Which made Tori think of Delon, and damned if she didn’t blush from head to toe, but in some weird way, the crude joke snapped the shimmering line of tension between her shoulder blades. She roped a dozen steers without a miss, her loop more sure with every throw. Shawnee snatched at least one rear foot out of the dirt every time and two on the majority.
Tori retrieved her rope and released the last steer from the stripping chute, then chased the herd up the return alley. As Shawnee pushed them on into the chute, Tori patted Fudge on the neck, waiting. For applause, she realized with disgust. “Wow, you’ve really improved!” or “Way to go!” Even “Hot damn, Princess, who knew you could actually rope?”
Shawnee said nothing. Just loaded a steer into the chute, got on her horse, and backed in the box, ready for more. Well, fine. Silence was good. From Shawnee, silence was a miracle. Tori ran Fudge up on the next steer, took a couple of extra swings, then roped the horns clean before taking the steer left and looking back to watch her heeler. Shawnee wasn’t there.
Alarmed, Tori released her dallies and let the steer go. She wheeled Fudge around and saw Shawnee parked ten strides in front of the roping chute. “What’s wrong?”
Shawnee fisted her hand around her loop and propped it on her hip. “You are aware that this is a timed event?”
“Yes.”
“So what the fuck are you doing clear down there, when you had a perfectly good throw right here?”
Tori felt herself flush. “I just wanted to be sure—”
“How sure do you have to be? Geezus, woman. I’ve been on shorter cattle drives.” Shawnee stepped off and used the heel of her boot to scrape a line across the arena, twenty yards from the front of the chute. “Me and Roy go this far. You rope ’em after that, you’re on your own.”
Tori’s teeth snapped together with an audible click. “Fine.”
“Fine,” Shawnee echoed, and got back on her horse.
Except it wasn’t. On the first steer, Tori took three swings and drilled her loop square into the back of his neck. The next loop spun around the right horn and off. And the next floated like a Frisbee over the steer’s head.
Tori cursed and pulled up, coiling her rope in quick jerks. Why was she pushing so hard? Hadn’t Willy taught her consistency was more important than speed? “I can’t do this.”
“You can’t do it yet.”
Tori set her jaw. “Willy always said if I turned every steer, I’d be in the money more often than not.”
“That’s real sweet.” Shawnee’s smile was as condescending as the words. “But Roy and I don’t practice to win the little checks. If you’re gonna rope with me, you gotta turn ’em for first place.”
Tori stared at her, stunned at the utter gall. As if Shawnee was doing her a favor by showing up to use her arena and rope her steers. “Then maybe you should practice with someone else.”
“Your choice.” Shawnee dropped her loop, coiled up her rope, and turned to ride away. “If you don’t figure you’ve got the cojones…”
It was such a juvenile dare Tori laughed outright. “You’re shitting me, right? You actually think that’s gonna work?”
“Don’t know. Don’t care. I don’t waste time doing things half-assed.” Shawnee swung off her horse and picked up her rope bag, clearly serious about leaving.
Tori rode up and jabbed a finger at the line Shawnee had drawn in the dirt. “You’d rather watch me miss every steer right there than turn them on down the arena and let you throw your rope?”
“Yep.”
“That’s…stupid.”
Shawnee whipped around, suddenly fierce. “No, Princess, it’s called trying. Pushing yourself. Getting better every day, instead of just going through the motions. Your hunka burnin’ love taught you how to rope pretty good. Now, if you’ll quit being such a wuss, I’ll teach you how to compete.”
Tori stared at her, mind completely blown. First Delon, now this. It was just too damn much. She closed her eyes, dropped her chin to her chest, and took a long, deep breath. Then another. Just tell her to fuck off and die. But the words wouldn’t come. Deep inside, that knot of rock-hard stubbornness refused to let her back down.
“Whatever,” she said. “I can jump out and throw my rope in the dirt all night.”
Shawnee grinned. “Now, there’s a positive attitude. Get yer skinny ass in the box—we’ll see if you can miss ten in a row.”
