Page 91 of The Wildest Ride

“Your country girl rudeness is showing again.”

She flipped him off and he smiled.

“I told you it comes in handy,” he said. “I once saved a man’s leg, resetting it after a bronc stomped him. Stopped a lot of blood flow over the years. Kept young fools from riding with concussions, that kind of thing.” He said the last bit looking her over, and she stared coolly back, eyebrow lifted.

Behind them the cows mooed.

She ignored him, asking instead, “Will you go back to it when this is over?”

He hated every version of the “what are you going to do next?” question, even coming from her. It was hard to say exactly what you were going to do with the rest of your life when you’d climbed your personal Everest by thirty-six. “No. You’ve got to get off on the job for it to last. I was happy to say goodbye.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. “There’s a lot of stuff you can’t save and I was already in love—with rodeo. Leaving emergency response was like coming home from a long stint away—and I never even stopped rodeo.”

“Good skills to have, though,” she said.

He nodded. “Good skills to have. You never know when the next emergency is going to show up.”

As if his words had conjured the moment, the cows erupted in frantic mooing. A knot formed in the left flank of the herd, while several cows from the front and right flank broke into a trot, stretching and elongating the herd block like pizza dough. Looking around to see what had startled them, he saw a strange moving dust mote on the horizon. As he watched it, it grew larger, coalescing into the shape of the camera van.

“Ah shit, camera crew startled them.” Lil’s curse wasn’t panicked, merely resigned, and it calmed AJ. She began to nose her horse toward the knot of cows, but AJ maneuvered to block her.

“Let me do it,” he said.

“You don’t know what to do.”

“Tell me.”

“Takes too long to explain,” she said testily.

He didn’t have to say anything for her to sense that he would not be moved.

She heaved a frustrated sigh. “Fine. Go check out the bunch. You’ve got a set of skills, so assess the situation and determine which one to use: rope, tie, wrestle, or herd.”

He moved as soon as she was done speaking, guiding his horse toward the bunch. Lil turned her horse the opposite direction and began to pick up speed.

What’s she doing?he wondered. He figured she’d hold tight where she was, but as she surged ahead of the scattering cows, he realized she was recapturing the lead. She looked like something from a movie, her hair whipping and coming undone in the wind behind her as she rode. But as much as he wanted to, he couldn’t afford to spend any more time watching her in action—he had his own mess to untangle.

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Lil allowed herself only a moment to watch AJ ride toward the distressed cows before she took off to catch the rest of the herd. She had to recapture the lead before they built up too much steam. So far things were controllable, but even a docile herd could become dangerous if they got too riled.

Lil and Becky the Horse broke ahead of the trotting cows and then slowed their pace.

“Whoa, there. Atta girl.” Lil spoke louder than she needed to—her calm, soothing command voice wasn’t for the horse. It was for the cows.

Herd animals craved cool and competent leadership. Give them that and they were down to follow you wherever.

And follow they did.

It was almost comical how easily they settled down and got in line behind her. Their sea of moos beginning to fade.

Lil twisted around in her saddle to check on AJ.

As always, and even from a distance, the sight of him made her heart do a little flip. He was gorgeous in his seat, expertly nosing his horse between cows to break up the cluster.

One by one, cows broke free from the chaos and trotted to rejoin the rest of the herd with Lil, until all that remained were a single female and a younger male.

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