Hope Against Hope: The Hope Brothers Series (20 page)

I sat in my usual spot with Ruby, both of us more nervous than we could ever remember being.  Crit and Beau were the last two competitors, with fifteen total men vying for the championship title.  The scoring was the same as last time, and the judges sat alone in a little box seat directly behind the chutes.

The crowd laughed as the rodeo clowns did their best to keep them entertained, but neither me nor Ruby was in any mood to laugh.

I was bubbling from excitement, and I wanted to tell everyone my news, but both Beau and I had both decided to keep our engagement quiet until after the competition.  Neither one of us expected Crit or Seth to take it very well, and the last thing we wanted was to cause any more grief for Crit before the finals.

I had run into Jesse when I went back home to get some clothes, though, and since he was the only one that didn’t seem to be so worked up about me seeing Beau, I had given in and told him.  I swore him to secrecy first, and then I told him that Beau had proposed.  He was a little shocked, but who wouldn’t be?  He didn’t seem upset, though.  In fact, he didn’t seem much of anything at all.  He went back to his room, promising he wouldn’t say anything to the other two until after I had told them myself.

I was dying to tell Ruby, but I knew she’d stand up and announce it to the world right there in front of God and everyone, and this day was not about me.  It was about the rodeo.

“And now, for the event you’ve all been waiting for, the Bull Riding Championships for the great state of Texas!  It’s man versus beast today, folks!”

The crowd exploded, and with a few announcements, the competition started with an explosive exit from the first bull and rider.  At four seconds, the bull was able to throw the rider to the dirt, and he scrambled out of the arena with a disappointed gait.  The next two managed to stay on for the full eight seconds, both of them getting great scores, a ninety and ninety-two, respectively.   The fourth one was disqualified, because his hand touched the bull during the ride.  He stomped out of the arena looking like he was going to kill someone.  The rest of the competition flew by in a blur, with nobody beating the score of the third competitor.

When it came time for Crit, I spotted him in the back of the chutes, talking to Dustin and putting on his kevlar vest.  When I was a little girl, my father and his friends didn’t have to wear those, but now, they were a requirement, saving the riders from the intense damage that a two thousand pound bull could do if he fell on you, or decided to gore you. 

I saw Beau just a ways away, and my heart skipped a beat.  That handsome cowboy had asked me to marry him.  Marriage!  I was giddy with excitement, and truth be told, I was ready for this day to be over, so we could find some semblance of normality.

Everything had been so upside down lately, nothing really seemed to make any sense. 

Beau looked up and caught my eye, winking at me and grinning before turning back to focus on getting ready.  I was so nervous for him, and I couldn’t wait for this to all be over.

The fact that he was competing against my brother wasn’t lost on me.  I decided I would cheer for them both, and whatever happened happened.  What went on in that arena was out of my control.

Crit entered the chute, the bull he had drawn was one he was familiar with, and I knew he would have the advantage because of it.  Beau was riding a bull he had never been on before, and I hoped like hell what was going on with us wasn’t too much of a distraction for him.

Crit’s allotted sixty seconds in the chute passed slowly, and Ruby squeezed my hand as we waited.  Seth had joined us to watch, and three of us stood and held our breath together.  When Crit finally nodded his head, and the chute flew open, we watched, mesmerized and suspended in time.  The bucking bull was huge - a monstrous beast that flung Crit around violently.  The bull began bucking in a circle and I felt Seth tense up beside me.

“He’s a spinner,” he murmured.  After that, all time seemed to stop. We watched with horror as the bull spun in tighter circles with each rotation, pulling Crit down the side of the bull into the motion’s vortex.

“He’s down in the well!” Seth said, his voice filled with fear.

Crit struggled to regain control of his body, but the force of the spins and the bucking bull made it impossible once he had lost it.  The buzzer sounded, and Crit was still attached to the side of the bucking bull, unable to free his hand from the rope.

“Oh, god, oh god, oh god!” Ruby cried beside me.

Crit’s body flung helplessly in the air as the bull continued bucking over and over, pulling his mangled body through the arena.   Finally, he managed to get his free hand up to pull his gloved hand free and he fell to the ground.  The bull failed to go in the opposite direction, and instead, kept bucking, trampling over Crit’s body, his hooves landing right in the center of his back, as he lay still and unconscious in the dirt.

The clowns managed to distract the bull, getting its attention and then jumping into their barrel right before the bull attempted to hook them.

Scores of medics descended on Crit.

Ruby screamed, jarring me from my shocked trance, and we began running down the stairs.  A crowd had already formed near the gate, and we jumped up and down, pushing our way through to the front.  Crit was already on a stretcher, bloody and unconscious as the medics pushed through the crowd, rushing him to the waiting ambulance outside.

