Home on the Ranch: Rodeo Legend

by Pamela Britton

  “Do you need anything, Mr. Gillian?”

  Ava. He wanted Ava.

  He opened his mouth, tried to form words. “Thank. You.”

  “You’re welcome, Mr. Gillian.”

  No. He wanted to thank Ava. He wanted to tell her what a great doctor she was. And that he appreciated her hard work. And that he liked her.

  His elbow throbbed.

  Or he’d like to like her...except he couldn’t. Why couldn’t he like her? He couldn’t remember his reasons.

  “Do you need something for pain?”

  As much as he wanted it, he shook his head then immediately wished he hadn’t. Nausea overwhelmed him. He closed his eyes.

  How long he was out, he had no idea. When he woke up next, Ava stared down at him, a professional smile on her face, hair pulled back, white doctor’s coat matching the sheets on his hospital bed. He sat in a room with a curtain partition on either side of him, nurses moving back and forth.

  “Hello,” she said.

  His head throbbed in time with his arm. “’Lo.”

  “How are you feeling now?”

  “Pain,” he said, looking down at his arm. At least this time the room didn’t spin.

  “That will pass.” She glanced at her tablet, almost as if she didn’t want to look him in the eyes, but before her lashes swooped down he caught a glimpse of something that seemed like embarrassment. “You took a while to wake up. Do remember us talking earlier?”

  Talking? When? He shook his head.

  She looked...relieved? “That happens sometimes. Don’t worry.” Her eyes scanned his face and then his elbow. Satisfied with what she saw, she straightened. “We’re getting ready to send you down for an X-ray. We want to make sure everything’s in place. Afterward, we’ll fit you with a special splint and, if you’re feeling up to it, you can go home. I’ve spoken with your family and they’d like to come see you while we wait for someone from radiology to come get you. Would that be okay?”

  “’Course.”

  Ava turned as if about to leave, but he called her back. “Hey.”

  She swung to face him and he was certain of it now. She was having a hard time looking him in the eye.

  “Thanks.”

  She nodded. “My pleasure.” She tried to turn away again.

  “Don’t you want to stick around for my family?” A nurse had come forward to help him sit up, smiling. Any other time he would have smiled back, but today he had eyes only for Ava. “I’m sure they’d like to shake your hand, too.”

  “That’s okay.” She clutched her tablet to her chest. “I’ve already spoken to them.”

  “Yes, but you haven’t formally met any of them.”

  “Well, no, but...”

  “Stay.”

  Ava glanced at the nurse, who hadn’t moved away. He did, too. The younger woman stared down at him with a bemused smile on her face and it triggered a memory. Something he’d said earlier. Something he couldn’t quite remember but had a feeling he probably should.

  “I have other patients—”

  “There he is!” someone called.

  Shane, home for the week, his eyes bright and teasing as he rounded the corner of the curtain. His dad, Reese, was in his wake, followed by Maverick and his aunt and uncle. Heck, his whole damn family had come to see him, all but Jayden who still stubbornly refused to speak to their dad. She’d call him later, she’d said.

  “What are you guys doing here?” Carson asked. “Maverick said he had this handled.”

  “You didn’t think we’d trust Maverick to do this on his own, did you?” asked Shane, his black cowboy hat nearly the same shade as his thick brows.

  “Hey, now,” said Maverick, who was younger by a couple of years but shared their eyes. All the Gillians had dark hair and blue eyes, although Maverick was the better looking of all the brothers, so he’d been told. The most serious, too, which was why Carson had asked him to take him home from the hospital.

  “You feeling okay, son?” Reese Gillian looked a little worried. His dad took Carson’s rodeo career seriously. Probably more seriously than Carson did lately. Once his mom had died, it’d taken the wind out of Carson’s sails. His priorities had changed and success had seemed...well, unnecessary in a way. Which was why his reaction to his injury had surprised him. Knowing he might never rope again had scared the hell out of him. Made him want to try harder to get back into the arena.

  “Doc says your elbow’s going to be fine.”

  “Hurts a little,” he said to the room at large.

  “We’ll give you some instruction on how to ice it when you go home,” Ava said.

  His aunt broke away from the crowd. “Hi,” she said to Ava, sweeping her long grey hair over her shoulder. “We didn’t get to meet earlier. I’m Carson’s aunt Crystal.”

  Ava took Crystal’s hand. “Nice to meet you.”

  Both women glanced at him, Crystal’s eyes filled with laughter. “I hear Carson here gave you a tough time in the recovery room.”

  Ava seemed confused. Carson knew how she felt.

  “What do you mean?” Ava asked.

  “After surgery. My friend’s daughter works here. Maggie Bell. Her mom and I were in high school together. She said a couple of the other nurses heard my nephew talking to you in the recovery room.”

  Ava’s brows shot up. “Nurse Bell heard about that?”

  Crystal’s blue eyes sparkled. “I guess all the nurses are talking about it.”

  “What?” He glanced around the room and could tell by the looks on everyone’s faces that they all knew it, too. Whatever “it” was, it amused them. Everyone except his father, who just kind of shook his head, the light catching his silver hair. He exchanged a look with his uncle, who also shook his head.

