The Comeback Cowboy

by Cathy McDavid

  “Sorry, I need to take this call,” he told the students nearest him, and nudged Hamm into a fast walk away from the group. Stopping about twenty feet away, he answered the call. “Hey, Dana.”

  From his chosen spot, he could see Adele frowning at him. Too late, Ty realized there was probably something in the rules and regulations he hadn’t yet read about no cell-phone calls during class. Oh, well, he’d already screwed up.

  “How’s it going, bro?”

  “Not so great.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m sitting here in a beginners’ class.”

  “Really! Doing what? Showing the students how it’s done?”

  “No, attending. Actually, attending as little as possible.”

  “I guess a refresher course never hurts.”

  He should have figured Dana would agree with Pop’s suggestion, being it was her idea to come to Cowboy College.

  “Right. I could be doing this in my sleep.”

  “So prove it.”

  “You’re not serious.” He laughed.

  “I am, Ty. You need to figure out what’s not working, and fix it. Taking a beginner class might seem ridiculous, but you need a new perspective, and I’m all for trying anything. You should be, too, if you want to win that championship.”

  Ty tamped down his rising annoyance. It had been a long time since anyone had lectured him. A long time since he’d felt he deserved a lecture.

  A quick glance at Adele confirmed yet another talking-to might be in store for him. She looked about as happy with him as his sister sounded.

  “This isn’t easy for me, Dana.” The admission came with an uncomfortable tightening in his gut.

  “I know, honey. But I’m one of the people who has your back, remember?”

  “And I appreciate it.”

  “You couldn’t have two better experts there.”

  “I agree with you about Pop Donnelly. And I wouldn’t mind half so much if he was teaching the class.”

  “What’s wrong with Adele Donnelly?”

  There was nothing wrong with her that Ty could see. It was his ego having the problem. Granted, he’d asked for her help yesterday, but that was in a weak moment. This morning, when he’d faced himself in the bathroom mirror, he wished he’d asked Pop for help instead.

  It wasn’t too late. He’d get through this one class and seek out the older man. Maybe then he wouldn’t feel like so much of a loser. Or have an entire group of people witnessing his shame.

  “You practice with a woman roper,” Dana prompted.

  “It’s different with you.”

  “Because I’m not competing against you in the same sport?”

  “Yikes.” Ty grimaced. “That smarts.”

  “Give Adele a chance before you hightail it out of there.”

  How did his sister know he’d been contemplating leaving? “Fine. I promise to stay another couple days.”

  “You said a month.” Her tone dared him to defy her.

  “Okay, okay. You win.”

  “Call me if you need anything.”

  “I will.” They disconnected after saying goodbye.

  Ty silenced his cell phone and walked Hamm over to the group, smiling apologetically to his classmates and Adele, who blatantly ignored him. All right, he deserved that. Leaning forward and propping a forearm on the saddle horn, he made an effort to really listen to her. After several minutes passed, he had to agree she knew her stuff. She certainly had the attention of all the students.

  “Are we ready to try? Who wants to go first?”

  Hands shot into the air, none of them Ty’s.

  “All right, how about you, Mike?” She picked the husband of the woman Ty’d been talking to earlier.

  He sat quietly on Hamm, watching Mike and the others take their turns one by one. He easily and quickly spotted the errors with each student. Adele did, too, and patiently explained it to them in laymen’s terms the students could comprehend. When everyone had done it, Adele’s gaze landed on him.

  “You’re up next, Ty.”

  He moved into position behind the bale of hay. Hamm pawed the ground, far more eager to get started than his owner.

  “Wait. We’re going to do this a little differently with you. Put up your rope.”

  “My rope?”

  “Then drop your reins and kick your feet out of the stirrups.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “No hands, no legs.”

  “Why?” he asked.

  “You don’t think you can stay seated?” Her green eyes flashed up at him.

  He attached his lasso to his saddle with the rope strap. “Ma’am, I can break a green horse riding bareback and with one hand tied behind my back.”

