A Cowboy's Pride

Stop it.

“The only way you’ll get me up on that horse is if you knock me senseless.”

“That can be arranged,” she muttered.

Cabe stepped in between them. “Trent, your mom told me to tell you to do as you’re told.”

Trent tipped his head back, glaring from beneath the brim of his hat. “I’m not ten years old.”

“No, but I was told to tell you Anderson men don’t shy away from anything. And that if your dad were alive, he’d be ashamed of your lack of ‘try.’”

Alana turned in time to watch the words change the landscape of Trent’s face. His eyes narrowed. His mouth pinched together. His cheeks filled with color. Brows that matched his dark blond hair came together in a frown. He hooked her with his gaze, the depth of his emotions bringing back memories of her own horrible loss, and Cabe’s and Rana’s, too.

“Fine.”

No, a little voice told her. It would never be fine. Not for him. Nothing would ever be the same again—and she knew exactly how that felt. A surge of sympathy rolled through her.

But it was more than that.

It would never be fine between the two of them, either, because no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t stop the attraction that tickled her insides.

And that worried her most of all.

Chapter Four

He wanted to kill his mother.

Anderson men don’t shy away from anything.

Yeah, well, none of the Anderson men had ever been paralyzed from the waist down. Okay, okay...not entirely paralyzed. He still had partial feeling in his thighs. And some feeling in his lower extremities, too, but it was spotty at best, and it had spelled the end of his rodeo career.

Still, though he tried to banish the words, he found himself wondering how many times he’d heard them over the years. First when he was little and in the mutton-busting events, then later when he’d decided to try bull riding. He closed his eyes, his hands aching he held them so tightly clenched. Back then, he’d been scared. Hell, if you weren’t scared of riding a bull, you had no business riding them. His father used to tell him that, too.

When he opened his eyes, his mouth tightened into a mirthless smile.

And the bitch of it, the thing that should make him laugh right now, was that he hadn’t been maimed by a bull. No. He’d been ruined by a worthless piece of shit with four DUIs. A man who’d been so drunk, he’d walked away from the wreck without a scratch on him while he’d barely escaped with his life, and Dustin...

He closed his eyes again. Dear God, he didn’t want to think about Dustin.

“We have a mounting block for people with disabilities over there.”

His eyes sprang open. Alana stared down at him...and was it his imagination? Or had that pretty blue gaze softened? She caught a glimpse of his hands again, and Trent unclenched them instantly. The only limbs that still functioned without a problem: his hands and arms.

“I can help you mount,” she added. And, yes, her eyes had definitely lost their edge.

“I can do it myself.” He gritted his teeth.

“Okay.” She stepped back.

He jammed his cowboy hat down on his head in determination. But as he turned toward the ramp, he almost balked when he caught sight of the saddle again. It was ridiculous. Like a bar stool built into the back of a horse. It was even padded with red leather like a stupid stool.

He pushed his chair forward. What would they do? Strap him in as if he was some kind of felon?

Every inch he traveled, every second that passed, his wheels turned slower and slower until, at long last, he stopped at the base of the ramp, staring at the horse with mutiny in his heart.

“Are you sure you don’t want some help?” he heard the teenager ask. He bit back an immediate retort, words that he knew would be colored by irritation.

“No.”

The ramp didn’t concern him. It was getting on the horse. He’d be damned if he asked for any help, not with that woman watching his every move. Cabe had led the bay gelding between some parallel bars with a platform built up next to them, the bars holding the animal in place.

For special-needs people...like him.

The sickness returned, the same woozy feeling he’d gotten when he’d woken up in the hospital and tried to slip from the bed...only to find he couldn’t move his legs.

Anderson men don’t shy away from anything.

His chest expanded as he took increasingly deeper and deeper breaths. The ramp was grooved to allow for tire traction, and at such a gentle incline he doubted anyone would have issues. Still, he felt the muscles tighten in his arms, felt his breath begin to labor as he shoved his wheels forward. His heart pounded. His mouth had gone dry, too, but damned if he let that woman see how he struggled.