  “Well?” he asked.

  Shane leaned forward, winked at him. “Seems you made a pass at your pretty doctor here.”

  His gaze shot to Ava. She just shrugged and, though she tried to play it off, he could see her cheeks had turned red. So that was the reason for her sideways looks.

  “It happens.” She pasted a wide smile on her face. “Anesthesia makes people say some strange things.” She started to inch backward. “So nice to meet everyone. I have to continue on my rounds.”

  She ducked out so fast, he looked around and said, “What did I supposedly say to her?”

  Crystal laughed. His siblings all smiled. His dad and his uncle Bob were the only ones who didn’t seem amused, but that wasn’t uncommon for the elder Gillians. His uncle and dad could be twins when it came to temperament, except where his dad looked older and wrinkled with age, his Uncle Bob still looked the same. Bushy grey grows, thick mustache, face relatively unlined with age.

  “You told her how hot she was and that you wanted to take her out on a date,” Crystal said gleefully. “Apparently it’s the talk of the hospital. I guess Dr. Moore is a bit of a stick in the mud and so everyone thought it was funny.”

  “She’s not a stick in the mud. She’s just overwhelmed by being a doctor and a mom and a single parent.”

  The whole room went quiet—well, as quiet as it could be given they were in a recovery room and other patients were within earshot. Even his dad quirked a brow.

  “Well, well, well,” said his aunt. “Look who’s smitten.”

  * * *

  She couldn’t get out of there fast enough.

  Things were out of hand as far as Carson Gillian was concerned and it irritated the heck out of her. Why did she always seem to fall for the cocky masculine type?

  Fall?

  Okay. So it was more like attracted. She paused in front of a window overlooking the parking lot of the hospital. In the distance, fluffy clouds left ink-blot shadows on the hills and the mountains to the west. She’d been flattered by his comments in the recovery ro
om, although there was a part of her that had a hard time believing he’d meant them. He might have been hallucinating she was someone else.

  The bummer of it was that she’d have to see him again in a few days, and after that, on the weekend when Bella had her riding lesson. For the first time she wished she had someone she could pass his chart along to, but that would be unprofessional at best, and cowardly without a doubt.

  She managed to avoid him as he left the hospital later that day.

  It didn’t help that Bella couldn’t seem to stop talking about her lesson that weekend. As she played with Balto in the kitchen later that same day, she even asked how his surgery had gone.

  “Great,” Ava said, hoping her daughter would drop it.

  “Will he be able to ride again?”

  “Sure, sure,” she said dismissively, spooning some spaghetti onto her daughter’s plate.

  “I mean, will he be able to ride at rodeos again, Mom?”

  Okay, she thought, taking a seat at the head of the square table, next to her daughter. She wasn’t going to let the matter drop.

  “I don’t see why not.”

  She took a bite of her food, hoping Bella would do the same. She did. But the moment she finished chewing and swallowing, she was back at it again.

  “I hope he does really good. When I met Carson’s brother at the ranch he said he could go all the way.” She sat straighter. “Maybe we could fly to Las Vegas and watch him ride.”

  “When did you meet his brother?”

  “At the barn the other day.” Bella smiled. “So can we go to Vegas?”

  Not if she could help it. “How was school today?”

  Bella launched into a play-by-play of how her day had gone. Ava tried to focus on her words but her thoughts kept slipping back to Carson. If he fell again, he might injure that elbow worse than before. She’d have to make sure he knew the risks. And that he didn’t do too much too soon.

  “Mom!”

  Ava jerked. Balto whined from his position at Bella’s feet. Bella stared up at her accusingly.

  “I asked you if I could bring Rosa out to the ranch this weekend.”

  Rosa? Who was Rosa—a school friend? “We’ll have to ask Carson first.”

  Bella stared up at her quietly. Ava didn’t like the look on her face at all. It was far too knowing for someone her age.

  “You like him, don’t you?”

  What? “Like who?” She pretended confusion.

  “Carson.”

  “He’s a patient, honey. Of course I like him.”

  That wasn’t exactly true. She’d disliked plenty of the people she’d operated on over the years.

  “Not like that,” Bella said. She tipped her head sideways. Someone had braided her bangs and then clipped them off to the side. She wondered who’d done it...and how come she hadn’t noticed before now.

  “Every time you talk about him, your face turns red.”

  “It does not.”

  Bella nodded. “It does. And you’re trying to change the subject.”

  Ava set her fork down. She didn’t want to be having this conversation. “Finish your dinner.” She glanced down at the puppy at her feet. “And stop feeding him scraps.”

  “Mom, why don’t you ever go out on dates?”

  Where was this coming from? Ava sat back in her chair, unsure how to answer. It was clear Bella had something she wanted to get off her chest. Her daughter had set her fork down, too.

  “Honey, I’m too busy to do that. Besides, it’d be unprofessional. He’s a patient.”

  “But he’s had his surgery,” she said, brown eyes wide.

  “He’s still my patient.” For now. Once he started therapy, his care would be passed to someone else, but still.