I searched the crowd for Beau, but I couldn’t see him.  Finally, I spotted Seth, running after the stretcher and medics. Ruby and I followed him, and I called his name.

He turned to me briefly before jumping into the ambulance with Crit.

“He’s going to be okay, sis!  Find Jesse and meet us at the hospital!”  The ambulance doors closed, and in a flash of lights and wailing sirens, they were gone, leaving Ruby and I standing alone in the parking lot, with tears streaming down our faces.

“I have to find Jesse,” I murmured, turning to Ruby.  She looked more devastated than me, her eyes swollen and red.  She dug in her bag for her car keys, and hugged me.

“Find Jesse.  I’m going to the hospital.  I’ll see you there,” she said, leaving me standing alone, fear ripping my heart in two, as I spun around and headed back to the arena.

I was almost to the entrance when my cell phone rang.  

“Hello?” I answered.

“Georgia, it’s Randy.”

“Randy?”  Why in the world is the fire chief calling me, I wondered, the deep pit of fear in my stomach growing bigger with each second.

“There’s been another fire.  At your place.  We got another anonymous call.  We’re on our way now, I thought you and your brothers would want to know.”

“I’m on my way,” I said, hanging up the phone.  I spotted Finn staring at me by the doorway and headed straight towards him.

☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼

I had a perfect ride.  When the buzzer sounded, I let go effortlessly, the momentum of the bucking bull throwing me behind it.  I landed in the dirt with an easy thud, jumped up and retrieved my hat, waving to the crowd as they applauded thunderously.

I knew I had won, and I felt like shit.

I certainly never wanted to win like that.  Not with Crit getting hurt.  That shit was brutal and I was seriously worried about him.  Getting trampled by a bull was violent and painful, and by the grace of God, he would be okay.

I needed him to be okay.  The last thing Georgia could handle would be losing another family member.  She had been through so fuckin’  much already, I couldn’t bear to see her in even more pain.  She didn’t deserve it.  Hell, she didn’t deserve any of this.

She deserved to be happy, to be loved, to be treated like a queen, and I had every intention of doing that for the rest of our lives.

If we could just get past all this damned drama that kept popping up left and right.  

My eyes searched for her in the crowd, but I couldn’t find her.  I had to endure the winner’s ceremony before I could go anywhere, and I figured she had probably gone to the hospital anyway.  I’d find her there after.

I stood in front of the crowd as they awarded me the championship belt buckle and a check for ten grand.  If this had gone down any other way, I would have been ecstatic.  As it stood, I couldn’t even muster a smile for the photographers.

When I finally made my way back to the locker room, I called Georgia’s phone.  She didn’t answer, but I left her a message to call me right away.  I would head over to the hospital as soon as I could.

Finn walked in just as I was gathering my things.

“Finn, have you seen Georgia?” I asked. “She go to the hospital?”

“I got some bad news, Beau. We gotta go. Now.”

☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼

There’s no other sound in the world more terrifying than the sound of screaming horses.  I flew out of my truck, my own screams drowned out by the sounds of the roaring flames that had engulfed the entire right side of our horse barn.

Somehow, I had managed to beat the firetrucks here.  Thankfully, the drive from Houston was a short one, and outside of the screams of our horses, everything else was still and quiet.  Frantically, I looked around for help, for anyone else who might be able to help me.

Another horse whinnied in fear, the sound shooting right through me.  I ran to the barn, the heat blasting my face the closer I got.

I paused, looking around quickly once more, before I realized that I was all alone in this.  The fire had consumed the right side of the barn, and luckily all of our stalls were on the left.  If I could open the runs from the outside, I could let the horses run out to safety without having to go inside the burning barn.

Just as I began to head to the side of the barn, I saw a figure burst out of the flames, with another person in their arms.  When they got closer, I recognized Lee’s large frame.

“Lee!” I screamed. 

He turned my way, and began running towards me.  It was then that I saw who he was carrying, and my heart stopped.

“Oh, my god, is he okay?” I screamed, running up to them.

“No, he’s not, the little arsonist bastard,” he said, laying an unconscious Jesse at my feet, and beginning CPR on him.

“What the hell is going on?”  I asked, my mind clouded with confusion.  The sound of the screaming horses broke through my daze and I snapped.

I turned and ran as fast as I could towards the left side of the barn.  Jumping over the fenced runs, I unlocked the stall doors from the outside, one by one.  Each of the frightened horses shot out of the fiery barn like bullets, running into the open pasture and as far away from the flames as they could get.

All but one.

When I got to the end, which was Cherokee’s stall, he didn’t come out.  I peered in, seeing nothing but falling pieces of the barn, and the biggest flames I had ever seen in my life.