He made it to the top in seconds, expertly spinning his chair to face the horse and the ridiculous saddle. The deck was at the perfect level, the saddle sitting waist high. It should be a simple matter to pull up alongside the animal then lift himself on the horse’s back, just like he did getting into a chair.

Then why did it seem as if he were about to lift weights, his breath whistling past his lips, every muscle in his shoulders strung as tight as a guide wire?

Just lift and swing.

Onto a horse!

A terrified yell, that’s what the words sounded like in his skull, a litany of other words pounding between his ears.

You haven’t been on a horse since the accident. No horse is completely trustworthy. What if it moves? What if you fall?

This is a bad idea.

But he would not, under any circumstances, back away from the challenge his mother’s words had evoked. And so he rolled his chair as close to the saddle as he could, glancing at the bay gelding. The horse didn’t look one iota interested. In fact, it had its head down, its lower lip hanging...as if it were asleep.

See that, Trent, they put you on the old nag. A horse you wouldn’t be caught dead riding a year ago.

He trembled, yes, trembled in anger at the whole situation, at his life, at the fact he felt goaded into doing this, that he was even here, at this ranch, when all he wanted to do was be back home in Colorado. Still, he reached for the saddle, slowly testing his weight on the padded seat as he prepared to slip from his chair to the horse’s back.

The horse didn’t move.

Quickly, before he could think better of it, he shifted from his wheelchair to the saddle, sitting sideways for a moment before using his hands to lift his right leg and somehow managing to get it swung over the saddle’s horn, the limb, like his left leg, dropping like an anchor.

“Good job,” the girl cried.

He was on a horse, could actually feel the saddle beneath his butt. He tried clenching his thighs, but he only had marginal feeling in them. Still, it might be enough to hold on...if he clenched hard enough.

“Well done,” Cabe echoed.

On a horse for the first time in almost a year. On a horse that hadn’t moved an inch and that seemed to realize he was a damn useless human being. His breath hitched as he inhaled, his eyes suddenly burning hot.

Don’t you dare blubber.

He closed his eyes, waited a few breaths, then opened them again.

He wasn’t useless. He would find something to do. Anything had to be better than staring at four walls.

Feeling sorry for yourself.

When he opened his eyes again, Cabe was staring up at him, but another person was by his side. Alana stood there, too, and she was smiling, her own eyes rimmed with tears.

“Congratulations,” she said softly. “You’re back on.”

If she’d been hoping to lift his spirits, her words had the opposite effect. “I might be back on, but I still can’t ride.”

His words came out like a death ray, melting her pretty little smile.

“Not yet.” She glanced at Cabe. “Not yet.” She appeared to take a deep breath. “We usually walk on either side of our guests when they ride for the first time. Did you need us to do that?”

Like he was some kind of toddler on a pony ride? “No.”

“I didn’t think you would.”

Alana mounted her own horse less than ten minutes later, but you’d have thought they had just secured Trent Anderson to a medieval torture device, so loudly did he protest. The man still grumbled under his breath.

“Okay, let’s go,” Cabe said, swinging up onto his own horse.

“This is ridiculous,” she heard Trent say. “I can hold on. You didn’t need to strap me into this thing.”

She risked glancing in his direction, although she sensed if he caught her staring, he wouldn’t be pleased. The man seemed to have taken an instant dislike to her. Well, the feeling was mutual, never mind how good-looking he was.

“It’s for your own safety,” Rana said. “Even though you might feel capable of balancing in the saddle, we can’t risk you falling off, especially since you don’t want us to spot you while you’re riding.” She grinned at him. “Try and use your leg to kick Baylor forward.”

“I’m a paraplegic,” Trent shouted right back. “How the hell am I supposed to do that?”

To give Rana credit, she didn’t let his words faze her. “You’re a partial paraplegic.”

Alana almost smiled. The girl sounded forty, not fourteen.

“Your horse responds to hip movement,” Rana added. “A portion of your thighs still work, so use them. Pretend you’re kicking. It’ll move your hips, which will cue Baylor forward.”

“No, it won’t.”

“Yes, it will. I know. I was once a paraplegic, too, a full paraplegic, so don’t tell me what you can and cannot do.”

