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So he’d run just like his father only slightly less permanently.

Hardly admirable. That needed to stop today. Tonight. He’d tell her about the time bomb he might be sitting on. Let her make her decision, and he would make his.

He reached out to play with her hair while she threaded the last Velcro strap on his hard brace.

“What?” She looked up and smiled.

Even in the shadows her eyes glowed with warmth and her creamy skin was luminous.

“Thank you,” he said, wanting to say so much more, but this wasn’t the place and definitely not the time. He was about to jump on an animal that could kill him if he weren’t at one hundred percent focus.

And he had plans for his future now.

Bodhi pulled on his gloves, and without asking, she tied them on and then bent down and wrapped and tied his boots. He stood still looking at her crouched at his feet. It was unbearably sweet and sexy, and his mind and body didn’t know what to do, how to react.

“I’m a little nervous,” she admitted. “I looked at videos of your riding online last night.” She moistened her bottom lip. “I wish I were the praying type.”

He pulled her into his arms. “I’ll come back to you,” he promised rashly, something he’d never promised anyone, this year especially. After receiving the letter, he’d been riding hard, focused only on points and money and glory. He’d wanted to go out on top.

“I don’t know what to do,” she whispered. “I’m scared for you, but I’m also so in awe. I want you to do your best. How can I help? Leave so you can get in your zone? Meet you at the end?”

“This is good,” he said, surprised he meant it. “I like spending time with you and knowing you’re watching me,” he said. “Waiting for me.”

God, did that make him sexist? Nico was the smartest, most competent woman he’d ever met. The last thing she needed was to be hanging around waiting for him too often.

She kissed him and then wiped at the bit of gloss.

“I need to get some lipstick that sticks,” she said. “Otherwise it looks like I’m claiming territory. A bit primitive.”

“Claim away. It’s yours.”

It was like the sun shone from her eyes, and as he saw her tension ease, so did his.

“Ride ’em cowboy.” She smiled.

*

As an exitline it was the cheesiest she’d ever delivered, but that’s what had made it funny, and hopefully less emotional. She’d felt seconds from clinging to him, anxious for his safety—anathema to the rules of improv and her new cowgirl persona. She needed to channel some of that rodeo queen cool.

She edged closer when the saddleless bronc riding started. Oh. My. God. It was more intense in person. More intense and stressful than any time she’d faced before a key or adversarial witness or judge.

Her heart slammed painfully when Bodhi’s name was called. The announcer said a few things about Bodhi that she could barely hear over the roar of the crowd. They were on their feet just like they’d been when Bodhi and Bowen had been announced for their roping events and Beck had been for his steer wrestling that she still felt she could never unsee. She hadn’t met Ashni yet, only seen her from a distance, but she didn’t know how Ashni had watched her man for years do that crazy maneuver of jumping from a galloping horse, grabbing the horns—yes, horns—of a steer running flat out and hit the dirt and tip the steer over.

She would have had gray hair before she hit twenty-five. And by her age now, thirty-one, she’d be using a walker.

What was the deal with cowboys? All those men she competed with in the Ivies and in the corner offices with their trust funds, education, vacation homes in the Hamptons, connections, and black Amex cards wouldn’t last a hot second in Marietta, Montana.

They bred them tough in the west.

“West is best,” Bodhi had whispered in her ear one morning in the loft of the Vista Barn when they were theoretically setting up the seating, but Bodhi had been making love to her again. She’d been commenting on how beautiful all the mountain ranges were ringing Paradise Valley just before he’d kissed her jeans right off her body.

Her body heated at the memory. Bodhi was absurdly, mouth-wateringly hot.

She climbed the gate so she could see over it and clung to the green metal bars. She could see Bodhi. He was on top of what was called the chute, talking to Bowen. Bodhi laughed. God, he was beautiful. So vibrant. So alive that he’d brought her back to life. The thought of him being sick was impossible to contemplate. No matter how bad things had been this past year, they would be nothing compared to how she would feel if Bodhi were sick or injured.

She wanted to be there for him.

But she would also have to come clean, and Bodhi with his love and loyalty of family would never look at her the same.