The Bull Rider Meets His Match

by Jeannie Watt

  “Nothing. Just—” she shrugged as casually as she could “—a long story. Not very interesting.” She smiled brightly, and Jared took the hint.

  “Yeah. Okay...” He took a look around the fairgrounds. His crew was mounted, and he walked over to open the gate so that they could ride the horses around the small arena where he’d be giving lessons, warming them up before the students arrived.

  “I’ll be in the stands,” Lex called after him. She went to the truck and pulled out her hat and her phone and then climbed the bleacher stairs to a seat high enough to see clearly but low enough that she could help if there were any unforeseen problems.

  An unforeseen problem arrived twenty minutes later in the form of one cocky bull rider. Lex practically smacked her forehead as Grady’s truck pulled up and two little girls with bouncing pigtails got out. Of course Annie’s twins would be taking lessons. And of course Grady would bring them here because Annie was running the store.

  Yay.

  Grady helped one of the little girls adjust her belt, kneeling and fiddling with the buckle, which was nearly as big as the kid. When he stood, the other twin grabbed his hand and pulled him toward the arena fence. Jared intercepted them, had a brief discussion and then the girls raced back to the truck and came back with helmets.

  Lex pulled her hat a little lower over her eyes, as if it would make her invisible. It didn’t work. When two more cars showed up and four more kids joined Annie’s twins, Grady turned toward the stands. And even at a distance, she could see him smile. It wasn’t a friendly smile, either.

  Lex shifted in her seat as he said a few words to Jared before making a beeline toward the stands.

  He walked up the steps and took a seat a few feet from Lex.

  “Morning,” he said as he settled, leaning back on his elbows on the seat behind him.

  “Yes,” Lex agreed. She did her best to ignore him, but it was like trying to ignore a panther sunning himself nearby. His sheer proximity made her edgy, and it irritated her. “There’s a whole lot of bleacher here,” she finally said.

  “Do you want me to move?”

  “Maybe I don’t want people to keep questioning me about you.”

  “Whose fault is that?” he asked mildly.

  “Mine. But you were asking for it.”

  “I was asking you to kiss me?”

  Lex wasn’t about to be put off by an innocence act. “You were trying to provoke me.”

  “You made first contact.”

  “If you’re not careful, I’ll make second contact.”

  Grady’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully, and it was all Lex could do to keep from swallowing drily. But she wasn’t going to look at his mouth—even though she wanted to.

  This was a habit she needed to break. Especially when it seemed totally possible that Grady was reading her mind. Why else would that mouth have formed an ironic curve when she lost her battle with herself?

  “No. You won’t.”

  And there he had her. No. She wouldn’t. The element of surprise was gone, as was the shock factor.

  “You’re right,” she said casually. “I don’t like to repeat myself.”

  Grady snorted, then lifted his chin as the high school kids helped the students mount.

  “I take it your nieces haven’t ridden much?”

  “No. Something I’m hoping to rectify. I’m glad Annie signed them up for lessons.”

  “So you didn’t sign them up just to come here and annoy me?”

  “Didn’t even know you’d be here,” he said, keeping his eyes on the arena. “Do not overestimate your own importance.”

  Lex managed not to elbow him and instead followed his gaze. One of his nieces, mounted on one of Jared’s horses, was sitting tall and confident, but the other little girl, riding gentle Daphne, was practically curled over the saddle horn.

  “She’ll probably relax as the lesson progresses,” Lex said.

  “I hope so.” Grady once again leaned back, making a show of being unconcerned, but Lex could feel tension radiating off him. His niece unfurled a bit as the lesson progressed, and Grady leaned forward, watching as the kids slowly rode in circles, then reversed and rode the other way. The high school kids would occasionally bring riders to the side and reposition their feet or hands.

  The lesson lasted another thirty minutes, during which time Lex and Grady maintained a mutual silence. He was too focused on his nieces to banter with her, and she was too busy wondering how it was that she was sharing an empty grandstand with Grady Owen.