  “Then this should be a cakewalk for you.” She stepped away from him.

  With a shrug of his shoulders, his hands resting on his thighs and his legs dangling, he waited for the wrangler to take off on the ATV.

  “One more thing,” Adele said, the lowered brim of her cowboy hat partially hiding her face. “You have to do it with your eyes closed.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Eyes closed, Mr. Boudeau.”

  Was she smiling?

  Ty decided to go along with her rather than put up a fight. He’d promised Dana, and besides, the students might learn something from watching him.

  “Go!” he told the wrangler.

  Hamm took off after the bale of hay as if it were the real thing. Because the wrangler didn’t drive the ATV very fast, Hamm’s gait was an easy lope rather than a full-out gallop, as it would be in the arena.

  Ty set down deep in the saddle, adjusting himself to the horse’s rhythm. Trying to, he amended. It wasn’t as easy as he might have guessed. Not with his eyes closed and his legs dangling. As the driver zigzagged, mimicking the course a calf might take, Ty felt—really felt—the nuances of Hamm’s muscles bunching and releasing when he changed directions. Ty shifted accordingly, to compensate for the horse’s movements, thinking about it rather than doing it instinctively as he should.

  After thirty feet, the wrangler slowed to a stop. Hamm also slowed. Opening his eyes, Ty used the pressure of his legs to guide his horse in a circle and back toward the group. Once there, he stopped and rubbed his neck, contemplating what had just happened.

  “You look perplexed,” Adele said, studying him.

  “Not that so much,” he answered.

  She’d put him through a very basic exercise, one, he realized in hindsight, he should have tried himself. Perhaps if he had, the results wouldn’t be quite so startling.

  Ty trusted himself as a rider. What he’d learned today was that he didn’t trust Hamm. Not entirely and not enough. His other horse’s accident had robbed Ty of that vital component to a successful rider-horse partnership, and the tiny fear that it would happen again was causing him to hold back.

  “Ty?” Adele asked.

  He grinned suddenly and waved to the wrangler to come back around.

  “I want to go again.”

  “HEY, ADELE, hold on a minute.”

  Hearing her name, she stopped and turned to see Ty hurrying after her. Uh-oh. He was probably annoyed at her for what she’d pulled on him during class earlier. Squaring her shoulders, she waited for him to catch up, committed to defending her actions.

  “Can I help you with something?” She smiled, pretending she didn’t notice the Ben Affleck–like perfection of Ty’s strong, dimpled chin or the fluttering in her middle that ogling his chin caused. “Perhaps a copy of the rules and regulations you obviously lost.”

  “I guess I deserve that.” He returned her smile with a healthy dose of chagrin. “No more phone calls. You have my word.”

  She was glad to see he didn’t take offense at her more-serious-than-humorous jest. Rules were rules, in place for a reason, and Ty Boudeau didn’t get to break them just because he was a professional roper.

  “You’re allowed one mistake before we start gi
ving demerits. Ten demerits, however, and you’re kicked off the ranch.”

  His startled expression was so comical, she almost laughed. “I’m joking.”

  The hint of a twinkle lit his eyes. “You’re good, you know.”

  “I’ve had a lot of practice keeping unruly students in line.”

  “No denying I’m one of those unruly students in need of lining out, but that’s not what I meant.”

  “Oh?”

  “You’re good at spotting what a person’s doing wrong. Me included.”

  She knitted her brows in confusion. “I didn’t notice you doing anything wrong.”

  “Maybe not exactly. But the exercise helped me understand some things about myself. Things that need fixing.”

  “Not many competitors at your level would admit to that. I’m impressed.”

  “Don’t be. I’m usually thickheaded. A good suggestion could be driving a Mack truck straight at me, and I’d ignore it.”

  “I’ll remember that next time.”

  He moved closer. “I just wanted was to thank you for the help.”

  “You’re welcome.” She worried that he was going to take her hand again. Relief flooded her when he didn’t. One intimate encounter was more than she could handle. “Have a productive remainder of your day, Mr. Boudeau.”

