Rodeo Sweetheart

“You missed one of the guests swimming in waffles.” Ethan’s voice sounded smooth and rich over Sam’s shoulder, much like the syrup that must be clinging to Mike’s pants right about now. Too bad those waffles couldn’t have fallen in Ethan’s lap, too.

She dropped the grooming brush in the bucket in the corner behind her. “Sounds like fun.” She bent and snatched a comb from the same tub, and began picking through Wildfire’s tangled mane. “Is that all you came to tell me?” She felt more than saw Ethan’s startled response, and couldn’t but grin.

“No, I, just—well…” Ethan’s voice trailed off and he coughed. “I thought maybe I could help out, if you were too busy to take a walk.”

Sam turned to face him, the blue comb dangling from her fingers. Even Wildfire snorted, as if shocked. “You want to do chores?”

“Sure.” Ethan straightened his slumped position on the gate and smiled. “Why not?”

“Why not?” Sam laughed as she turned back to Wildfire’s mane. “Because you have no clue what you’re doing. Because you could get hurt. Because this is your vacation and you shouldn’t be working. Because—”

“Okay, I get it.” Ethan held up both hands. “But I don’t mind. I can learn.”

“Thanks, but no thanks.” Sam tossed the comb in the bucket and clipped the lead rope that she’d draped over the stall door to Wildfire’s halter. “Excuse me.”

Ethan backed away from the gate as Sam and Wildfire walked through, giving Wildfire’s back legs a wide berth. “Then what about a walk later tonight? After dinner?” His tone held a hopeful edge.

Sam clucked to Wildfire and led him down the barn aisle. His shoed hooves clacked on the hard floor. “Again, thanks—but no thanks.” Sam refused to feel even slightly sympathetic or look back at Ethan standing alone in the barn aisle. She had zero interest in being a pawn for some rich boy’s family to manipulate with their weird games. She had chores to do, a ranch to save and a bull to ride.

Starting with a steer tonight at eleven o’clock.

Chapter Six

The moon hung low in the velvet night sky, a shiny silver orb against a sea of black. Sam trudged through the shadows toward the north paddock, her boots silent on the dewy grass. Despite the late hour, adrenaline pulsed in her veins and her hands shook. She shoved them into the back pockets of her jeans as she walked.

Maybe she was crazy. Riding a steer was nothing like riding a bull, as steers were significantly smaller, but it was all she had access to for practice. She’d sat on a bull once before on a dare—for about two seconds at a friend’s ranch as a young teenager. Of course, that was before her friend’s father ran outside, yelling at them for taking the risk and looking much scarier than the bull. After watching the competition at the local rodeo each year, Sam figured her brief stint couldn’t even come close to being the same.

She rounded the corner of the barn, and the outline of the steer’s narrow horns inside the paddock siphoned into view. Cole, dressed in dark denim from head to foot, waited by the fence, one boot hung lazily on the bottom rail. A long rope was coiled over his shoulder. He straightened as she approached. “You ready for this, kid?”

Sam nodded. Only Cole could get away with such a nickname. He’d started work at the Jenson farm right after he graduated high school, when Sam was a child, and stayed on full-time these past twenty years. Now he was more like a big brother than a hired hand. “Of course I’m ready. Bring it.”

The tremor in Sam’s voice almost cancelled out the confident words, but to her relief, Cole didn’t seem to notice. “That’s what I like to hear.” He opened the paddock gate and motioned for Sam to go through first.

She strode into the pen, keeping a wary eye on the steer. The miniature beast looked up from inside the makeshift chute Cole had concocted, and blinked lazily, grass dangling from its flabby lips. At this rate, riding would be a breeze—downright boring, even. But once Cole tied that rope around the steer’s hindquarters…Sam swallowed. “Where’d you get him?”

“A friend with a cattle ranch a few miles west owed me a favor. He said we can borrow Lucy here for as long as we’d like.”

“Lucy?”

“Short for Lucifer.” Cole winked.

Sam’s stomach flipped.

“I know he looks calm now, but this here is a flank strap.” Cole gestured with the fleece-lined leather rope he uncoiled off his shoulder. “Don’t worry. It’ll get him bucking good.”

That was the problem. Sam forced a smile, hoping the evening shadows hid her apprehension. She couldn’t back down now, not after Cole had gone to all that effort to bring the beast. Besides, kids rode steers in rodeos all the time—it was considered a junior event. If some 4-H preteen could do it, Sam could, too.

She just wouldn’t think about her father’s last bull ride in the process.

“What do we do first?” Sam crossed her arms, hoping to keep her pounding heart from bursting through her long-sleeved T-shirt. Too bad Cole couldn’t have found a steer with shorter horns.

Cole started toward the animal, which backed up a step. “I’ll tie the flank strap and bull rope on him, and you hop on.”

“And then what?”

“Hang tight.” Cole grinned, his teeth a white splash against dark stubble.

Easy for him to say. He wasn’t about to mount a giant cow with horns. Sam took a deep breath as Cole straddled the fencing between the rail and the makeshift pen and went to work securing the flank strap. Cowboy up, as her father always said. She could do it—for him, for the farm. Winning the rodeo competition was her only immediate chance at earning enough money to buy Noble Star from Kate’s dad. Without the stallion, the farm would continue having to front as a tourist trap. Going from trail rider to bull rider would be hard enough with months of training—and Sam only had a few weeks. There was no time to waste.

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