And then she couldn’t look away.
Just stood there in horror, watching.
Grayson. Flying through the air as he slid from his horse toward the running steer. Only the steer stopped short, and instead of finding purchase on the animal, Grayson slid right past him, landing in a tangle of racing horse legs and steer horns. The hazer’s horse went down, rolling right over him, and both animals became even more frenzied as they tried to get away from each other, from Grayson and from the riders who raced in trying to separate them all.
And once they succeeded, instead of rolling to his feet the way she’d watched in countless videos, Grayson just lay there on the ground.
“There’s a steer-wrestling wreck if there ever was one,” the announcer said as the very worst of the video started playing again. As if once wasn’t enough. “Now, folks, we all know accidents can happen despite everything we do to keep our rodeo athletes safe, but you combine a five-hundred-pound steer and horses going thirty miles an hour and—”
Billie’s head seemed to fill with a roaring sound as the video went to slow motion on his cowboy hat rolling from Grayson and finally falling flat amid a cloud of dust.
“—all remember six years ago, Grayson used to compete in saddle bronc, until injuries during the National Finals in Las Vegas sidelined—”
She bolted away from the rodeo announcer’s voice and ran into the house, where she’d left her purse.
“Belinda—”
She ignored her mother’s call. Once inside, she fumbled in her purse for her cell phone, only to finally upend the contents right on the kitchen counter. Her keys, notes about property listings, lipstick and commission check all scattered. She snatched her phone from the midst of it and quickly found Deborah Fortune’s number and dialed.
She wasn’t even aware of her mother hovering beside her as the phone rang, until Peggy pushed a chair against the back of her knees and made her sit on it.
Finally, the call was answered. “He’s okay, Billie,” Deborah said in greeting, sounding breathless.
Billie’s insides liquefied. She leaned over, until her head was near her knees. “You’re not just saying that? I saw the replay on television.”
“The doctor at the arena is pretty certain he’s broken a bone or two. But he was conscious and, of course, mad as hell at himself. There’s a pilot here who is giving us a lift to the hospital in Lubbock.”
She was still ready to think the worst. “He was conscious?”
“They’ve given him something for the pain,” Deborah said. She sounded far calmer than Billie felt. “He was asking for you.”
Billie lifted her head again. “What?”
“Honey, I know it’s a lot to ask, but would you consider meeting us at the hospital?”
Her knots tightened up again. “Why would he a-ask for me? The ranch sale is complete.”
“There was a time when I was as single-minded as you.” Deborah sounded disappointed. “I guess I wanted to believe there was more between the two of you than—”
“I can get to Lubbock.” The decision came out in a rush, so easily it was really no decision at all. “I’ll fly or drive. If...if you’re really sure he wants me there.”
“I’m very sure.” Deborah didn’t wait a beat. “We’ll be in Lubbock within the hour. If you do drive, be careful yourself. The last thing we want is another accident.”
“I’ll be careful. Mrs. Fortune—Deborah—thank you.” Billie’s hands were shaking as she ended the call and opened the flight app on her phone. The next flight to Lubbock didn’t leave for a few hours, and it was routed through Houston before backtracking to Lubbock. Meaning it was unlikely she’d save any time at all traveling by air.
She pushed to her feet and slid her phone into her pocket. “I’m driving.”
“I’ll go with you,” Peggy said quietly.
Tears burned in her eyes. “Mom.”
“You’re not driving all that way when you’re this upset.” She began shoveling the contents of Billie’s purse back inside. When she reached the commission check, she hesitated, her eyes widening when she saw the amount. She carefully tucked the check inside the purse and then cupped Billie’s chin in her hand. “I warned you that life doesn’t follow all the little plans we make.”
“The day isn’t complete without an ‘I told you so’ from Mom,” Ray said as he walked into the kitchen.
“Because so many days go by when I’m right about so much,” Peggy retorted. “Now, I’ll just go tell Hal and we’ll get on our way.”
