by T. S. Joyce
QUICKDRAW SLOW BURN
(BATTLE OF THE BULLS, BOOK 3)
By T. S. JOYCE
Quickdraw Slow Burn
Copyright © 2020 by T. S. Joyce
Copyright © 2020, T. S. Joyce
First electronic publication: December 2020
T. S. Joyce
www.tsjoyce.com
All rights are reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the author’s permission.
NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR:
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental. The author does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for third-party websites or their content.
Published in the United States of America.
Editor: Corinne DeMaagd
Cover Model: Jonny James
Photograhper: Wander Aquiar
Other Books in this Series
Two Shots Down (Book 1)
Dead of Winter (Book 2)
First Time Train Wreck (Book 3 - Coming January 2021)
Contents
Copyright
Other Books in this Series
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Epilogue
Up Next in this Series
Newsletter Sign-Up
More Series from this Author
For More from this Author
About this Author
Prologue
“I’m his girlfriend,” Annabelle lied to the nurse.
Laura, the nurse’s nametag read, frowned at her but nodded. “Then you can stay. He needs to rest for a while, though.”
Annabelle dragged her attention back to the window where she could see into the room and the poisoned bull shifter lying still in the hospital bed. “I won’t go in there then. I just wanted to make sure he’s okay.”
“I understand,” Laura said softly.
“Are his friends okay, too?”
Laura leaned her shoulder against the wall. “First Time Train Wreck and Jack of All Trades will be fine once the drug is out of their system completely. But Last Chance? He could use some extra prayers.”
Her heart ached at hearing that. “Is his family here?”
“No one has shown up for any of them. No one but you and that guy.” She gestured to a man sitting in a chair at the end of the hallway. “Do you know him?”
The behemoth was staring straight ahead, but she recognized his profile. That was easy. Black hair that hung stylishly down to his cheekbones, and a dark beard to match. Tattoos up his neck and a stout frame layered in muscle. He was famous. He had bucked tonight. He was the number one bull shifter in the world in the PBSCR and seemed to be a new friend of Annabelle’s best friend, Raven. Quickdraw Slow Burn was his name.
“I know him.” Kind of.
Laura twitched her head in his direction. “There’s a chair by him if you get tired of standing. I have to get back to work.” She gave a soft, crooked smile before her kind eyes brightened a little. “Train Wreck will be okay.”
Annabelle thanked her and then looked back at the stranger in the hospital bed.
Train Wreck was looking back at her, conscious now, a slight frown across his features. He was younger than she’d thought from the charcoal tint to his hair, and the silver in his beard. Maybe his bull was silver. His face was smooth and tan, and on his upper arm, tattoo ink stretched from his elbow up into the sleave of his hospital gown. He lifted two fingers in a weak wave back to her, and then relaxed and closed his eyes again.
No, she wasn’t First Time Train Wreck’s girlfriend. She’d never even met him before, but she knew how awful he felt right now, his body trying to detox from the drug Filsa that someone had poisoned him with. She’d taken the drug before, too, back when she thought she didn’t want the animal that lived inside of her.
“What are you doing here, Wolf?” Quickdraw Slow Burn asked low.
He hadn’t moved, was still sitting in the chair, elbows on his knees, white cowboy hat dangling from his hand, his dark hair covering his eyes as he stared straight forward.
Huh. Well, he’d pegged her animal. Bull shifters had good instincts. Or perhaps Raven had told him what she was.
Annabelle pulled her purse closer to her side and made her way toward him, her sneakers squeaking against the sterile white tiles of the hospital with every step.
“I could ask you the same thing. Isn’t that your competition in there? Lying there helpless?”
“Did you do this to them?” he asked, dragging a dark gaze to her. His face was half hidden with a thick black beard. His eyes were full of fury and seemed to look right into her soul.
“No.”
After a second of hesitation, he nodded. “You’re telling the truth.”
It was Annabelle’s turn now. She was a shifter, too, and could hear truth and lies, just as clearly as him. “Did you do this to them?”
To her surprise, a small smile took his face. “Atta girl. You just proved you’re here for a good reason.”
“You didn’t answer my question. Did you poison those bull shifters?”
He sat up and then leaned back in the chair, dragged his attention up and down her body before he said, “No.” And it was the truth. “Your animal is protective. You playing guard dog?”
Annabelle shrugged up one shoulder and allowed a, “Maybe. Are you a guard moo-cow?”
“Don’t call me a cow.”
With a little laugh, she sank down in the chair next to his. “I wanted to make sure no one came in to finish the job. The nurse said Last Chance is worse off than the other two.”
“Shit.” Quickdraw chewed the corner of his lip and then said, “I’ve been trying to figure out who has the most to gain if the bull shifters go down.”
