"Where'd you leave it?" the guy in white snapped.
"On the bull," Jackson said. "You're the ones who're supposed to be watching that, and if you can't even pick it up, can you at least point me to it?"
The three idiots looked confused, as if they had no damned clue what he was talking about. Tanner sighed and shook his head, but Jackson saw his gear. One of the chute attendants had picked it up.
"This is a fucking mess," Tanner grumbled.
"Yep," I said, leaning over the railing with my forearms holding me up.
Tanner joined me, matching my posture. Like this, we looked like nothing more than a pair of cowboys wanting a good view. It also moved us away from the fans sitting around us, giving us a little privacy.
"You know," I said, "if I come out, ain't gonna be real hard to figure out this shit we're doing."
"Nope," Tanner agreed. "I'm good with it, though. So's Cody."
"Yeah, but - "
He gave me a scathing look that had my mouth shutting real fast. "J.D.," he said, "listen to me. I'm done hiding it. I'm done being ashamed of it. I didn't say anything before because I didn't want to deal with my parents, but Austin took that out of my hands. I also got a damned good dad in the process, and I'm ok with that."
"Well, yeah..." I tried.
He murmured, cutting me off. "No, you're not listening. I've got an amazing man beside me, a phenomenal girl with me, andher old man keeps calling me 'son.' Why wouldn't I want to do this?"
"Because 'this' is why the PBR has you sitting right here, not out there!" I hissed, doing my best to keep my voice down. "If you make it clear you're straight, Cody'd have the bullfighters she needs."
He shook his head. "Sometimes, it's not about what she needs, J.D. Sometimes, we get to need shit too. And me? I need this. If I have to go work in a fucking mailroom? Yeah, I'll do it, because as much as I like that girl, I happen to like someone else just as much."
Feeling my lips curl, I glanced down at the dirt by the wall. "You used another L-word before."
"And she hasn't."
"She will," I assured him. "Tanner, she's workin' up to it, and I'm pretty damned sure she's right there, so she will."
"Don't rush her," he warned.
"Naw." I shook my head, proving I had no intention of that. "I'm just sayin' she's real damned close, but me?" I reached up to scrub at my mouth. "I could say it."
His eyes narrowed as he tried to read between the lines. "About her?"
"Not just her."
His gaze snapped to mine so fucking fast. "Yeah?"
"Yeah," I said, feeling my damned-fool face getting warm. "Fuck. See, this is why I wanna come out, so I don't need to feel like I'm doing some double talk."
Tanner leaned in a little more. "Well, so you know, this isn't a fling for me. This isn't a little fun, an itch that needs to be scratched, or anything else. See, I have a real weakness for men who have no problem with stepping back so they can lift someone up - even if it's not me who's getting the lift."
"Her?"
"Mhm," he agreed. "And yeah, I'm getting all mushy about her. Fuck, but she's exactly the kind of woman I didn't think I'd ever find."
"The kind you love?" I pressed.
"Yeah," he breathed, those hazel eyes of his locked right on mine. "And she's just like you, J.D. Kinda why I feel the same."
Fuck, but now my chest ached for a whole different reason. This time, it wasn't my ribs healing. Nope, I was pretty sure that was a punch right to the heart. And deep inside me, I felt the fucker pound like it had just gotten the medicine it needed.
"Same," I breathed. "Yeah, Tanner. Me too."