  “If you don’t mind, I’d like to pick your brain sometime when you have a minute.”

  She debated refusing his request. In the end, she decided to grant it. He was a paying guest, after all, and part of the fees they charged entitled students to “pick her brain,” as he said.

  “I’m heading over to check on one of our expectant mares. You can come with me if you like.”

  His dark eyes, arresting to begin with, lit up. “I would.”

  “I’m not keeping you from anything important, am I?”

  He fell step in beside her. “Only the horde of adoring female fans waiting for me in the lobby.”

  She momentarily faltered. “If you have to go…”

  “I’m kidding.” He flashed her his heart-stopping grin.

  It appeared she was just as gullible as him.

  He surprised her during their walk with the questions he asked, which were detailed and thought provoking. Did tie-down straps really help horses stop faster, or hinder them? How did she feel about the new Professional Cowboy Association regulations, and did they affect her teaching methods? What kind of personal fitness regime, if any, did she recommend for her students?

  More than once, Adele found herself examining the techniques of roping from a different and enlightening perspective.

  “Here’s where Pop and I keep our private stock,” she told Ty when they entered the smallest of the ranch’s three barns. At the end of the aisle, they came to a double-wide stall separated from the other horses by twenty feet and a six-foot wall.

  “And this is Crackers,” Adele said by way of introduction.

  Upon seeing her, the heavily pregnant mare nickered softly and lumbered over from the corner where she’d been standing, to hang her shaggy head over the stall door.

  Adele stroked the animal’s neck. “She was my first barrel-racing horse. Gosh, was that really fourteen years ago?”

  “Did you compete professionally?” Ty asked. He stood beside her, his elbow propped on the stall door.

  “A little in college.”

  “Any good?”

  “All right.”

  “Why’d you quit?”

  She absently combed her fingers through Crackers’s mane. “I came here after graduation to help Pop with the ranch. He’d turned seventy, and his arthritis was getting bad. He needed help, and I needed a job.” She didn’t mention her grandmother’s death. “I’ve always loved Seven Cedars, and spent a lot of time here when I was growing up.”

  “Did your parents rodeo?”

  “My dad. Though he never did all that well, and moved to Texas years ago. My mom traveled the rodeo circuit considerably longer than Dad, but not to compete.”

  Adele didn’t elaborate. Despite Ty’s friendliness, she wasn’t ready to confess that her mother had taken up with whatever cowboy would have her, dropping Adele off with her grandparents if her father wouldn’t have her. As her mother aged and her looks faded, those cowboys went from being competitors to bullfighters to stock handlers. In between men, she’d find a small place to rent for herself and Adele, but only until another man came along. For a young girl feeling unloved and unwanted, Seven Cedars became a haven in an otherwise turbulent childhood.

  “So, Pop taught you to rope.”

  “He was a man ahead of his time. In those days, women didn’t rope. Period.” She opened the stall door and went in to give Crackers a closer inspection.

  “She looks close,” Ty observed.

  “Soon.” The foal had dropped considerably in the last week, but otherwise, Crackers showed no signs of delivering. “She’s due this week.”

  “Her first?”

  “Second. Up until a few years ago, we used her steadily for beginner students. When her stamina began to fade, we decided to breed her.” Adele patted Crackers’s rump, then left the stall and shut the door behind her. “She’s got good lines, and she’s a good mama.”

  “And she’s your first horse.”

  “Pop bought her for me when I was a freshman in high school. There were always plenty of horses to ride wherever I lived, but she was the first one that was truly mine.” Latching the stall door, she met Ty’s gaze. “Cook will be serving dinner soon, and I need to get back to my office first.”

  “Will I see you in the dining hall?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Adele made a point of sharing dinner each evening with the students, often moving from one table to another. That way, she got to know them on a more personal level. Breakfast and lunch, however, were hit-or-miss and often consumed on the run.

