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So I nodded, making it clear I'd heard. My mind was still stuck on what I'd seen, though. Just this morning, Ty had been talking like we were a real thing. He'd been trying to "protect" me because he liked me so much, or so I'd thought. But was it all a lie?
He'd moved his stuff out of our room. He'd cut me out of his life. He'd been here tonight with some girl, and the worst part was that she was beautiful! Not some desperate bimbo or anything. No, that girl had looked like the kind I'd always wished to be: strong, sexy, and sure of herself.
"He moved on," I said softly.
"Cody..." J.D. tried. "Look, it's what guys do. You get over a girl by getting into another, you know? And I dunno if he was sober. Don't think so."
"He wasn't," I assured him.
"Which means he was tryin' to drink you away."
That didn't really make me feel better. Drinking me away would've been ok. The girl? The absolutely stunning woman who he'd found so easily? The one who was such a good replacement that he'd have nothing to miss about me? Yeah, that one. She'd clearly been sitting in his lap long enough to suck on his neck a while. The red lipstick kisses she'd left behind were impossible to miss. Then there was the big problem I kept coming back to.
"He knows everything, J.D."
"Yep," he breathed.
"What if he decides to use that against us?" I asked.
J.D. caught my hands, stepping in close like he was shielding me from the rest of the world. "Use what?" he asked. "That you've got a couple of guys chasing you? Pretty sure there ain't no one in the PBR who'd be surprised about that."
"You and Tanner," I whispered, glancing over to make sure there wasn't a soul around to hear us.
He said nothing for just a little too long. Then, "I don't care."
"Tanner might!" I hissed.
J.D. chuckled once. "Yeah, well, what's done is done. We thought he was one of us, and I think he just proved he wasn't. Fuck him."
"I did," I mumbled.
And that was a big part of my problem. I'd slept with Ty McBride. I'd liked him enough to do that, and I'd honestly hoped that maybe we had something real. Now, I was stuck wondering if I'd just been a bed warmer for him.
That fight we'd had last Thursday popped into my head. He'd been pissed because I wasn't fucking him enough. He hadn't cared about me sleeping with other guys. Didn't all of that mean our thing had meant nothing to him? If it had, wouldn't he have been jealous? Instead,he'dbeen the one encouraging me to mess around, have fun, and be a little wild.
Now he could use it against us. If it came out that J.D. or Tanner slept with men, then what? J.D.'s sponsors would dump him so fucking fast. Tanner? I had no idea what would happen there. Would the PBR ignore it, calling him a sign of their diversity or something? Maybe, but I was pretty sure the bull riders wouldn't make it that easy.
No, they'd turn on him the same way they had with me. Probably more. I just had Austin and his idiot cronies to deal with. A gay guy in the middle of the toughest sport on dirt? No, that would be a good excuse for a beat down. It was the way bull riders seemed to think. At least the ones I'd known.
I felt like I was ruining everything around me. Maybe I was bad luck? For a little bit there, it had all been so good, though. I'd actually dared to hope, and now, just when I swore I had it all figured out, I felt like my dreams were all crashing down around me.
"I'm losing everything," I said, looking up to find J.D.'s eyes waiting.
"Not everything," he promised. "You're still qualified. You still got Tanner. Shit, that boy was going to go after Ty too." Then he licked his lips. "And you've got me. Cody, you're my best friend. I swear I'm not going anywhere. Not now and not ever."
"Yeah, but that doesn't help!" I whined. "If the judges keep giving me shit scores, how long will it take before I'm not qualified anymore?"
"You came in seventh," he reminded me.
"And my scores are going down, not up," I shot back. "Don't you get it? I'm not playing the same game you guys are. I ride better and I get punished for it. They want me to show my tits and ass. So long as they can crack jokes about me being a sweet little lady, then I'm ok. But when I prove I can do this?"
"They score you low," he realized. "Fuck!"
"And I can't beat that," I told him. "J.D., don't you get it? I rode better and scored worse. How can I work hard enough to make up for that? And I didn't get any fucking sponsors! Without those, I'm just a nobody. You know that as well as I do."
"Which is why I started getting in shit when I was a rookie," he admitted. "No, you're right. I just don't know how to fix it."
"Me either." So I pressed my hands over my eyes, leaned my head back, and groaned out my frustration. "I feel like I'm losing everything! This was my dream. It's all I have, J.D."
