that he was going to be popping the question at the premier of the documentary he’d been worked on, which was being held at the community center. I never thought that day would come. In school, we’d bonded over our mutual desire to get the hell out of Wishing Well and part of our “plan” had been to not date any hometown girls.
It had been an easy task for me, since the only girl I’d ever loved or had any interest in had been off-limits to me. Not only was she my best friend Bentley’s little sister, she was also walking sunshine and an angel on earth. Whereas my mom had nicknamed me her dark prince because I’d tended toward the melancholy and I was more of a sinner than a saint.
Both Jackson and I had stuck to our pact and escaped the trappings of small-town life. Strangely, our lives had taken similar trajectories. He’d traveled the world as an award-winning cinematographer, and I’d done the same as a world champion bull rider.
And most recently, we’d both reached the pinnacles in our professional lives before they came to an abrupt stop. Jackson decided to walk away from his globe-trotting after meeting the woman of his dreams and realizing that there was more to life than his career. I’d been forced to retire after a career-ending injury.
As I sat in my truck, the same sense of claustrophobia and feeling like a caged animal I’d felt in my youth returned to me now. My thumb tapped rapidly on the steering wheel as I contemplated turning my truck around, driving out of the parking lot, getting the hell out of Wishing Well, and going…
That was the problem. I had nowhere to go. I sure as hell wasn’t going back to California, where a team of world-class doctors and specialists had given me less than a five percent chance of walking again without assistance.
I’d beaten the odds, in that respect. I’d taken my first step forty-eight hours after my last spinal fusion surgery. The word miracle had even been thrown around. But what kind of miracle would rob me of the only thing in my life that I was proud of, that I loved, that I’d sacrificed everything else for? What sort of “miracle” was that?
My rodeo days were over. The career that I’d built and sacrificed everything for since my first professional competition at five years old was finished. Two months ago, I’d gotten on the back of a bull, aptly named Punisher, and it had ended in a bad wreck that would change my life forever.
After weeks of rehabilitation and surgeries, I’d woken up three days ago and finally faced reality. I still wasn’t sure what had made me face the truth that particular morning or why it had taken fifty-eight days after my wreck for the epiphany to occur, but for whatever reason, it had.
Without speaking to anyone, I’d put my overpriced downtown L.A. condo on the market, packed up everything I owned, which fit in three storage bins, put them in the back of my truck, and left. My plan had been to drive straight through to my hometown. But after eight hours on the road, the searing pain in my back had forced me to stop in Phoenix.
Kurt, who’d been my manager since I was fourteen, had called me that first day after I’d missed my PT appointment to see what was going on. I’d planned on calling him back, but I’d just felt too tired. He’d called again yesterday during a stretch of the drive where I hadn’t had any service. I’d told myself I had to return his call. But last night, after another eight hours in the car, the pain in my back had forced me to get a room in El Paso. I’d fallen into bed, both emotionally and mentally drained, and just hadn’t had the energy to face the conversation I knew I’d need to have.
Now, after a third consecutive eight-hour day of driving, as I sat in the parking lot of the community center, I still wasn’t ready to face the conversation.
I checked my texts and saw that one was a link to a YouTube video. I pressed it and saw a face that sucker punched me ten times harder than when I’d passed the town welcome sign. Grayson Locke filled the screen, which was easy to do since he had such a big head, both metaphorically and literally. His hat size was