Her Cowboy Lawman

by Pamela Britton

  “Can we go down and meet the bull riders?” Kyle pleaded.

  Her son didn’t waste any time, dancing on his toes and wiggling back and forth—like a puppy greeting his favorite human.

  “Of course,” Bren said.

  “Now?” he asked, looking at her this time.

  What could she say but, “I don’t see why not.”

  Kyle’s smile was something to behold. So wide and happy and pleased that it instantly made her forget her own troubles and tugged at her heart instead. It’d been so long since he’d looked at her like that. When Paul had died, she’d had to move to the poor side of town. She’d hated dropping him off at school, where he had no friends. He’d been miserable. She hadn’t known exactly how miserable until they’d moved in January and he’d started his new school and she realized her little boy was back. The one who smiled when he woke up and didn’t mind going to school in the morning. Just no kissing him goodbye.

  “You coming?” Bren asked. She realized then that Kyle had scooted past her already. Bren waited for her to follow.

  “How do we get down there?” she asked, more to cover her embarrassment than out of any real curiosity.

  “Back doors. Secret stairwells. The usual.”

  He was playing with her, trying to tease her, which meant he’d picked up on her mood and how distracted she was. Great.

  “Lead the way,” she said, motioning him in front of her.

  He hesitated. She waited because for some strange reason she didn’t want him watching her walk up those steps.

  “You don’t always have to be in charge, you know.”

  The words rocked her back on her heels. “What?”

  “You can just relax and let me take charge.”

  What was he saying?

  “Your brother told me you work too hard and that you needed a break. I figure tonight you can do that. Relax. Enjoy yourself.”

  She would kill Jax. She glanced up the steps. Kyle waited for them at the top. He smiled. Waved. It took every ounce of willpower she possessed to smile back.

  “Thanks.” She took a step. “I’ll try.”

  He grabbed her hand. She was so startled she turned back to face him, and this time she was level with him, and her eyes instantly found his lips.

  “Do more than try.”

  She sucked in a quick breath, and he let her go. She gulped and spun around so fast her long hair flicked her in the face. She couldn’t get out of there fast enough.

  * * *

  HE’D SCARED HER OFF.

  Bren cursed himself inwardly for about the third time. He shouldn’t have touched her. That had been a mistake.

  Why a mistake?

  He had to remind himself that he didn’t want a relationship. That single life suited him just fine. That she looked about half his age in her tight jeans and beige shirt with rhinestones across the front. At least she’d left her hair down today, but that was almost as bad as when she had it in pigtails because the long brown strands framed her cheekbones and made her face look tiny and her eyes seem huge. Gorgeous didn’t begin to describe her. And so if he scared her off, that was good.

  Election year, remember? he reminded himself.

  Kyle slammed through the door he’d led them to, Bren saying, “Easy there, partner,” at the crashing sound the thing made.

  “Sorry,” the kid said, shooting him a look of contrition.

  He liked her son. He liked the kid a lot. He was so full of boyish enthusiasm. So completely thrilled to be at the bull riding tonight. So happy about everything—from the corn dog vendor on the mezzanine floor to the souvenir booth right behind them.

  “You need to calm down, Kyle,” Lauren said, following in his wake. “You could have hurt someone bashing through the door like that.”

  The kid’s eyes grew huge and Bren found himself patting him on his head. “It’s okay. Just slow down, bud. We don’t want you knocking over a bull rider, do we?”

  That made him smile again. “No, sir.”

  And off he went, down the long concrete sidewalk that led to the arena floor. He leaped. He spun. He all but danced his way down and Bren couldn’t help but smile.

  “He’s a good kid.”

  She nodded, but he could tell she was still tense, and he knew why. He wasn’t an idiot. He’d seen the way her gaze had caught on his lips. Had watched as color spread beneath her skin. Knew she’d felt the same current of energy as he’d felt when they’d stood at eye level.

  “He could barely sleep last night,” she admitted.

  That was better. At least they were conversing. “Did he ride yesterday?”

  She nodded. “Jax helped him saddle up.”

  He smiled as he recalled the halter that first day. “Did they manage to get the saddle on right this time?”

  There it was. The thing he’d been looking for. The thing he wanted to see even though there was no good reason why he should want her to smile. It was a little grin, but it would work. “They did.”

  The air turned cooler. He saw her shiver. “Cold?”

  “No, I’m all right.”

  They’d reached the bottom floor, Kyle standing in front of a curtain that had an opening in the middle blocked by a security guard.

  “This your kid?” the big burly man asked them.

  “Yes,” Lauren said warily.

  “He tried to duck past me.”

  “Kyle!” she chastised.

  “But I have a pass, Mom.”

  “You can’t go in there alone,” the man said.

  If ever a kid looked crushed, Kyle Danners was the poster child. His shoulders sagged; his head bowed; his feet shuffled the dirt beneath his brand-new Western boots.

  “It’s okay,” she told the security guard. “We’ve got him.”

  The man nodded and stepped back. Kyle instantly perked up. He took two steps beyond the curtain and stopped in his tracks. “Woooowwwww!”

