Beside him AJ paled, his brown skin losing all its light, but neither Lil nor The Old Man saw. They had eyes only for each other.
Horrifyingly, hers filled with moisture. More horrifyingly, his did, too.
Shaking his head, he whispered, the sound carrying in his rich voice but meant for her, “I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”
She’d waited a lifetime to hear those words, and they’d been perfect, exactly what she’d wanted him to say and never even known. He somehow had. The thought flickered across her mind and heart that the knowing was what they meant when they talked about inheritance—the bond that connected them explained all the strange quirks of her personality and existence.
But after AJ she was already bleeding out. She couldn’t lose any more of herself and still survive.
Shaking her head, she shuttered her gaze, slamming an invisible wall down between them as if holding him at a distance could undo the revelation that had already occurred.
“It’s too late.” She didn’t mean to say the words out loud, but they were true. It was too late. It was all too little, too late. AJ was too old to learn new tricks and she was too old to discover a father she’d never known.
It wasn’t worth it. She couldn’t do it.
She knew it with the same cool clarity with which she spoke. “I’m sorry. I must’ve been mistaken. That can’t be right. I just wanted to ask you about this week’s challenge.” Her words were brittle, but she was proud of them. She was holding it together remarkably well.
Body rigid as if stung, The Old Man caught his breath, but simply nodded.
Still pale, AJ took a step toward her, but she shook her head.
If he touched her, she’d fall apart, and that was something she couldn’t afford, not with all of the cameras in the room trained on her, not surrounded by people.
She needed air. That was what she needed. The camera was going to love this, the ratings too, she thought, strangely removed from the fact that her most private moment had been the stuff of good TV. She’d given them enough. Her hopes, her dreams, her heart—all of it for the world to see and she needed some freaking air. They could give her that.
And if they couldn’t, she was going to take it anyway. She strode from the gym, posture daring anyone to try and follow her, the sound of her boots hitting the concrete floor echoing in the heavy silence she left in her wake.
They’d start talking again as soon as she was gone, she knew. Talking and generating copy and web content and editing the video for teaser trailers. The Closed Circuit couldn’t have done better if they’d scripted it.
Outside, she put her hands on her hips and paced. No one approached, and for that she was grateful. She wouldn’t have put it past the greenies to sidle up for video exclusives.
She was going to have to go back in there, back in there where it was too much with AJ and too late with her father. And she was going to, because the ranch was on the line, and because she was the first female rough stock champion of the PBRA, and because she was her gran and granddad’s granddaughter.
With a breath, she squared her shoulders and walked back inside.
Whatever else was going on, she had a challenge to win.
AJ’s challenge was a week of serving as a mentor and coach for a select group of interested CityBoyz candidates, all of whom eagerly awaited the return of the program after AJ’s sure win—never mind that Lil had been giving him a run for his money.
Each of the final three contestants had been assigned two mentees, and the goal was simple: get the greenhorn from never having ridden a horse, to lasting eight seconds on the mechanical bull known as Shirley.
“Shirley,” The Old Man explained, every word he spoke a painful and yearning dart in Lil’s flesh, “is old and slow, but don’t think that means she doesn’t still have tricks up her sleeve. Believe me, our old girl can still throw a pro.” He’d smiled as he said the last, his eyes lighting warmly on AJ and AJ returned the expression with open affection.
The fact that AJ had had him in his life, a volunteer father figure, while she and gran and granddad had mourned the absence of her mother alone all those years was bitter salt in an old wound.
As an experienced coach and mentor, and having gone through the program himself, AJ already had the advantage in the challenge, not to mention the fact that all the candidates hero-worshipped him and had a vested interest in his winning—it wasn’t fair that he got her father, too.
But of course he had her father, because CityBoyz was her father’s creation, his heart and soul offered to the world. Swirling between emotions too big to name and the vertigo of that, of knowing that now she wasn’t just trying to beat AJ, but her father as well, was threatening to unravel her.
That it was a father she’d never known somehow made it only worse. As did the fact that she’d met her father as an “enemy,” just as he, and his emissary in AJ, were a threat to everything she held dear.
Torn in two directions was a terrible place to start a challenge and it didn’t get easier.
Lil’s mentees, a fifteen-year-old named Carlos Jones and a seventeen-year-old by the name of George Barnes, both towered over Lil and, to their minds, that meant she couldn’t possibly know more than them about rodeo.
It’d taken three days of both of them getting thrown by Shirley multiple times to prove to them without a doubt that Lil, who had not been thrown once, had it—and, more importantly, that they did not—before they finally settled into listening to her. Even then, their attention was dicey, forever snagging on whatever it was that the great AJ Garza happened to be doing at any given moment—a fact she had little tolerance for no matter how much she could relate. They had two days left when they finally found their groove as a group, after Lil realized that teen boys weren’t all that different from goats, which was recalcitrant, wayward, overenergized, and far too clever for their own good.