  Life was strange sometimes.

  After the lesson, Grady’s nieces rushed him, and Lex saw that they were both wearing silver championship bull-riding buckles on their pink belts. The kind of buckles the average bull rider coveted.

  “Hey, guys. You did great.” He pointed behind them. “Looks like there’s a meeting. Come on.” He took their hands, and they went to where Jared was speaking to the parents and riders.

  Lex headed around her trailer and found her mares tied there and a teenager busily unsaddling them. Lex said hello and helped, carrying the lightweight nylon saddles to the equipment trailer hitched to one of the trucks.

  Before driving away, Lex took one last look at Grady and his nieces. This was a side of him she hadn’t expected. The Grady Owen she knew was totally self-centered. He didn’t go all tense because one of his nieces was having a bad day on horseback.

  Lex turned onto the road leading out of the fairgrounds, glad to be putting distance between herself and a certain bull rider. She wasn’t going to spend the next six Saturday mornings in the grandstands with Grady, but then again, she wasn’t going to hide out in her truck, either. So the solution was...

  To put the situation out of her mind until next week.

  * * *

  AFTER LEX GOT HOME, she unloaded the horses and gave them a small portion of grain. She gave the goat and donkeys even smaller portions, handed out treats to all the dogs, then put everyone back into their respective yards, kennels, corrals and pens so that she could drive back to town and get the supplies for the new jewelry designs knocking around in her head.

  “You’ll be out before you know it,” she told Dave the Terror when the little terrier protested being shut up in the yard so soon after being released. All she had to do was to hit the grocery store and the hardware store and then check in with Danielle at Annie Get Your Gun before heading home again. All in all, not too bad as far as errand day went. Or so she thought until she spotted a familiar truck parked in front of the hardware store after pulling into the lot. Todd Lundgren. She’d rather cozy up to Grady in the bleachers for a couple of weeks than come within fifty feet of Todd even once.

  For a brief moment, she considered swinging the truck in an arc and coming back later.

  Except that she was no coward.

  During high school, she and Todd hadn’t paid much attention to each other. He’d been busy commanding the social scene and captaining teams, while Lex had been more of a get-the-job-done-and-graduate person. Their paths rarely crossed, but when Todd returned to town to take over the family business six months ago, he suddenly seemed to realize that Lex existed. And apparently she was supposed to be pleased about that.

  He’d zeroed his sights in on her one night at Shardlow’s Bar, bought her a drink, which she accepted out of politeness, and then, after some amount of flirting and casual boasting, had asked her to leave with him. Lex politely declined his offer. She’d been amazed he’d even made it on such a short acquaintanceship.

  Todd had seemed mildly stunned at her refusal. Apparently thinking she was playing hard to get—because he was well-off financially, had played one year of pro baseball and was good-looking to boot—he gave her another chance. This time Lex was quite clear about the possibility of them going out—wasn’t
going to happen. She did it quietly, which she thought was rather decent of her. Quiet or not, Todd hadn’t taken it well. So it went with spoiled golden boys. He wanted what he couldn’t have.

  Well, he needed to get it through his thick skull that he wasn’t getting her.

  When she walked through the automatic doors, Todd was standing near the checkout counter—tall and blond, with the perfect amount of scruff on his face—talking to one of the guys who’d been at Shardlow’s the night she shut him down. So much for getting in and out of the store without seeing him. He smirked at her as she went by, and he was still at the counter when she came back with solder, wire and some copper sheeting. She wondered if it was her imagination, or if he was posing.

  “Home repairs?” he asked.

  “Something like that.” She dug through her purse for her bank card and paid for the items.

  “Need help getting this stuff to the car?”

  “Thank you, no.” Do not engage. Do not engage.

  Todd touched a finger to his ball cap, pushed off the counter and left the associate to load her purchases in a bag.

