Her Cowboy Billionaire Bull Rider: An Everett Sisters Novel (Christmas in Coral Canyon Book 5)

by Liz Isaacson

“There you go,” she said. “We’ll get you up next time you wake up, okay? I think two broken legs deserves an extra bit of time to just relax.”

  If she thought he was relaxed, she couldn’t be further from the truth. But he said nothing as his eyelids grew heavy. Two broken legs.

  His last thought before he drifted back into a drugged sleep was What in the world am I going to do with two broken legs?

  The next time he woke, the brown-haired nurse made him get out of bed and Vi was nowhere to be found. The clock on the wall in the nurse’s station read four-fifteen, and the deathly silence of the place testified that it was indeed the middle of the night.

  He couldn’t walk—not with two broken legs, both of which had required surgery—so the nurse made him push himself around in a wheelchair. “Your muscles need to work,” she said. “So do what you can.”

  What he could do was frown at everything he saw and count down the minutes until he’d be allowed to wheel himself back into his room. But that only brought more embarrassment and humiliation, as it took three nurses to get him back into bed. They all looked a little sweaty and out of breath afterward, and they mercifully left him alone in the semi-dark room.

  Only minutes later, Vi opened the door and tiptoed in. When she saw he was awake, she startled and said, “Oh.”

  “Hey,” he said, his voice as unused and rusty as the rest of his body. He closed his eyes in a long blink, wishing he could fall asleep until he was fully healed.

  “I moved your things up to the main floor,” she said. “Graham and Laney have been here to visit, but I said I’d…take care of you.”

  Todd met her eye and they watched one another for several long heartbeats. He finally nodded. “Thank you, Miss Violet.”

  “The nurses let me sleep in here, but I just had to get out for a few minutes.”

  He understood that perfectly too. “You don’t have to sleep here.”

  She took a couple of hesitant steps toward him. “I wouldn’t want to be alone. But if you want to be alone, I’ll go. I mean, I don’t have to stay here. I’ll just go.” Her words tripped over themselves the more she said, and she rushed over to the recliner beside his bed to grab her purse.

  His brain was still slow from all the medication he’d been given, so it took him a minute to say, “Don’t go,” and he managed to catch her at the doorway before she left.

  She turned back to him, backlit by the light from the hallway. “Don’t go?”

  “Don’t go,” he said again, wiggling his fingers as a pathetic way of asking her to come back over to his bedside and hold his hand.

  She returned to the recliner much slower this time, set her purse on the floor, and sat on the chair. He watched her, wondering how much his expression was telling her. Definitely something, because she scooted to the edge of the recliner and wrapped his hand in both of hers.

  A smile touched his lips, and he let his eyes drift closed again.

  The next afternoon, Todd was just about to throw the remote control for the TV at the wall when his mother walked in. She stopped as if she’d been frozen to the ground and let her eyes travel from his feet to his head and back.

  “Oh, baby,” she said in her Texas drawl. She came forward and leaned over him, the peach-scented perfume so familiar and so wonderful that Todd felt like he might cry. She kissed his forehead like she’d done when he was just a boy, and she gave him a quick hug.

  “Who called you?” he asked. Vi had gone home to shower that morning, and she’d brought Todd’s phone back. Apparently, Graham had found it out in the woods, and it had escaped the accident unscathed.

  “Graham, of course,” she said, taking Vi’s spot in the recliner. She’d gone down to the cafeteria to see if she could rustle up some pie and smuggle it back to his room. A vein of nervousness ran through him. How would he introduce her to his mother?

  She’d held his hand in the wee hours of the morning. It was a friendly thing to do, that was all. At least Todd hadn’t let his mind wander down any other road.

  “What happened?”

  Todd related the story to her, the snakes, the horse, the rearing up, everything he could remember.

  “Graham said you landed on a tree root,” she said. “That’s why your leg broke. Didn’t land on flat ground.”

  And he’d certainly landed on plenty of flat ground. He’d trained for years to jump right back up, even if his brains felt scrambled.

