The True Cowboy of Sunset Ridge (Gold Valley #14)(25)

“You’re not bound up in his death, Colt.”

“I am,” Colt said, his voice rough.

“Whatever gets you in a better space. If this does. I sure as hell have no desire to bury my brother, and I know the rest of them didn’t see the kind of shit you pulled...”

He meant his family. They saw him happy, laughing. Playing his guitar at family gatherings. Even though they didn’t see how the music in him had changed. How his own songs had gone away. They saw what he wanted them to see.

They’d never seen him dark and ready to defy death.

Jake had.

“Yeah it does. So there’s some stuff I’m not doing anymore. No rodeo. No sex.”

“You failed at that last one.”

“Yeah, I don’t have practice with abstinence unfortunately. Apparently I’m bad at it.”

“We all have our strengths.”

“But, I’m also not drinking to excess.”

“Good for you.”

Silence lapsed between them and Colt looked around at the valley below. He saw another horse coming up the hill, flying like the devil was on his heels. And on top was his brother’s wife.

“There she is,” Jake said.

Her dark hair was flying in the wind, her expression fierce. And Jake looked like he’d been hit with a ton of bricks.

It almost made Colt believe in love.

“Hey there,” Cal said when she got to them, smiling, the brightest edge of that smile reserved for his brother. “I thought you’d like some lunch.”

“You cooked?”

“No.” She looked at her husband like he was an idiot. “I went and picked something up. But I’m taking a break from work too.”

He liked that about Callie. His sister-in-law was the same as she’d ever been. Working with energy and optimism. The only daughter of the rodeo commissioner, Callie fought tooth and nail to be allowed to compete the same as the men. This season she was competing and doing well.

She fixed him with a direct gaze. “My dad asked me to pass on his condolences.”

“I don’t need that. But...same back to him. I know this has been hard for him too. I know it was the first fatality in competition on the circuit in his time as commissioner.” It had been four months since Trent’s death, but the pain hadn’t let up.

“Yeah it was...really tough. But it’s a dangerous sport. Everyone getting involved in it knows that.”

It was dangerous, yes. But there was a difference between competition and competing when you were in the right headspace. When you were too cocky, drunk off your ass and thought you were bulletproof.

“Thank you.”

“Mallory Chance is Colt’s new tenant,” Jake said, his tone making it clear why that mattered.

“Jake, I swear...” Colt growled.

“Oh, did they sleep together?” Callie asked.

“How the hell did you know?” Colt asked.

“The way you were looking at each other at Sammy’s over pie. Like scalded cats. Well, I’ve seen plenty of rodeo cowboys dealing with barrel racers after a one-nighter where the guy didn’t call. I know what that looked like to me.”

“It’s not that I didn’t call,” he said, defensive.

“So you did call?”

“We didn’t exchange numbers,” he said. “It was a mutual not intending to see each other again, I promise.”

“And she found you anyway!” Callie laughed. “That is a funny story.” He did not find it so funny.

“Yeah. Sure.”

“Touchy.”

“Don’t tell anyone,” he said.

“I won’t,” she said. “You men are as gossipy as a pack of hens. But I don’t give a shit who you sleep with. If I spent any time worrying about women that grace your bed, Colt Daniels, I wouldn’t have the time to worry about anything else. And I have better things to concern myself with.”

“Is that so?”

“Yeah. Like your brother and what he’s doing in bed.” She leaned over on the back of her horse and kissed Jake on the cheek.

“I don’t like this at all,” Colt said.

“What?” Jake asked. “My joy?”

“It’s the familiarity with your joy that I could do without. Take your joy over there.”

“You know, Colt, if you need anything, we’re always here,” Callie said.

It was the sympathy from Callie that put him over the edge.

“My friend died. I’ve been through worse. Remember that time my parents died?”

Jake huffed a laugh. “As a matter of fact, I do.”

“It doesn’t mean this isn’t also terrible,” Callie pointed out.

Against his will, he had to soften a little. “Thanks, Cal. I appreciate it.”

He didn’t, though, not really. He just wanted to have things go back to how they had been.

Someday maybe he’d mean it. Someday, after he’d been living here for a while maybe... Maybe he could change himself into someone different. Just maybe. Maybe if he did that, he would feel... Alive again. Not so much like he’d died out there in an arena under the hooves of an angry bull.

Or in a plane somewhere over Alaska eighteen years ago.