Rein Him In

Chapter One

Lena

Breaking my leg on an international stage is not the way I wanted my day to go.

It started out as normal as the Reining Futurity finals in Oklahoma City could, especially as the only rookie in the finals. I was only supposed to compete on my own young mare in the novice class, but that changed pretty quickly when one of the trainers at my lesson barn stormed off and took his horse with him two weeks before we had to leave for the show.

For the most part, Jeff, the owner of Two Seven ranch, was able to move things around in order to ride all three of his client’s horses. However, despite having paid the exorbitant entry fees for an incredible daughter of A Vintage Smoke, Jeff wasn’t allowed to ride the extra horse. Since he owned the quarter horse filly with a deep buckskin coat and bright, intelligent eyes, he took the risk and asked me to ride her in the preliminaries. If she’d been a client horse, the situation would have been a lot worse.

Somehow, over the course of a week, that turned into the semi-finals and then the finals.

And now I’m lying on the ground, heart racing, wondering what the hell happened. I was the last ride of the night, and it was an absolute disaster.

“Don’t move,” a warm, deep voice says in my ear.

I blink up at the too-bright lights on the ceiling. “My leg is broken,” I say, calm as a cucumber. All things considered, this isn’t that bad.

It’ll hurt like hell when I move, though.

“It is. The paramedics are walking in the arena,” he says, although I haven’t quite identified who he is. “Your filly’s bridle snapped at one of the buckles, and she tripped over it and fell on you. Do you know your name?”

I stare up at the Big-Ass Fan above me—seriously, that’s the brand name—mesmerized by its movement.

“Lena Hayes,” I say, turning my head slightly.

“Don’t move,” he chastises lightly.

“Is Daisy okay?” I blink up at the man kneeling over me. I recognize him from somewhere…Oh, god. He’s another one of the riders. A lean, handsome man with wavy black hair and a jaw that could cut glass. I may have watched a few thirst trap videos of him whilst using riding research as my internalized excuse. Darren Newport. Bajillionaire famous rider Darren Newport.

“She’s just fine,” he says. “Jeff Ford and the show vet have her now just in case.”

I nod, staring deeply into his green and gold-flecked eyes. Time is moving eternally slow, and the blood is rushing through my body far too loudly. “That’s good. Can you ask the paramedics to give me drugs before they move me?”

He chuckles, and a woman’s voice cuts in, “I’m happy to oblige. We’re gonna give you a sedative that will help, although it seems like you’ve got some adrenaline going in your favor, too. Can you tell me your name?”

I repeat it for her, my hand searching for the cowboy leaning over me. He doesn’t hesitate to take mine. Maybe I should be embarrassed, but the truth is, there’s no one here for me. I don’t have family that would come to watch this sort of thing, and I really haven’t made any friends in my short time in the show pens.

“I’m here,” he mumbles, squeezing gently.

“You’re gonna feel a little prick,” the woman says. I don’t even look at her, so I couldn’t say what she looks like. I’m too entranced by the magical eyes of my handsome cowboy.

I squeeze tighter. “Can you talk to me?” I ask him. “I feel like I’m about to go into shock.” It sounds funny to say, considering how clear my head is, but a shiver runs through me in the chilly December arena.

“Your ride was going amazing,” he says. “Have you been riding Daisy for long?”

I shake my head. “Just the past few weeks. Mike quit, and Jeff didn’t have time to find another trainer. I’m just a working student.”

Darren scoffs. “A pretty damn good one.”

“Alright, Miss Hayes, we’re going to lift you onto the stretcher. It’s gonna suck a lot, but you should be good to go,” the paramedic says. “Your friend can meet us at the hospital.”

Worry floods me, and I shiver again. I’m going to be alone.

Alone and without health insurance. Are they even going to fix me?

Darren’s thumb rubs over mine in a comforting motion. “I’m her fiancé. I’ll be going with her.”

I shake my head. “The awards ceremony. Didn’t you score something like a two-thirty?” A two-thirty-one, but I’m not going to say that. I don’t want to come off as a stalker. I giggle at my thoughts.

