Chasin' Eight (Rough Riders #11)(72)

Like hell.
Chase smiled at her. “I’m glad we can sort this stuff out so quickly.”

After he was scrubbed and freshly shaven he wandered out of the bathroom with a towel loosely secured low around his hips. As he dug in his duffel bag for clean clothes, he felt her checking out his package, and then his butt, although she didn’t utter a peep.
It was a long, quiet afternoon.
An hour before the finals performance at the fairgrounds, Chase checked out his bull, stretched his quads and hamstrings and tried to mentally prep himself. He was leaning against the corral, watching the last rays of sunshine through the clouds of humidity, when he heard, “Bill Chase. You’re lookin’ good to win this tonight.”

He turned toward Taz. “I hope so. Be nice if we all came in the money, huh?”

Taz spit a stream of tobacco juice through the fence rails. “Yep. Be a boost to the boy if he could place.”

“He’s doin’ better than I did. Took three events before I even rode one for eight seconds. I damn near gave up.”

“Been there myself more times than I care to admit. Started the junior events at fifteen. Got my pro card at eighteen. I’ll be fifty-one next month. So a long damn time.” Another brown stream landed in the dirt.
“You get tired of it?”

“There are days. But it ain’t like I got other skills. Ridin’s all I know.”

Sobering for Chase to admit that he might be Taz in a few years.
That’s when Ava sauntered into view. Smiling at assorted cowboys as she shooed them aside and set up her video camera. Fuckin’ hell, the woman was something else.
“She sure is,” Taz said.
Shit. He hadn’t meant to say that out loud.
“I saw her last night at the bar on Main Street.”

He’d been too pissed off and filled with pride to track her down after she’d left. “Any guy in particular catch her notice?”

“Hmm. I believe one did.” Taz snorted. “If I were twenty years younger, I’da given that guy a run for his money. Man. He was all over her.”

Chase wanted to demand what the guy looked like. If he was tall. If Ava and the putz had danced together. Or whether they’d snuck off early. They could’ve gone back to his place right after they’d met. She could’ve ended her sexual drought and he wouldn’t know it. That thought turned his vision a dangerous red and he wanted to rip something to pieces with his bare hands.
“Didn’t see Ryan last night until late neither. Kid still had a grin on his face this mornin’. You got time to have a beer at the campsite tonight after the event?”

“I’ll swing by. It’ll be an early night since I’m hitting the road tomorrow mornin’.” He clapped Taz on the shoulder. “Gotta get my head on straight about this ride. See you in the chutes.”

He’d gone about fifty feet when Ryan tracked him down and blurted, “I need your help, man.”

“You nervous?”

“Like you wouldn’t believe. I don’t know—”

“You’ll be fine. You’re in the home stretch. Just treat it like any other ride. Concentrate on staying on, ridin’ hard, and that’s it.”

Ryan shot him a baffled look. “Huh-uh. I’ve heard guys talking and I know there’s more to it than that. I’ve got the basics down, but I need…ummm…advice with the fancier stuff I ain’t tried before.”

“Fancier stuff?” Chase frowned. “Explain that.”

His cheeks turned cherry red. “You know. Like usin’ my mouth on her and different positions.”