He could save the ranch. No, he couldn’t earn enough in the next year – or even three years – to pay off the loan, but he was a good enough rider to earn enough to meet the payments and then some, even if he rode only on the little tour. He admired his mom’s efforts with the Christmas trees and the pumpkins and expanding the herd, but both of them knew it wasn’t going to be enough. He’d heard enough about the cost of fixing this or that to know that things were tight even in the best of times.
So what was he supposed to do? He had to either pretend that everything was going to work out – which wasn’t possible – or find a way to fix the problem. And he knew exactly how to fix the problem. All he had to do was ride well.
But even if he rode well, he still might die.
Luke understood the risks. That was the reason his hands shook every time he prepared to ride. It wasn’t that he was rusty or that he was plagued with ordinary nerves. It was the fact that when he used the suicide wrap to hold on, a part of him wondered if this would be his last ride.
It wasn’t possible to ride successfully with that kind of fear. Unless, of course, there was something greater at stake, and for him, it came down to the ranch. And his mom. She wasn’t going to lose the ranch because of him.
He shook his head. He didn’t want to think about these things. It was hard enough to find the confidence he knew he needed to last – and win – over the course of a season. The one thing that you didn’t want to think about was not being able to ride.
Or dying in the process…
He hadn’t been lying to the doctor when he said that he was ready to quit. He knew what a life of riding could do to a man; he’d watched his father wince and struggle in the mornings, and he’d felt the same pains himself. He’d lived through all the training and he’d given it his best, but it hadn’t worked out. And eighteen months ago, he’d been okay with that.
But right now, standing beside the mechanical bull, he knew that he had no choice. He pulled on his glove, then he took a deep breath and climbed onto the bull. Hanging off the horn was the control, and he took it in his free hand. But maybe because the season was getting close, or maybe because he hadn’t told the complete truth to Sophia, he couldn’t press the button. Not yet, anyway.
He reminded himself that he knew what might happen, and he tried to convince himself he was ready. He was ready to ride, he was preparing to ride, no matter what might happen. He was a bull rider. He’d done it for as long as he could remember, and he would do it again. He’d ride, because he was good at riding, and then all their problems would be solved…
Except that if he landed wrong, he might die.
All at once, his hands began to tremble. But, steeling himself, he finally pressed the button anyway.
On her way back from New Jersey, Sophia made a detour to the ranch before returning to campus. Luke was expecting her and had tidied up both the house and the porch in anticipation.
It was dark when her car pulled to a stop in front of his house. He bounded down the porch steps to meet her, wondering if anything had changed since he’d last seen her. Those worries evaporated as soon as she stepped out of her car and rushed toward him.
He caught her as she jumped, feeling her legs wrap around him. As they held each other, he reveled in how good she felt, certain again of how much she meant to him, wondering what the future would hold.
They made love that evening, but Sophia couldn’t stay the night. The new semester was beginning and she had an early class. Once her taillights vanished up the drive, Luke turned and walked toward the barn for yet another practice session. He wasn’t in the mood, but with the first event in less than two weeks, he reminded himself of how much more he had to do.
On his way to the barn, he made the decision to keep the practice shorter than usual, no more than an hour. He was tired and it was cold and he missed Sophia’s presence already.
Inside the barn, he went through a quick warm-up to get the blood flowing, then hopped on the bull. While rebuilding the bull, his dad had modified it to make the ride more intense at top speeds and had rigged the control switch so that Luke could hold it in his free hand. Out of habit, he kept his hand clenched in a half fist even when riding live bulls, though to this point no one had ever asked why or probably even noticed.
When he was ready, he started the machine at a low-medium speed, again just enough to loosen up. He then rode once on medium and once on medium-high. In his practice sessions, he rode in sixteen-second increments, exactly double the time he’d need to ride in the arena. His dad had calibrated the machine for these longer rides, saying that it would make the live rides easier by comparison. And maybe it did. But it was twice as hard on the body.