But even then, loathe to admit that she wasn’t, Lil couldn’t really get her head in the game. She’d be working with Carlos on balance and hear AJ and then Carlos would be on the ground. She’d catch herself midsentence, trailing off in answering George’s questions about grip and positioning because her father had snagged her eye and she was as helpless as a little girl to do anything but watch him in fascination.
It was all just too much, and being so far from home, so far from the wide-open spaces where she could usually leave it, she just couldn’t seem to set any of it down and get the job done. It didn’t help that for the first time in her rodeo life, she also couldn’t channel it into the ride. Pouring her emotional turmoil into two struggling teen boys was a recipe for disaster of monumental proportions. They’d deserved better than that from her, and she’d been determined to give it to them—even if sometimes staving that catastrophe off was about all she could muster.
Of course, it hadn’t been enough—not for the boys and not to earn first draw.
Yes, both boys had made it, each one lasting the full eight seconds without being thrown or technically disqualified, but neither boy looked any good doing it. And that, and the fact that they’d tried to hide the embarrassment they felt even amongst all their triumph, felt worse than coming in third—especially after AJ’s mentees looked like young pros and Hank’s even seemed to have a decent grip on things. She’d let the boys down, maybe even turned them off rodeo. She certainly hadn’t proven the strength of her granddad’s training methods. She hadn’t really shown anything at all, and because of it, she’d lost out on her draw and she was going into the finale down valuable points. And through it all, she still hadn’t spoken to either AJ or Mr. Henry Bowman.
35
AJ hadn’t seen her since they’d arrived in Vegas. The greenies had informed him that Lil had gone immediately to her hotel room and not been seen since, and his stomach clenched. She’d kept herself removed from everyone ever since her scene with The Old Man.<
br />
The moment never lost its intensity, no matter how many times he recalled it. That The Old Man, the man he loved like a father, was Lil’s father, and he hadn’t known was mind-blowing.
It was so obvious now—the way she rode, the preternatural balance, her eyes. God, her eyes. How had he not guessed? How many people had gray eyes in the world? How many Black people? It was so obvious and it hadn’t even occurred to him because he’d been so lost in everything else that she was. Everything that she’d pulled back and locked up.
He was worried about her. He wanted to go to her, rattle her out of her self-imposed exile and rustle a laugh out of her, shake her loose enough to make her realize what he was offering—what The Old Man was.
The ball was in her court now, though, and they’d both just have to wait.
He’d laid his cards on the table and he wasn’t about to beg after her like a sad puppy. She had to make the next move.
But he hadn’t seen her now in days, so he had no idea what progress was happening. So while it might be her turn to make a move, it didn’t hurt to check in and see how she was coming along.
That was why he stood outside of her hotel door, knocking.
She opened the door a crack and peeked out of it.
“What do you want?”
Her eyes were puffy again, the inside of her room dim.
“Open the door, Lil,” he ordered.
When she did as he said without pushback, he worried.
She stood aside to let him come in and closed the door after him.
Her duffel bag was on the entry bench and there was a water bottle by her seat. Otherwise everything was undisturbed inside.
“We could fix this before we go on, you know.” He spoke softly, like she might spook. He had a feeling that was a distinct possibility.
She eyed him, a line of alert tension visible through her body. “Nothing needs to be fixed, as far as I know.”
AJ let out a laugh that was arid for joy. “I was right and you know it, Lil. Stop being stubborn and give us both what we need.”
“What I need is to win and get back where I belong.”
AJ made a sweeping gesture around the space. “You’re going to need to do more than just show up if you want to win.”
“Thanks for the advice.” Her face was stony and uncompromising.
He said, “You’re better with me.”
Her eyes narrowed. “I’m as good as I am on my own. You’ve got nothing to do with it.”
He took a step closer, and she tilted her chin up to keep eye contact. “Stop this foolishness,” he said. “Take me home with you.”
Something sharp and scared flashed through her eyes, but was gone in an instant. “You won’t stay.”
He leaned in, bringing his lips closer to hers, and she strained up toward him, even if she wasn’t aware of it.
“I will.” He spoke softly, his mouth only inches from hers.
“Cowboys always leave,” she whispered before he closed the gap between their lips with a growl.
She opened for him immediately, her body going fluid as she sighed into it, relief virtually seeping from her every pore. She hadn’t just been wanting him, she’d needed him. He could feel the truth of it in her body’s urge to merge with his. But she needed to be the one to see it now.
He ended the kiss slowly, lingering on the first taste he’d had of her in ages, savoring even as his hunger grew for more.
He said, “You’re the cowboy, Lil,” and then he left.
Her taste lingered in his mouth, but he wouldn’t try again. The play was doomed if he followed her around like a fool. She had to come to him, but it was more of a challenge to hold his line with the whisper of her still on his tongue than it had been before.
Fortunately, he had a room to himself and a free afternoon ahead of him. It wouldn’t be glamorous, but there was relief in his future.
He’d planted the last seed with Lil. Now to wait and see if it sprouted.
36
While a woman dressed in all black rubbed Vaseline on her teeth, Lil wondered how she’d come to this place in her life.