Annabelle puffed air out her cheeks. “I wish I knew more about rodeo and about the circuit, but I don’t even know all the players. Would the riders benefit by this?”
“Not at all. Their rank and income and notoriety depend on them being able to ride us for eight seconds. If there are no bulls to ride? They don’t get paid. They don’t keep their sponsors, they don’t keep their fans, they fade into nothing. They would be forced back into riding regular bulls but take a big pay cut and lose the attention.”
With an explosive sigh, Annabelle threw up her hands. “Well, that was my only guess. I can’t help you play detective, but I can watch over these boys until their people get here.”
“Why?” he asked earnestly. “Why even bother?”
“Because it doesn’t feel right celebrating the rodeo tonight when something this awful happened. They’re important. All shifters are.”
“Not all,”
he grumbled.
She laughed. “Aaaah, you’re the dark and moody type, huh? Well, I see good in people. Everyone has some in them, and even if it’s just a tiny amount, the good is valuable.”
Quickdraw’s dark eyebrows furrowed as he studied her. “But the bad weighs heavier.”
She tucked her knees up into the chair and rested her head against the wall. “Does it?”
His frown deepened, and after a few moments, he murmured, “You’re strange.”
Annabelle smiled at him brightly. “Thank you.”
Chapter One
The plane tickets were for today at 3:10 pm.
Had she trapped him?
From the envelope, Annabelle pulled out the single ticket for the rodeo finals for the Battle of the Bulls. It was the last event of the PBSRC circuit, and it was set in Casper, Wyoming. The winner would take home a huge purse, and so far, Quickdraw was dominating the entire circuit.
He was going to be rich after this, and in her mind, that was part of the problem.
Had she accidentally trapped him?
There would be a letter. There always was. Three times, Quickdraw Slow Burn had sent her plane tickets, and two times before now, she’d ignored them. She’d ignored his texts asking if she’d gotten them, too. Even Raven, her cow shifter best friend and a member of Quickdraw’s herd, had asked why she was ignoring him.
That part, she hadn’t been able to explain. Not to anyone. Not to her parents, not to her co-workers, not to her best friend, and certainly not to Quickdraw.
She pulled out the letter with shaking fingers and read it.
Annabelle,
This is a long shot. I know it is. I ain’t asking for a date. You do what you want with your life. But since that night, I want to spend more time with you. I guess my bull does too. He always looks for you after a buck.
Please come.
Quickdraw Slow Burn
Tears prickled her eyes as she refolded the letter and settled it back into the envelope with the tickets. He had drawn her attention, too, that hospital night when they watched over some poisoned bull shifters together. It wasn’t their time at the hospital that had tethered her little heart to him, though. It was the time they’d spent in his camper before she’d left for the airport the next day. It was the way he’d touched her and the way he’d talked to her in his bed, exposing a deep vein of caring she hadn’t realized a man could possess. It was the pillow talk and the soft fingertips caressing her spine. It was gentle kisses from a man who wasn’t gentle by nature.
If she’d made a mistake, she couldn’t take it back now. Her uncertainty had ruined any chance she had with Quickdraw.
Annabelle rested her hands on her flat stomach. She was too chicken-shit to even take a test, but she felt different, and her inner wolf was acting so strange.
There was a possibility that Quickdraw had changed her entire life in one night.
When a knock sounded at the door, Annabelle nearly fell out of her seat. Her werewolf hearing usually alerted her to someone at the front door of her apartment way before they reached her porch.
Unless…
Annabelle smiled despite herself.
She stood and made her way to the door, opened it, and caught the hug of her maker. Rork was growling, but he always did that. His wolf was a little on the crazy side.
“You haven’t been answering texts,” he murmured, releasing her to push past her and into the small studio apartment. “I brought you presents.”
“You know you don’t have to bring me presents.”
His bushy gray eyebrows raised up high. “But don’t I? There might be a new wolf in the pack soon.”
Annabelle’s heart stuttered a beat. “W-what?”
“Look at your eyes. They’re the color of ice, and they never go back to your human color. Your wolf is frozen inside you, waiting until she can have your body again. She doesn’t want to risk changing and hurting a pup. And if that didn’t tip me off, you smell different. I wanted you to tell me yourself, but you got quiet, and now your mom and dad are asking me what’s wrong with you. You’re worrying people. Here.”
Rork set the paper bag he was carrying on the table and pulled out two tiny baby onesies. One said, Hungry like the wolf and the other read Momma’s lil mooo-nster. That one had dairy cow spots all over it and a little cow tail attached to the back.
Shocked, Annabelle padded to the table and picked up the cow one, studied its tiny size, and then drew it in to hug to her chest.
Rork gestured to the tiny blue outfits. “Because I don’t know if you’ll have a bull or a wolf yet.”
“You said a bull. How do you know it will be a boy?”
