Page 5 of One Last Rodeo

The less she knows, the better. Besides, she’ll probably read that “fine” and convince herself that I’m happy and having a blast. Probably imagine me riding bareback on one of the horses we cart around the series with us while wearing a cowgirl hat.

I don't think she's ever actually seen me happy before. Unless you count that one summer where our parents got us a puppy when I was thirteen. Or the time when I discovered a new surgery technique that the hospital I did my residency at ended up patenting. And even that, they couldn’t give me credit for. A female with immigrant parents making a medical breakthrough?Bury the evidence!

There's a row of horse trailers parked along the back lot as I cut through toward Craig's office, and from one of them, a dog starts barking excitedly. I don't mean to stop walking. I just do, for a second, watching some wrangler crouch down and let a blue heeler climb all over his boots like it hasn't seen him in a year instead of an hour. They look so happy together.

I was thirteen the summer my parents got us that dog. A scraggly little thing from a shelter in Bakersfield that none of us could agree on a name for, so we just called himPerritofor two weeksuntil it stuck permanently. He used to wait by the door for us every day at three-fifteen. I think he understood how badly I needed someone to be waiting for me. He'd launch himself at my legs the second I walked in like I was the best thing that had happened to him all day.

Nobody has looked at me like that since. Not my parents-while proud, yes, but neverdelighted.And definitely never my ex-fiancé, Davis. I used to think I'd get a dog of my own when I was an adult, once I had a place that was mine and a life that allowed for it. Davis hated them. Said the fur, the mess, theunpredictabilityof an animal in a controlled home would drive him nuts.

I let that be the reason I never did. I'm not sure it was ever really about the dog. I think he didn’t want me to have anything that brought happiness outside of my career.

I shake off that thought and push through the door to the arena's back hallway, badge swinging against my chest and setting a rhythm I try to get lost in. The Iron Horn series isn't set up like others. While normally bull-riding is a solo sport, every rider for themselves, this competition allows teams to enter as a group for a shot at the prize. My team is theBroken Spurs, which consists of five professional bull-riders who’ve been riding together for years, a few saddle broncs, bareback riders, barrel racers, and our team’s training coach, Dawson Reed.

Today we're in Austin. Tomorrow we’ll be in Denver. The schedule rolls through my memory as I try to keep track of the jumps. I’ve never had the opportunity to travel for work but that was one of the most attractive things about this job. That and the shock of doing something wildly new. Now I just need to get control on these athletes before we get deeper into the series, and someone gets hurt.

I come to a stop in front of Craig’s door. Take a deep breath and knock once.

“Come in!” he shouts.

Craig Brooks is younger than I expected he would be—mid-forties, but with the harried, overcaffeinated energy of someone twenty years past that—buried behind a desk stacked with enough paperwork that I don't know how he locates anything. He's sharp, though. Organized under the chaos. And he's the only reason I have this job, because Hayes, a man who spent a decade on a circuit not unlike this one before he traded his boots for scrubs, made a phone call on my behalf when I told him I needed something else. Anything else, after my whole life imploded.

Which means I cannot screw this up. Family favors carry weight with me. They always have.

Craig glances up and brightens, the way men in positions of comfortable authority tend to when a woman walks in and they assume the conversation will be easy.

"Oh, hey, Doctor Alba. How're things treating you this week? Broken Spurs are looking good, huh?”

“Fine.”

He nods, accepting the one-word answer without blinking.

People on the circuit are used to short, clipped communication. Grunts, chin lifts, half sentences. At least that’s one perk of this job: no one expects bedside manner from me. Good thing, because I never developed any, even after a decade in cardiothoracic surgery.

I can hold a beating heart in my hands, identify all its flaws and fix them with the gentlest motions, but small talk? No thank you.

I cut straight to it. “Are you aware that Jensen Grant rode tonight?”

Craig looks up, eyebrows pinching like he already knows exactly where this is going. “Of course I’m aware.”

The irritation is faint, but it’s there, and I’ve spent ten years reading micro-expressions better than most therapists manage in a lifetime. People call me cold and detached. I didn’t become a surgeon by being dumb, and idiots are the only people who mistake observation and awareness for coldness.

I choose my next words carefully, even though I don’t want to.

“Are you aware he had heart surgery six months ago?”

He nods again. “Yes.”

“He shouldn’t be riding.”

Craig sets the papers down slowly with the universal male ‘don’t start with me’energy.It’s the posture that men seem to adopt right before they explain, at length, why the educated professional in the room can’t possibly know better than them.

“The last series doctor cleared him to ride.”

“The last series doctor was fired for stealing supplies out of an arena in Houston. I’d be curious what else he signed off on without reading it.”

His jaw flexes.

“I’m the new doctor on the circuit.” I keep my chin lifted, tone neutral but making my annoyance apparent.