Page 91 of Rough Ride

When I pulled into my apartment parking garage, I had a text. It was an unknown number, but it was easy to tell who it had come from based on the context.

Sawyer: Stop it.

Me: ???

Sawyer: You’re probably blaming yourself for all of this. Don’t. For one thing, I’m a grown-ass man who chose to fight Appleton. I’d do it again, even knowing how things turned out. And for another thing, it’s not your fault. You didn’t choose to get harassed by that tiny-dicked asshole last night. You’re the fucking victim here. Don’t you DARE feel guilty. Okay?

Me: I’ll try not to. Thanks. Your text fixed my mood.

Sawyer: I’m a fucking delight.

Me: Yes, but not sarcastically. Genuinely.

I still felt bad, but his textdidhelp.

And beyond all of that drama, I had a deeper sense of sexual liberation. Not just from Sawyer—but from Eli, and Johnny before him.

After my failed relationship with Trent—and the awful affair with Appleton—I’d fallen into a rut. Not outright depression, but close to it. I’d stopped going out with Liz on my free nights, holing up at home. Keeping to myself. I was damaged from those relationships, if not broken. The fallout from them made me afraid to get close to any guy, even if it was just meaningless sex.

But I had crawled out of that hole in the past two weeks, and it feltso good. I had been missing out on a deeper satisfaction in life. When sex was good, it was the best thing in the world. And sex with these three guys wasn’t just good. It wasamazing.

I didn’t want to think about what would happen when the rodeo ended. When they eventually left.

After showering and changing clothes at home, I still had an hour until my scheduled Uber window, so I drove to the rodeo camp. Fortunately, Eli and Johnny were there, standing outside their trailers and chatting.

“Sawyer was kicked out of the rodeo!” I immediately told them.

Johnny shook his head and held up his phone. “We just found out.”

“It’s fuckingunbelievable,” Eli shouted, angrier than I had ever seen him. “That piece of shit was practically assaultin’ you behind the bar, yet they swing the ban-hammer onSawyer?Shit doesn’t make sense.”

“It makes perfect sense,” Johnny murmured, “if you remember that Chris Appleton is the face of the rodeo. They can’t let anything happen to him.”

A man in the trailer spot across the aisle poked his head out. “It’s even worse when you realize Appleton got into a bar fight a few years back. All they did was slap him with a warning. The rules are different if you’re a big name, I guess.”

“Isn’t there something we can do?” I asked. “We were all witnesses.”

“We gave our statements to the police,” Johnny said. “That didn’t stop them from slapping aggravated assault charges on Sawyer.”

“The cop I talked to didn’t look like he was listening to what I said,” Eli grumbled. “I told him Sawyer never touched his knives or threatened to use ‘em, but he just rolled his eyes.”

“Salmon’s got a lot of power in this town. He was there when I bailed Sawyer out of jail. He said they’d drop the charges if Sawyer took a dive in the Bull Riding event.”

“I fuckin’knewit was rigged!” Eli exclaimed, turning away and pacing. “Fuck!”

“What if we organize some kind of protest?” I suggested. “If there’s enough participants, especially among the rodeo competitors, they’ll have to let Sawyer compete. They don’t want any bad publicity.”

Johnny removed his hat and stabbed his fingers into his yellow hair. “Not a bad idea. Not bad at all. I can make some calls.”

Dusty scratched at the door to the trailer, and a soft whine drifted out. Eli was already over there, so he opened the door for the dog. He came leaping out and immediately ran up to me, wiggling his entire body between my legs.

“She makes me feel that way too, Dusterino,” Eli said. Then he turned to Johnny. “I’ve been parked alongside your trailer for a lot of rodeos. I’ve never seen him act so happy around someone other than you.”

“He’s a good judge of character,” Johnny grinned at me.

Eli’s smile faded into deeper thought. “Hey. How’d you find out about Sawyer so quick?”

“I was with him when he got the call, at his…” I trailed off.

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