* * *
When they finally turned the steers out for the night and uncinched their horses, Tori was exhausted, mentally and physically.
“So you know how I said earlier that I could pee my pants?” Shawnee asked. “I really mean it now.”
Tori blinked at her, uncomprehending.
“You do have indoor plumbing, right? I mean, from the looks of that house…” Shawnee waved a hand in the direction of the concrete bunker.
Oh. Shit. She wanted to go inside. Where no one else had set foot since the day the moving company had dropped off her furniture.
“Uh, sure,” she said, and led the way across the yard.
Opening the front door felt like ripping off a scab. As they passed through the narrow foyer and into the living room, she felt Shawnee’s gaze like a physical thing, reaching out and touching, leaving fingerprints in the dust on the cluttered coffee table, leafing through the magazines scattered on the floor, smudging the glass on the pair of photographs beside the television.
Tori made a jerky motion. “End of the hall, second door on the left.”
“Thanks.”
Tori veered into the kitchen and yanked open the refrigerator door. The shelves were jammed with the moldering remains of well-intentioned trips to the grocery store, real meals that never came to pass. Somewhere in there… She rummaged around, pushing aside a bag of desiccated carrots, wrinkling her nose at a tub full of something that had gone green and fuzzy, and grabbed two Dr. Peppers before any of the science experiments could rear up and go for her throat. She had a can in each hand when Shawnee emerged from the bathroom.
“Drink?” Tori asked, holding out a can to lure Shawnee back to the vicinity of the front door, the better to shove her out.
“No, thanks.” Shawnee paused, her attention drawn to the pictures beside the television.
Tori set one can down with a clunk, then popped the top on the other. Anything to keep her hands busy so she didn’t rush over and snatch the pictures from under Shawnee’s nose—an action shot of her and Willy roping, and another of the two of them grinning like fools as they were presented with trophy buckles, the first they’d won as a team.
“This your husband?” Shawnee asked.
“Yes.”
Shawnee stuffed her hands into the pockets of her faded jean jacket. “I hate to be the one to point it out, Princess, but you married yourself a big ol’ fat boy.”
“Willy was not fat! He was just…” Loud and proud and big enough to be her entire world. “You couldn’t squeeze Willy into any smaller package.”
“That’s what my mama says about me.” Shawnee straightened. “You don’t have a bed.”
“No room in the moving van.”
Which was a flat-out lie. She’d brought only the bare essentials, bits and pieces of their life that she couldn’t let go. She had no need for a king-sized bed without Willy to fill the vast empty space.
Shawnee blew out a gusty breath and turned to face Tori. “Okay, look, I suck at pussyfooting around. So I’m just gonna say—I Googled you and your husband. I know how he died. Hell, I remember when it happened. I was at a ropin’ up in Colorado and all the Wyoming guys were talkin’ about it.”
Emotions rippled through Tori—shock, grief, the ever-present thread of anger because Damn you, Willy, for leaving me like this. But when she opened her mouth, what came out was “You Google?”
“Yeah, I know how to ru
n a computer. I can even spell most of the big words all by myself.” Shawnee rolled her eyes. “This is the kind of snotty shit that made you real hard to like back in college.”
“I was hard to like? You—” Tori jabbed a finger at Shawnee, then cursed as Dr. Pepper sloshed onto the faded linoleum. “You told the rodeo coach it’d be a fucking miracle if he ever made a roper out of me. While I was sitting right there.”
Shawnee shrugged, unapologetic. “You waltzed in and treated our practices like they were a roping clinic, taking time away from girls who’d been working for that spot for years, and the coach fell all over you because your daddy might write the school a fat check.”
“I was just—” So used to her family name greasing the rails she hadn’t even realized it was happening. She scowled down at her soda can, thumbing the tab hard enough to snap it off. “I didn’t think… You could’ve said something.”
“I did.”
“Not that kind of something!”
Shawnee made a What can I say? face. “Bitch is my default mode. When are we ropin’ again?”
