Cowboys Down (6 page)

“Sorry my hands are clammy, only I’m kind of nervous.”

“Someone you know have an accident?” The question escaped before Calum could stop it.

“My brother.”

Jasper continued to scratch Zander, his face turned away from Calum. He didn’t say anything else, but Calum couldn’t leave it there.

“Bad?” he asked.

Jasper turned to look at him. “Ben died.”

Why didn’t I leave it? Me and my big fucking mouth.
“Oh Christ. I’m sorry.”
Shut the fuck up.
“How long ago?”
Quiet! Now!

“Five years.”

Calum took a deep breath. “I figure you’re allowed to be nervous. You want me to go grab that helmet?”

“No. I’m guessing I’ve got the horse you use for beginners. He’s not going to buck or kick or move faster than a snail, are you, sunshine? It’s just that the other half of my brain is telling me he’s been waiting for an idiot like me so he can show his hidden demon side.”

Jasper took a roll of mints from his pocket and Zander almost knocked them out of his hand in his desperation to snaffle one. The white mint on Jasper’s palm disappeared and Zander whinnied.

“You’re welcome,” Jasper said.

Calum laughed. “You just made a friend for life.”

Jasper stared straight at Calum and offered him the roll. The grin on Jasper’s face didn’t last long, but it was deadly. Calum took a mint and smiled. Jasper popped one in his own mouth. After he put the mints back, Zander tried to get his head in Jasper’s pocket.

“No more until you’ve let me get on your back,” Jasper said. “I’ve done enough sweet-talking. You’ll be wanting flowers and chocolates next.”

Zander’s ears twitched, but Jasper stepped away from the horse not toward him. The set of his jaw told Calum that for all his chatter, Jasper was on the point of walking away.

“Zander won’t throw you,” Calum said.

“Right.” Jasper took a deep breath.

“What happened to your brother?”

“He came off his horse and…hit a car. Ended up paralyzed from the neck down. Ben was only fifteen years old. He spent the next nine years unable to even breathe on his own before he died.” Jasper’s voice had dropped to a whisper. “I don’t want that to happen to me.”

“Oh fuck.”

“Oh fuck sums it up.”

Calum struggled for something to say. “How about I promise to shoot you if it does?”
Oh crap, not that you idiot.

But Jasper released a strangled laugh and then looked straight at him with those big chocolate eyes. “Would you? If I asked?”

Calum’s answer came straight from his heart. “Doesn’t seem right to let humans suffer when we’re prepared to put animals out of their misery.”

“Not as simple as that though, is it?”

And that told Calum a lot. “Did your brother ask you to kill him?”

“All the time.” Jasper untied the reins and slipped on the gloves. He put his left foot in the stirrup, grabbed the pommel, swung up onto the horse and then pulled down his sunglasses.

Drop the subject now.
Calum sighed. “You made that look pretty easy.”

“I’ve got my eyes closed. Am I sitting the right way round?”

Calum laughed. “You’re fine.”

“I’m fucking scared shitless.”

“Need me to fix your stirrups?”

“I can do it.” Jasper reached down and then gave Calum a puzzled look. “Where’s the strap?”

Calum smiled. “Maybe you’d better let me get that. Kick your foot out of the stirrup.”

Jasper moved his leg forward and Calum lifted the fender and adjusted the stirrup leathers in the buckle. Jasper murmured quietly to Zander as Calum fixed the other side.

“Walk him round a spell when you’re ready.”

Jasper made a clicking sound, squeezed with his legs, kicked once with his heels and Zander moved out into the corral. Calum saw a confidence in Jasper that hadn’t been there a moment ago, though he was holding a rein in each hand.

“Western horses neck rein,” Calum said. “I suspect you’re used to horses responding more to direct pressure on their mouths than reins on the side of the neck.”

“I use a combination of the two.”

“Try holding the reins in one hand, palm up with one rein between the thumb and forefinger and one between the forefinger and middle finger.” Calum watched as Jasper changed his hold. “That’s it.”

