Augusta glanced at the faces in the crowd and breathed a sigh of relief when she didn’t see Dally’s face among them. She walked past the others and asked if she could take a seat next to Slim. When he glanced up at her and realized who it was, Augusta noticed the embarrassment painting his cheeks rosy. She offered him a gentle smile. “It’s okay, Slim. We all knew you were trying to pull our legs. Sam’s just busy, is all. He doesn’t have time to say it nice.”
“Ah, heck, Gus”—Slim offered a wide-gapped grin—“I ain’t upset at Sam. I know better’n to cut in line. Everybody knows that’s a prime rule of camp—take your time when it comes up. Not before and not after.” He sighed heavily, rolling his shoulders as if they ached. “I’m just sorry nobody thinks I got it in me to ride ol’ Toe or any other bull worth his snot.”
“You’ve got other talents, Slim. And you’re a smarter man than most for not wasting your time on trying to ride those bulls. You aren’t really gonna go through with riding Fulla Stomp tonight, are you?”
“Funny thing, you say that.” Slim’s lips curved into a conspiratorial whisper. “I’ve been trying to think of a logical way to get out of it ever since I drawed this afternoon. Trouble is, me and logic don’t always sit on the same saddle of giddy-up, if you know what I mean.”
“I tell you what—” An idea struck Augusta—one that just might work better than the one she’d planned when she first decided to approach Slim with her request. “You promise me that you’ll talk Dally out of riding Bone Buster during this reunion and I’ll see that my father pulls Fulla Stomp out of the competition before you’re scheduled to ride.”
His eyebrows drew together in a frown as he shook his head. “Can’t do that, Gus. Dally’s set on it. Maybe you just oughta wait and see if Bone Buster’s luck holds true. Maybe Dally won’t draw him this time, or maybe he’ll have to wait till the next competition to get better luck. That’s September or better, I’m thinking.”
“There won’t be a next time for Bone Buster,” she said quietly. This was the first time she’d told anyone what she and her parent had decided. “That’s why we brought the brindle back here. We’re taking him out of competition after this one. He’s only got another year or two at most before Father would put him out to pasture anyway. So, I’ve asked my parents to pull him for stud now.”
Slim rose to his full six feet two inches in height. “You’ll crush him, Augusta. You gotta let him have his ride. He won’t be the same if he never gets it.”
Frustration made her bolt to her feet, her hands gripping Slim’s arms in an effort to keep him from walking away. “Why, Slim? Why can’t he leave it alone?” She tried to make him understand in a way she never could Dally. “Bone Buster won’t bring his father back. Flint’s dead.”
Tears welled in Augusta’s eyes, but she wouldn’t let them fall. God knew she’d cried enough of them trying to understand, trying to find some sense in Dally’s unrelenting bull-headness on the subject.
“You think it’s about revenge, don’tcha?” Slim stared down at her hands until she let go of him and dropped them to her sides.
“Isn’t it?” Right now she felt as sad as her tramp outfit appeared to others.
“No, Gus. It ain’t.” Slim pushed back his hat and stared into her eyes, looking suddenly full of gravity she’d never noticed in him before. “It’s about having control. Dally ain’t the sort what gives over easy to letting anyone or anything control him. That bull represents the time when life just up and slapped him in the face and took away the feeling that he would live forever. It was like life said, ‘Look here, Dally Angelo, there’s gonna be things no amount of true grit will see you through. Everybody who ever trod this big ol’ patch of heaven we call Texas and the rest of that hell those other folks call home has to face it. Flint Angelo did. You do. You just gotta decide if you’re gonna let it whoop ya or if you can be cowboy enough to accept it, learn from it and make yourself stronger because of it.’”
Slim had a talent far beyond one of riding bulls. He knew how to bring home a point. He had somehow shed a new light on Dally she’d never seen before.
Hadn’t she faced the same sense of lack of control? Hadn’t her life spun in a way she never anticipated? Hadn’t she been trying to manipulate it so that the outcome would eventually be the way she wanted it?
Was she just as guilty as Dally for not letting go of what she thought was best, hiding behind the reasoning that she couldn’t watch him kill himself?
Had she hung on to that justification so long that she hadn’t been able to accept the curve life had thrown her, learned from it, and didn’t trust herself to have the strength to see through whatever truce they might find together?