“Saturday afternoon?” Tori heard herself say.
“Can’t. There’s a big Wrangler roping in Childress this weekend.”
Where Shawnee would have partners who could turn steers all day in the six-second hole. Unlike Tori. But that could change.
“Tuesday, then,” she said.
“That’ll work.”
They walked outside, Tori trailing along behind and stopping to hover awkwardly in the middle of the driveway as Shawnee loaded her horse. Inside the barn, Fudge whinnied, shrill and high. The buckskin nickered in response, as if Fudge had earned that much respect. Shawnee slammed the back gate of the trailer, tied it shut with the chunk of rope, and ambled to the pickup. She paused, then puffed out her cheeks and let the air hiss between her teeth.
“Look, this is none of my business…”
“Like that ever stopped you.”
Shawnee snorted, acknowledging the point. “Maybe you being back, living right down the road from Delon, has nothing to do with him, but just in case…” She propped one hand on top of the door and leveled an accusing stare at Tori. “Delon is a good guy, and you really fucked him up last time. Don’t do that again.”
She climbed in her pickup and rattled away, leaving Tori to stare after her, open-mouthed.
Chapter 15
Tori didn’t even have to ask how Delon’s session on the spur board had gone. First thing Monday morning, he called to say that yes, he did want to go ahead with the MRI. Beth worked her magic to get him an appointment with radiology on Tuesday morning and get the results to Tori by the time they were wrapping up his therapy that afternoon. Tori summarized the report, then pulled up the images and scrolled through them, hitting the high points as he sat silent, stone-faced. This, the same man who had once tied her to the showerhead with a pair of bandanas and…
She squeezed her eyes shut, glad she was facing the computer so he couldn’t see her face until she’d scrubbed it blank. Scrub. Crap. Not the best choice of words. The memories had been blindsiding her left and right since that moment at her place when he’d touched her, looked at her that way. And then Shawnee had to go and make that crack about how her leaving had messed him up. As though he’d actually cared. Like she’d hurt him. But if those same memories were torturing him as well, he was doing a stellar job of hiding it.
“So what does all that mean?” he asked, tilting his head toward the MRI images.
“Short answer? There doesn’t appear to be anything that could be addressed surgically.”
“Pepper can’t fix it.” Delon’s fingers curled around his knee, knuckles whitening.
“Not with a scalpel. There’s another option.”
“Which is?”
“Manipulation under anesthesia.” She faced him, keeping her gaze steady and professional. “We can’t tell by the MRI, but if adhesions between the folds of the joint capsule are the problem, they have to be broken. He could knock you out and force it to bend.”
Delon winced. She didn’t blame him. It wasn’t a pleasant procedure to contemplate, even if he would be unconscious at the time.
“Will it work?” he asked.
“I can’t say—”
He made an impatient noise. “You’ve done all your tests, felt it with your own hands. Do you think he can free it up?”
She hesitated, then said, “You’ll gain some motion. I would be surprised if it restored the full range.”
His jaw tightened a notch. “What’s the downside?”
“You’ll be sore afterward.”
“I’m sore now. Not much to lose.” He stood, his face still impassive. “Tell Pepper I want to give it a try. I’ll grab my own ice packs.”
When he was gone, Tori leaned against the wall and massaged her aching forehead. Damn, damn, damn. Why couldn’t there have been a bone spur or a handy chunk of misplaced cartilage that could be plucked out. Voila! Not that she’d expected it to be that easy. She sighed and went to tell Beth to set up the appointment with Pepper. A boy of about five was perched on the reception desk, chattering excitedly as he pointed to a handheld computer game.
“And then you press this button and the ship shoots fireballs and BOOM! That’s the end of the sea monster.”
“Cool,” Beth said.
“Wanna give it a try?” the boy asked.
Beth glanced over and saw Tori in the doorway. “Not right now, kiddo. Gotta get back to work.”
“Let me guess,” Tori said. “Guardians of the Sea?”
