I looked between him and Mister Mooney. “Can…can I ask why he’s in there, sir?”
Mister Mooney’s face sliced into a grin. “When the boys bought this group of babies, we decided to place a wager. Each of us would break one. The most broke and rideable one that sells for the highest dollar wins…This here’s Goodie’s charge. We was gonna call her Widowmaker, but…well, Goodie is gonna die alone, just like he’s lived his entire life so, it doesn’t fit.”
“Shut up,” Goodie groaned.
Mister Mooney nodded back to the red filly before focusing his attention on his brother once more. “You should spend less time bitchin’ and more time workin’ that horse before she turns your head into a canoe. What good is it doin’ ya to yell at me about how you hate her? She hates you just as bad. More maybe. Did you try hittin’ her in the head with a shovel?”
The first smile on Goodie’s face was like a sunrise on a new day, bright and refreshing. Holy shit, no wonder Cash was a cocky sonovabitch…look at his fuckin’ dad and uncle. “She bent the shovel and snapped the goddamn handle in half.”
The chink of spurs drew my attention and suddenly Maverick stood behind us. A shiver traversed the length of my spine as I took him in. He wore his usual all black, his aviator sunglasses hiding his eyes from me, but the look he snuck my way wasn’t any less scalding.
Mister Mooney let out a string of curses. “God damn it, Maverick, don’t sneak up on me like that. You’re gonna give me a fuckin’ heart attack and then Cash, here, is yours and Ryder’s fuckin’ problem. Do you want that?” He nodded at his son for extra emphasis.
Cash grinned, but it didn’t reach his eyes. He wasn’t wearing any of his godawful, obnoxious sunglasses like usual. It was like the light in him had dulled, dimmed.
Who’d have thought I preferred the brash, brazen brunette over this. Give me back the Cash who perpetually stuck his foot in his mouth and somehow miraculously got laid, not this sullen, sad, serious version.
Maverick’s lips peeled back into a smirk as he shook his head before gesturing toward Goodie in the round pen with the red filly. He still didn’t talk, but it’s like Mister Mooney understood him anyway.
“I think he’s tryin’ to get himself killed.” Mister Mooney chuckled. “Course, he’s just as bad at that as he is at everything else.”
Goodie clapped back, a glare on his face. “Fuck you, Bad.”
Mister Mooney laughed once more, glancing back at Maverick. “Whatdya think, boy? What’s the problem here?”
Maverick’s lips pursed as he took a step up to the pipe-stall between his uncle and I. Still silent, he slipped his sunglasses down, his eyes sharply focused on the arena for a long moment before he gave a single shake of his head. Mister Mooney’s voice drew my attention. “He’s undoin’ all the shit we spent yesterday fixin’, right?”
Maverick nodded, gaze still focused on the filly.
Goodie turned and bolted for the fence as she raced past him, trying to climb out and charge him again. He hauled himself up the metal piping and fell over with a thump just beside Cash. “Well, if you’re so good,youhandle it.” He stabbed a finger at Maverick.
Dear God…she was psychotic.Worry knit my brow, a scowl curling my lips downward, my heart thumping faster as Maverick looked at Mister Mooney, an unspoken question in his eyes.
“Get in there and see if you can calm her down.” Mister Mooney nodded.
He was going to get in there with her? That hell beast?
Maverick climbed the fence and dropped down on the other side, his gaze never leaving the horse, who snorted and pawed the earth. I gripped the pipe-stall, watching. Waiting.
He didn’t rush. In fact, he didn’t do anything at all. He just stood there, watching her as she watched him. He waited, as if he didn’thave a single other worry in the world. Nowhere to go. No place to be.
Mister Mooney moved to help Goodie up. “Only thing that fuckin’ horse is good for is target practice,” Goodie groaned as he brushed himself off. “Let me go get my Henry rifle and punch a couple air holes in that nag’s head.”
Mister Mooney settled back at my side once more and nodded at the arena. “Maverick’ll get her sorted out.”
“I don’t think so, Bad.” Goodie settled on the other side of me, his fancy cologne drifting on the wind and filling my nose. He even smelled of money. Wealth. He reminded me of that old Marty Robbins song,The Cowboy In The Continental Suit,except he hadn’t ridden no brute. “Last time I seen a horse that was both that meanandthat stupid was that old broodmare dad used to keep in the pasture to keep the coyotes away from the sheep.”
“Maverick’s got a way with the wild ones,” Bad said, pulling a leather pouch out of his back pocket. “He’ll calm her down.”
Goodie glanced past me to see what Mister Mooney was doing as he pulled some rolling papers and a bag of tobacco out. “I thought you quit smokin’?” Goodie asked before looking at me. “I’m sorry, Miss. Where are my manners?” He offered out a hand to me. “Goodfellow Mooney.”
I smiled, placing my hand in his and giving it a firm shake. “Cheyenne Harris, sir.”
“You one of Cash’s girls?” he asked. So, he hadn’t heard Mister Mooney and I talking then.
“She wishes…” Cash sidled over to my side and bumped me in the shoulder, a glimmer of his usual self peaking through.
I rolled my eyes and laughed, nudging him back. “If I recall correctly, I’m the one who turned you down, remember, sweetheart?”