“Natural-born female shifters are very rare. Raven is an anomaly. You’re carrying a boy. I know it.” He was growling again, but he was also smiling. Rork had always been a strange bird. Errr…wolf.
“I haven’t even taken a test yet,” she whispered.
Rork shrugged up a shoulder. “I don’t give a shit when you take it. Maybe you won’t. Maybe you’ll start your period in five minutes. Maybe your wolf just wants a pup so bad, she’s hoping. She’s wanted a pup for years. She’s always been maternal. How does he feel about all this?”
“Who?”
“The dad?”
Annabelle dropped her gaze immediately and held onto the little onesie tighter. “He doesn’t know. Why would I tell him? I don’t even know for sure. I’m just a little bit late on my period. Just a few days. A week maybe. Week and a half. And sometimes that happens with me. The wolf always got overly excited if I was late when I was with Matthew, but I don’t have those steady periods other girls do. I never did. And besides, even if I am, I don’t know if I’ll ever tell Quickdraw. He has a big life to live.”
“So do you.”
“It’s different for the mother.”
“Only if you make it different for you.” Rork canted his head and studied her with those bi-colored brown and hazel eyes that never missed anything. “You like him.”
“I do not—”
“Lie.”
“He’s a stranger—”
“Lie.”
“I don’t want to ruin his life, Rork!”
He straightened his spine, and both his eyes turned the bright hazel of his wolf. “Truth. Which is why I’m accusing you of liking him. A pup won’t ruin a life, Annabelle.” His voice softened. “A pup gives purpose to good men.”
“I don’t know Quickdraw. What if he isn’t a good man?”
“You can’t just plan a life for yourself anymore,” he murmured, gesturing to her belly. “If you’re carrying a pup, it’s your responsibility to build his pack. You’ve always been a lone wolf, like me. I’ve always been on the outside, watching you struggle with what I turned you into. I wish you had been turned in a loving way, and had a healthy pack surrounding you, but that’s not what happened. That’s not what I gave you.”
“Rork, it’s okay. It was so long ago, and you didn’t mean to. Your wolf went crazy.”
“Doesn’t matter, Annabelle. Don’t make an excuse for my animal. It’s still what happened. I altered your life, and I made it hard for you to find people you can trust. You hide. You quit before you start. Quickdraw will show his merit if you let him. You go find out if he’s a good or a bad man. But we don’t play what-if games, Annabelle. That’s not how we grow. We succeed or we get hurt and learn, but we never quit a race before we begin. Do you understand?”
“You think I should take a test.”
“Yes.”
“And you think I should tell Quickdraw.”
“You said he has a big life.” Rork raised his eyebrows and leveled her with a serious look. “Go see if he can handle an even bigger one.”
Rork left without another word. He always did that. He was good at hellos, but never goodbyes. When he was done talking, he simply walked away.
Annabelle stared at the door as he closed it behind him, clenched her shaking hands at her sides. S
lowly, she forced her attention from the door to the envelope sitting on the table.
She didn’t have to take a test right away. It was her choice to wait. To not get her hopes or fears up. She didn’t have to tell Quickdraw right away either. She could see him and talk to him and gauge for herself whether he would be any good at this.
And if not? Then at least she knew. She could come back home and prepare a life and do her best alone.
Either way, Rork was right.
She wasn’t one to live on what-ifs.
Chapter Two
I’ll be there.
Quickdraw read the text for the twentieth time. It was real. He hadn’t imagined it, he hadn’t made it up, and it was right there on his phone.
He sat in front of the Terminal A arrivals in Casper, Wyoming, nervous as a virgin on prom night.
What the fuck was wrong with him? His hands were even sweating.
Quickdraw rubbed his palms on his jeans, and then gripped the wheel in a choking grasp. Everything was fine. All he wanted was to get to know her a little better, and that little she-wolf was playing hard to get. She barely responded to him, and maybe that was part of the draw.
He was the number one bucking bull shifter in the world right now. He could have any buckle bunny he wanted, but he’d never been interested in easy. He was a worker, and Annabelle? She was work.
Her flight had landed twenty minutes ago, and she would be walking through that sliding glass door and out to his truck any moment.
In front of him was a Mercedes, behind him was an Audi, and his mud-splattered, jacked-up Chevy stuck out like a sore thumb.
In his defense, he’d washed his truck yesterday because he was nervous as hell and wanted everything to be perfect for her. And that’s when the what-the-fuck-was-wrong-with-him took over because he didn’t normally do this. He didn’t get nervous. Not talking to girls, not talking to interviewers, not being on TV, and not when he bucked in front of thousands in rodeo arenas every couple of weeks. It just wasn’t him. He was Steady Eddie. But this girl? This werewolf? One night with her had drawn him up and changed his whole way of thinking.