Trust was what she needed right now. Not trust in Dally, but trust in herself. Trust that she could do the right thing and tell him about Maddy. Tell him that they had a daughter together. Trust that if he hated her for keeping the secret from him and never spoke to her again, she could somehow live through the devastation of losing his love forever.
Augusta reached up and softly touched Slim’s cheek. “Thank you, friend.”
“For what?” He took her hand and slightly pushed it away. “It’s the cowboy way, you know.”
She stared at him, wondering which “way” exactly he was referring to. Cowboys did an awful lot their own way.
“Telling the truth when you’re alone with a partner. Spinning yarns when there’s a crowd to work up.”
She laughed, grateful for the amusement twinkling his eyes and reminding her that he had dimples. “Now who’s the clown? You’re full of beans, Slim Doogan.”
“Most the time if I can help it,” he admitted.
“Walk with me over to the Springs Hotel?” she asked, linking her arm through his. She needed to see if her folks had made it to Kasota Springs. They were due in from St. Louis already and she hadn’t seen them yet. Good thing she had paid for two rooms in advance or they’d have to stay in one of the tents in Clown Alley. There were no rooms to be had anywhere all over town. She’d heard someone say that the sheriff had let out a couple of the criminals on good behavior just so the county could rent out some of the jail cells to boarders.
The thought of sleeping in a cell next to Cherokee Bill Bartlett, the bank robber, would certainly have no appeal to her parents if she had to give up the hotel rooms. The LeDouxes might offer to put them up out at Jacks Bluff.
“I’ll make a quick change and we’ll go see about pulling Fulla Stomp out of the mix,” she announced.
“Nah. I didn’t make the trade, remember? I’ll just see you to your hotel. I said I’d ride that bucker and I will.” Slim reached up and playfully honked her nose. “Let’s just hope he don’t jar a bunch of them beans out my butt or the crowd’s gonna wanta be borrowing that nose of yours, Rusty.”
Her parents had not arrived by the time she completed her last routine and changed into the periwinkle teagown that matched her eyes perfectly. Her hair now hung in thick auburn waves down her back, brushed to a luster that could have rivaled sunset shining on the walls of the nearby Palo Duro canyon.
They should be here already, she worried, making her way through the hotel parlor and out into the crowded street. They said they’d be here in time for the dance. It wasn’t like them to be late.
A throng of excitement swept over Kasota Springs as fiddlers, tamborine shakers and banjo pickers struck a lively tune together to entice everyone to join in the dance.
Women wore their best bonnets and graced the festivities in a kaleidoscope of calico, paisley and lace parasols. The men sported string ties, brocade vests and spit-polished boots.
“Dance with me, Little Lady?” a wrangler asked, taking his hat off as she approached the livery.
“It’s my true regret I can’t, Sir.” She knew most of the women there would be expected to accept several dancing partners. Men outnumbered women twenty to one. Unmarried women were even more rare. “At least not until I find my folks. Maybe
later.”
“I’ll hold you to that, darling.” He returned his hat and moseyed on down toward where the musicians were drawing a bigger crowd.
“Where’s Joey when I need him?” she wondered as she headed to Clown Alley. She doubted she’d find any of the tramps still there. All of them had put in a hard day’s work and deserved a well-earned rest.
Sure enough, when she reached the tents and searched several, Augusta found them empty of anyone she might send out to see if her parents were having trouble along the trail. She hadn’t seen any of the troupe among the dancers. After doing comic routines all day, dancing was usually one of the last things a clown wanted to do. They danced all day in one form or the other.
She concentrated for a moment and tried to recall what Joey might have mentioned earlier about participating in the evening’s festivities. The bull riding. Dally had asked for some clowns to help distract the bulls if they got too dangerous for a safe retreat. Joey would be there most likely. If not him, then somebody else from the Flying G would have agreed to earn a little extra money.
It took her longer than she hoped, making her way through town and over to the chutes next to the railyard. Men kept stopping her and asking her for a dance. At some point this evening, she was going to have to grant all those she’d promised for later.
Just as she spotted Joey running around the arena waving his hands like he was swatting flies overhead, she realized what he was attempting to do—flag an angry bull away from a downed rider.
Her heart felt as if it dropped to her feet and took root in the soil beneath them. The bull raking his hoof deep into the red dirt, tossing its head and bellowing with rage was none other than Big Windy, the bull Dally had drawn. Dally lay sprawled across the ground, his back to the bull. Dally dug his boots in, digging for enough scramble to get away. His boot slipped. Someone yelled, “Look out!”
