Page 2 of One Last Rodeo

He lifts his chin, salutes me, and the gate whips open—he’s gone in a blur of dust and muscle. I don't stick around to watch his ride, I'm sure he'll be fine. We're a small team of five riders this competition. While bull-riding is normally a one-man show, the Iron Series is a team lead event with one leader from each team getting promoted to the finals. I already know for our team, the Broken Spurs, that’ll end up being me. That doesn’t mean these rides aren’t important for the rest of the guys. It’ll give themsome more airtime and exposure with the sponsors and the fans, it just means I’m better.

I hop the fence and head for the training room, rolling my bad shoulder where no one can see me do it. It's been acting up again. Nobody needs to know that but my physical therapist, and even he's only getting the abbreviated version of just how bad it feels. Few more months till the finals. I can grit through anything in that time. I’ve handled worse.

I walk the halls without looking at my phone, without really thinking at all. My head's been static since the surgery, white noise behind everything I don't say out loud. To everyone around me I'm still the guy holding the whole production together, still the one signing the most autographs, cracking the best jokes. Inside, most days, there's nothing. Like someone wrapped my brain in cotton and I’ve lost the plot.

I push open the training room door without a thought, bee-lining straight for a free table. Thankfully, there’s no one else in here right now but me and Heath, a guy who’s been on the circuit with us for years off and on and who’s probably getting close to my grandma’s age now.

“Hey, Jensen. Good ride. Just the shoulder?”

I nod. “Yeah. Thanks. It feels a little tight.”

He starts pulling out some tools, focused and humming an old country song quietly to himself. I lay back, letting the table take my weight as I stare up at the ceiling. My hips hurt but I don’t tell him that. My hamstring’s pulling too. I need to call grandma. We’ve got a break coming up soon which means I’ll be heading back to Tennessee to see her in a week or two. I miss her, but somedays I wish I had more to look forward to than a quiet week off in Tennessee.

Distant words play through my mind as Heath’s fingers dig into the muscle and tissue…“A second chance... Heart good as new... Don't waste this opportunity...”

“So,” he says like he’s making small talk. “You meet the new team doctor yet?”

“No. What happened to the last one?”

“Got caught stealing money and supplies from the arena in Houston.”

“Wow. Fuck.”

He nods and digs his thumb into a knot in my shoulder. It hurts like a bitch, but at least it cuts through the static better than anything else does these days.

“New one’s real pretty,” he adds, like that’s the selling point and not the doctor's skills and credentials.

I grunt when he works the knot harder. “Pretty?”

He grins. “Doctor Catalina Alba.”

Doctor Alba…?

The name catches against something in my memory, a nerve ending sparks, but it doesn’t quite land. Not until the door to the training room slams open hard enough to rattle the hinges. I twist to see who’s stupid enough to come in here like that. It’s a woman. Moving fast. Dark brown hair spilling loose from a bun that looks like it was pinned up with an actual pen. Her eyes are the warmest shade of brown I’ve ever seen, and she’s headed right toward me, looking like she’s already decided this conversation is going to go badly for somebody.

Me. It’s going to go badly for me. Because I know that face.

I sit up so fast Heath stumbles backward with a grunt.

That's the face I saw first when I came out of anesthesia, half-convinced I'd died and gone to heaven. When really, I’d gotten lucky on an operating table in California. Hers are the hands that cracked my chest open, repaired something I didn’t know was broken, and then put my heart back where it belonged. The same eyes that explained the surgery to me afterward in a voice so flat and clinical I thought for ten straight seconds she was going to tell me I was dying.

What the hell is she doing here onmycircuit?

“Jensen Grant.” She says my full name like it’s an accusation, already closing the distance between us. I sit up a lot straighter. She’s pissed. But why?

"I'm the new doctor assigned to the Iron Horn series." She says it flat. Like she's reading off a card she hates. "I'm introducing myself to all the riders." She thrusts a hand toward me like she’s being forced to do it.

I take it. Soft. Delicate. The same hands that held my heart in them and didn't nick or drop it. For one second the static clears all the way out of my skull, and I swear I feel my pulse try to match hers.

She’s closer now. Brown skin that looks as soft as butter. Brown eyes with a halo of gold around the edges. Last time I saw her, her hair was slicked into the tightest bun I’d ever seen, and she was wearing a mask. Damn shame because she has the prettiest shaped mouth that I’ve ever been this close to.

If she recognizes me from the surgery, she doesn’t show it. But the glare she’s leveling at me tells me I'm still on her shit list. She's robotic in her movements. Stilted like she's protecting herself and being assessed. That disappears the moment that she yanks her hand away and leans in so that only I can hear her.

"Need I remind you that my hands are my livelihood. I'd prefer you not crush them with your Herculean paws."

I didn't even realize I was being rough with her.

“Didn’t realize they made livelihoods that fragile.”