Page 23 of Tame Our Wild

I start throwing excuses out into the universe. “It’s probably not even allowed for another rider to coach another rider,” I say with too much attitude.

“It’s never happened, so how would we know? If you’re that worried about it, I can ask.”

My response is immediate. “Absolutely not. I would never want anyone to find out.”

He seems to mull that over for a second. “Fine. We’d keep it a secret then.”

I conjure up another excuse. “The age is a factor.”

“The other coaches are my age or a little older. So, I don’t see what the problem is,” he says through gritted teeth.

“The problem is us, Colson!”

His gaze bounces between mine. How is he not getting how strange this whole thing is?

Shutting my eyes, I try to calm my demeanor—we are still in public, after all. When they open, I soften my tone. “Since the very beginning”—back when I was seventeen—“you’ve acted like I was never meant to be in the PBR. You’ve been an ass. And here you are, trying to convince me to let you coach me. Sorry if I’m having trouble processing. Why do you have a change of heart now?”

Something flashes in his eyes, but I can’t tell what it is. Guilt maybe?

He glides a hand across the back of his neck. “I know.”

“Not to mention, I live here, and you live in Tennessee. You’re not suggesting I move to Tennessee for the next five months to let you coach me until the World Finals in May. That’s ridiculous.”

A sheepish expression transforms his features, and my eyes widen to the point that I think they’ll fall out of my head and into my whipped cream like cherry toppers.

“I was thinking, if you want to, you could stay at my ranch since traveling back and forth would be too hard. And that’s a long time to get a hotel, and short-term rentals would be expensive for a single person in Chattanooga. The house is big enough that we can keep our distance.”

My heart smashes against my ribs. “Colson, this is the longest we’ve been around each other without tearing each other’s heads off, and you think we can … live together?”

He huffs out a frustrated breath. “I just wanted to offer since … you know—” He picks up his mug, sipping his coffee as I gape at him. Since I lost Aaron, I want to say. But I don’t. “I don’t need an answer today.”

This is the same man who told me when I was seventeen at our small-town rodeo, when he was a guest judge, that I should stick to the women’s rodeo circuit. He told me it may seem tempting to prove I can make it into PBR, but some risks aren’t worth proving a point.

That has always stuck with me.

He was wrong. Proving that women are just as capable is a big deal to me, and there he was, lighting the fire under my ass because out of all the dicks I encountered competing, he was the biggest.

My head tips back, and I look up at the ceiling.

Oh, Aaron, my sweet, sweet angel, I could really use your advice right now.

Before I met Colson, I would bull ride because I loved the thrill.

Loved the adrenaline.

Loved feeling as untamable as the beast under me.

However, the brutal reality is that I need a coach. There’s also this part deep down in my core that has me wondering if I lasted the eight seconds last weekend because Colson’s advice was at the forefront of my mind. We’re already partway through the season, and I don’t see anyone else offering to help me except the infuriating man before me.

A man who happens to be Colson Payne—the one who has always been the fuel to my fire.

If I take him up on his offer, it might escalate past bickering and busted lips. We may be starting a wildfire from which neither of us will escape unscathed.

TEN | COLSON

Ikeep my weight centered, my head and determination a solid, impenetrable barrier, like it always is, the second the chute flies open. Marshmallow Bunny’s hooves dig into the earth, a cloud of dust rising around us as we do this deranged dance that became both of our livelihoods a long time ago.

My breaths are shallow but controlled with each jerking movement that I read as flawlessly as one can when they’re locked on the back of a one-ton beast.