She’d slept like garbage the night before but was dressed in her finest—the clothes she would wear for the finale. She’d braided her hair with immaculate precision that morning and it showed. A single thick braid began at her hairline and trailed along the central line of her skull and down her neck and back like an exposed spine. She’d freshened her undercut, shaving in a double lightning bolt on either side, in the process.
There were dark circles under her eyes, but they weren’t puffy anymore. She hadn’t cried last night, awake or in her sleep. AJ’s kiss had had her tossing and turning for other reasons, but she’d taken that gratefully over the alternative—especially the night before press day.
The Vaseline forced her smile wider and she turned on cue as the team shot her from multiple angles.
“Such delicate bones!” a woman with a white-blond pixie cut exclaimed.
“You’d never guess she was a rodeo star,” a bombshell redhead with shoulder-length hair said.
Everyone in the room wore black. The production team sported various combinations of boatneck tops, ballet flats, plain T-shirts, and jeans—all in black. Lil did too, but made it look Western, wearing black boots, Wranglers, and a button-up beneath her granddad’s vest.
They’d lost their minds when they’d seen it.
“This is definitely going to be the theme!”
“The whole thing! All around this!”
“Grab my blue pallet, Kelly!”
“Seriously, fabulous!”
Lil’d stammered thank-yous in reply, tried to get it out there that it was her gran’s work, and then followed the instructions they began shouting out at her.
“What fascinating eyes you have,” a woman with a sharp short black bob said as she powdered her face.
Lil grimaced, knowing now they were her father’s eyes, but mumbled, “Thank you,” by reflex.
Another woman shouted, “Keep your mouth open, please!” though, so she stopped trying to respond at all.
Which left her alone in her mind to dwell on AJ. The same thing she’d had far too much time to do recently.
She’d arrived in Vegas a sweating mess, questioning her instincts in ways she never had.
Her entire life was evidence of the truth: cowboys disappeared. Even if they said they loved you. Both things could be true.
Her body told a different story. One she knew better than to pay any attention to. His kiss sure knew how to linger. It was the thought that her mind most wanted to jump to whenever she stopped being vigilant.
Her body was tricky. It would sneak into it, creating brand-new pathways with each guerrilla attack. It might start as a phantom tingle across her lips and the memory of the pressure of his against hers. The next time it would be her breath catching, nipples hardening while her chest went heavy and sensitive at the memory of the way he’d stepped into her space. Once she’d wrangled it again, it’d return as something different yet again, a flavor on her tongue, a memory of the times before the kiss, times they’d gone further and he’d set her on fire from the inside out.
But she knew what happened to women who listened to their bodies. They died, abandoned in roadside motels, with only their mothers to identify them. And those men raised other children.
So she wouldn’t bend. Not when everything was at stake.
Following makeup, the day passed in a blur of videos, photo shoots, and the sponsor’s dinner.
Lil avoided both AJ and Hank wherever possible, allowing herself to be corralled with the two of them only for obligatory top three photos. She smiled until her face hurt, sad the Vaseline was no longer there to force a smile for her.
At the end of the day, she hung her clothes up to wear agai
n for the real deal the next day, and crawled into bed feeling painted on and sucked dry.
She woke up once, blamed it on AJ and forced herself back into a fitful sleep for the rest of the night.
In the morning, the hollows under her eyes were deeper, but her expression one of grim purpose.
One way or another, after tonight, it was all over. Tomorrow she’d be going home.
She splashed water on her face and repeated her braid from the day before. Later, she would put on the same vest and jeans she’d worn the day before, she’d don her chaps and hat, and she’d walk out to compete in the final event of the closed circuit reality rodeo.
They would draw their bulls just before go time, AJ first, Hank second, her with what was left, but every draw was a proven beast—Cortes, Shadow Haint, and Sweet Suzy—each one undefeated. Each one a certified man killer.
Once a bull got a taste for blood, it wanted more. Just like everything else.
Her mind hopped back to AJ before she dragged it back to the day ahead. She needed a plan. Breakfast, then...what? The afternoon stretched out ahead of her, the free time before the big event really more a tyranny than a boon. She could call AJ. Spend the day distracted by his body. Her heartbeat raced at the thought. But it wasn’t real. She couldn’t. Not if he loved her. She would feel it, and feeling it, she wouldn’t be able to deny him.
The body wouldn’t win.
But she needed something good for the mind. She settled on room service and binge-watching a costume drama. She’d have to keep it light with the snacking and even the most complicated plot wouldn’t be able to keep her mind fully off AJ and the event, but it was her best shot.
It was more effective than she’d imagined. Ten hours later, after her alarm had gone off, she came out of her TV stupor. She’d ordered cheese, charcuterie, and hummus platters and stuck to drinking water throughout the day and felt...good. Even when she’d changed into full gear and checked herself in the mirror one last time, the sense of peace lasted. Something good was going to happen—even if she lost, tonight was the night her stress would come to an end.
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