  “And his wife—such a nice woman—said you tried to get up, and that was when they think the horse stepped on you, fracturing the other leg.”

  Todd had no idea, no memories of any of that in his head. And he’d seen the look on his mama’s face before. The one where she had something she wanted to say but was waiting for the right moment.

  “Say it, Ma,” he said.

  “Graham also said there’s a woman named Vi takin’ care of you.”

  “She’s…not taking care of me. I’m in the hospital. There are nurses for that.” He kept his eyes on the game show he didn’t care about.

  “You two live together?”

  “What? No.” Todd shook his head. “We’re both staying at the lodge. Temporarily. She’s only going to be here for a little bit.” He couldn’t remember if she’d said weeks or months. “And I’m only at the lodge until I find someplace of my own.” A ranch or a homestead, he wasn’t sure. And this accident would definitely set him back in those plans, in moving on, in making a life for himself outside of the rodeo.

  “There’s another woman there too,” he said. “Bree something.” He hadn’t met her, and Vi had said she’d be gone for a few more weeks. But he wasn’t living with Vi.

  “Mm,” his mama said, and Todd felt visited out. “Well, Taylor won down in Amarillo.” She went on to detail Taylor’s bulls, and his roping, and Todd found it all very boring. Strange, he thought. Only a few months ago, the rodeo was his whole life. It had consumed him for decades, and he honestly had no idea who he was or where he should be without it.

  But he knew he didn’t want to go back to it.

  Thank you for a good life, he prayed, not wanting God to think he wasn’t appreciative for all he’d been given. All he’d worked for and achieved. But what do I do now?

  He thought about the question, hoping an idea might take root in his mind. But nothing formed out of his circular thoughts. His mom kept talking, and Todd only had to “hmm” every now and then to keep her going.

  Exhaustion pressed down on him, but he couldn’t ask her to leave. She’d come all the way here from Texas. “How long are you staying in town?” he asked when she hit a lull in the one-sided conversation.

  Before she could answer, Vi burst into the room with a loud giggle and hurried to close the door behind her. “Good news. I got peach and lemon meringue.” She took a few steps toward him, reaching into her purse to procure the two slices of pie.

  When she looked up and met Todd’s eyes, her gaze immediately flew to his mother’s. “Oh.”

  And down went the peach pie—a real shame in Todd’s opinion.

  Chapter Six

  Vi stared at the older woman in the room, obviously Todd’s mother. She had the same eyes and the same sloped nose. “Hello,” she said, putting on her celebrity skin. She could charm the best of them, act like she was deliriously happy to be somewhere she wasn’t, and make small talk until the cows came home.

  She left the pie on the floor where it had splatted and stepped over it. “I’m Violet Everett.”

  His mother shot to her feet, her eyes widening—a common reaction when one of the sisters said their names. “Oh my goodness.” Her gaze bounced from Todd to Vi. “You didn’t say she was famous.”

  “Oh, didn’t I?” Todd’s gray eyes sparked with lightning, and Vi almost started giggling again. She tamed the flirtatious behavior behind a plastic smile and extended her hand.

  “You must be Todd’s mother. Graham said he was calling you.”

  His mom recovered quickly, and s
he shook Vi’s hand. “Yes. Yes, I’m Vanessa Christopherson.” She patted her hair as if she would be lunching with the queen, and Vi kept smiling at her.

  “How was your flight in? Everything went okay?”

  “Yes,” she said, recovering well. She’d obviously spent a little time in the spotlight herself. “I was just about to tell Todd I have to leave in the morning. It was the only flight they had that made it so I could get down to Tallahassee. My other son is riding down there for a championship.” She spoke with a measure of pride in her voice, and Vi actually liked it. She was obviously close with her sons, and Vi edged around to the other side of the bed, where a hard chair had been pushed into the corner.

  She took it and removed the other piece of pie from her purse. “It’ll have to be lemon meringue.”

  Todd wore half a smile and a knowing look in his eyes. In fact, an entire conversation happened in the two seconds they looked at each other, without a single word being said. Then he said, “Thanks, Vi,” and reached for the plastic fork she’d procured from a side pocket of her bag.