  Bella wasn’t going to drop it. “You could ask someone else to be his doctor.”

  Her daughter was entirely too smart for her own good, and so very much like Paul. He’d seen the world in black-and-white, too.

  “And that would be unprofessional.” Ava shook her head. “So let’s just drop it, shall we?”

  She should have known better than to try to escape. Even when she got up to put her plate in the sink, Bella still hadn’t picked up her fork again. She just kept staring at her to the point that Ava leaned back against the sink and said, “What?”

  “Ask him out, Mom.”

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Yes, you can. You’re a strong, powerful woman. And women can do anything. That’s what you always tell me.”

  It took her a moment to realize her mouth hung open. She closed it with a click of her teeth. “This is different.”

  Bella shook her head. “You need to have some fun, Mom. You’re like that guy from that movie. You know, the one where his wife dies and he doesn’t date anybody for, like, a really long time.”

  “What movie?”

  “You know,” Bella said impatiently. “The guy that plays Forrest Gump. He’s in it. And you always cry at the end. You’re like him, except a girl.”

  It took her a moment to place the movie, and then she straightened in outrage. “Sleepless in Seattle? I am not.”

  “Face it, Mom. You’re like that man, the one you called a lonely widower.”

  “Honey, it’s not just that he’s my patient. There are other reasons, too. Sometimes even when you like someone, you don’t want to date them.”

  “So you admit you do like him.” Bella pounded on the words like a cat on a butterfly.

  “Not like that.” Okay, maybe she did. A little. He was so good with Bella. “He’s a really nice guy, but he’s a rodeo cowboy, Bella.”

  “I know. It’s cool.”

  Ava shook her head. “It wouldn’t be cool when he was on the road all the time.” Girls throwing themselves at him, no doubt. Look at all the hospital nurses. She could only imagine what it was like for him when he was out on the road. No thanks. “It’s like spotting a cake at the market and knowing it looks good, but also knowing it’d be bad for you, so you don’t eat it.”

  Bella frowned. “You’re comparing Carson to cake?”

  She knew when to stop arguing with her daughter. Bella wouldn’t stop. She’d keep tossing out solution after solution until one of them gave up. This time around it was Ava.

  “Finish your dinner,” she said again, turning to leave the kitchen. “I’ll be upstairs, folding laundry.”

  One day her daughter would understand, although she hoped that day was way far in the future. She couldn’t imagine navigating the shoals of Bella’s social life. The thought practically gave her hives.

  When her cell phone dinged a little later she winced, hoping against hope she wasn’t being called in to work. She wasn’t. It was a text from Carson.

  I hate to bug you, but my dad would like you to sign a release. He’s worried about liability.

  Liability? Well, yes she could understand that. But why did she want to delay her response?

  She sat on the edge of her bed.

  She did not want to get involved with him, not at all, and yet that didn’t stop that little heart-tickling flutter whenever she thought about him and what he’d said in the recovery room. Not that he’d remembered.

  Sure. I’ll sign one when I’m out there this weekend.

  She tipped her head back, finding it ridiculous that she waited with bated breath for his reply. It was like being a teenager all over again. She was just about to toss the phone aside when it dinged once more.

  And if you wouldn’t mind paying me then?

  Oh, dear goodness. She’d forgotten to pay the man. Here she was talking about keeping things professional and she’d walked off without paying for his services.

  Because you’re not yourself when you’re around him.

  Okay, so maybe that was true, but it was
time to take back control. She wasn’t going to date the man, ever. She would treat him like the professional he was.

  I can pay you now. And sign your release. Meet in town?

  Her heart began to pump like a cardiac patient’s just before a heart attack. Stupid and ridiculous, and all the more reason to prove to herself that she could handle her attraction to Carson Gillian without feeling like a silly schoolgirl.

  Her phone dinged.

  Sure. How about tomorrow? Name a time.

  She’d sign his paper and hand him the money. What better way to prove her professionalism.

  Then why are you already plotting what to wear?

  She refused to answer the question.

  Chapter 8

  Humiliating.

  That was what it felt like to ask someone, especially an attractive someone, for money.

  Carson stared into the coffee shop. The glass storefront reflected passing traffic behind him, but beyond the glass, inside the store, he could see a line of people at the counter.

  It wasn’t like he didn’t have a savings account, and he’d made some good money at rodeos over the years, but now he was out of commission for who knew how long and he hated—actually, refused—to touch his construction savings account. One day he’d build his dream home on the back of his family’s property, something that would belong to him, and not his dad or uncle. He’d buy the land from them, build the house, but not something that looked new. Oh, no. He’d always loved old houses for their woodwork and unique details. His house would look old, but be new on the inside. Until he could build it, though, he’d do what he needed to do to get by, and that included selling his services to his pretty new doctor and her daughter.

  The smell of coffee greeted him the moment he opened the door and he could hear the whir of a coffee grinder. The place seemed to be packed this early in the day and, for a moment, Carson wondered if he’d even be able to find her. But there she sat, at a table in the far corner of the shop, a smile that seemed forced upon her face.

  “Hey,” he said, pulling out a metal chair that matched the table right down to the polished aluminum surface.