Way to go, Rana, Alana thought. Don’t let him push you around. She shifted her gaze to Trent. The look on his face was priceless.

“You had a spinal injury?” he asked.

Cabe kicked his horse forward then. “Didn’t you know? That’s how we got into this gig.”

No, he hadn’t been told. Alana could see that. So what was the guy doing here? From what Cabe had told her, this was supposedly some kind of last resort, but he clearly didn’t want anything to do with therapy.

It was her turn to nudge her horse forward. “It’s time you rejoined the land of the living, Trent.” She met his gaze head on. “So either kick that horse forward, or get left behind.”

She gave Cabe and Rana a look, one that clearly said to follow her lead. They did.

“Hey,” she heard Trent call out.

Rana went so far as to kick her horse into a lope, Cabe following suit. Alana didn’t glance back.

“Hey!”

Keep riding, Alana.

“Don’t you dare leave me here.”

Reluctantly, she pulled on the reins, but only because she’d caught the edge of panic to his voice. But when she turned back, the man wasn’t even looking at her. Rage had him contorting atop that horse like a Jedi Knight trying to use the force. Alana almost laughed, although there was nothing funny about the situation.

“Use your hips,” she called out.

He could move them. Patients with an L2-S5 injury had movement through the pelvis. Some even had moderate to mild use of their limbs below the waist—like Trent. But the man acted as if he were a quadriplegic.

“Try pretending you’re scooting a chair forward.”

Miracle of miracles, the man finally listened, his hips thrusting so forcefully, it was a good thing they’d strapped him in. He’d have toppled forward otherwise.

The horse moved.

“There you go.”

He did it again. Baylor took another step. Alana turned her horse toward the pasture.

But when she caught up with everyone at the pasture gate, Alana turned back in time to watch Trent thrust his hips forward like he had a hula hoop around his legs and not a horse between them. Baylor ambled along, the animal’s head low to the ground, legs slowly moving in tune with Trent’s hips.

“Good thing we didn’t just rob a bank,” Alana quipped.

Cabe smiled at her. “You know, you were pretty hard on the man.”

She slouched in the saddle.

“That’s not like you.”

No. It wasn’t.

“Doesn’t have anything to do with how good-looking he is, does it?”

Alana glanced around quickly for Rana. She was out of hearing range, on the other side of the fence, holding open the gate for them all. “I’m not even going to answer that question.” She clucked her horse forward.

“I’ve heard the buckle bunnies talking,” Cabe said as he rode alongside her.

She had, too.

And that was exactly why she wanted no part of the man. He might be done with rodeo, but she had a feeling rodeo wouldn’t be done with him. Men in his position usually went to work for the Professional Rodeo Association in some capacity. He’d be on the road 24/7, not exactly boyfriend material. Besides, she would never leave Rana. Never. The girl had already lost enough people in her young life.

Boyfriend?

“I’m not interested in Trent Anderson,” she told Cabe. “So you can get that idea right out of your head.”

Cabe just shrugged. “If you say so.”

“I say so,” she firmly told him.

She just wished she believed her own words.

Chapter Five

Frustrated.

The word summed up how Trent felt two days later. The damn woman wouldn’t leave him alone. She kept strapping him onto a dang horse, insisting that he could use his hips better, clamp down with his thighs harder, use his lower leg to kick Baylor forward faster. He had rub marks on his calves and bruises on the insides of his thighs.

Today she agreed to take it easier on him, but only after he’d almost fallen out of his wheelchair after yesterday’s particularly grueling session. They would work on leg-strengthening today, she’d told him, and resume riding the next day.

He couldn’t wait.

A knock on the door sent his mood plummeting even more. “Enter.”

She swung the door wide, pretty blue eyes scanning the interior of his cabin as if worried he might be hiding from her. He wasn’t. He sat in his chair, which he’d positioned near the doorway of bedroom.

She smiled when she saw him. “Ready?”

Such a beautiful smile. Too bad she was a slave driver.

“Depends on what you have planned for me.”

The smile grew wider. “Actually, we’re going on a picnic.”

