Page 9 of The Chances We Take

When I looked up at his face, his eyes meeting mine, heat immediately rose to my cheeks.Holy shit, this is the most gorgeous man I’ve ever seen.

“Nice to meet you too.” I tried my best not to stutter, or even worse,droolover him, beforedropping his hand.

I couldn’t tear my eyes away. He was a cowboy version of Finnick Odair fromThe Hunger Games, except with honey-colored eyes instead of green. In other words, he was every middle to high school girl’s fantasy come to life.

Ellison gave me a knowing smirk, and I shot her a dirty look before Colter and Reid ran off.

A woman walked by our seats in the most extra outfit I had ever seen. There were sequinseverywhere,and not only that, her boobs were practically hanging out of her top.

“Isn’t that a little…fancy for a rodeo?” I raised an eyebrow, although I did admire her sense of style a tiny bit. It took a lot of guts to go out in public like that.

“The NFR is basically rodeo fashion week.” Jake chuckled from his seat next to me. “You ain’t seen nothing yet.”

Right after he finished his sentence, he pointed out a pretty blonde wearing an orange and purple slip dress, teal fur jacket, orange knee-high boots with lightning bolts embroidered on, and an orange cowboy hat. The turquoise jewelry she was decked out in clinked together as she strutted past us.

“See? Western influencers, you know?”

“Apparently.” I blinked, trying to adjust my eyes to the bright colors. “But damn, if I would have known I’d have packed more than what I did.” I looked down at my plain white blouse and denim jeans, suddenly feeling very underdressed even though plenty of people were wearing similar things.

“It’s all right, Is, we can go to Cowboy Christmas and you can shop your little heart out,” Ellison replied. “You could spend a few days there, it has so many different vendors.”

I locked pinkies with her as I said, “Deal.” What was a Vegas trip without a little shopping?

The first few events went by in a blur, and before we knew it, it was time for Colter and Reid to compete.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve got the fifteen best roping teams in the world tonight! You’ve seen a few of them compete already, but now we’ve got a duo from up in Silver Creek, Montana! They’re standing at number five in the world right now, folks! Colter Carson and Reid Lawson!”

Ellison and I cheered as the boys whooped and hollered for Colter and Reid.

Colter backed up his horse into the box on one side of the small pen-like structure Ellison explained to me was what the steer would run out of, and Reid backed his horse into the other side.

I was completely enamored with what was happening in front of me. The world seemed to still as Colter nodded his head and the steer was released. The boys took off like bullets, Colter catching the horns with ease and Reid following close behind.

“Three-point-nine seconds for Colter Carson and Reid Lawson!” the announcer cried.

“Is that good?” I asked, grasping Ellison’s arm with excitement.

“That’s one of their best times so far this year,” Hayden answered.

I looked at him, a little bit surprised. I think that was the first thing I’d heard him say since Ellison introduced us.

“He doesn’t say much. He surprised me, too, when I met him,” Ellison whispered to me. “He’s super sweet, though. Just quiet compared to everyone else.”

I leaned toward her. “To be fair, I don’t think that’s very difficult in a group like this one.”

We watched the remaining teams rope, each one coming up short on Colter and Reid’s time. They ended up winning the first round, adding thirty thousand dollars each to their earnings.

When Jake told me how much money they would earn from today, my jaw dropped. I couldn’t wrap my head around it as, “Holy shit. That’s a lot of money,” spilled out of my mouth.

“I think this is a great cause for celebration. We should definitely hit the clubs tonight,” Mikey suggested before he was quickly shut down by Jake, Ellison,andHayden.

“No one’s stopping you from going, but I don’t think Colter or Reid will be down for that,” Ellison pointed out.

I couldn’t decide if the Las Vegas Strip was better at night or during the day. At night, at least, the city lights made for quite a view, but you also had people trying to give you tickets for the clubs, which, of course, Mikey had been jumping at every chance he got. He’d been trying to get all of us to go with him for the past four days, to which we all gave a firmno. His reasoning was that Colter and Reid deserved to have a little bit of fun because they were performing really well and hadn’t stopped winning since the first night. And his reasoning was always accompanied with a suggestive eyebrow wiggle or wink.

Colter and Ellison were walking ahead, leaving me between Mikey and Reid. Jake and Hayden walked behind us, and I felt a little bit like a celebrity, having a group oftall, muscular cowboys walking with me. Well, besides Mikey. He was only about six inches taller, compared to the foot Jake had on me.

“So, where are you from, Isabelle?” Reid looked down at me, slowing his stride so I could match his pace. I hadn’t really had much of an opportunity to talk to Reid, or Colter, since the day I flew in because of how busy they were.

---