  It was wow, all right. Ahead were green pipe panels that held a pen full of bulls bigger than any he’d seen in a long, long time. They stood there completely unbothered by their surroundings, surveying the crowd of people who walked between the main arena and the prepping area in the back of the coliseum. To the right, stock contractors and other officials made sure everything was as it should be. He turned left, knowing where he needed to go. There was a room in the back where everyone hung out until the performance started. That wouldn’t be for another hour, but he’d texted Trent Anderson to make sure he’d arrived. Little did Kyle know that he was waiting for them in the back room.

  “Slow down there,” he warned Kyle.

  Lauren caught up to her son, grabbing his hand. She shot him an apologetic look. He just smiled, motioning her to hold up. There was a door ahead, one that said No Admittance.

  “You ready?” he asked Kyle.

  The kid looked up at him, obviously confused. “For what?”

  He went to the door and opened it. Inside, a half-dozen cowboys sat around on benches or on the floor or alongside the wall, each one performing his preshow ritual, which might be reading or listening to music or rubbing rosin on his bull rope. That’s what Trent Anderson was doing, his rope hanging from a wire on the wall, his face breaking into a huge smile beneath his black cowboy hat when he spotted them standing by the door.

  “Well, as I live and breathe. Boys. Look who just walked in the door.”

  Eyes swiveled in his direction, a few he recognized, more he didn’t, but those he did widened in surprise and then he was being crushed from behind in a giant bear hug by Trent, who’d crossed the room faster than a rooster after a hen. “Where have you been, boy?” he asked, spinning him around.

  “Chasing bad guys,” he answered.

  Trent drew back, mad
e scary fingers and said, “Ooooh. He has a gun.”

  Someone else clapped him on the back. One of the guys bashed the brim of his hat and Bren wondered why he’d stayed away so long. It’d been years since he’d been to a bull-riding event. Years since he’d watched his friends perform. Oh, he still tried to see Trent when he was in town or if he found himself up north, but he hadn’t attended an actual performance in nearly a decade. It made him long for the old days.

  “Come on. Let me introduce you to a few of the new guys,” Trent said.

  “Wait.” He looked back to where Lauren and Kyle stood by the door. “First I’d like you to meet one of your biggest fans.”

  Trent’s silver eyes followed his gaze, smiling when he caught sight of Kyle. But then he spotted Lauren, and Bren watched as he broke into a flirtatious grin, one that Bren knew was completely harmless because the bull rider had been happily married for years, and said, “Howdy, ma’am. Always happy to meet a fan.” He completely ignored her son.

  “No,” Kyle cried. “Not her. Me.”

  Trent stopped, pasted a confused look on his face and looked down at Kyle. Bren couldn’t have loved a man more than he did in that moment. He might be one of the most famous bull riders in the sport’s history, but he’d never let it get to his head.

  “You?” he teased. “Why, you don’t look old enough to know what bull riding is.”

  Kyle’s eyes were wide when he said, “I do, too.” He drew himself up. “I’m ten, and I know you’ve won the average six times. I know you were in a horrible accident years ago. I know you’ve already qualified for the finals for this year.”

  Trent glanced over at him, wiggling his brows. “Kid’s a regular record book.”

  “Like I said. Your biggest fan.”

  That started what must have been a dreamlike experience for the little man, one that Bren was only too happy to have a hand in providing. He’d never seen a kid so excited to meet bull riders. Not even some of his former students had been able to recite statistics like Kyle Danners did. By the time they were ready to leave, it was hard to say who was more impressed, Kyle or the bull riders he’d met.

  “That was the coolest thing in the world.” Kyle’s grin was second only to that of a child who’d seen Santa Claus on Christmas morning. “I’ll never forget that for as long as I live.”

  He said the words with such absolute reverence and conviction that Bren knew he wouldn’t. He caught the look on Lauren’s face, the way she smiled gently down at her son. How she touched his hair, lovingly, and he wondered what it would have been like if his own mother had been so gentle. But that was a road he didn’t like to travel, and so he said, “Ready to watch them ride?”

  “You betcha.” Kyle shot off toward the grandstands. Lauren slowed her steps and Bren knew she wanted to say something.

  “Thank you,” she said when their gazes connected. “You have no idea how much this means to him.”

  He thought about when he was Kyle’s age. How he would have killed to meet one of his heroes. “Oh, I think I do,” he said, for some reason feeling the need to stuff his hands in his pockets.

  You want to touch her.

  He did, he admitted. He wanted to grab her hand again, to squeeze it, to let her know without words that he knew what it was like to be a ten-year-old kid crazy about riding bulls.

  “Why’d you walk away from it?”

  He glanced at Kyle. The boy was waiting for them, peeking their way in between staring up at a banner that hung on one of the pipe panel fences.

  “Long story.”

  She held his gaze and he felt himself sink deeper. It made him dizzy, that feeling, and that’s when Bren knew he wouldn’t be able to fight it. Whatever this was between them, it went deeper than mere physical attraction. There was something in her eyes. Something that drew him to her. Something that made him want to ask her why she looked so sad from time to time.