  Vi got up and cleaned up the peach pie, a growing pit in her stomach. And not just because she’d been fantasizing about feeding Todd the pie. Or maybe him feeding it to her. She shook the images from her head and commanded herself to be real.

  He couldn’t be all that interested in her. He craved the outdoors, and she only went outside to get to the salon, or to a movie, or because she had to. She didn’t ride horses—or bulls—and he knew everything about both. Everywhere she was soft, he was hard.

  But she had enjoyed holding his hand, and listening to him breathe while he slept, and though he seemed absolutely miserable, Vi was looking forward to helping him if she could. She’d been praying for some purpose in her life, and she couldn’t help thinking that nursing Todd Christopherson back to health was an answer from the Lord.

  The next morning, Vi woke in her bed on the second floor. She’d decided she didn’t need to stay in the room with his mother there. It had become awkward after about an hour of the woman talking about her daughter in Grand Junction, and Vi had slipped out behind the nurse when Todd’s dinner came.

  The scent of coffee rode on the air, and Vi sat up. Was she living in some sort of Groundhog Day scenario? She darted over to the window, but she couldn’t tell if things were the same or different. The sky seemed just as gray today as it had the morning Todd had been injured, so she threw on a sweater and headed downstairs.

  Singing met her ears as she descended, and she found Celia in the kitchen, belting out a song as she chopped onions. She caught sight of Vi and stopped singing to smile. “Good morning.”

  “I wasn’t expecting you today,” Vi said.

  “Oh, I know,” the older woman said. “But Graham told me about Todd’s accident—well, the whole town knows. What with him being so famous and all. Did you know he grew up here?—Anyway. I said I’d come get a bunch of food in the freezer for you two.” She beamed at Vi like she’d just found the cure for cancer, and Vi had no idea what to say.

  You two.

  As if Vi couldn’t make them something to eat.

  She had passable skills in the kitchen, thank you very much. And Todd wouldn’t be back at the lodge for days.

  As quickly as her irritation had sprung up, it withered away. She liked Celia, and Celia liked cooking, and Vi appreciated having food. And hey, Graham paid Celia, so it wasn’t like Vi had to do anything.

  “Thank you,” she said, putting a smile on her face. Celia’s coffee was fifty times better than Todd’s, and she drank two mugs before heading upstairs to shower. She drove down the canyon with a belly full of French toast, which Celia whipped up in a matter of minutes, and parked at the hospital.

  She hadn’t expressly told Todd she’d be back today. He hadn’t asked. No one had told her his schedule, or what she should expect him to be like. And why would they? She wasn’t his girlfriend, or his fiancée, or his wife.

  But no one questioned her when she pushed through the door on the third floor, and hardly anyone looked at her as she approached his room. So she went right in to find the space empty. When she asked at the nurse’s station, she was told he’d gone for a walk.

  She cocked her head, and the nurse explained with, “Margo is pushing him around outside. He doesn’t like being inside much.”

  Vi laughed and agreed with her. “Well, I’ll just wait for him then.” She returned to his room and relaxed in the recliner, glad she hadn’t had to sleep there for another night. It seemed odd that she could smell Todd’s cologne among all the more stringent scents of the hospital, but she swore she could.

  She heard him laughing before he came through the door, both legs straight out in front of him. Margo was a pretty auburn-haired nurse whose cheeks seemed a bit on the overly flushed side as she wheeled Todd back into his room.

  A sudden flash of jealousy mixed with betrayal struck Vi somewhere behind her lungs. Her breath hitched on the way in, but she pushed it out easily as she met Todd’s eye. His laughter stalled in his throat, as if he’d been caught flirting with another woman—which of course, he had.

  Did he flirt with everyone with the double-X chromosome?

  The pinch in Vi’s chest intensified. Probably. He was a rodeo champion who’d toured on the circuit for over two decades. She’d never personally dated a bull rider, but Rose had, and he’d had a different girlfriend in every city he’d visited.

  Idiot, Vi chastised herself as she rose.

