Prologue
TY
My dream was taken from me in less than a second. Everyone said it would be the eight seconds that I chased week after week that would end up landing me in the hospital with an injury I wouldn’t be able to recover from.
They were wrong.
I’d mastered the eight seconds over years of bull riding. That night had been no different. I’d stood in the middle of the arena and held up the trophy. The winner yet again, on the road to another world championship. My life had been perfect. Everything in my world was exactly how I’d wanted it.
All it took was one second to change it all. One wrong decision made by someone to climb into their car and drive drunk.
“When can I get back up on a bull?” I asked the doctor. My mother held on to my hand tightly as my father stood on the other side of the hospital bed. I was ignoring the throbbing pain in my leg that seemed to grow more intense as the doctor stood there and looked around the room before settling his gaze on me. A feeling of cold tingles rushed through my body, and I already knew the answer before he said it.
My two younger brothers, Brock and Tanner, stood off to the side. Both were in the same business as me. Brock was a professional bull rider and just below me in ranking, and Tanner was ranked in the top five in the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association standings as a team roper. I took a quick look their way. They both looked exactly like how I felt.
Defeated.
“A bull?” the doctor asked, a bit of shock in his voice.
“Ty,” my mother whispered, squeezing my hand. I ignored the sadness in her tone.
“Son, did you even hear a word I just said?” the doctor asked.
I nodded. “Yes, you said my leg was partially crushed in the car accident. I’ll need another surgery once I heal from this one, then possibly another after that one, and I’m lucky the leg wasn’t severed. I heard you. Now, I’m asking you, when will I be able to get back up on a bull? How long will this injury take to heal?”
The doctor’s gaze drifted over to my mother and father, then back to me. He cleared his throat and slowly shook his head. “I’m sorry, Ty. You’ll never be able to bull ride again. For one, your leg is so badly injured you’ll be lucky if there isn’t permanent nerve damage. Putting full weight on it and walking normally will take a great deal of physical therapy. Painful physical therapy, and that’s if you’re able to regain full use of it. Second, no professional bull-riding association will clear you to ride, not with an injury like this. Ever.”
The walls in the room felt like they had begun to close in on me. The doctor’s words sounded as if he were talking into a can as each syllable grew more hollow and tinny. The whole room felt like it was disappearing as the only world I’d ever known seemed to be collapsing before me. I closed my eyes and took in a few deep breaths while I let his words sink in. Allowed the reality of my fate to settle around me.
Never bull ride again.
The thought made me sick to my stomach. Bull riding was my life. My dream. The only thing I knew how to do well.
Now it was gone. Taken from me in one alcohol-infused second.
Everyone kept saying I was so damn lucky and that I must have had a guardian angel on my side, because this could’ve been much, much worse. What the hell did they know? This was the worst thing that could ever happen to me.
When I was finally able to breathe without every inhalation burning my chest, I opened my eyes, looked directly at the doctor, and said, “I will regain full use of my leg again—that I can promise you. That drunk driver won’t get to take that away from me too.”
My mother leaned down and kissed my forehead.
Despite my declaration, it was in that moment that I felt myself start to slip into a pit of darkness. One so deep there was no way I would be able to see the pain and ultimate addiction that awaited me. With wide-open arms. The feeling of loneliness that would wrap itself around my soul and sink its claws in was smirking at me from a distance.
The knowledge that I’d never be good enough. For anyone. Ever again.
Chapter One
TY
“Junior, are you going to stand there staring off into space, or are you going to pull the damn fence tight?”
I glanced over to my father, who wore a concerned look. I hated that he felt like he still had to worry about me.
I’d been named after him, since I was lucky enough to be born first. My brothers—Brock, Beck, and Tanner—followed after me. Beck died while serving in the marines, something I knew still weighed heavy on my folks’ hearts, but my mama never talked about him. I wished she would. I really felt like in some way it would help us all heal from his loss. Mama’s knack for avoiding bad or unpleasant situations was one of the reasons I held my own worries and fears inside. Who was I to add any more to their already-full plate of sadness?
Now there was something familiar in my father’s eyes as he looked at me. Worry. Fear.
Stella and Ty Shaw Sr. were amazing parents, but when my dad looked at me like he was looking at me right now, the guilt almost crushed me. Heaven knew I’d given them both enough to worry about: both after my accident four years ago and then when I got lost to an addiction to pain pills . . . it had nearly torn my father and mother in two, especially when they’d found out how long I’d been keeping it from everyone.
I knew he worried enough about Brock and Tanner as well. Being the oldest, I also knew I should be the one setting the good example for my siblings, and I’d failed miserably at that so far.
So I looked at him, wanting to quell his unspoken worry. “It’s all good, Dad. I’ve got a lot on my mind, that’s all.”
He nodded. “Want to talk about it?”
I forced a smile. “Nah, it’s nothing, Dad.”
His brows pulled in tight, but he nodded again and went back to working on the fence.
“How is the counseling going?” he asked after a minute or two.
“Fine. We’ve cut it back to meeting every other week,” I replied.
“That’s good, son.”
“Yeah.”
I had gone back into therapy last summer, after I was tempted to take a few pain pills that Brock was given after a bull-riding incident left him pretty banged up. He’d left them on the counter in his kitchen, and the temptation to pop them into my mouth scared the living shit out of me. I wasn’t sure if it was my own willpower that stopped me or if it was Kaylee Holden walking in and seeing me with that bottle.
Kaylee was the best friend of Lincoln, Brock’s wife.
Whatever the reason, I didn’t take the pills—but I was left with even more of an unsettled and confused feeling, because Kaylee walked up and kissed me as she took the pills from my hand.
It was the second time she’d kissed me. The first time was only a few weeks after she and Lincoln had moved to Hamilton, Montana, from Atlanta, Georgia. And that first kiss sent me into a tailspin of confusion and fear. It was a fear I’d never experienced before, one that rivaled any anxiety I had felt about a relapse into addiction. One I still couldn’t completely understand, or at least refused to understand.
I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t attracted to Kaylee from the moment she crawled out of Lincoln’s car. She was beautiful. Blonde with the bluest of blue eyes. A smile that made my knees feel a little weak and a laugh that went straight to my dick. She was supposed to be a one-night stand, or maybe a few nights if things really clicked between us. Then she was going to leave and go back to Atlanta, and I would move on to the next woman.