seconds that seem to take an eternity to pass. Not the pain that radiates through my wrist as I hold on with one hand while my body moves at breakneck speeds. No, it’s the steady rhythm of my breath and the sound of hooves meeting soft dirt just before he bucks again. There is a moment on every ride when you know you’ve made it. And right now is that moment. The whole ride feels like second nature, something I’ve been perfecting for years and could do in my fucking sleep.
It’s not until the buzzer blares through my focus that I allow myself to see the beautiful chaos before me. I work on getting my hand out of the rigging just as one of the pick-up men rides up beside me. Leaning over and wrapping my arms around his waist, I slide off Menace who continues his stampede around the arena while the crowd screams all around me. I grab my rigging out of the dirt and look up to see my score flash across the screenin the crowd before making my way over the gate. Just as I toss a leg over the top, a flash of pink from the practice arena has me damn near breaking my neck to get a second look. Straddling the gate as another rider is released from his chute, I try to scan the group of women warming up. My heart pounds against my chest, begging me to pull her into it. She may not remember me, but I remember everything about her.
HannahfuckingHarlowis here.
hannah
Usually I’ll peekthrough a gate and watch the bronc riding event after I’ve led Queen through some warmups in the practice arena. But the second I climbed up on one of the rusted metal gates, my lungs seized up. Of course, he would be here. I’ll probably see him quite often this summer, and the very thought of that sends my stomach into knots. The one and only Dean Wilder shoots out of the gate like a lightning strike. It’s infuriating how talented he is. He makes riding a bronc bareback seem as simple as taking a walk in the park. The way the black fringe on his chaps seems suspended in air as he’s thrown up and down, over and over, is mesmerizing.
“Amazing, isn’t he?” I clamp my open mouth shut, burying it in the fabric of my sleeve. Mallory George steps up on the gate beside me, resting her chin on the top bar. Her eyes are glazed over, as if in a daze.
“Him and all the others,” I mutter, the excuse sounding childish even to me. When she doesn’t answer, I push off the gate, huffing at the perfect score he just received and the racer turned swooning buckle bunny behind me. He shouldn’t botherme as much as he does. No man has ever lingered on the edge of my mind as annoyingly often as this man has since last weekend. I haven’t even talked to him, for crying out loud. He probably doesn't even know I exist outside of our interaction on stage. And that irritates me more than it should.
My fingers angrily untie Queen’s reins from one of the railings, and I swing up into the saddle, muttering to myself about how stupid I’m being.
“Hannah, right?” I wince at the cramp that forms in my neck from how quickly I look in the direction of my name. A tall man with tan chaps and a tight buzz cut looks at me from his place on top of the metal fence. He smiles at me with perfectly straight teeth. Any girl would melt on the spot, I’m sure they’d drop to their knees for him right here in the dirt, surrounded by people. But me? I’m bothered that I have to even pretend to enjoy his company.
“Right.” I make to turn away, but he reaches out and grabs Queen’s halter, rubbing her between her eyes. Damn traitor falls into his trance and nuzzles into him. Rolling my eyes, I release her reins and put my fake ass smile in place. “That’s me. You are?” His crystal blue eyes meet mine.
“Kasey.” I nod my head at him.
“Nice to meet you, Kasey. What event were you in tonight?” He stares at me a beat too long, and I feel my smile start to slip.
“Just rode, bare back,” he says with a hint of seduction. The wink he gives me has me doubling over in silent laughter.
