A voice said, "Easy, darlin'."
The hell with that! There was no air! She was going to die!
The voice of reason, buried way under the panic in her mind, said she'd had the wind knocked out of her. Gemma wasn't interested in reason. She was interested in breathing.
The owner of the voice was scrabbling near her. Gemma raised one hand to bat him away. She already couldn't breathe. She didn't need someone hot touching her and –
Forcing her down? Gemma panicked, trying to pummel the guy with both fists. Her lungs heaved. Black spots floated in her vision.
The voice came through slowly. "I'm not going to hurt you. Lay back. It will help you breathe."
Gemma went instantly limp, letting herself fall back onto the dirt. The little air she'd managed jolted out of her again. Panic set in harder.
Then a hand gently pushed her left shoulder down while fingers tucked themselves under the waistband of her pants.
He'd said he wasn't going to hurt her!
She didn't have enough energy to fight the hand. She went limp, and the voice said, "Good, relax," and the hand on her shoulder stayed there and the one at her waist gently pulled her up, arching her back, pulling her hips up.
"Breathe, darlin'," the voice said.
If she could have, she would have screamed at him. What did he think she was trying to do?
But air started flowing back into her lungs. Her throat ached, like she'd swallowed something too salty or choked on something sharp. But there was air again, and the spasm in her body started to relax.
Gemma took a long experimental breath. The air went in and out again.
"OK?" the voice asked.
She didn't have the air to agree or disagree. She nodded, her hair in the dust.
"Couple more breaths," he said. "Then I'll let you up.”
Normally sarcasm would come to her rescue, even if only internally. What if I want to be let go of right now? She did, actually. But the air going in and out was too nice, even air reeking of animal waste and hay and cowboy.
Three breaths later he lowered her gently, let go of her shoulder, and extended a hand. "That was so not what I meant to do."
Her mind was clearing. She couldn't make out what he'd said, though. What he had meant to do? She'd run into a wall.
Gemma blinked. Her eyes watered and cleared and she looked at the guy who was squatting in front of her. When he saw her take him in, he stood easily, brushing his hands down his Wranglers. He extended one enormous hand.
Gemma put her hand out uncertainly and the giant paw engulfed it. He pulled her up easily, set her on her feet, and looked her over.
"Could've been worse." He wore a cocky grin and a ten gallon hat. The hair escaping out from under the hat was a reddish brown mass of curls.
It was easy to see how she'd mistaken him for a wall. He was big and broad as one. Gemma started at the top. Hat, mile wide. Dusty, dirty and dilapidated. Real cowboy hat. Then the curls, amazing color.
She got as far as the cheekbones – sharp and angular – and the mouth, sensual rounded lips that were quirking up in a grin as he watched her – before she went back to the eyes.
Deep honey golden.
Shifter.
Chapter Two
He wasn't Owen Hutch. That was clear. After her confusion about senators and cowboys, Marla had suggested she look up the superstar hotshot cowboy. Owen Hutch was built like the bear he was, massive with a broad chest and dark good looks.
But there was only one family of shifters she knew of who would be in the billionaire Ray Chaudett's rodeo circuit, the one run by father and daughter team of Mary Beth and Ray Chaudett, and that was Owen Hutch himself.
The Tyrell clan. Still controversial, the idea of shifters in rodeos. Various circuits and a whole lot of riders and other cowboys kept trying to ban it
Probably because the Tyrell's kept on winning.
Which was why she was here. To interview the superstar, champion bull rider, as well as Wally Wold, cowboy poet and bronc rider.
She'd gone too long without speaking. Hell, she'd gone too long staring. He was grinning at her, a big lopsided grin that pretty much summed up, Yeah, I know I'm good looking.
Gemma cleared her throat. "I'm looking for Owen Hutch."
He thrust out a lower lip in an exaggerated pout. "Now that's a shame. Could I interest you in his cousin?"
"Not if she has any sense," said a voice from beyond the wall and Gemma craned her neck to see around her attacker and rescuer.
Now that, that was Owen Hutch. Even unwilling and uninterested in the whole rodeo thing she'd had to admit that Hutch was beautiful. Broad shouldered, thick chested, dark and smoldering.
But the Wall wasn't bad either.
Before heading off to the rodeo, Gemma had done her research on the Tyrell clan and Owen Hutch, as well as Wally Wold. Wally was a cowboy poet and bronc buster, a grizzled veteran of rodeos, and not tied into the clan at all. She'd thought he'd be the easy interview until she tried to set it up. Marla was right – the man was infuriating and stubborn.