If she’d told him they were flying to Mars, she couldn’t have surprised him more. “A picnic is your idea of therapy?”

“Yup.” She motioned him forward. “Come on. I’ll show you.”

She turned and left him standing there, a habit of hers, he’d noticed. The woman waited for no one, least of all him.

“Just a sec.” He grabbed his cowboy hat off the peg by the door. He turned back to the front door in time to spot her scooping up a basket, a breeze throwing back the smell of fried chicken and...pie? Was that what he smelled?

His stomach grumbled.

“What is that?”

“Lunch.”

He hadn’t eaten all morning. Frankly, he’d been too exhausted to do much more than sleep.

“Can we eat here?”

She glanced back at him. “Nope. Where we’re going isn’t far.”

“Smells good,” he grumbled.

His chair picked up speed as he rolled toward her. She wore a red shirt this morning, one that emphasized a natural bloom on her cheeks. Her black hair had been left loose, and Trent had observed her enough times to know that she preferred it that way. She liked to flick it out of her face when she was determined to make him do something, which was pretty often, he admitted, his eye catching sight of her rear end, or more specifically, the crystal beads on her pockets. They caught the light and beamed out rainbow-colored prisms. Pretty jeans for a pretty woman.

Now, now. Just because she’s taking it easy on you today is no reason to have thoughts like that.

A blind man would notice how gorgeous she was. The woman might be a termagant, but she was a good-looking termagant. And even though he might despise her militant attitude, she knew exactly what to say to motivate him into action. He respected that.

“How many guests can you accommodate here?”

The words caused her to slow down, Trent finally able to stare at her profile. That was good. The view from the rear was entirely too distracting for his peace of mind.

“Eight families.” She glanced down at him and Trent found himself wondering if maybe he should have kept quiet. When she wasn’t giving him orders, he had a hard time focusing on her words because suddenly he was noticing how her eyes matched the color of the sky, and how the red shirt tucked into her jeans made her waist seem smaller.

“Most of the cabins sleep four people,” she added when he kept quiet. “Although two of them, the ones on the end—” she pointed to the last two cabins “—they’re bigger and can comfortably sleep six.”

He couldn’t care less, but if he were honest with himself, he could admit to feeling more relaxed. Between the light breeze on his face, the quiet gurgle of the river to his right and the pleasant tone of her voice, Trent found himself relaxing for the first time in ages.

“How long has this place been a guest ranch?”

“Since a year after Kimberly died.”

The girl’s mother, he thought. Alana’s fiancé had died in the same wreck. Wait. She’d corrected him on that. She hadn’t been engaged to Braden, but they’d been close, despite her words to the contrary. He thought about the emotions on her face when he questioned her the first day. The pain he’d spotted. The lingering sadness. The emptiness. He’d felt like a heel the moment he’d closed the door behind her.

“Is that how all this started? With Rana’s injuries from the wreck?”

He saw her swallow and nod. “We almost lost her.”

One of his wheels hooked on a rock. He straightened himself out before asking, “How long was she in the hospital?”

“Months.” She shook her head, as if trying to shake off the memories. “She lost her mom and her uncle all in one fell swoop, and then had to fight for her life. It was almost too much for her to bear.”

Was she speaking of Rana? Or herself?

“When we brought her home, Cabe and I put our heads together. I’d always planned on being a therapist, had the majority of my schooling done. He was desperate to get Rana back. The extent of her injuries harmed her mind as well as her body and so we came up with a plan to distract her. Horses. Lots and lots of horses. We made sure she was out of doors every chance we could get. I finished my degree and went to work on her. I guess you could say she was my guinea pig.”

She’d slowed down, stopping by a massive tree, one with roots jutting out all the way down to the riverbank. A frog croaked nearby. The breeze had kicked up, and it tossed her hair back. She seemed lost in her thoughts. He almost didn’t want to breathe for fear of distracting her. Then she blinked, met his gaze.

“Everything happens for a reason.”

She meant the ranch, of course, not what he’d gone through.

“You didn’t stop with Rana, though,” he said.

