Chapter 2

Delon was still gorgeous. Which, of course, Tori had known. He’d been one of the top bareback riders in the country for years, and fans and sponsors alike swooned over that face, that body, and that way he had of making every person feel like he’d been waiting all day just to smile at them alone.

He wasn’t smiling now.

Tori led him through the open gym space immediately adjacent to the waiting room, past patients sweating on stationary bikes, grunting painfully through sets on the weight equipment and stretches on the mat tables. She pointed Delon down the hall toward one of the four private treatment rooms. He walked with the distinctive, slightly duck-footed gait of a bareback rider who’d spent a lifetime turning his toes out to spur bucking horses. From behind, the view was spectacular, despite loose-fitting nylon warm-up pants and a plain navy blue T-shirt. His body was denser, the way men got as they matured. The changes only made him more attractive. More…there.

She’d never seen him in workout clothes. Hell, she’d barely seen him in clothes at all, back in the day. Most of the time they’d spent together had involved the opposite of dressing for the occasion. She poked at the memory, the way her dentist poked her cheek to see if she was numb enough for him to start drilling. Can you feel that? No? Great. We can go ahead then.

Ah, the blessed numbness. It had settled around her like thick cotton batting, layer after layer, down the long highway between here and the Wyoming border. By the time she’d crossed into the Panhandle, she hadn’t felt anything but the most basic biological urges. Eat. Drink. Pee. Sleep…well, she was working on that one.

Everything else was muted. Grief. Guilt. The gossamer thread of anger that wound through it all. She was aware of their presence, but from a safe distance. An induced coma of the heart, so it could finally rest and heal.

If anyone could penetrate her cocoon, it should have been Delon, but she had looked him straight in the eye and there was…not exactly nothing. But what she felt now was an echo from far in the murky past. Which meant her concerns about whether she could effectively function as his therapist were ungrounded, at least from her perspective. From Delon’s…hard to tell, since he had yet to say a word. He hesitated at the treatment room door, as if unsure about being trapped in the confined space with her.

“Climb up on the table,” she said. “I want to take some measurements.”

He didn’t budge. “It’s all in my chart.”

“I reviewed Margo’s notes, but I prefer to form my own opinions.” When he still didn’t move, she added, “You won’t be charged for the evaluation, since it’s solely for my benefit.”

She held her breath as he stood for a few beats, possibly debating whether or not to turn around, stomp back to reception, and demand to be assigned a different therapist. Being fired by a star patient wasn’t quite the impression she wanted to make on her first day. Damn Pepper for insisting that she take over Delon’s rehab when she transferred here, but she’d rather hang herself with a cheap rope than explain to her mentor why she shouldn’t take the case.

Delon finally moved over to the table. But rather than sit on it, he braced his butt against the edge and faced her, arms and ankles crossed. The pose made all kinds of muscles jump up and beg for attention. A woman would have to be a whole lot more than numb not to notice.

“So, you’re back from…”

“Cheyenne,” she said, filling in the blank.

He blinked. “Wyoming?”

Was there any other? Probably, but only one that mattered. “Yes. I did my outpatient clinical rotation at Pepper’s place and he hired me when I graduated.”

“Pepper Burke?”

“Yes.” Surgeon to the stars of rodeo. The man who’d performed Delon’s surgery, also in Cheyenne, where Tori had made damn sure their paths hadn’t crossed. “I’ve worked for him since I graduated.”

She watched the wheels turn behind Delon’s dark eyes, connections snapping into place. Cowboys traveled from all over the United States and Canada to be treated by Pepper and his staff. “Tough place to get hired on.”

“Yes.” She gestured toward the table. “If you’re satisfied with my credentials…”

He blinked again, then squinted as if he was seeing double, trying to line up his memory of college Tori with the woman who stood in front of him. She could have told him not to bother. She’d shed that girl, layer by superficial layer, until there was barely enough left to recognize in the mirror.

Whatever Delon saw, it convinced him to slide onto the treatment table. She started with girth measurements—calf, knee, thigh—to compare the muscle mass of his injured leg to the uninjured side. As she slid the tape around his thigh, she felt him tense. Glancing up, her gaze caught his and for an instant she saw it all in his eyes. The memories. The heat.

Her pulse skipped ever so slightly, echoing the hitch in his breath. Her emotions might be too anesthetized to react to his proximity, but her body remembered, and with great fondness. A trained response. No more significant than Pavlov’s drooling dogs.

“Lie flat,” she ordered, and picked up his leg.

Halfway through the series of tests, she knew Pepper’s concern was justified. If anything, Delon’s injured leg was slightly stronger than the other, testament to how hard he’d worked at his rehab. Four months post surgery, though, he should have had full range of motion. Instead, when she bent the knee, she felt as if she hit a brick wall a few degrees past ninety. She increased the pressure to see how he’d react.

“That’s it,” he said through gritted teeth.

Well, crap. “How does it feel when I push on it?”

“Like my kneecap is going to explode.”

Double crap. She sucked in one corner of her bottom lip and chewed on it as she considered their options.

“Is there any chance it’s going to get better?” His voice was quiet, but tension vibrated from every muscle in his body—for good reason. He was asking if his career might be over. It wasn’t a question she could, or should, answer.

She stepped back and folded her arms. “I’ll give Pepper a call. He’ll want new X-rays, possibly an MRI—”

“What will an MRI tell him?” His gaze came up to meet hers, flat, black, daring her to be anything less than honest.

“Whether you’ve developed an abnormal amount of scar tissue, either inside the joint or in the capsule.”

“And if I have?”

“He can go in arthroscopically and clean up inside the joint.” But from what she’d felt, she doubted that was the case.

“What about the capsule?”

She kept her eyes on him, steady, unflinching. “You had a contact injury with a lot of trauma. The capsule may have thickened and scarred in response, or adhesions may have formed between folds. There are ways to address the adhesions.”

“But not the other kind.”

“No. And there are limits to how much we can improve it with therapy. You’ll have to learn to live with a deficit.”

That would mean a shorter spur stroke with his left compared to his right leg, in an event where symmetry was a huge part of the score. How many points would the lag cost him per ride? Five? Ten? Enough to end his career as he knew it.

“Worst case scenario, we can get you to at least eighty percent of normal. Then we can look at your biomechanics, make adjustments—”

He gave a sharp, impatient shake of his head. “The judges aren’t stupid. They’ll notice if I try to fake it.”

She didn’t argue. After the thousands of hours he’d spent training his body to work in a very precise groove, telling Delon he had to change his riding style was no different than informing a pitcher they couldn’t stay in the major leagues unless they changed their arm angle, or a golfer that they had to retool their swing.

The tight, angry set to Delon’s shoulders suggested it might be a while before he would consider trying. Well, he was in luck. He’d landed a physical therapist who knew all about adapting to loss. One of these days she might even get around to finding her new style.

Delon sat up abruptly and swung his legs off the table, forcing her to step aside. She pulled out a business card and scribbled a number on the back.

“For today, stick with your regular exercise program. Between now and your next appointment, I’ll decide what changes we need to make. If you want to go ahead with the X-rays and MRI, let Beth know on your way out and she’ll make the arrangements.” She handed him the card. “That’s my direct line if you have any other questions.”

He turned the card over and studied the front for a long moment. Then he looked at her, his face a wooden mask. “What does your husband think of living in Texas?”

“I wouldn’t know.”

His fist curled around the card. “Sorry. Divorced?”

“Dead,” she said, and walked out the door before he could join the legions who’d expressed their heartfelt sympathy when they didn’t know fuck all about Willy except what they’d heard on the evening news.