“They’re ranch kids. Other kids skateboard on rails and jump bikes over holes and ramps. Ranch kids get in the arena with cattle.”
She crossed her arms tight and glared at the cow that stood contently in the pen. He knew as well as she did when she started after the cow’s udder things would change in an instant.
“Look, I don’t want you to get hurt. The thing is the older teens know what they’re doing. This isn’t for little kids. You have to remember, one will have her head, and one will control her tail and one will be helping the boy holding the head. I’ll be helping you get to the udder. They’ll have her stretched out and it won’t be as dangerous as it could be. You just have to look out for her feet, and I mean it. Watch them. Now I’m going to call the boys over and we’re going to demonstrate.”
“Fine. You do that.”
He almost chuckled at the way she was fighting her fear. He’d learned that she wasn’t one to back down.
Rowdy liked that. Respected it.
* * *
“Okay, you need to hold your hand like this, like you are going to shake my hand.”
Lucy watched Rowdy hold his hand out with his fingers together and his thumb slightly separated from them. She copied him, trying hard not to think about the kiss. But it was a little bit distracting— Okay, it was a lot distracting.
She held her hand as he was and then looked skeptically at him. “Then what?”
“Then you grab here at the top,” he explained. “No pulling like you see in the movies. Just clamp it between the fingers and push gently upward. Milk will come. Remember, in the competition, you need a few drops.”
How hard could it be?
“And then you run.”
She glared at him. “Thanks. Thanks for letting me get myself into this. If the boys don’t want to paint, then I wonder why I’m doing this?”
“Sometimes even if a boy is curious about trying new things, he needs an excuse to do it. Painting isn’t the most macho thing for these guys to do, so you getting in the ring with this cow gives them the excuse because you called their bluff. Get it?”
She did, actually. “Yes. So now I know.” And she couldn’t back down even if everything in her warned her to run now. As she looked at Rowdy, her stomach felt off-kilter and she wondered if the warning was for her to run from him instead.
“So do we have a regular milk cow somewhere that I can practice on?”
He chuckled. “Sorry, we’re not in the milk-cow business. You’re going to have to test it out on Betsy Lou here.”
“Why does this not surprise me?”
“Hey, Wes, Joseph, y’all come on over.” He’d sent the boys to practice with Morgan on the other end of the arena and now, at his call, the entire group came running. It looked as though she was about to be the show for the day.
Morgan rode his horse over behind the boys. She liked Morgan—he seemed to be a rock, and as steadfast as they came. She had a feeling—just from all the responsibility that he carried on his shoulders—that if a man could be trusted, Morgan McDermott would be that man. Rowdy’s boyish grin tickled her memory.
Could Rowdy be trusted?