When he saw Jasper got it, Calum relaxed and leaned on the rail. He tried to imagine being unable to do anything for himself, if he couldn’t scratch an itch, fuck or jack off, and what he’d do if someone begged him to flip a switch and end a life. Hell, whichever way he looked at it. Had Jasper cracked in the end and done what his brother had asked? Killed him?

“I’ll get Blue. You okay in here on your own?” Calum asked.

“Fine.”

I’m doing it.
Jasper’s pulse raced, excitement overwhelming his fear. After making such a fool of himself earlier, there was no way he’d have given up and retired to the pool when Calum stood watching him. If the animal had been foaming at the mouth and pawing the air with his hooves, Jasper would have still tried to ride. To think he’d spent all this time worrying about getting on a horse, when all he needed for that extra push was a good-looking guy’s gaze fixed on him.

Jasper patted Zander on the neck. “Good boy. Are we going to have some fun? That doesn’t include you throwing me and then standing there whickering. You treat me well and I’ll return the favor. Okay?”

The horse whinnied and Jasper laughed. “I’ll take that as a yes.”

Calum returned on a lively looking black quarter horse, followed by Bessie, and leaned down to open the corral gate to let Jasper out.

“Is she rounding us up?” Jasper asked, nodding at the dog.

“She’ll follow to the bottom of the first pasture. She’s too old now to run along with me.” Calum reined Blue back so the two horses walked side by side, but from his snorting and blowing, Blue was clearly anxious to race off. “You okay?”

“Yes. I think I’d built this up in my mind to be something akin to taking a parachute jump. The fear of it worse than doing it—once I’d been pushed out of the plane, that is. Though now I’ve seen you’ve brought a rifle, I’m wondering if there’s something else for me to worry about.”

“Nope, it’s just in case we meet a bear. When we’ve had one reported in the area, we don’t take chances.”

Jasper smiled. “Nothing to worry about at all then.”

“Not for me. Blue’s way faster than Zander.”

Calum grinned and Jasper wished he’d worn looser pants.

They travelled for quite awhile in comfortable silence before Calum spoke.

“What do you do for a living?”

“Stockbroker.”

Calum chuckled. “Me too. Part of my job’s breaking stock. Any good at it?”

“You don’t survive in the business for long if you’re not. Same for you I’d imagine. Have you always worked on the ranch?”

“I went away to college, though not far. Wyoming’s in my blood, I guess.”

Jasper looked around. Powder-blue skies stretched as far as he could see, punctuated by craggy peaks, some of them capped with snow. “You’re very fortunate to have this on your doorstep. A sky blue enough to swim in, snow-capped mountain peaks, rolling plains. It’s hard to think of anything more beautiful.”
Don’t think about Calum naked.

“Yeah, it’s great until you want to go to the movies or need your laptop repaired or you want to dance where no one’s going to laugh at you.”

Jasper raised his eyebrows. “You like to dance?”

“No, because I get laughed at. What about you?”

“I don’t get laughed at because I don’t dance.”
But I might with the right person.

Calum smiled. “Want to encourage Zander to pick up the pace?”

“I thought you said we wouldn’t be going above a walk.”

“I lied. Going to show me you can persuade him without spurs?” He tugged his hat farther down on his head, kicked Blue and cantered away.

Jasper dug his heels into Zander’s flanks, clicked his teeth, flicked the reins and the horse set off after Blue. At a slow trot.

“That won’t do,” Jasper muttered. “Come on, boy. Don’t show me up.”

He kicked harder at Zander’s flanks and urged the horse into a canter. As the ground began to run away beneath him, Jasper wanted to whoop.

Oh Christ.
He’d forgotten the fun, the exhilaration of being carried at speed on a horse’s back, the sound of hooves pounding, the sensation of all that muscular power between his legs. Calum glanced over his shoulder to check he was following and then yelled something that was carried away on the wind. Blue was much faster, but Zander tried to catch up. After a few minutes, Jasper reined him back. The last thing he needed was a horse to collapse under him because he’d pushed too hard.