  “Well, I hope one day you’ll tell me.”

  He had a feeling he would. She turned toward her son, waving. He hung back for half a heartbeat, scrubbing a hand over his face.

  This was getting complicated.

  She glanced back at him and there it was again. That soft smile. That warm gleam in her eyes. For once she didn’t look up at him as if he were a possible threat. Her hair fell in soft waves around her shoulders as she turned back again.

  Complicated, but quite possibly worth it.

  Chapter Eight

  “Mom! They’re doing it again!”

  Lauren pulled her gaze away from the action in the arena and glanced in the direction her son had pointed, even though she knew what he looked at. A Jumbotron hung in the middle of the coliseum, and Kyle kept hoping they’d put his image up on-screen.

  “Which camera is it?” Bren asked, glancing around as he tried to match up the camera angle to the people waving on TV.

  “I think that one.” Kyle pointed. Bren leaned in and laughed with Kyle as they tried to get the attention of the cameraman.

  He was good with kids. She had to look away because watching him with her son did funny things to her insides. Oh, heck. Just being with him did funny things to her insides.

  The crowd erupted. Lauren sat at the edge of her seat as a bull shot out of the gate with its rider clinging to the back of the brindle-colored animal with all his might. Didn’t do him any good. With a snort and a spin, the bull was clearly going to unseat the cowboy. Lauren watched, breathless, as he tried—and failed—to hang on. He looked like a man dumped from a plane, arms akimbo, legs spread, only he didn’t have a parachute. She covered her eyes when he landed.

  And this was what her son wanted to do. What he dreamed about doing. What the man next to her would teach him to do.

  “It’s okay.”

  She felt his warm hand on her jean-clad thigh and her whole body tensed in another way. She didn’t want to open her eyes. She really didn’t, but he lightly squeezed and she felt compelled to meet his gaze.

  Dear goodness.

  His gold eyes were full of reassuring compassion. “He’s got years before he’ll be riding at this level. Heck. He might never get to this level. He might forget all about bull riding once he discovers girls.”

  She gulped and looked down at the fingers on her leg. “Maybe,” she muttered, then clasped her knees together and shifted away.

  He withdrew his hand, and she breathed a sigh of relief.

  “You don’t look convinced.”

  She wasn’t. There was just something about the way Kyle talked about growing up to become a cowboy. It wasn’t little-boy fantasies, she didn’t think. His feelings went deeper than that. Something in his eyes. It was there right now as he leaned forward and watched the bull in the arena. A fascination. A curiosity. But most important, a determination and a look of utter confidence. The bulls didn’t scare him.

  “I have a feeling he’s in this for the long haul.”

  When she glanced up at him, she saw it in his eyes, too. He knew. He wasn’t surprised by her answer. Not at all. He felt the same way.

  “The good news is he’s going about things the right way. He’s learning. Not just jumping on any old thing that moves and hoping for the best. He’s working at it.”

  “Yeah, but it doesn’t matter how hard he works, does it?” She took a deep breath and said the words she’d been keeping to herself for weeks. “He’s going to get hurt.”

  He nodded and she had to look away because just the thought of it scared her to death. That’s when she felt it again. His hand. This time it landed on her own hand, gently clasping it, and she looked into his eyes and it was as if the seats they sat on suddenly shot up to the heavens and it was just the two of them. She watched as his gaze moved to her lips and everything inside her tensed because it was almost as if...

&n
bsp; He liked her.

  She pulled back again.

  He liked her.

  As in found her attractive.

  “They’re doing it again!”

  The words jerked her back to earth. Her son pointed at the Jumbotron and a couple appeared on-screen, but only for a split second because a heart covered the screen, one that opened up to frame the couple’s heads, x’s and o’s dancing around the edges.

  “What are they doing that for?”

  “It’s the kissing cam,” Bren explained. “They’re supposed to kiss each other.”

  “Eeeewwwww,” Kyle said.

  The sound almost made her laugh, especially when the couple kissed. There was no mistaking Kyle’s groan of disgust.

  “I’m thinking it might be a while before you have to worry about him kissing girls,” Bren said.

  She nodded, not wanting to meet his gaze, worried about what she might see in it. “I think you’re right.”

  The camera panned to another couple. In the arena someone else climbed aboard a big bull, one with horns the size of handlebars. They’d been chopped off at the ends, from what she could see between the bars of the bucking chute, but were no less intimidating.

  “Why do they do that?” Kyle asked when the second couple kissed.

  “It’s a game.” Bren leaned forward and smiled at her son. Once again her heart did that odd little flip. There was such kindness in his eyes. “If you don’t do it, you’ll get booed.”

  “But what if you don’t want to kiss the girl?”

  “Then you’re in trouble,” Bren provided.

  The bull rider pulled on his rope, the long end of it held straight up in the air. Lauren tried to focus on the action in the arena, not what sitting next to Bren did to her heart. The crowd cheered and clapped because yet another couple on-screen had given each other pecks, this time on the cheek. Kyle wrinkled his nose, looking as grumpy as a ninety-year-old man.