Page 46 of My Cowboy Freedom
Maybe Iama human remora, looking for a shark to groom.
My ears knew his voice now and my body responded. Once my gaze found his I didn’t see anyone else.
In bed that night, long after he stopped playing and went inside, it was as if I heard his music. As if I still heard the words...
But it was my mother I dreamed about.
Her howl of sorrow when she realized my stepfather was dead.
The screams that got lost in the sound of sirens.
My mother’s mouth, forming the words,No, andWhy, andLiar, over and over, until the police dragged me away.
The tap on my door came none too early for me.
“Sky?” Tad called. “Get up, princess. It’s time to move some cattle.”
I tried to swing my legs over the side of the bed, only to discover someone had—from the feel of things—ridden a dirt bike over my ass all night.
I let my head fall back on the pillow.
Bang, bang,bang! “C’mon, Brody. It ain’t going to be any easier ten minutes from now.”
Ten minutes later, I left the room, dressed and ready.
“You looking forward to riding out?” Tad asked when I caught up to him.
“You bet,” I lied.
Because of the distance, we put the horses into trailers and climbed into the cabs of the Rocking C’s trucks. On the ride out to the service road, where the trucks would let us off, the men ribbed one another.
This is it.
Thisis why I came to the Rocking C.
Notto find some new guy to moon over.
I’d been warned off Rock McLean by three different—three really important—people, but wouldn’t you know it? My heart didn’t want to listen.
Once the truck came to a gliding stop, and me and the boys got the horses down to tack them up, there was no more time to think about sweet, smiling country boys and their guitars and their adorable damn dogs.
Cowboying is hard work. I knew that. But I didn’t. Not really.
Not until that day.