Hutch, on the other hand, was a cousin of the Tyrell clan brothers, known shifters who competed in the circuits. This year Hutch was competing in Ray Chaudett's series of events, like the other Tyrell shifters. Hutch had long been associated with the billionaire's circuit, almost a son to the billionaire.
Only now he was son-in-law. He'd married Ray Chaudett's daughter Mary Beth.
She blinked at him as she stood in the shadowy barn, still a little winded. Too bad he was off the market.
Gemma mentally shook herself. She wasn't looking.
Beside her Colby dusted his hat against his dustier Wranglers and held out a hand. Gemma took it uncertainly. Colby neither kissed it nor shook it. He held her hand and grinned at her, cocky and hot.
"I've got a bull waiting for me," he said. "I've got to go ride."
Eight seconds of glory. At the end of which the animal might throw him, gore him and possibly kill him. She shuddered.
He saw it and laughed. "I can tell you're a true fan, Miss - ?"
"Gemma Thomas," she said.
He nodded acknowledgment. "Know you were looking for my cousin. Questionable choice."
"Hey, now," Owen said good-naturedly. He might as well. His star was firmly risen.
"When you're finished with him, and I'm finished with my date with 2,000 pounds of beef on the hoof, could I buy you a drink?" He quickly lowered those amazing gold eyes and said, sounding almost shy, "By way of apologizing for stompin' you, ma'am."
Gemma shuddered. Everything in her told her to run away. Very fast. But he was amazing looking. And nice. And the others were watching. If she had someone to meet, she could escape her interview with Hutch and maybe with Wold. If she ever found him.
"I'd like that," she said. "Can I meet you somewhere?"
This time when he took her hand, he raised it to his lips. His breath was hot as an animal's, weirdly sensual on her skin. This time she shivered. She could feel his touch of her fingers, his lips on her hand. The sensation was as intimate as it might feel against the skin of her neck. She felt dizzy. She didn't think that was from either the fall or having her breath knocked out.
It was the honey colored eyes. The hot breath. The cheekbones and jaw. The sensual, hot mouth that had just caressed her hand. The way his index finger slid inward and under to stroke across her palm.
He arranged to meet her at the ticket booth. "If you're not running lost," he added with a wink.
She blushed. He'd seen her? Probably right before she barreled into her. And now he was teasing her about it. But gently.
Even if Colby had totally made fun of her for being lost, she'd have met him at the ticket booth. She was already half intoxicated by his looks.
She watched him stride away. He had the lanky long-limbed stalk of a cowboy. His legs ate up distance fast. Out on a ranch, he'd move with economy under the broad desert sky.
Gemma could sudde
nly picture and even smell her father's ranch, clear as if she were standing on the land. She hadn't been back there, or around anything remotely cowboy if she could help it since –
She broke off that thought and looked up at Hutch. He grinned lazily, as if he hadn't seen any of her emotions going across her face.
She thought he probably had. Gemma didn't lose her composure very often. Maybe being bowled over by a bear had something to do with it. Her thoughts about the past were emotions she tried to keep under wraps.
The thought of Colby made her hot inside again. That was something she'd try and keep hidden as well.
She turned and looked up at Hutch to lead the way.
Hutch put a hand on her shoulder and led her into an office off the main part of the barn. Or pavilion. Maybe this was the pavilion and she'd found it after all.
The sounds of the arena faded.
The office would do for the interview. It was utilitarian and filled to bursting. Two western style saddles took up a ton of space, and saddle blankets lay tossed over filing cabinets. Gemma suspected they'd been put in the office after use. There was a pungent smell to the office that Owen Hutch didn't seem to notice.
A big, old fashioned metal desk dominated space not taken up by the saddles. Parts of the desk were curling up in ragged metal strips. The chair behind the desk had thick molded plastic arms and a seat and back made of cracking green leather. Four black file cabinets groaned under the weight of books, brochures, dust and Stetsons. A Native American dream catcher hung on one wall.
Gemma averted her gaze from it. Her father had brought her one, back when she was a little girl. When Marla had given her the assignment, Gemma thought it meant getting through coarse conversations and dusty places she didn't want to be. Having shaken the dust off her boots and the boots off her feet, she wanted to be metro.
At no point had she admitted to herself she didn't want the memories of her father's ranch. Or the cowboys or the long, hot, still summers outside Winnemucca.
Or of her father.
