A Cowboy's Heart

A Cowboy's Heart
Rebecca Winters

“Let’s dance.”

Liz felt a spurt of adrenaline as Connor pulled her into his arms and drew her close to his hard-muscled body. His hat nudged hers, but he didn’t let that stop him from pressing his cheek against hers. She was burning up. He couldn’t help but notice.

When the song ended, he didn’t let go. “This is nice,” he whispered in a husky voice.

So nice she could hardly breathe. He continued to rock her in his arms until another song began. “I like your gold barrel-racer earrings. They’re unique.”

Liz lost track of her surroundings. The whole time they clung to each other, his warm breath tickled the ends of her newly cut hair, sending rivulets of delight through her body. It was uncanny how they moved as one person.

A Cowboy’s Heart

Rebecca Winters

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

REBECCA WINTERS, whose family of four children has now swelled to include five beautiful grandchildren, lives in Salt Lake City, Utah, in the land of the Rocky Mountains. With canyons and high-alpine meadows full of wildflowers, she never runs out of places to explore. They, plus her favorite 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, www.cleanromances.com (http://www.cleanromances.com).

Many thanks to three remarkable ladies who were kind enough to give their time and answer some of my questions about the rodeo world:

Leslie DiMenichi with the WPRA, professional horse trainer, barrel champion rodeo competitor and breed show trainer.

Sue Smith, 2x NFR Qualifier, Circuit Finalist & Year End Winner, Calgary 100k Winner, Multiple Futurity and Derby Winner, Amateur Rodeo Barrel Racing and Breakaway Roping Winner.

Martha Josey, WPRA, AQHA and NBHA World Champion Barrel Racer, Cowgirl Hall of Fame in 1985, representing the United States in the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary, Canada.

Contents

Cover (#u798520e5-24fc-5d58-b449-bc7f90656731)

Introduction (#ufe80ecf5-9c9c-5631-82d6-c2d4a5a29f25)

Title Page (#u6f8bcfb5-c0f2-5586-8c98-ba51365a4704)

About the Author (#uaae8b525-b6ba-5ab1-b774-90b5758af2ba)

Dedication (#uae8ed167-7cf2-5033-96c9-17b3f803ee74)

Chapter One (#ulink_0c1b8ba4-d7ea-5523-9527-dbeffc70b690)

Chapter Two (#ulink_8faa45fd-fa3d-5340-82ee-04e7eab1fb6c)

Chapter Three (#ulink_a8306280-a8d2-5b0a-9ae7-fceae87a16e3)

Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)

Extract (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter One (#ulink_cd6089a2-1c98-52fc-b3f4-5dbae21447c1)

November 28 and Mother Nature had decided to dump new snow over the Pryor Mountains on both sides of the Montana–Wyoming border. Ten inches during the night. Their biggest storm so far this year.

Liz Henson, the top barrel-racing champion in both the Montana Pro Rodeo Regional Circuit and the Dodge Ram pro finals in Oklahoma, left the barn astride Sunflower. She headed toward the covered arena behind the Hensons’ small house that sat on Corkin property. With this snow she was glad she’d had the farrier in White Lodge check both her horses’ shoes yesterday.

Both she and Sunflower enjoyed the invigorating air as her horse made tracks in the pristine white fluff past the Corkin ranch house. Liz’s parents had worked for the Corkins since before she was born. Sadie Corkin was Liz’s best friend, and both families had shared the barn over the years.

Every dawn, like clockwork, Liz got up to put her horse through a practice session before she left for work as a vet at the clinic in White Lodge twenty minutes away. Sometimes it was a trail ride, other times flat work in the arena. She tried to vary the experience for Sunflower.

Every night at dusk she went through another practice session. Barrel racing required months of progressively harder and more challenging work to build up her horse’s tolerance to intense acceleration and turning. She needed to spark her horse out of some rollbacks, yet keep her soft and relaxed.

Today she wanted to work on her horse’s shoulders. Mac Henson, her father, idol and mentor, had explained that the more control you had over the shoulders, the easier it would be to steer Sunflower. He’d warned Liz about everything that could happen during competition.

Her horse might be too hot and nervous, or refuse to rate or stop. It might dive into the barrel and knock it over, or misbehave in the alleyway and balk at entering the arena.

Liz had received a five-second penalty in a competition when Sunflower had dropped her shoulder at the barrel. Since then they’d been practicing correct body arc and position around the barrels.

A horse was generally left-sided, just as most humans were right-handed. The trick during the lope or canter was to shape your horse for either turn by using reverse-arc exercises and riding serpentines. She needed to teach her horse to lift the shoulder away from the pressure of the inside rein.

If the problem couldn’t be mastered, she wouldn’t have a prayer of winning at the Pro National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas in December. The Mack Center on the University of Nevada campus hosted the top rodeo competitors in the world.

She might have made it to number two out of the top fifteen money winners in her event, but without constant practice and staying in excellent physical form to make her legs strong, she couldn’t expect to come out with the overall win. Sadly, this would be her last competition before she gave it up to devote herself full time to her career. Dr. Rafferty needed a partner who wasn’t off every few days barrel racing in another rodeo to stack up wins.

Her seven-year-old quarter horse had been a runner from the beginning and was well proportioned. Liz had trained half a dozen horses, but felt she couldn’t have found a better horse for the sport than this one.

Polly, the other quarter horse Liz trained and took with her to every rodeo, wasn’t as reliable as Sunflower. But if something happened to Sunflower during competition, Liz needed a backup.

Her third horse, Maisy, she left behind. She wasn’t as teachable and hadn’t learned to body rate or lower her head when Liz pulled on the reins. The ability for a horse to slow its speed at the first barrel in response to light rein pressure was crucial. Only then could you position it for a precise first turn and properly align it to change leads for the other two turns, thus shaving off time.

When Liz’s body relaxed, Maisy should have related that to the movement. She tried to teach Maisy, but the horse was slow to respond. Nevertheless, she was a great horse for riding in the mountains.