  Lex gave a mental sigh of relief only to find him waiting for her just outside the door.

  “I have this theory,” he said.

  “Let me take a wild guess.” Lex palmed her keys, in case she had to deck him. “You think I secretly like you.”

  “I don’t think you’re immune. I just moved too fast. You’re not used to that.”

  She smiled humorlessly. Refrained from saying, Dream on. He wasn’t stupid or delusional. He was offended about being shut down, and to him, the ultimate victory would be for her to admit she’d made a ridiculous mistake.

  That was her best guess, anyway.

  “Have a good one, Todd.” She unlocked her door and got into her truck, and then, in an uncharacteristic but not altogether unwarranted move, locked it again. She wasn’t afraid of Todd Lundgren, but she didn’t want him climbing into her truck, either.

  The one saving grace was that Todd’s newly inherited ranch was closer to Dillon than Gavin, so he spent more time there. She only ran into him every now and again, and if she saw him in a bar, she left.

  “Everything okay?” Danielle looked up from the catalogue she was perusing as Lex walked in through the back door. That was when Lex realized that she was frowning.

  “Everything is fine, except that I ran into Todd at the hardware store. He’s still at it.”

  “I swear,” Danielle said as she closed the book. “You’re his great white whale. He’s not going to rest until he—”

  Lex gave her a look. “Did you just call me a whale?”

  “Symbolically.”

  “Thank you for that small favor,” she said primly.

  “Bad analogy.”

  “Let’s move on from Todd,” Lex said. “I have some ideas for some copper jewelry, which would be a lot more cost-effective than sterling. I’m going to work up some sample pieces today and tomorrow.”

  “Great idea! We can set up another display area near the pottery. Kelly’s behind on her schedule because of her new job, and that’d be a great way to fill that space.”

  “Hey,” Annie said as she joined them in the back room. “I thought I heard you. How were lessons?”

  Lessons. Right. Todd had blasted that stuff right out of her head. “The girls did great.” Lex would leave it to Grady to explain that one of the girls did better than the other. That didn’t seem to be her place. “They rode for half an hour, and Grady was watching them like a mother hen.”

  “I’m so glad it worked out. If he wasn’t here, I don’t think they could have made it.”

  “He’s a good uncle,” Lex agreed, rather proud of herself for being able to say something nice about the guy to his sister—and something true at that.

  The bell rang in the other room, and Annie ducked out of the room to greet the customers.

  “Hiring her was a good call,” Lex said.

  “Yep,” Danielle agreed. “Sometimes you’ve got to move beyond the past for the good of everyone.”

  Unless that past involved Grady or Todd Lundgren. There were limits to moving on.

  * * *

  GRADY KNEW SOMETHING was up when Kristen polished her cowboy boots on Friday afternoon and Katie didn’t. Katie also mentioned about six times that her stomach hurt. Bad.

  “Do you want to miss riding lessons?”

  “Maybe this once,” Katie replied in a voice so low he could barely hear her.

  “But you want to go back next week.”

  “Maybe.”

  And maybe he had a problem on his hands. “You want to talk?”

  “No.”

  “All right.” He had two choices. He could either let things be or see if Kristen had some information he could cajole her into sharing.

  Kristen did not need to be cajoled. “Katie’s afraid.”

  “Of what?”

  “Falling. She wants to sit with you and the lady tomorrow instead of riding.”

  Grady blew out a breath. He hadn’t planned on sitting with the lady, even though he seemed to be doing a lot of thinking about her. She made it clear the other night that, kiss or no kiss, she pretty much despised him.

  The next day as he drove the girls to lessons, Grady debated how best to handle the matter. Katie was not a happy camper, and he needed to do something about it.

