Page 6 of Maverick
I’m not even going to be in the top five. The level of competition this year is wild. Far beyond other years, and I just messed up.
And I know it’s one of those things that just happens. I know that sometimes it’s a combination of factors. The way the dirt is, the way that you’re sitting on your horse, your horse’s footing. And that it’s hard to even adjust at this stage, because it’s not usually a skill issue. But I still feel like it is. And I have to finish out the round knowing that I’ve royally messed up. The five-second penalty puts my ride at a time that I haven’t had since I was brand-new.
I grit my teeth in fury and frustration. I can’t bear to watch the rest of the event. I haven’t been able to watch the bull riderssince Colt’s accident anyway. But usually I stay and watch the other events.
I consider blowing off the poker game. At this point, it feels reasonable. But…
I move over to the trailer, and retrieve my tack, before taking Cloud Dancing over to the stall that she’s going to sleep in tonight. My plan has been to bunk in the trailer – it has sleeping quarters in it, something else that I bought for myself with my winnings. Extravagant, but I do love to have it, because it keeps me from having to get a hotel every time I travel.
But it’s starting to get a little bit old. Everything is starting to feel a little bit old. My mood is sour.
No middle ground about it.
I lead Cloud Dancing over to the wash station, and there he is, leaning against the wall. I see the end of his cigarette lit up in the darkness.
“Are you trying to be the Marlboro Man, complete with lung cancer?”
He lifts his head, and I see a glint in his eyes. He takes a drag on the cigarette, and a cloud of smoke spirals through the air. “Anything can kill you. Pick your poison, I guess.”
“That’s grim,” I say.
“Life is grim.”
“Well, it also smells. So, there’s that.” I lead Cloud Dancing into the wash space and tether her to the peg. Then I grab my wash hose and start spraying her down.
“I amveryconcerned about what you think about me.” His voice is dry. Sardonic, and I’m quite certain he doesn’t care at all.
There’s something about him right then, all dark and rangy and mysterious, and I want to move closer to him, not run away.
Like a big cat in a zoo that you can’t look away from because you know it might eat you.
That reckless electricity under my skin feels dangerous tonight. I lost tonight, and that’s only making it worse. I need a hit of something, something new, a win.
Everything feels grim and dire and pointless.
Everything feels like I’ve done it before.
I’m sinking into the morass of my own sameness. I hate it. This is the thing my parents called out directly. The kind of thing that saw me trying to learn how to jump a horse on my own at seven (I didn’t die, even if I did fall off). The kind of thing that saw me cutting up all my mom’s old photos without permission to make a (very bad) scrapbook. The kind of thing that sent me off to the rodeo in a fury, and straight to a championship, and now I need something new. Something else.
Our eyes meet, and I feel a tug of desire in my stomach. I could kiss him.
I could just close the distance between us and taste the nicotine on his lips, even though I want his mouth and not the smoke – but I suspect with him, you don’t get to choose.
What would that be like? All that good, bad, and danger aimed fully at me. Hands on my hips, mouth against mine…
I wouldn’t know because the one time I kissed a guy it was in the back of the barn at my parents’ property and he was sweaty and not in a sexy way, and I pushed him away because I was sixteen and he was twenty – so many problematic horse guys roaming around us all the time – and if it had engaged my impulsive side at the time, I’d have probably dragged him right into the tack room and let him take my virginity.
But my head was somewhere else.
Now it’s there.
I can’t get it out of my head.
I move away from him. Quickly.
I need to save myself.
“I’ll see you at poker,” I say.
