Page 41 of Lucky Cowboy

Val wouldn’t have imagined in a million years that Biggs would become psychotic enough to try to kill her. Even now, after the event and laid out in a hospital bed, it didn’t feel real.

About an hour after she and Mark had their emotional reunion interrupted by a pair of law enforcement officials.

“Ms. Bernard, are you up to answering some questions for us?” the older of the two asked, but before she could so much as open her mouth, Mark stepped in.

“What you can do first is enlighten us about Biggs. We don’t even know if the man who managed to shoot her is alive or dead.”

His voice had lost every bit of that choked up quality, even if some of the bloodshot proof of his breakdown with her remained.

“And you are?”

Mark crossed his arms with all the authority she’d witnessed out of him on their initial encounter. “You first.”

“I’m Sargent Fields, and this is Officer Touter. We were the first to arrive on the scene.”

“I’m Sheriff Mark Talbot, Val’s fiancé.”

Val goggled at this little tidbit of news. Had he proposed while she’d been out, and she’d said yes without remembering? What in the world?

“Well, sheriff,” Sergent Fields continued without pause. “As we drove up, the assailant was in the process of firing his weapon at your fiancée. Officer Touter here had a clean shot to take him out, so she did.”

Took him out? Did that mean that Biggs had been killed?

“I discharged my firearm at the assailant,” the officer picked up the narrative as her partner or senior nodded at her. “The bullet struck him in the midthoracic region, causing him to fall forward. The projectile caused some damage to one of his lungs and other vital areas, requiring surgery. The physicians here operated, but he didn’t survive.”

Biggs had died on the table.

Val attempted to let all this sink in, but everything still felt surreal. And the officer also seemed stunned by all this. She seemed young though no younger than Val herself was. Had she ever shot someone in the line of duty before? Had she ever had to take out someone in the line of duty? Had Mark? It occurred to Val that she’d never asked him.

“We’re here to take Ms. Bernard’s statement,” the Sargent took over again. “If she’s up to it.”

“She’s not,” Mark told them, but Val countered this.

“I am. I mean, I’m not one hundred percent, but I’d like to get all this out while it’s all so recent.”

So with Mark right there by her bed, she recounted everything. Biggs appearing right after she’d finished performing with Calliope. The gunshot. And then how she’d passed out believing she’d died.

Mark had laced his fingers with hers again at that. As if to reassure himself that she truly was alive and with him.

“I didn’t think he’d come after me,” Val went on after a few rapid heartbeats. “Not with the restraining order against him. Didn’t he know he’d be caught? And to do it around all those people?”

“It’s a mystery on our end, too,” Sargent Fields answered. “But I can assure you that our department will do all we can to determine why he snapped. We’ll keep you both apprised of any findings.”

* * *

Days passed,then weeks. And though the process was slow, Val began to heal. Mark stayed with her every step of the way, only going back to work after two continuous weeks of taking care of her. Mitzi took over from there, for which Val would always feel grateful. Much as she hated being an invalid, such a severe injury meant she wouldn’t be performing for the rest of the season and left her assistant with time to fill.

Her father couldn’t have taken care of her without possibly endangering his own health, so even though it’d been traumatizing, ultimately, things worked out for everyone involved. Having such a near death experience made Val reevaluate certain aspects of her life and work she’d been taking for granted, and it opened her up to different possibilities.

Up until now it’d felt so necessary for her to be the main breadwinner for her and her dad that walking away from her career had seemed impossible. Also, she’d loved performing and hadn’t wanted to turn her back on it in the middle of her prime. But being forced to take this downtime changed her perspective and had her doing something she’d never tried before: Thinking outside the box.

While recovering, she put out some feelers about running a clinic teaching other young women how to trick ride. Instantly, she received tons of interest due to the popularity of her name within the sport. It occurred to her that she could switch gears by a few degrees and still make this work.

Maybe.

Val received the news she’d been waiting for when it was just three days before switching over to October. But she couldn’t celebrate it, not yet. Not before she spoke to Mark and updated him.

“So, I might’ve done a thing, and I’d like your opinion on it,” she spoke to his image on her computer screen. She wanted to see as much of his face as possible to gauge his reaction.

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