“It’s okay.” Billie swiped at her face. “You don’t have to ride with me, Mom. We’d just have to figure out how to get you back home again. You know you hate to fly.” She gave Peggy a tight hug. “But thank you for offering.” She kissed her cheek. “I’ll call you when I get to Lubbock.”
Peggy looked like she wanted to argue. But then, surprisingly, she subsided. “All right.”
Billie couldn’t contain her surprise. “That’s all you’re going to say?”
“Well.” Her mother handed her the refilled purse. “When all this is over, I guess maybe we’ll let you buy us a new air-conditioning unit, after all.”
* * *
It was nearly dark by the time Billie reached the emergency center parking lot in Lubbock. She’d made the drive in just under six hours. But before leaving town, she’d gone to her apartment to throw some clothes in an overnight bag. She’d phoned Amberleigh from the road to have her reschedule her appointments for the rest of the week, and only thoughts of Grayson’s comments on her lead foot kept her from hitting the gas pedal even harder.
She’d kept the radio on the news stations the whole while, but didn’t hear anything at all about him. Not that it surprised her. A rodeo accident generally didn’t garner the same media attention that other sporting event catastrophes did. Which meant that for a good portion of her drive, she was entirely out of touch with both ends, Lubbock and Austin.
She locked the car and hurried through the emergency room doors. She figured that she’d have to ask someone to find Grayson’s mother first, but the moment she walked through the waiting area to the information desk, she stopped in her tracks, hopeful emotion flooding her at the sight of him standing right there. “Grayson?”
As soon as she said his name, the tall man turned to look.
Disappointment flooded through her. How stupid of her.
It wasn’t Grayson at all. Just a near identical version of him. His brother. Either Jayden or Nathan.
The man headed toward her, one hand outstretched. “You’re Billie.”
She nodded. She felt more than a little punch-drunk with the combination of worry, the long drive and now, feeling like she was seeing double. “You’re—”
“Jayden.” The man smiled faintly as he squeezed her hand. He hitched his thumb toward the carbon copy who’d walked up beside him. “And this is Nate.”
She looked from one face to the next. They were equally as handsome as Grayson. But she didn’t feel a speck of the pull that their brother held for her. “How’s Grayson?”
“Loopy as all hell,” Nathan answered. “He just got out of surgery and the anesthetic’s still wearing off. Keeps talking about getting some damn shoes or something.”
“Probably got the deal he just inked with Castleton Boots still on his brain,” Jayden surmised. “Anyway...” He turned his attention to Billie again. “Mom sent us down here to wait for you. There’s not a lot of space in the recovery room.” As if he recognized the fact that her knees had turned rubbery, Jayden slid a supportive arm around her shoulders. “They had to put a pin or two in his leg and he’s got a concussion. Docs say he might not remember everything that’s happened, but he’ll heal up okay.”
“Except he’s not gonna be bulldogging for a while,” Nathan added. His voice was a little deeper than Jayden’s. His expression a little more closed. “Not the rest of this season, anyway.”
She realized that as the men had
talked, Jayden had steered her to the elevators.
“He’s not going to be happy about that,” she said faintly. “I don’t think he’s ready to retire, even though he’s been thinking about it.”
“Retire!” Both brothers looked shocked, and she caught the glance passing between them as she stepped into the waiting elevator.
“He’s talked to you about that?” Jayden punched the button for the third floor as the doors slid shut.
“I didn’t know it was secret.”
“It’s not,” Jayden assured her. “Just didn’t know he’d talked to anyone about it besides me and Nate and Mom.”
Billie chewed the inside of her lip. She wasn’t sure if Grayson’s brother was happy about that fact or not. And it made for a very slow climb from the first to the third floor as silence bounced around the elevator car.
Finally, the doors opened again, and the two men waited for her to exit first. Then took a circuitous route until they stopped outside one of several curtained cubicles fanning out from a central nurses’ station.
