Page 16 of Buck This (Battle of the Bulls #6)

What had just happened?

Buck staggered to his feet and was immediately shoved backward.

He took a swing at the person tackling him, but Quickdraw ducked neatly and shoved him behind a panel into a Changing room. “You’re good, you’re good. There’re cameras out there.”

“Where’s…where’s…” Buck frowned, his head spinning. “Where is she?”

“Torrey is coming in right now. I can hear her trying to fight everyone out there.” There was a chuckle in Quickdraw’s voice. “Hey,” he said, easing Buck down onto a seat. He knelt down in front of him. “You didn’t suck tonight.”

Relief washed through him. Buck huffed a laugh. “There’s always tomorrow.”

Quickdraw snorted and set a plastic bag beside him. “Eat before you come out here. I’ll get everything settled out there.”

“Everything settled?” he asked, trying desperately to clear his head after the intensity of that Change.

“You’re in a different world now,” Quickdraw said mysteriously. “You’ve got five minutes with Torrey and then I’m coming back in here.” Quickdraw roughed up his hair and then shoved his head to the side before he left.

Buck closed his eyes and blew out a steadying breath. He hadn’t sucked for once. This was a new feeling.

Torrey peeked her head around the corner. “There you are.” She made a little squealing sound and collapsed onto him in a hug that banished the remaining fog from his mind.

“Ninety-four,” she uttered.

“Holy shit,” he whispered, hugging her tightly against him. Hell, what was this feeling in his chest? What was it? It felt so good having her here in this moment, hugging him like this.

“Ninety-four, Buck.” She repeated it as she eased back and cupped his cheeks. “You’re a monster.”

“If that’s true, you would be scared,” he said softly.

Her pretty blue eyes filled with excitement. “You followed me right into the chute. You didn’t charge me. You followed me. Your monster doesn’t aim at me. He goes for riders,” she whispered. “You’re still in it. Annabelle and Raven both said so.”

And Quickdraw had said he didn’t suck. That was as close as he would ever get to a compliment from that burly old legend.

“Here,” she said breathlessly, digging around in the plastic bag beside him. “Quickdraw said you have to eat something.”

Her hands were shaking, and he didn’t like that. “What’s wrong?” he asked. “Did someone mess with you?”

“What?”

“Your hands. You’re shaking.”

“Oh, I was so nervous for you!” She squatted down beside him, pulling sandwiches and protein shakes from the bag, but gripped his calf and grinned up at him with the prettiest smile he’d ever seen on a woman. “That’s what I wished for.”

He frowned. “What did you wish for?”

“For you to buck well tonight. That was my wish. I want you to win. I can say it now that it’s over.”

She’d used her wish on him?

Something about that touched him deeply.

“You’re up,” Quickdraw said from around the corner. “Get dressed and slam a protein drink and let’s go.”

“Up for what?” he asked, confused.

“You’ll see!” Quickdraw had disappeared around the corner again but could be heard over the noise of whatever was happening outside.

Buck chugged a vanilla flavored protein drink, and in a rush, he pulled on a pair of jeans and his belt, then his boots before Quickdraw was rushing them out of there. There was no damn shirt in the bag Quickdraw had brought so fuck it.

He grabbed Torrey’s hand and led her out to meet whatever chaos Quickdraw had organized but halted in his tracks when he saw all the cameras and onlookers gathering on the other side of the Changing space.

“What the hell?” he murmured.

“Dude, where is your shirt?” Tuff Enough asked from where he and the others stood off to the side, keeping a group of pretty girls in cowboy hats back.

“There wasn’t one in the bag.”

“This is good,” Dead of Winter said with a nod. “Real good. Hey, I used to do interviews shirtless, and it did me well.”

“Interviews?” Buck This demanded. “I’m not doing those. Never have and never will.”

“Torrey, can you go grab him a T-shirt at the merch table?” Quickdraw asked.

“On it!” she said and started walking away.

Buck This pulled her back to him. “We could just leave.”

“I think you’re supposed to stay and work that crowd,” she said, scrunching up her face as she gestured to the gathering media.

“I would rather get bit in the dick by a snake.”

“What kind of snake?” Dead of Winter asked.

“What?”

“It matters! Are we talking rattlesnake or run-of-the-mill garden snake? Venom or no venom?”

“If the interview questions are anything like this, I’m not doing it,” Buck griped, getting pissed.

“Ignore him,” Two Shots Down said as he started walking toward the cameras. “You’ll be fine.”

“You look hot,” Torrey said, looking him up and down. “Go work your magic on the masses.”

“I don’t have any magic! My magic is three shots of Jack Daniels after I buck terribly and then I usually just start a fight in some hole-in-the-wall bar somewhere.”

“Not tonight!” she called behind her, pointing her finger to the sky.

He watched her leave and hated every step she took away from him. “Pink T-shirt, or lime green,” she asked, turning around and walking backwards just to gauge his reaction.

“Black with a black logo or I’m not wearing it,” he ground out.

“Shirtless it is!” she teased.

“Heaven help me tonight,” he muttered. But his words lacked vitriol on account of her little sashay as she walked away in those little wrangler cut-off shorts.

God, she was pretty, but more than that was the way she’d made him feel when she’d hugged him after his buck, and the excitement he remembered on her face after he’d bucked off Rawling Cummings.

She’d been proud of him.

God, how long had it been since he’d made anyone proud?

Ninety-four.

He bit back a smile as he followed the guys over to the media.

Ninety-freakin’-four.

His brother would’ve been damn proud of him too.