Page 4 of Eight Seconds to Fly
Whatever he was going to say died in his throat. A car crossed into our lane, and Daddy yanked the car to the right. I screamed as the car plowed into our truck. As it flipped end over end, I thought how much this looked like coming off that bull only an hour earlier.
Eight seconds to fly or die.
1
Three Years Later
Ijump off my bull, dismounting easily. My draw had been a bit of a sleepy old bastard, but I rode him with style and hopefully that would be enough. I just needed to boost up my points a little bit more and then I could enter a cup tournament. I hightailed it off the sand while Frankie showed off for the crowd. Frankie was nuts, but he was also my best friend.
The bull wasn’t really overly aggressive and trotted out of the arena now that he knew he had done his job. I headed out the gate toward the back, nodding to the guy getting ready to ride. He nodded back respectfully, though it wasn’t always that way. The Rodeo had always been a boy’s club, and the first year after I came back, after the… accident, had been tough.
My mind stuttered away from the accident. The screams, the crunching metal. Waking up and seeing my father’s lifeless eyes. I sucked in a breath, trying to keep the panic at bay. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Not now. One meltdown and all that hard earned respect I'd garnered over the years would be down the drain in a moment.
An arm came around my shoulders and I looked over. Frankie’s smile was wide but his eyes were concerned. I shuddered with relief as I focused not on the memories, but on the feel of his arm around my shoulders.
“You good,Querida?” he whispered and I nodded. Frankie was my savior. He was a bit crazy, a bullfighter on the circuit because his brother had come up here from Brazil to ride and Frankie had come with him. When Luiz had gotten injured and gone home to Brazil, Frankie had stayed. He was my roommate, my travel buddy, my rock. I loved him to pieces.
I nudged him in the ribs with my elbow and smiled up at him. “I’m good. Shitty memories trying to creep in. We hitting up a party later?”
Frankie knew about my past. About the accident. When I’d been shipped off to my aunt out in Cali, I hadn’t been able to see a bull for a year until I turned eighteen. But as soon as I could, I headed back down to Texas and signed up for the first tournament I could find. I paid my dues, even if the WBRP people gave me a funny look. I had nothing to prove to them. The only person I wanted to prove anything to was dead and gone. So I rode for me. For the love of it.
Luiz and Frankie had been as out of place in that first tournament as I had, and we bonded together as outsiders. Luiz was older than Frankie and me, and while he’d looked out for me, even beaten down a couple of loud mouthed cowboys, it was Frankie who really had my back.
Frankie waggled his eyebrows. “You know it.”
The announcer called my score over the PA, and I grinned. 76. Not great, but enough to push my ranking enough and give me a little bit of prize money. Hell. Yes. Frankie whooped, picking me up and spinning me around. “Looks like it’ll be a bit of a celebration too!”
I danced around in a circle, resisting the urge to squeal like a girl. Instead, I followed Frankie out back to the dressing rooms. I’d been a bit of a conundrum when we first started. A woman in a room filled with half naked men? Absolutely not. But I’d been stubborn as fuck, and no matter which tiny storage room they pretended was the women’s dressing room, I always ended up back in the one with the rest of the riders until they stopped trying. The guys, they had no fucking shame. I’d seen more cowboy dick than I’d ever wanted to see. But I always kept it respectable, never undressing. The only person I let help me into my gear was Frankie, who showed absolutely zero interest in me. I’d think he was gay if he didn’t chase every buckle bunny this side of the Alamo.
I took off all my gear, Frankie getting the buckles and straps I couldn’t reach, and loaded it all into my duffle. It would be a quick trip back to the hotel to shower off the dust and sweat, then down to the bar.
It was a wild life, but I loved every moment of it. Someone slapped my shoulder and I looked over at the dopey grin of Tom. “Good ride, shit luck about the draw though.”
I shrugged and grinned back. “It’s all good. I needed the points and riding a shit bull for eight is better than face planting in the dirt after three,” I joked back. A lot easier on my body too. I’d had quite a few breaks over the last couple of years, but with each wreck, the bull taught me something new. “You coming out later?”
Tom shook his head. He was in his late twenties and had a fiancee who traveled with him. Lissy was nice, but she was seven months pregnant and she always looked at me like she was gonna cry or scratch my eyes out. I stayed well out of her way and Tom coddled her like she was his world. Which she was. Tom was a good guy.
I stuffed everything in my bag and waited for Frankie to do the same. I know the guys all thought me and Frankie were a couple, but even if they did see him fucking buckle bunnies no one said anything to me. I didn’t mind, and I didn’t dissuade the notion. It offered me a little bit of protection, because although they were all respectful of me, they were even more respectful because I was someone else’s girl.
Fucking knuckledraggers.
I talked shop with a couple of the guys while I waited, talking about their rides, the crowds, all that other crap. After about twelve months, the majority stopped seeing the blonde curls and the boobs and instead saw another person with the same passion they had.
“Cover your dicks boys, the piranha is here,” a crude voice yodelled and I grimaced. Most. Not all. Junior was the son of rodeo royalty. His father, grandfather, and uncles had all been pro riders. Junior sucked but got by on the legacy of his name. But he was a fucking dickcheese of a human being. The guy beside me, a part timer who worked a normal construction job most months, grimaced and went to stand. We were still in the South and I was still a woman, even if I did like to climb on the top of bulls. I grabbed his arm and pulled him back down, shaking my head. I stood and gave Junior a derisive look. “I don’t see you covering yours, Junior. Is that because you don’t have one?”
Someone snickered, and Junior’s eyes narrowed. “Maybe you chewed it off,” he growled. I made a truly disgusted face that I didn’t have to fake in the least.
“I wouldn’t go near your dick for a million dollars. Hell, I wouldn’t touch it even if they offered me the chance to ride in the World Finals.”
Junior growled and stepped forward, and suddenly Frankie was there. “Ready to go,Querida?”
Frankie didn’t follow Luiz into bull riding because he was way too tall. Easily 6”4, he didn’t have the center of gravity to be a bull rider. But he was big, muscled and athletic as hell. There was a reason he pulled the buckle bunnies.
Junior, however, was scrappy and I wasn’t sure who’d win in a fight. No, wait I was. Frankie. Junior was a little bitch who was all bark and no bite.
Frankie led me from the room and I flipped Junior the bird on the way out the door. Asshole.
Frankie was shaking his head as we got to my truck. It was new and reliable. It had four doors and seat warmers. It was the only time I’d dipped into my trust fund money. Technically, my daddy’s shares in the contracting business went to me. Jack Watson, Branch’s father and Daddy’s business partner, had hired a property manager to govern the place on my behalf.
