Page 35

Hot Cowboy

May

W ith our day of reckoning against Alabama on our heels, the girls and I are well aware we should probably be living and breathing lacrosse for the next week, but we don’t have the luxury of big East Coast lax towns. Tables don’t stop filling up in the bar, the festivals don’t move themselves a week later, and the cattle don’t park themselves in one spot and hibernate till post-season’s over. Half the team applies for time off from their jobs and doesn’t get it. And those of us working on the farm still end up ankle-deep in muck on the evenings, balancing oncoming finals, lacrosse practice, and chores.

‘Bring ’em round, May!’ Tía Juana calls out to me from outside the fence, a cold sweet tea – salvation – in her hand.

I turn Rocky in response, and the livestock follow with a resigned lowing. ‘C’mon, now. Let’s go!’

‘?Vamos, May!’ Tía claps a hand against her thigh. She’s ten times more efficient at this than I am. My harried pace – and Rocky’s leisurely one – aren’t quite on par. Now that my horse’s annual moment of speed is past, he’s got no reason to do anything beyond a casual trot.

‘Goin’!’ The cattle moo exasperatedly when I herd them into the corral. The enormous pack of gentle giants are a combination of Tía’s and ours. While the ranch undergoes major reconstruction, my aunt is letting us keep the animals at her farm in Tulsa where she has a ton of extra barn space. The condition? I have to keep doing my chores – an hour-fifteen drive away. I adjust my hat, swivelling towards Tía and guiding Rocky out of the corral before my aunt comes over to close the gate. I dismount my horse, taking his reins so we can lead him back to the field. ‘Where’d you put Colt?’

‘Oh, the boyfriend? Got him to work on my four-by-four,’ she replies. My aunt’s rickety red truck breaks down at least once a week. Poor Colt is probably trying to turn water into wine back at the house.

‘You’re good at making college kids do the chores,’ I tease her, nudging her side so she jumps, nearly losing her sweet tea to gravity.

‘My back can’t do these things any more!’ Tía Juana says in defence. This much is true. Tía, like my Papa, used to be an adrenaline junkie, barrel racing and doing some crazy stunts in show that screwed her back up for good. I’m honestly shocked it’s her who walked away with the permanent bodily injury and not my bull-riding father.

Her back issues, coupled with the fact that she lives alone, happily single since she divorced her deadbeat husband at twenty-eight, make for a ton of work to be done on her farm, all the time, even with well-qualified ranch hands.

I lean over and take a sip of her tea. The freezing liquid buffered by big ice cubes cools my entire body immediately. We take the short walk to the field where my aunt likes to let her horses run.

A loud sputtering sound emerges from the other side of the stables. ‘The truck?’ Tía says around her tea.

‘Better go make sure Colt didn’t blow that thing up,’ I reply, and we hustle on over to the back of the barn.

I’m not sure what I expected to see as I idly dust the dirt off my Wranglers and tank top, but it certainly isn’t what we encounter.

When the overachiever had offered to help me with my chores in Tulsa for the day, I couldn’t say no – I mean, I didn’t mind having someone speed up the dreaded process. And deep down, I didn’t mind spending the drive with Colt, either. Beside the point. Either way, I couldn’t have foreseen him looking this comfortable out on the farm. Extremely comfortable. And extremely … good.

Tía’s straw falls out of her mouth as her eyes, like mine, go wider than the tyres on the four-by-four. The hood of the truck is propped up, some Tyler Childers crooning through the speakers, and Colt’s deep brown leather boots, no longer as unscuffed as they were when he first arrived here, are screwed in the ground as he leans over the engine, a wrench in his hand, giving something one final twist. He stands briefly, squints at his handiwork, then immediately dips right back down to the engine, and Tía lets out a little squeak.

I think our shock is justified. I could start with the fact that I’ve never seen jeans fit a man as well as they do Colton James Bradley. For that matter, I’ve never seen jeans fit a man’s spectacular butt as well as they do Colton James Bradley’s. Things only get more difficult for us when I drink in his very shirtless torso, the strong muscles of his back and arms moving when he steps back from the truck, rounding it to get to the driver’s side. The silver chain of his necklace glitters against his neck, its medallion flat against his chest. I get a full view of his impeccably chiselled abs, at least before he pulls the white tee half-tucked into his back pocket out and over his head, then adjusts the Ariat cap sitting backwards on his head, his wavy dusky brown hair peeking out behind.

Tía and I exchange a knowing look.

Colt plops down in the driver’s seat and turns the truck over. It lets out that same putter as before, except this time, the sound persists and the engine roars to life, buffeted by what’s now a Chris Stapleton ballad on the radio. He grins at my aunt, and then at me, the corners of his eyes creasing happily. ‘All done, ma’am!’

He swings himself out of the truck, as casually as someone who’s worked on the ranch their entire life would. I blink furiously. My increasingly complicated and increasingly involved feelings for Colt are one thing. But I cannot have this idiot catch me drooling over the fact that he looks like he was born to rock ‘walking womanizer country boy’.

‘May,’ he says with a cheeky little smirk, dusting his palms off on his jeans.

‘Where did you get your buckle?’ I blurt.

Colt’s eyebrows rise. Oh my god. May. SHUT UP. Please do not talk more about his belt-buckle, insinuating that you were ogling his belt-buckle. Ogling everything in the vicinity of his belt-buckle. MAY. ‘Your pop, actually.’

My cheeks are reddening faster than I can control them. ‘It … um … you look very—’

‘Cowboy,’ my aunt finishes unhelpfully. ‘My niece means to say you look like a very hot cowboy .’

‘Huh.’ Colt’s eyes don’t move from mine for a minute. They narrow just slightly in amusement, flecks of brown in his irises glittering in the ruthless sun. ‘Hot cowboy. That’s a new one.’

My aunt, under the total assumption that this man is certainly my boyfriend, just titters satisfactorily. ‘You got yourself a good one, May. Why don’t the both of you feel free to get to some more tea in the house? I have a couple of rounds to finish up here.’

Tía Juana struts off, chuckling to herself, leaving me, Colt, and my dumb, big-mouth comment.

‘So, May.’ Colt leans against the side of the truck, the smirk returning to his face. ‘My buckle, huh?’

I could literally hide under the pickup in embarrassment right now. I groan and bury my face in my hands instead: next best thing. ‘Let’s go home, hot cowboy. Terrorize me later.’

‘O-kay,’ hums Colt, taking the lead on our walk back to the driveway. My head is still in my hands the entire time. If the way he stood up for me at the rodeo and the moment on the homemade backyard field weren’t enough to make me question every limitation I’d set for myself, this might just be my shove over the edge. Granted, CJ Bradley is a handsome angel of a man, but more than that, it’s how well he fits right in with this life, my life.

He’s tempting me in every way. And Jordan’s probably right. He’s trying, and he’s certainly starting to succeed.