“Hey, it’s alright,” he mumbles. “Take a breath. Focus. I’ll get the pictures they want tomorrow. I just want to make sure you’re okay.”

A shiver and a wave of nausea roll through me, and I groan as I’m moved swiftly onto a gurney. “These drugs suck,” I bite out, trying to be funny.

“I know, darlin’,” the woman says. There must be a paramedic, but they haven’t spoken for me to know anything about them. “They don’t give us the good stuff.”

They carry me out, and I hold up a hand to wave at the hundreds of people who must be staring at me, although I can’t focus on them. If I do, I really will puke. Cheers light the arena, and I cringe internally.

“You alright, kid?” Jeff asks as the paramedics take us past the riders who’ve already shown. I glance up and see him stroking Daisy’s cheek, concern etching his features.

“Just a bit broken,” I say. “I should be good to ride next week.”

He laughs, but the sound is strained.

“Maybe give it two,” the paramedic says.

I roll my eyes. “Fine, a week and a half.”

My heart aches at the truth as they load me up into the ambulance, though.

I’m hurt really damn bad. I don’t know how bad it is, but…

“What if I never ride again?” I gasp out as Darren sits in a seat beside my gurney. My throat is thick with emotion, and tears fall freely.

He wipes a tear off my cheek. “You will,” he says.

* * *

Darren

I sit nervously in the waiting room, my leg shaking as I attempt to scroll. Lena’s wreck is all over the internet, and maybe I shouldn’t, but I text my lawyer to get it scrubbed. Nobody needs to see that, and she doesn’t need to be forced to relive it when she’s out of surgery.

Not that I have to be here for that. As soon as her family gets here, I’ll be respectful enough to leave. She doesn’t need some random guy checking in and harassing her.

I’m still wearing my dusty boots and my show outfit, including a maroon button-up with sponsor patches sewn onto the sleeves. My hat was on the horn of my saddle when I last saw it, and I can only hope that one of the ranch hands put it back in the box. Like my tack, I inherited the hat from my dad. Well, that and half the farm and the billion-dollar business to go with it.

A worried-looking woman who could be Lena’s twin rushes in. I stand and walk over, holding a hand out. “I’m Darren,” I say. “I rode with Lena in the ambulance. You must be…” I trail off to give her the space to explain.

“I’m her sister. Emily. How is she?”

I shake my head. “Still in surgery, but they said it was a clean break and should be fine.”

She doesn’t hear the strain in my voice, or at least she doesn’t acknowledge it. My dad was supposed to have a routine surgery to remove his gallbladder, and it turned out he was allergic to the anesthesia. He was only fifty-seven, and he didn’t respond to the emergency treatment.

She nods, wringing her hands over the coat clenched between them. “Thanks for coming with her. I live a few hours away, but I came as soon as I heard. I was watching the show at work.”

I cringe. She must have been horrified to see the danger her sister was in. I know if my sister ever got hurt like that, I would have a panic attack that made it impossible to drive. “She was very alert afterwards. Most people wouldn’t have been that level-headed.”

She smiles weakly at me. “She’s always been the strong one.” There’s some sort of regret in her voice, but I don’t ask about it. She blinks, then sits down. “Thank you so much for coming, but I’ve got it from here. When Lena texted me from the ER, she said you had an award to win or something?”

I grimace. I’d watched her texting once the morphine took some of the edge off of her pain, but I hadn’t asked what she was saying. She wants me gone, though, that much is clear. She hadn’t asked me to go the whole time, but I must have made her uncomfortable if she asked her sister to dismiss me.

“Here,” I say, pulling out a business card with my personal email on it. “Can y’all let me know how it goes? I just want to make sure she’s alright.”

Emily smiles tightly at me. “Of course.”

With only a moment of hesitation, I finally leave. When I text Gabriella, she reveals that she’s already in the hospital parking lot, ready to take me back to the futurity, away from Lena.