Billie’s nerves were at fever pitch. She started to reach for the curtain, but her hand froze in midair. People said all sorts of things when they were under the influence of painkillers and anesthetics.
“You all right, kiddo?”
She looked up at Jayden. “When my dad had shoulder surgery a few years ago, he thought he was an astronaut on a space mission.”
His expression softened, making him look even more like Grayson. “You’ve come this far.”
“Might as well go the distance,” Nathan added.
She swallowed. “I hate feeling like a ninny,” she muttered.
“You’re not a ninny. It just ain’t all that easy falling in love with a Fortune.”
Startled, she stared at Jayden. Nobody had said anything about love. “I’ve only known your brother for a few weeks.”
He definitely wasn’t cowed by her stare. If anything, he looked like he wanted to smile. “Sometimes that’s all it takes.”
Nathan nodded toward the curtain. “We’re not here to make you go in, Billie. If you’ve changed your mind, change it now rather than later.”
He couldn’t have chosen better words to straighten her shoulders. She pulled back the edge of the curtain far enough to see the foot of the hospital bed. A lot of thick white cast extending up and over his knee. A lot of bare, masculine thigh. And a very little bit of white sheet between thigh and hair-dusted chest.
She felt perspiration break out along her spine.
Then Deborah stepped forward, rounding the end of the bed and catching Billie’s hands in her own. “Billie, hon.” She brushed her cheek against Billie’s. “I’m so glad to see you.” She gently tugged her into the curtained room.
Billie decided then and there that Grayson’s brothers looked more like him than he did lying there right now. His eyes were closed. His face was so pale that the bruises on his temple and his cheek looked purple in contrast.
Deborah drew her unresistingly to the side of the bed. “Grayson, honey, look who’s here.”
Billie swallowed her instinctive protest not to wake him, and felt afraid to breathe as she waited for Grayson’s eyes to open. Waited for him to look at her with the same anger that he’d felt for her in Reno.
“Mom.” Jayden quietly caught Deborah’s attention. He and Nathan were still standing just outside the border of the cubicle. They’d been joined by an older man with salt-and-pepper hair who struck Billie as vaguely familiar. “Orlando is flying back to Horseback Hollow. Now that everything’s stable here, we figured we’d hitch a ride with him and leave the truck here for you.”
“Excuse me, hon.” Deborah left Billie’s side and joined them. “I know you want to get back to Ariana and Bianca.” The curtain rattled softly in its track as she pulled it closed behind her.
Billie tuned out their low voices, which were still audible despite the impression of privacy afforded by the curtain, and sank down on the chair next to the bed. She moistened her dry lips, looking from Grayson’s ashen face to the monitors surrounding him. One beeping softly. One humming monotonously. He had an IV taped to one arm and some sort of sensor clipped over the tip of his index finger. The leg with the cast from the knee down was suspended several inches off the mattress by an overhead contraption.
“Grayson,” she whispered tentatively.
He didn’t stir.
Her eyes burned and it felt like a vise had tightened around her throat. “I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you about Max. That I didn’t believe he was wrong about Bethany without you having to say it. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you that I would have gone to Red Rock with you.” Unable to help herself, she leaned even closer to the bed. “Or anywhere else,” she added hoarsely. “Just open your eyes so I know you’re really okay.” She slid her hand beneath his on the mattress and her heartbeat stuttered when his lax fingers seemed to tighten against hers. “Grayson? Wake up, sweetheart, please.”
“Anywhere.” His lips barely moved.
She could hardly breathe. “What?”
“You’ll go anywhere.” The words weren’t much more than a mumble. His thick eyelashes lifted only long enough for her to glimpse a thin slice of dark brown.
But it was enough.
Tears burned in her eyes and she pressed her forehead to his hand, aching sobs jerking through her body.
His hand moved. Pulled away from hers. But only to touch her hair. And then he was still again. When she looked at him, his eyes were closed once more.
But the monitors were beeping softly. Humming reassuringly.
She wiped her face, but the tears still flowed. Not because she’d been saving them up for so many years.