  When a bull rider got to the point that he was afraid to get on a bull, it was time to find another career. You could tell a guy how to improve his technique, how to center and relax before his ride, but there was no talking him into trying to overcome his fear, because the consequences were dire. Therefore Grady had no experience in calming fears. The only fears he’d had to calm were those of people afraid of something happening to him. And then he simply said, “Don’t worry. I’ve got this.”

  He parked the truck, and the girls got out. Kristen looked as if she wanted to head over to where her horse was being groomed, but she held back.

  Grady bent close to Katie and pointed to where Lex was unloading her mares. “Do you want to go over to see your horse?”

  Katie pressed her lips together and didn’t answer. Kristen said to Grady, “We’ll go say hello to the horse and the lady and then we can go see my horse.”

  “All right,” Katie said. Kristen took her hand and they walked over to Lex, Grady following a few paces behind. When they got to the trailer, Lex glanced over her shoulder at the girls, then smiled. A breathtaking smile. Grady almost stopped in his tracks. Wow.

  Had he ever seen Lex look like that before?

  “Hi, guys. Ready to ride?”

  “Kind of,” Katie said.

  “Kind of?” Lex lowered the brush she’d been using to sweep the road dust off the mare’s back and cocked her head at Katie, who nodded that yes, she was kind of ready to ride.

  “We’re working through a few things. I need to speak to Jared.” Grady met Lex’s puzzled gaze. “Would you mind if the girls hung here with you for a few minutes?” He gave her a look that promised an explanation later, and she gave a small nod.

  “Not at all.” She turned back to her brushing. “You might want to stand back, or you’ll end up wearing the dirt I’m brushing off these guys.”

  The girls obediently stepped back and Grady went to find Jared, who was discussing the day’s lesson with his helpers. Grady explained the situation, and Jared told him that he’d talk to Katie, but if she was truly afraid then he wasn’t about to force her onto a horse. Grady was in full agreement, but after the talk with Jared, Katie told Grady she’d try again, because Jared said she could stop whenever she wanted. She lasted for half of the lesson, until it was time to trot; then she raised her hand and asked if she could be done.

  Grady met her
at the gate, where he’d stayed with a small group of parents instead of sitting in the stands with Lex, and helped her dismount.

  “That was good,” he said.

  Katie nodded and he could tell that she was embarrassed at having quit early, but her instinct for survival was stronger than her fear of embarrassment.

  It was a quiet ride home. Kristen had enjoyed the lesson, but she wasn’t about to talk about it when Katie so obviously didn’t enjoy herself.

  “Give her time,” Annie said later that evening when she and Grady were sitting on the porch. “Katie has always been more cautious than Kristen.”

  “Neither of them struck me as cautious until riding lessons.”

  “Katie’s a little nervous around big animals,” Annie said. “She takes after me. Kristen takes after you.”

  “In some ways that’s more worrisome than Katie being afraid of falling off a horse.”

  “I’m not touching that one,” Annie replied, sending him an amused look.

  She didn’t seem that concerned, so Grady decided that maybe he didn’t need to be concerned. “How’s work?”

  “I love it.” She leaned her head back, a smile still playing on her lips. “I can’t believe that something went right in my life for a change.”

  “Hey, you have a free sitter.”

  “Well, there is that,” she said. “It took a tornado to get me my free sitter, but—” she gave her head a small shake “—whatever it takes.” Her expression sobered. “I really appreciate you coming back to help.”

  “I should have been back earlier. As in years ago.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “It was selfish of me to winter in Oklahoma when I could have been here.”

  She gave him a hard look, similar to the one she’d given him after seeing the aftermath of the twins’ cake-making efforts. “You’re my brother, Grady. With a life of your own. You owe me nothing.”

  “I disagree.” They sat in silence, and then he said, “Do you see much of Lex at the store? And don’t read anything into the question.”

  “She comes by a couple times a week. We have business meetings on Wednesdays, and she helps cover when Danielle is busy with her wedding preparations.” She gave him a sidelong look. “And just so I don’t read anything into it, why do you ask?”