  At the entrance to the barn, she and Ty separated, each heading to their own vehicle. Hers was parked closer, and she hesitated before climbing in, stilled by the sight of Ty striding to his truck.

  It had been a very long time since Adele had met a man who gave her that uncomfortable yet deliciously thrilling feeling every time she got within ten feet of him.

  She silently warned herself to proceed with caution. Ty Boudeau had all the makings of a heartbreaker, and as much as she might want to get to know him on a more “personal level,” she was far better off keeping her distance.

  Men who spent inordinate amounts of time on the road didn’t make good husbands. It was one of the many lessons her parents’ failed marriage and her mother’s endless stream of lovers had taught Adele.

  Chapter Three

  Ty drove through the small town of Markton, the closest community to Cowboy College. It could hardly be described as a metropolis, but he liked its grassroots country charm, its one stoplight at the intersection of Main Street and Brown, and the way everybody waved at everybody else.

  Markton was a far cry from Santa Fe, where he’d grown up. He couldn’t say lived because once he’d left home to rodeo full-time, he traveled six to nine months a year. When he needed to crash for a while, he stayed at his older sister’s place. His fifth-wheel trailer parked behind the barn was, sad to say, the closest thing he had to a permanent residence.

  He drove along Main Street at the posted speed of thirty-five, enjoying his free afternoon and taking in the various sights. The Spotted Horse Saloon. The feed store. Bush’s General Store. The elementary school. The barbershop and its counterpart, Goldie’s Locks and Nail Salon.

  He’d often thought he might like to settle down in a town like Markton, and as he drove through it—end to end in less than five minutes—he contemplated where to stop first.

  The feed store, an always familiar stomping ground, looked to have possibilities. Ty pulled into an empty space across from a sign advertising a popular brand of dog food. Inside the store, he was greeted by the middle-aged man behind the counter, whose double t
ake was almost comical.

  “Ty Boudeau?” he asked with raised brows.

  “On a good day,” Ty joked.

  “We heard you were in town.” The man came around from behind the counter carrying a pen and piece of paper. “Name’s Henry Parkman.”

  “Pleased to meet you.”

  “If it’s not too much trouble, the wife would sure love to have your autograph.”

  “No trouble.”

  It felt good being asked. The requests for autographs had tapered off since he’d lost at Nationals. Ty preferred to think it was because he hadn’t been competing of late, not that he’d fallen from grace.

  As he scribbled his name on the notepad, Henry Parkman produced his cell phone, held it at arm’s reach, leaned in close and snapped a picture of him and Ty.

  “For the wife.” He grinned sheepishly. “Anything special I can help you with today?”

  “Just browsing.”

  “Holler if you need me,” he said to Ty, returning to his place behind the cash register.

  Ty gravitated to the back of the store where the saddles and a rather impressive assortment of lariats hung on the wall. Though he wasn’t in the market for another one, he removed several from the wall display and tested them for weight and flexibility.

  For reasons he chose not to address, he avoided the Iron Grip Ropes—though it probably had something to do with the face smiling at him from the rope’s cardboard wrapper. Garth Maitland. The man who’d beat out Ty for the championship last December.

  “Mr. Boudeau?” The cracking voice belonged to a teenager who bore a striking resemblance to Stick. “Hi.”

  “Hate to bother you, sir,” he said, his exceptionally large Adam’s apple bobbing as he talked, “but could I trouble you for an autograph?”

  “Are you by chance related to Stick over at Cowboy College?” Ty asked as he signed the kid’s ball cap with a black marker.

  The teen’s eyes went wide. “He’s my cousin.”

  “Well, he’s a pretty good worker. But don’t tell him I said so.”

  “I—I won’t,” the kid stammered, and made a beeline for the door.

  Ty wasn’t in the market for a new pair of boots, either, but he checked out the selection just for something to do. The front-door buzzer went off every few minutes as customers came and left. Deciding he could possibly use a new leather belt, he picked one out and headed to the counter.