Walker: The Rodeo Legend (The Codys: The First Family of Rodeo, 1, Band 1310) - Softcover

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Rebecca Winters lives in Salt Lake City, Utah. With canyons and high alpine meadows full of wildflowers, she never runs out of places to explore. They, plus her favourite vacation spots in Europe, often end up as backgrounds for her romance novels because writing is her passion, along with her family and church. Rebecca loves to hear from readers. If you wish to e-mail her, please visit her website at: www.cleanromances.net.

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May 1

"Clay!" Paula Olsen screamed in horror. One second her little blond two-year-old had tumbled headfirst out of the Red Flyer wagon onto the asphalt. In the next second, a stranger plucked him away as a snarling black Lab in the town's Dog-Walkathon lunged forward to sink his teeth into her little boy.

It was all over in an instant. The man more or less thrust Clay into her arms, giving her a glimpse of darkly lashed green eyes. She looked her son over. Except for a red bump on his head from the fall, she didn't see a mark on him. "How can I ever thank you?" she called out to the man.

But he'd disappeared without saying anything, making it impossible for her to thank him properly. It was no use calling him back. He moved like the wind and was already gone.

She heard a male voice in the crowd say, "Ooh-eee! I believe that was J. W. Cody's son! I thought he was still overseas!"

Two and a half years ago a pregnant Paula had done the master plan for the landscaping of John Walker Cody's spectacular new ranch house, the latest addition to the famed Cottonwood Ranch built on their 600,000 acre spread outside Markton, Wyoming. The fabulously wealthy Codys were the premier family of rodeo in the northwestern part of the state. She was aware he had a daughter and four sons, all rodeo champions, but she'd never met any of them.

If her recollection was correct, one of them was an officer in the Marines. Could that be Clay's rescuer? If so, he was out of uniform.

He'd been tall, maybe six foot two or three and in his late twenties, but she only caught a brief view of chiseled male features. For some strange reason she couldn't get rid of the fleeting impression that he'd looked…haunted, and not just because of the incident.

"Oh, Paula—" her friend Angie Gregson spoke behind her, holding Danice. She'd been pulling her two-year-old in a wagon right in front of Paula. "Talk about a close call!"

"It was," Paula whispered in a shaken voice, hugging Clay tighter. The man had a familiar build and midnight-black hair, like J. W. Cody, so she figured the stranger had to be a Cody. While everyone else stood there frozen, only someone with his quick instincts and skill could have pulled Clay away from those gaping jaws in time.

"Listen, Angie… I'm going to take Clay to the car and get the stroller. Without a restraint, the wagon's just too dangerous." The thought of what would have happened without the stranger's masterful intervention refused to leave her mind.

"I'll go with you. Some of the big dogs are scaring Danice anyway."

Paula nodded. "I'm pretty sure it was that huge black Lab that frightened Clay, but when he fell out of the wagon, he ended up scaring the dog." Together they pulled the empty wagons down the sidewalk and around the corner to Paula's car.

For the families living in Markton, Wyoming, a town of 997 people, the First of May was a big deal. The annual dog parade drew people from all the surrounding communities, including nearby Cody where she and Angie lived in the same apartment complex.

The two of them had made a special trip over here for the fundraising event showing off people's own dogs as well as those from the Humane Society. Paula wished she could laugh about it, but the close call—even though all the dogs were on leash—could have sent Clay to the hospital to be stitched up. After losing her husband, Brent, in the war in Afghanistan eighteen months ago, she couldn't fathom anything serious happening to Clay.

"Are you all right?" her brunette friend asked after they'd loaded their toddlers in the strollers.

"I will be in a minute." If that man was a Cody, she knew where to find him and thank him.

An intuitive Angie touched her arm. "If you want to go home, we can."

"Don't be silly." After eighteen months of grieving for Brent, she would have thought she was getting past the worst of it, but for some reason this incident brought her emotions to the surface once more. "We've been looking forward to this." She wasn't about to let what happened ruin their plans. "It's getting warmer out. Let's drop in the ice-cream store on our way back to the dog parade."

"And then let's walk around Old Trail Town. I'm craving one of those Wild Bill Cody chili dogs."

"Sounds good to me." Maybe the walk would bring back Paula's appetite.

Moments ago Walker Cody had left the motel on foot only to run into a dog parade, of all things. To see so many animals at once brought out children's excited cries and laughter from the adults, but Walker's attention had been captured by a blond toddler in a little wagon who was frightened by them. It reminded him of his own fear of horses as a child.

He noticed the boy start to stand up, then topple out, drawing the big Lab's attention. When it growled and bared its teeth, a woman's terrified cry followed. It was the kind he'd been trying to block from his subconscious since leaving Iraq.

Acting on pure instinct, Walker had torn through the line of onlookers and swooped the boy away before the person holding the leash could get control of the dog. But to his horror the incident brought on one of his flashbacks. While hugging the wailing child to his body, pressing him against his plastic-surgery scars, he'd broken out in a cold sweat.

Get away, Cody! Don't hurt anyone. Please, God, don't let me hurt anyone.

Blindly he handed off the child to the frightened woman standing next to him. Among the cacophony of sounds coming from the dogs and the crowd, Walker took off on a run. The last image in his mind had been of a pair of hot blue eyes turning to him in gratitude.

Her words had been spoken in English, not Arabic, which only added to his confusion and stayed with him all the way down the next block, where he found a bolt hole. Once in the men's bathroom at the Spotted Horse Saloon, he vomited.

Nothing came up but bile. He hadn't had an appetite since he'd flown home from Bethesda Naval Hospital three days ago. While he'd escaped the full blast of an IED, his two best buddies had taken the brunt. They would never get the chance to come home and live in a walking nightmare.

Post-traumatic stress disorder. That's what every guy in his outfit thought about, whether they admitted it or not. It was what they dreaded if their maimed bodies made it back. He'd had three episodes in the hospital where he'd been for the past two months, but this flashback had come when he couldn't pull out the dime he kept in his pocket.

He reached for it now and pressed it in the palm of his hand. His counselor at the hospital told him, "When you feel unreal, disoriented, 'crazy,' like you can feel your mind slipping away, hold that dime in your hand very tightly and say to yourself, 'I am not crazy. I am not in Iraq. This isn't really happening now. I am safe now,' over and over again. Be very sure you tell yourself, 'I am safe now. I am not in Iraq.' The feeling of safety is crucial during the flashbacks.

"Also tell yourself, 'I am not going to hurt anyone.' Many returning vets suffering flashbacks are afraid they're going crazy and they'll hurt people. They're not crazy, but the danger to yourself is real, because sometimes you might try to rationalize the situation by believing that it's better to hurt yourself than to hurt anyone else. Yo u need that spoken reinforcement to help you regain your feeling of being in control of yourself."

Walker reached in his pocket and pressed the dime into his palm, repeating the words like a litany. He was no longer aware of time or place. When he eventually became cognizant of his surroundings, he staggered over to the sink. No sooner had he rinsed out his mouth than he saw the reflection of a wizened cowboy in the mirror behind him.

The man in the cowboy hat and boots stared at him with a measure of curiosity and compassion. Walker knew he looked like hell. Fearing the stranger would ask...