But because he was the kind of man who really could—and would—break her heart.
Chapter Twelve
“Say hello to Selena.” Billie turned her phone to face Grayson so that her cousin could see his face.
Grayson offered his trademark grin. “Hello, Selena. How’s the riding clinic going?”
On the small screen, Selena’s face was beaming. “Great! I’m trying to talk my mom and dad into buying a horse, but they keep saying no way.”
Billie tapped her fingers against the edge of Grayson’s cast, which was propped on the chair next to her. They were sitting at the kitchen table at his family ranch in Paseo, as they had each morning since he’d been released from the hospital. “I warned you that she’d end up wanting her own horse,” she stated. He’d helped her young cousin get enrolled in one of Grayson Good’s ongoing riding clinics in Austin.
“I do, but it’s okay,” Selena said. “Long as I get to ride Molly at the clinic, I’m still happy. She’s the best horse ever! My mom and dad said I had to write you a thank-you letter.” She held up a small rectangle that had a big pink heart drawn on it. “But I already did. We’re gonna mail it today.”
“I’m glad you’re having fun, darlin’.”
The sun could have taken lessons from the wattage in Selena’s smile. “Are you gonna be back in Austin soon?”
Billie chewed the inside of her cheek, waiting for Grayson to answer. Even though Mr. Allen was salivating over Austin Elite handling the commercial property search for Grayson Gear, she figured her boss’s good graces would only go so far. She’d already been away from the real estate office for nearly a month now while Grayson recuperated. His purchase of the Harmon ranch was complete, but the house was still empty, and he’d chosen to come back to Paseo. It was just easier, he’d said.
Privately, Billie had wondered if he was testing her to see if she really would go with him.
If so, she’d wanted to pass that test. So when he’d been released from the hospital, she’d offered to drive him the long way to his hometown of Paseo. He’d be more comfortable in the big back seat of her car than in the pickup or the private charter plane that Orlando Mendoza—who’d been the one to fly him from Cowboy Country to Lubbock—had offered.
It was only
later that Billie had realized why he’d looked familiar.
Because he’d been the man with Lady Whatsername at La Viña the night she’d had dinner there with Grayson. Lady Whatsername who was really Lady Josephine Fortune Chesterfield and a relative of Grayson’s, albeit a distant one.
That hadn’t stopped Lady Fortune Chesterfield and her fiancé, Orlando, from inviting Grayson and his family to their wedding, being held in a few weeks. The invitation was taped to the old-fashioned white refrigerator because Deborah had already accepted. They owed Orlando a debt of gratitude, she’d said, considering the way he’d helped after Grayson’s accident.
It was one small mystery solved. But after three weeks of being in Paseo, a larger one loomed. Because she didn’t really know why Grayson wanted her there.
And she couldn’t help but feel increasingly antsy.
Deborah told her to have patience. That Grayson had never trusted easily, and the fact that he’d wanted Billie with him in Paseo meant more than any words he wasn’t offering.
She hadn’t known what to expect when they’d arrived at the remote ranch. She knew that Jayden and his wife lived there. As did Nathan and Bianca and little EJ. And Deborah. If Billie had thought all the bodies there would mean little extra space for her, she’d been wrong.
Grayson hadn’t even suggested that she sleep with him. Instead, she was in a small room of her own that had a chair and a window. She’d spent a lot of long nights sleeping alone in a narrow bed, knowing he was only a few doors away.
She looked at him now as he spoke with her niece. “We’ll be in Austin next week,” he answered Selena. “Have an appointment with the orthopedist.”
“Are you gonna get outta your cast?”
He made a face. “Probably not just yet. But maybe they’ll give me a smaller one.” His gaze slid over Billie. “Something easier to maneuver around with.”
All sorts of warmth sprang out inside her, but she knew better than to get too excited, considering he’d been treating her pretty much the same way he treated his sisters-in-law, Ariana and Bianca. Like a sister.
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