He’d lasted the eight seconds.Kyla stood motionless, every cell buzzing with disbelief, with pride shot through and threaded with doubt.Had he paid the price, or had the bill not come due yet?
The buzzer still hung in the air when the bronc jerked one last, angry hop.Titus launched skyward.Shoulder, ribs, then hip kissing dirt in a twisted roll.For a split beat, Kyla’s pulse dropped to nothing, weightless and gut-punched as if her own body struck earth.
Arena dust drifted in slow spirals.Everything beyond that center point vanished.Her boots jammed against the bottom rail, grip breaking, every muscle too slow.Then she snapped into motion, urgency torching hesitation.
She vaulted the railing without thinking, knee knocking metal, landing heavy, skin sticky with sweat and rodeo dust.Out in the center, Titus clawed up, one knee planted, blood sheeting from his mouth.
His left arm dangled wrong.The crowd had gone jagged, part roar, part shock-stiff hush.A clown swept past, waving her off, but she muscled sideways, knuckles at hips, every line of her body radiating.
Move or get mowed down.
The distance between them narrowed fast.Faster than anyone else’s help, quicker than logic, more rapid than all the polite boundaries she’d ever taught herself to honor.
The closer she got, the clearer the world honed in.The tremble at the line of his jaw, dirt streaking the downturned curve of his cheek, sweat dark at his collar.He’d lost his hat.Wild tufts of dark hair lay flattened, nearly comical.Except his eyes.Searching, hard, locked to her as if she were the only handhold left.
She crashed down beside him, shoes skidding, kneeling so close her dress rucked halfway up her thigh.Blood beaded at the edge of his split lip.
His nostrils flared.
He rasped her name, raw-edged, low enough that the grandstands only got a rumor of it.She swore, spit in her mouth, knuckles finding the line of his jaw.He wouldn’t look away.
“What hurts?”The words came chopped, barely a voice at all.
“Nothing I can’t fix,” he shot back, smile trying for reckless and landing crooked.
Bullshit.
Her thumb traced under his jaw, reading heat and pulse, the edge of bone.People called, cameras flashed.Kyla zeroed in.She searched his gaze for glassiness, watched for the subtle jerk.Broken or just bruised?Under her hands, Titus trembled, stubborn and proud, too stubborn to let weakness win.
He drew her closer, arm heavy over her lower back.In front of God, county, and every rival rancher, she pressed her mouth to his.The taste was copper and sweat and everything she’d denied wanting to stake in public.
His lips parted under hers, the hiss of breath between.Kyla slid both palms along his face, fingertips slick with his blood, feeling the steadiness of his jaw despite the tremor.Her world contracted.The press of him, scent of livestock and dirt and man, and the unrelenting need to keep this, to keep him.
Titus growled.
Animal, greedy, nothing like the man who spoke in riddles behind doors.His grip wrenched tighter, hauling her clean off the dirt.Kyla’s toes barely brushed packed earth; she wrapped herself around his hip, legs in the air, skirt bunched, boots still dust-caked and proud.
The kiss stretched.The arena was a blur of heat and smartphone flashes, whistling, the distant voice of an old-timer who never believed a Black woman from away could have a home here.None of it made a dent.
His tongue brushed the cut at the corner of her mouth, wild and searching, insistent with need and relief.Kyla caught the salt of blood, the bark of his pain muffled in the touch of her lips.Every line of her shouted to the world.
His or not at all.
Applause broke like a tidal slap.Kids howled, a ranch hand’s whistle trilled.Titus broke the kiss with a gasp, pressed his forehead to hers, both breathless.He cradled her in the span of his hands, every line of him vibrating with exhaustion and triumph.
“Three thousand people,” she mumbled, throat hoarse, not quite mocking.
“Don’t care,” he gritted, his words a vow, a dare, a flag stuck deep in contested ground.
This was hers now.The hurt and the want, the way the crowd receded from everything vital.
Pickup men moved in with horses, dust rising in new waves, crowd thunder riding the arena fence.Titus didn’t step away from Kyla.If anything, his arm tightened, hand dragging her firm against his bruised ribs.
She took in his smell, a catalog of what it cost him to stay upright.Her fingers, steady now, slid beneath the hem of his vest, seeking out heat and hardness beneath the cotton.
She skimmed knuckles along the ladder of his ribs, counting beats under her palm.He hissed when she pressed at the worst spot, but gave her a dare with his eyes.Still here, still unbroken.
“You’re a damn fool,” she muttered low enough only he could parse, voice scraping rough with fear twisted sharp.
