Page 48 of Buck This
“No, I just woke up,” she called, struggling into her cut-off jean shorts.
There was panic in Quickdraw’s tone. Something was wrong.
He was murmuring something to someone outside, and when Torrey yanked the door open, he stood there giving First Time Train Wreck and Tuff Enough instructions. “You two head to the venue and see if he’s there. Dead?”
“Yep,” Dead of Winter asked from where he frowned at some deep tire tracks in the mud. It was raining.
“Can you check the practice ring?”
“Sure, but have you seen these? He peeled out of here in a hurry.”
Quickdraw had the phone up to his ear and he was white as a sheet as he waited for an answer.
“What’s wrong?” Torrey asked, baffled.
“Oh shit, you don’t know?” Dead asked.
Raven hopped out of the back seat of Quickdraw’s truck and frowned at the tire tracks. “I’ll tell her,” she said softly as shepassed her mate by. She squeezed Dead of Winter’s hand gently, then told him, “You boys go find him. The RV can be home base. If anyone hears anything, put it in the text loop.”
Tuff Enough stood off to the side looking troubled as hell, and Quickdraw muttered a curse, and tried to connect a call again. “It’s going straight to voicemail. I think he turned his phone off. Fuck!”
“We have time,” Raven said.
“He has to be to the venue in eight hours,” Tuff rumbled.
“What is happening? What am I missing?” Torrey asked.
Raven blew out a sigh, and there was heartbreak in her eyes. “One of your friends leaked a story to the press.”
“One of my…” Torrey frowned. “What story?”
Raven climbed the narrow RV stairs and came inside, turned for the television and grabbed the remote from the table, then clicked up a couple channels and turned the volume up.
There was a news anchor warning the audience of the graphic nature of pictures they were showing, and a big headline at the bottom that read,Breaking news: Finalist bull shifter charged with the murder of his brother, Teague Storme.
And to Torrey’s absolute horror, there was a picture up in the right-hand corner of an upside-down mangled pickup truck, with blood staining the pavement by the driver’s side door, and every window shattered. The roof had been completely crushed in, and the tailgate of the destroyed truck was hanging off a ledge after having broken the protective railing that lined the shoulder.
The next picture was a standoff with police and a bull.
The bull.
Her bull.
Buck This Storme.
In what looked like early morning light, he stood wild-eyed and ready to charge as police surrounded him, rifles raised, andthe injury to his side was gruesome. His skin was hanging off and his ribs were exposed.
A gasp escaped her, and she ripped her gaze away from the screen. The news anchor’s voice droned on about how they had secured an interview with one of Buck’s personal friends, and the newly ranked number one bull rider in the Battle of the Bulls, and then Torrey heard it…she heard his voice.
Cobalt Blue.
When she looked back up to the screen, he was wearing a plaid button-up shirt and his cowboy hat, and behind his right shoulder sat Reece, dressed in a red sundress, with matching pearl necklace and earrings, and her lips painted red. Her hair was perfectly done up.
Torrey narrowed her eyes and slowly stepped closer to the television as Cobalt spoke. “Hey, Helen, how are you this morning?”
The news anchor smiled somberly and nodded. “My morning is probably going a little smoother than yours. I hear it’s chaos over at headquarters for the Battle of the Bulls.”
“It’s wild right now. We were all supposed to draw our bulls this morning for finals, but that has been postponed until tonight, for obvious reasons.”
