Page 14 of Burnin' For You

Custer snorted, slammed against the back of the chute.

“You sure, Rube?” This from CJ, his gate man perched on the rail, holding the nylon rope to swing the door open. CJ shed his smokejumper attire for a good-ole cowboy aura, including a Stetson and faded jeans, cowboy boots. He wore his dark blond hair short under that hat. “I’m not sure even my uncle would ride this one.”

CJ’s Uncle Rafe, multi-PBR champion, now a high-faultin’ bull-riding trainer. “I doubt that, kid.”

“No seriously—he had this bull that tried to kill him—”

CJ stopped talking when Reuben shot him a look.

He breathed out, centering himself. Then, just before lifting his hand, he looked out into the crowd.

The bleachers were full for tonight’s semifinals. Just local entertainment, but if he landed enough points here, he could move on to something bigger—like a junior PBR event.

Reuben scanned the crowd—usually some of the team showed up to the events. Conner, maybe. Or Jed.

Or—his heart slammed into his sternum, full halt.

Gilly. Wearing a—no.That couldn’t be.

A dress. Cut above her knees, girly and sweet and pretty.

She was standing up, her hand over her eyes against the setting sun, her hair turning to a dark sizzle under the twilight, scanning the cowboys in the gate.

For a second he was standing on the shore, watching her land in her broken airplane. Watching her as she stared out the window like she might actually be looking...for him.

It took the breath from his chest.

Below him, Custer shifted, his muscles bunched.

Reuben ripped his gaze off Gilly, to CJ.

“Ready, Rube?”

He breathed in, tried to right himself, found his center.

This one, Gilly, is for you.

He lifted his arm.

“Pull!”

CJ yanked open the chute and the crowd erupted.

First move out of the chute, Custer reared—and Rube expected it. He pushed himself up over the bull’s shoulders, gripping the length of the bull’s body with his legs.

Custer landed hard, and Reuben himself up onto the backbone, glued to the animal.

He was a big man, yes, but he had nothing on fifteen hundred pounds. Custer threw himself up, rearing again, then landed in a spin.

For Reuben, time slowed, narrowed, focused, one thrilling, terrifying millisecond after the next. Holding on, breathing, anticipating, doing.

That’s what he loved about bull riding. As dangerous and jarring as smokejumping, bull riding pared every action down to one.

Stay on the bull.

No thinking, no choices. Everything by instinct, ground in by training. He didn’t have to rely on chance, on favor. Just his strength against the bull’s.

He heard the roar of the crowd, thunderous in his ears, then the horn blared.

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