She cleared her throat and jumped when Hutch offered her a cold bottle of water from a mini fridge. "Thanks." She took a swig before she broke out her recorder and notebook.
"No laptop? And is that a cassette recorder?" He stared at it like she was suggesting recording onto wax cylinders.
"Old school," she admitted. "Digital recorders are far more likely to screw up. And I can store cassettes without giving up space on my computer."
"Just in case an interview comes back to bite you on the ass," he said with a chuckle.
"Something like that."
"Have any? Ever?"
She frowned at him. "Have any ever what?"
"Come back to bite you."
He didn't say on the ass this time. That was good, because she was still blushing.
There was no way she was answering that question. "Better safe than sorry," she said lightly. "Shall we begin?" Her palms were sweating. Instantly she recalled the feel of Colby's thumb brushing against her skin there, sensual as if he –
She pulled herself together. She'd see him when she finished the interview. Better to get through it, then.
For the next twenty minutes she asked the superstar rodeo cowboy about real world ranching experience, about horses and bulls, about lifestyle and choices. She asked him about the animosity so many people had to shifters being in rodeo.
Owen leaned back in the creaking desk chair, his feet on the desk and hands behind his head. "Basically, folks just don't like anyone different. Might've known about shifters for a lot of years, but they're happier when we stay out of sight. The old, Don't ask, don't tell mentality."
"Then why don't you?" Gemma asked.
He gave her a curious look. "Why don't we not tell?"
Gemma nodded.
He shrugged, not as casual as he was trying to look. "People know. They know anyway. You want to round out your article with more than just Owen Hutch, best looking, best bull riding, best all around best on the circuit today – " He stopped to see if she'd react.
She was already laughing. "And most modest."
"Yes, add that." He pointed at her notebook. Just that fast he was serious again. "Want to add some meat to that article, talk about not only the fight about shifters in the rodeo – which is kind of the no professional athletes in the Olympics thing – "
"How so?" she interrupted. If she didn't, she forgot questions she wanted to ask. Sometimes she forgot she was interviewing and just got interested.
"We're faster, stronger, bond better with the animals, and can subdue or at least stay on a bull the eight seconds with a much higher percentage than a non-shifter human." He let his hands fall from behind his head, rocked the chair down on its tired springs and crossed his arms on the desk. "But I'll tell you what. We're not cheating by being who we are and in rodeo. We're raising the bar."
Gemma didn't speak, just made a go on motion.
"Maybe other competitors are going to have to step up their own game and be more like the superstars of other sports – Michael Jordan, for instance."
"Not everyone can do that," she said, watching him.
"Not everyone can compete when it's human athlete versus human athlete. Professional games are for professionals. Everyone trains. Everyone competes."
She stared at her notes. She had other questions. He went on before she asked them.
"You've heard about the disappearances?" When her confusion was obvious, he said, "That's what Colby's doing here. He's kind of the on-again, off-again sheriff-type law back in our little patch of Texas. And yeah, he rides. He ropes, mostly. Damned good. You going to stay and watch?"
Marla had insisted. She wanted the flavor of the rodeo. Gemma nodded.
"Good. Keep an eye out for Eddie Tyrell. He's one of the best. And Jacob. He's the baby. I'm riding and so's Colby."
"And your brother – " She hesitated and read her notes. Part of Marla's interest in the clan was the very fact they were a clan, with generations of shifter bears bull riding and bronc roping together. "Holden?"
He closed down then. "Holden's out looking for some of the missing," he said simply. "Ask Colby about it. He can tell you more." He was looking past her, at the door Gemma had her back to.
"But – " she started, but he was already motioning someone to come in.
"Ask Colby," he repeated. "Because obviously he's waited long enough for that drink."
Gemma turned quickly, her whole body swinging around on the metal folding chair she'd set up on the far side of the desk. When she moved, she caught her leg on the bottom of the desk where a long curl of shredded metal decorative strips had come loose. One jagged edge sank into the outside of her left calf, between ankle and the bulge of calf muscle.
Gemma sucked in a hissing breath. Her hands went instantly to the wound. Her linen pants were caught on the metal and hot blood beginning to spurt through the fabric, coating her fingers. Instantly she was dizzy.
"Whoa, there, darlin'," Colby said. He was halfway through the door the instant she began to tip. He caught her easily as she began toppling out of the metal seat.
Clay (BBW Secret Baby Bear Shifter Romance) (Secret Baby Bears Book 4) Page 13