By the time he reached Calum, the cowboy was grinning ear to ear.

He wheeled Blue alongside. “Like riding a bike.”

“I thought you said Zander was old and slow.”

“Maybe he needed someone with the right touch to bring him to life.”

Jasper was glad his sunglasses hid his eyes. It would be easy to read too much into that.

“Blue and Zander are pals. Zander will follow him anywhere. Even when he shouldn’t.”

What was he supposed to read into
that
?

Nothing, idiot.

They walked the horses for a while and spectacular views kept opening up of sagebrush plains, grassy meadows and rocky gorges—all framed by snow-capped mountains. Compared to London, this was another planet. No traffic, no police sirens polluting the air, just the sounds of a rushing river and snuffling horses. Large birds circled overhead, wings spread as they soared on warm currents.

“Wow, eagles,” Jasper said.

Calum looked up and laughed. “Buzzards. Probably looking for something that’s died.”

Jasper snorted. “Wreck the moment, why don’t you? It’s beautiful anyway.”

“Yep, everywhere you look.”

Jasper caught a glimpse of Calum staring at him and his heart lurched.

“What can you see out of your window?” Calum asked.

“At work? The concrete and glass of an office block. An occasional bird flies past. Usually a pigeon. At home, well I have a small house with enough space to park my car at the front and at the back there’s a tiny flagstone yard with a small table and chairs. It’s all closed in, claustrophobic. Everything here is so big.”

“Yep, it sure is.”

Jasper’s mind got sidetracked and his cock pressed against his zipper. He sighed and tipped his face to the sky. Even surrounded by mountain ranges, the sky looked huge, endless.

“You live on your own?” Calum asked.

Jasper’s heart skipped a beat. “Yes.”

“No wife, fiancée, girlfriend, boyfriend, dog, cat?”

“No.” Jasper tried to think of some witty come back. An imaginary friend? Maybe not. A minute went by, his mind remained blank and the moment had passed.

“I’ve never lived on my own,” Calum said. “I’m used to having lots of people around.”

“It can get lonely when there’s just one of you,” Jasper said.

“It can get lonely when there’s a crowd.” Calum kicked Blue on. “Some of the cattle are over the next ridge. We’ll go take a look at them. We don’t bring them back down to the lower grazing until mid-September.”

Jasper urged Zander on. “I saw on the website you let guests help with that.”

Calum snorted. “Help, yeah, if they can ride. They don’t realize it’s all day in the saddle and not just one day either and they’re expected to look after their horse when they get back, not pass the reins and responsibility to someone else.”

Jasper heard a mechanical buzz and Calum pulled a phone from his pocket.

“Yep,” Calum said.

“Whereabouts are you?” asked a crackly voice.

“Dutton Ridge. Why?”

“Fence down at the southeast corner. I’ll find someone nearer.”

Calum put the phone away.

“I thought your father said anyone using a cell phone would be shot.”

“Yeah well, we can’t police the sounds guests’ phones are going to make. It’s easier to ban them, but the wranglers all carry phones or walkie-talkies in case of an emergency.”

As they reached the top of the ridge, Jasper looked down to see brown and black longhorn cattle meandering through the trees. He suddenly felt like a cowboy and smiled.

“Hey, there’s Bonnie and Clyde and little Jimmy,” Calum said.

Jasper gave him an incredulous glance. “You give names to your herd?”

“Just the ones we eat.” Calum only held his face straight for a moment. He laughed and Jasper chuckled.

“We’ll head for that rocky outcrop and rest the horses for a while. Follow me.” Calum kicked Blue on.

Jasper let Zander have his head to pick his way down the rough slope and ducked tree branches that threatened to knock him off. When Calum slipped from his mount, Jasper did the same and pulled Zander to where Calum was tethering Blue. Calum tied Zander next to him. He took two bottles of water from his saddlebag and tossed one to Jasper.