Page 10 of Bad Cowboy, Tennessee

There was a little spot of precum, leaking through the fabric at the tip.

My cheeks flared with heat. A potent mix of rage and embarrassment shot through me, like I was caught, pinned to the ground all over again. My dick had always had a mind of its own, and right now was theworstpossible time for it to be doing that.

No, no, fucking no.

The door slammed behind Draven.

And when I looked back up, he was gone.

Chapter 2

Draven

He’s lying down with half of his face in the grey-brown dust.

Next to his cheek, there’s a footprint-shaped shadow in the earth that my own boot made a few moments ago.

I take off my cowboy hat and gaze down at it, holding my own dark halo in my hands. There’s only a little bit of blood on the brim. Barely visible on the black felt.

When I crouch down beside his unconscious figure, I reach out and put my fingers to his nostrils. Check if he’s breathing.

Knocked out cold like this, he looks frail and fallible. The sweeping mountains behind my estate are bathed in grey, the fog rolling in along the basin and promising to stay through the night.

It could almost look like the backdrop of a play:

The Montana mountain range.

My endless ranch land under the darkening light at dusk.

The body.

The weapon: just fists and the fat trunk of a nearby tree.

And me. The villain.

But this is cold and bloody and the definition of a mess. A little bit too real to be theater. The truth is that I hadn’t even been trying to hurt him. Retaliation doesn’t always work that way, and all I’d wanted was to make things right.

I feel his pulse at his wrist as his heartbeat limps along, still going, and I know I might be making the biggest mistake I’ve ever made.

My land.

My problem.

My fault.

One more bad thing to follow me into my dreams. One more wrong choice etched onto my soul forever.

But the one thing I don’t feel, even a little?

Regret.

That’s how I know I’m a monster. And I don’t mind that, either.

I drop his arm back onto the ground. Stand tall. Put my black hat back where it belongs. Not like a halo, but like an ink-black crown.

This mistake won’t stop me from protecting what’s important. Nothing will.

The worst thing about Tennessee,so far, was the lack of violence.

---