The boy’s head whipped around and Tori nearly gasped out loud. Dear Lord. It was Delon, in miniature. The abstract awareness of a child was a damn sight different than the reality flashing his daddy’s grin at her.
“You know about video games?”
Tori couldn’t help but smile back, despite a weird twinge in her chest. “I had…um, have…eleven nieces and nephews.”
“This is Beni.” Beth’s eyes were as bright as the boy’s, measuring Tori’s reaction. “He’s been keeping me company while his dad has therapy.”
“I’m Tori. Your dad’s therapist. Do you come along often?”
“Nah. I’m not so good at not bothering anyone.” Beni cast a guilty glance at the chair in the waiting room where he’d abandoned his jacket and a backpack. A bag of microwave popcorn was tipped on its side on the floor, a few kernels spilling out around a Coke can. “Mommy had to pick Joe up at the airport and his flight got delayed, so Daddy had to bring me.”
Tori moved closer and held out a hand. “Can I see?”
Beni passed over the video game and she studied the screen, then clicked a couple of buttons. “Want me to show you something awesome?”
“Sure!”
He scooted over, his shoulder pressing against her arm as he peered at the screen, the cowlick on the top of his head tickling her cheek. Shyness was definitely not an issue. Tori breathed in the scent of popcorn and the same manly soap his dad used, along with the familiar hint of grease and diesel fuel.
She ignored another twinge and pointed at the screen. “See this lever? Pull it.”
Beni guided a character over and did as she instructed. A box opened with a choice of power-ups. “Whoa. Cool. I never saw that before.”
“It doesn’t appear until you have enough tokens. Now you can choose fireproof armor for your ship or add ice bombs to your arsenal.”
He pinched his chin between thumb and forefinger, giving it serious consideration. “What would you do?”
Armor, of course. She left the ice bombs to her mother.
“Either is great,” she said. “When you get another two hundred tokens you can come back and get the other one.”
Beni pondered for another moment, then clicked. “If I have ice bombs I can win tokens faster, so it won�
��t be long before I can get armor, too.”
Impressive logic. Willy’s nephews would’ve chosen based on which made the loudest noise. “How old are you, Beni?”
“I’m gonna be six. My birthday is Saturday. Wanna come to my party?”
Tori’s gut splintered as if hit square with one of those ice bombs. She was pretty good at math, and six years plus nine months added up to Tori, you total fool. Beni Sanchez had been conceived more than a month before she’d stopped sleeping with his father.
“Are you okay?” Beni asked. “You look funny.”
Behind him, Beth was eyeing her with equal concern, her curiosity dialed up to ten.
“I…um, yes. I just thought you were younger.”
Beni made a sour face. “’Cuz I’m little. And I’m not in school, because I was a preemie so Mommy said they shouldn’t rush me.”
“I see.” Premature? That might explain… “Do you know what preemie means?”
“Grandma says I didn’t wanna wait my turn, just like always. My birthday was s’posed to be in March.” His eyes narrowed, turning shrewd. “I think I should get to have two birthdays, but Mommy said no, I only got born once and she should know ’cuz she was there.”
March. So Delon hadn’t knocked up some other girl while he was popping by Tori’s place for the occasional roll in the hay. Just immediately after she left, which only made her feel slightly better. And puzzled, because no matter how rushed or wild the sex, Delon had always been careful to the extreme when it came to condoms. Knowing his brother’s story, she understood why.
The door to the waiting room swung open and a couple walked in. The woman was tall, strong, both muscular and curvy with brown hair that just brushed her shoulders. Tori should have recognized her immediately, but she had no reason to expect to see that face here. When it clicked, it was like the cocking of a trigger, sending Tori’s defense mechanisms into red alert.
Violet Jacobs. The man held the door for her, the hand he curved around her waist blatantly possessive. Tori had only an instant to register that he was also familiar before Beni stuffed the video game into her hands and vaulted off the counter to fly across the room.
Tangled in Texas Page 11