“No. When word got out that Rana was walking again, the phone started ringing. Cabe talked to me about opening a guest ranch specializing in people with disabilities. I thought it was a great idea. We started looking into grants. Before we knew it, we had the financing and a waiting list. We couldn’t build the cabins fast enough.”

He could tell she loved what she did. Just talking about it set her whole face aglow, causing Trent to marvel at how pretty she was all over again. The sadness was gone and in its wake was the joy of her success.

“It seems quiet here now.”

She smiled ruefully. “The calm before the storm. School’s still in session. Come July we’ll be packed solid. Cabe will bring in some help, usually interns from nearby colleges. It’s crazy, but it’s so amazing to watch people with a disability get on a horse for the first time. When they feel a horse beneath them, when they realize they can walk again, well, not them, but the horse, their faces light up. And then when they learn to control the horse and suddenly they’re mobile in a way they never imagined...”

He could watch the play of emotions on her face all day. The happiness. The excitement. The satisfaction. He couldn’t look away.

“I can’t imagine ever leaving this place...or Rana. She’s like a daughter to me now.”

Suddenly, he was unaccountably jealous of Rana, and that was just plain ridiculous. Why?

Because she could walk again.

“How long did it take?”

She seemed to snap back to earth. “For what?”

“To teach Rana to walk again?”

She smiled. “Months, but Rana makes it sound like it took a decade. I’ve never seen anyone attack therapy like Rana did. She told me at one point that God might have taken her mother, but He wasn’t going to take her legs away, too. She was angry.” Alana stared at him pointedly. “We had to deal with that, too. I’ve learned it’s pretty common for people to latch on to their anger when they’ve been dealt a debilitating blow.”

The way he had. He couldn’t miss her point.

“By the way, this is where we’re having our picnic.” She pointed to a spot beneath a tree, one so big its branches hung out over the nearby river. “That rope there will be your therapy today.”

She’d done that on purpose, he realized—changed the subject.

“We’ll work on leg strengthening, but not until after you eat.”

When she opened the basket he once again caught a whiff of something fried and mouthwatering.

“Don’t people think it strange, you living all the way out here with only Cabe and Rana for company?”

Her hands froze in the middle of unpacking plates. “No. Everyone knows we’re just friends. But even if people did talk, I wouldn’t care. I stick around as much for Rana as for myself. People can say what they want to say.”

She wasn’t messing around with Cabe—had never messed around with the man. He could see that in her eyes.

“Eat up.” She handed him a plate full of food before sitting down next to the basket.

It was good. Delicious, actually. “You’re a good cook.”

“Thanks,” she muttered, taking a bite of her own food. She didn’t eat all daintylike, either. She ate like a woman who worked hard for a living and consumed calories to keep her energy.

Sexy.

He jerked his gaze away. What the hell was wrong with him? Okay, granted, she was hot. A year ago he would have crammed down his hat and gone after her. A year ago he’d have been able to pursue her. A year ago he’d had the use of his legs.

The thought put him in a sour mood all over again, the two of them eating in silence. He thought about making small talk, but what was the use? He didn’t want to be her friend. Hell, he didn’t want to be here at all. So if she insisted on dragging him out of his cabin, she could deal with the silence.

As it turned out, she didn’t seem to care. As the silence stretched on, Trent found himself starting to relax again. That was, until she stuffed her plate back into the basket and asked, “Ready to get to work?”

He lost his appetite.

“Not really.”

She smiled. He hated when she did that. It increased the wattage of her beauty, and he didn’t like being in enemy territory.

“Too bad.”

He glanced down at his own plate, surprised to note he’d eaten it all.

“Come on.” She held out her hand for his plate. He reluctantly gave it to her. “Wheel yourself as close to the rope as you can get.”

He didn’t want to. He really didn’t. He could feel things from about midthigh upward, and those thighs told him he was done—sore as a castrated bull dragged to the fire.

“What do you want me to do?”

“Simple, really. Just wheel yourself close to the rope and pull yourself up.”

He eyed the rope in question. The thing dangled down from the branch above him, one with a canopy of leaves so thick you couldn’t even see through it. Why did he have a feeling this wouldn’t be as simple as she made it sound?

“You sure it will hold my weight?”