  “Margo was just taking me on a walk,” he said.

  “I heard,” Vi said, putting that plastic smile on her face and hating it. She didn’t want to hide behind a mask when it came to Todd, and that was a huge indicator to show how she felt about him. She stayed out of the way while Margo-the-giggling-nurse helped Todd get back into the bed. She lifted his legs and put them in the apparatus’s that were supposed to ease his pain and make sure he didn’t further injure himself.

  “I’ll check your chart for meds,” she said before scampering out of the room.

  As soon as she was gone, Vi reached into her purse and withdrew the treat she’d bought at the gas station on her way to the hospital. “One chocolate pie.”

  Todd looked at it and then Vi, his eyes sparkling with laughter. “You’re such a sneak.”

  “Hey, I’ve been in the hospital,” she said. “The food here is terrible.”

  He took the pie and she pushed the tray over so it was positioned in front of him. “Why were you in the hospital?”

  “Once, we had a concert down in Orlando. Have you been down there?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “Florida’s nice.”

  “It’s almost about one hundred percent humidity, and I got dehydrated, if you can believe that. Almost passed out on stage.”

  “Oh, wow.” He seemed interested in the story. “Did you?”

  “Rose saw me ‘acting weird’ she said, and she signaled our stage manager. Thankfully, they got me out of the spotlight before I collapsed.” Vi remembered that night in Orlando, and she never wanted to repeat it. The lightheadedness, the feeling of floating, then falling, then failing.

  She hadn’t finished the concert, and they’d ended up doing a second show there the following night for free. “I remember waking up to the smell of chicken broth and my whole family was there.”

  “That must’ve been nice,” Todd said, a touch of bitterness in the words.

  “Your mother came,” Vi said gently.

  “For less than twenty-four hours.” He looked away, a muscle jumping in his jaw. “I don’t know what I was expecting. The rodeo has always come first in my family. Always.”

  “Are you—did your dad ride?”

  “And my grandpa before him, and his dad before him.” Todd moved his gaze back to hers. “I’m one of the legendary Christophersons, didn’t you know?”

  Vi couldn’t tell if he was joking or not. “I had no idea,” she said dryly. “I mean, that billboard on the way into town i
s really vague.”

  That got him to laugh, and Vi felt like she’d accomplished something worthwhile that day. Maybe she wasn’t as cute or petite as Margo, but Todd reached over and slipped his fingers through hers. Hers, not Margo’s.

  Still, she had to know. “So I’m just going to ask this at the risk of hurting your feelings.”

  Todd’s grip tightened. “Hurting my feelings?”

  “My sister dated a bull rider once, and she was one of about ten girlfriends. I’m not really into that scene, you know?”

  Todd blinked at her, his light eyes so beautiful it almost hurt to look directly into them. “Was it Aaron Roberts?”

  “Yes,” Vi said, squinting at him. “How did you know that?”

  Todd started laughing again, the sound deep and rich and wonderful, and Vi figured she might as well give the man her heart right now. She gripped it tighter, knowing she couldn’t go around doing that anymore. She never got it back with all the right pieces, and it hurt to try to stitch it back together.

  “Aaron had quite the reputation,” he said.

  “I suppose you did too, then,” Vi said, still pressing for the answer he hadn’t given yet.

  “I suppose I did,” he said, teasing her with that glorious smile, those straight white teeth. She wondered how much those had cost and if he’d paid for them or if the PRCA had.

  “And?”

  “Oh, you want to know what it was?”

  Vi cocked her head at him. “You know what? It doesn’t matter.” She stood and extracted her fingers from his. “I have to—”

  “I was the designated driver,” he said. “Like, that’s what everyone called me. Big win and you wanted to go party? Bring Todd, because he doesn’t drink and will make sure everyone gets home safe. See a pretty girl in the stands you want to hook up with? Tell Todd, because he’ll make sure she gets home safe.”

  Vi stared at him, trying to understand.

  He reached for her again, and she returned to his side and sat down. The warmth from his fingers filled her whole body, and she imagined her face to be as flushed as Margo’s had been.