Quickdraw Slow Burn (Battle of the Bulls #3) - T. S. Joyce Page 0,27
looked like a grimace. “Or tomorrow. The next day at the latest.”
Cheyenne squeezed her hands. “Putting off a test won’t make it less real.”
She was right. She was so right. “I don’t have a job right now. Or any income coming in. I am in a studio apartment in Boise without a room for a nursery. I don’t have any light socket covers or like…bottles and boob pumps. Those little baby toenail clippers? I don’t have those either.”
“Well, Quickdraw can help with that stuff.”
“No. God, no. Cheyenne, he’s about to be rich. Maybe he’s already rich, and what does this look like I’m doing?”
Cheyenne shook her head and looked confused.
“It looks like I’m trapping him right as he’s making a run to win this whole circuit.” A pair of tears streaked down her face. “I wouldn’t do that to him.”
“Well…maybe he’ll lose,” Cheyenne said brightly.
“I would never wish that on him.”
“Me neither.” Cheyenne looked out the RV window. “Okay, maybe take a test, and if you aren’t pregnant, then okay! But if you are, maybe tell him after his event and give him the choice to stay or go. And if he chooses to go, I’ll just murder him, no big deal.”
Surprised, Annabelle belted out a laugh. It was one of those thick sob-laughs. “No murdering my potential baby-daddy.”
“Plan—I’ll pick you up a couple different kinds of tests after the interviews, and I’ll be discreet as hell. We’ll see what’s going on with your wolf and go from there. Deal?”
“Yes.” Okay, this wasn’t so scary now that Cheyenne knew. That anyone knew, really. This had been a heavy secret to keep. She was realizing that now as some of the weight she was carrying lifted.
Cheyenne stood. “I’m going to research nearby pharmacies, but I left my phone in the RV.”
“Cheyenne?”
“Yeah?” she asked at the door.
“Please don’t tell anyone.”
“Oh, Annabelle, that’s your story to tell either way.”
“Thank you.”
Cheyenne frowned, her delicately arched eyebrows drawing down. “For what?”
“For not judging me.”
“You’re a grown-ass woman perfectly capable of having and raising a happy baby, whether the dad decides to be involved or not. There’s so many in your same boat, Annabelle. You aren’t alone. It’s scary now because there’s uncertainty, but it won’t be scary forever. And I think Quickdraw will surprise you. I mean if you are pregnant. I think everything will be okay.”
Everything will be okay.
All right. Maybe that’s what Annabelle had needed to hear because, now, things didn’t seem so overwhelming. It was time to stop putting off her life and start figuring everything out.
Chapter Eight
This was a completely foreign world.
The media was a circus in itself. A dozen reporters and interviewers were calling out questions to the riders and bulls sitting behind a long table in a conference room.
Quickdraw was sitting between Two Shots and Dead, leaned back in his chair, his massive arms crossed over his chest, making him look roughly the width of a building, and he was glaring at each interviewer when they asked a question.
So far, he’d been asked three questions.
The first one: Do you wear any lucky underwear or socks the day of an event?
He’d just stared at the interviewer until everyone moved on.
The second question: What will you do with the money if you win tonight?
He’d literally yawned and looked over at Annabelle like he would rather be turned upside down in a Porta Potty than be here.
The third question he’d done better at, probably because Cheyenne had given him three seconds of ignoring the question—Are you nervous about Lee Bristol drawing you?—before she’d used his middle name. “Quickdraw Burtlebee Slow Burn!” she barked out. “Answer the damn question.”
He’d blinked slowly and then offered the most dramatic eyeroll ever, leaned forward, tapped the microphone with his index finger twice, ignored the screech sound the microphone made, and then answered, “No.”
Annabelle pursed her lips and tried not to giggle. Cheyenne’s face was turning so red, and beside Quickdraw, Dead brayed a single laugh.
“Wait.” Two Shots interrupted the muttering of the interviewers. “I thought your middle name was Slow. Last name Burn.”
“I made up his middle name,” Cheyenne muttered. “He’s pissing me off, so I wanted to piss him off back.”
“He looks like he cares a ton,” Dead quipped from where he was separating Skittles into piles based on color. He shoved all the yellow ones at Quickdraw.
Quickdraw couldn’t look more bored if he tried. Was he…? Was he falling asleep?
“You can have these. They’re gross,” Dead told him as an interviewer called out a