Before she could think about what she was wearing, before she could feel the crash of lightning pulse at her temples, before she considered the stupidity of what she was about to do, Augusta threw herself against the chute and hurdled its top.
Material shredded, her feet tangled, she landed on her knees in the dirt. Her breath had gone somewhere. Where she didn’t know. It didn’t seem to be anywhere in her body.
“Ho, bull! This way, bull!”
She could hear Joey trying to distract the beast, could see him waving his hands, trying to get the bull to change its focus toward him. The demon’s eyes rolled wild, its nostrils flaring, obviously taking in the smell of its new competitor. Augusta cursed herself for putting on that dab of perfume for the party, wishing now she still smelled like the animals she’d dealt with in the various routines. The perfume would infuriate the bull.
She found her breath. Made it to her knees.
The bull faced her, its eyes narrowed a second before it charged.
Augusta thought she saw Dally scrambling for cover. Joey yelled something about a barrel. Her gaze darted to a barrel a few feet away from her. A man standing on the other side of the chute near the barrel, punched it with his fists, sending it into a roll.
She and the bull reached the barrel at the same time. Self-preservation made her do the only thing she could think of at the moment. She jumped as high as she could, praying the leap would take her somewhere far out of reach of horns and thundering hooves.
Her toes touched the tip of the barrel giving her unexpected momentum. She leaped even higher, hurdling the bull’s bowed head and one shoulder.
“To the gate, Augusta. Over here!”
Dally’s voice came from a place of safety. Now, if only she could reach the same. Augusta called upon every skill she’d ever learned, prayed every prayer she’d ever been taught as the seconds ticked by and she ran faster than she thought possible.
“Here, Gus. Jump!”
Augusta did as she was told, jumping into the arms reaching out to pull her up and over the chute gate. One second. Two. Red dust swirled all-around her as the bull came to a shuddering halt behind her, the chute fence the only barricade between her and its fury. Big Windy lifted his mouth and bellowed discontent, throwing its tail over his back to fan the hot steam of sweat raising a musky bovine stink to the air.
All of a sudden, Dally was holding her, kissing her like no one but they were present and she hadn’t just been running for her life. His life, damn it!
The crowd roared in approval, whether for the bull’s defeat or Dally’s amorous victory demand, she wasn’t sure.
Augusta jerked away and slapped him hard across one cheek. “Grow up,” she said, forgetting all the good sense Slim had made earlier in the evening and listening to the fear that still thundered in her heart. “Grow up before you kill the both of us.”
She stalked away.
“Might’ve rode Big Windy the full ten, Angelo,” someone yelled, “but that kiss didn’t last long enough for bragging rights.”
“Are you okay?” asked Joey, trying to keep pace with her.
“I’m fine.” Augusta looked at what was left of her teagown, her mangled hair and her patience with any man who decided to come within ten feet of her at the moment. A wonderful sight to present to her parents. Just wonderful. “Don’t I look fine?”
Joey threw his palms up. “Oh, okay, boss lady. Just wanted to make sure you didn’t need me.”
“I need you all right.” She kept walking toward the hotel, punctuating her orders with every step. “Take one of the remuda and set out east of town. Go to Clarendon if you have to. Father and Mother haven’t made it in yet and I’m worried about them. Make sure they didn’t have trouble along the trail.”
“I wish they’d come by rail.” Worry filled his tone. “I thought they might being that Maddy’s with them.”
“They wanted to stop in and visit some friends over at the 6666 Ranch and then my grandmother in Clarendon. I couldn’t talk them out of it.”
“I’ll change out of my costume and light out of here before you know it.”
“Don’t bother changing.”
“You really think something’s wrong?”
“I’m not thinking any such thing.” She refused to consider anything might have happened to them. To Maddy. Oh God, Dally. What if she had to tell Dally that something had happened to—?
No. She wouldn’t let it enter her thoughts.
But just as quickly as she tried to dismiss the possibility, Slim’s words rushed to mind. Words that scared the hell out of her. Sometimes life just ups and slaps you in the face.
“Find them, Joey.” She prayed that she would never be called upon to be that strong. No one should ever have to be that strong. And for the first time, in four years, she finally understood Dally’s anger. Dally’s fear. Dally’s single-minded purpose.
“Please hurry,” she pleaded.
Chapter 6
Most who visited Kasota Springs thought the town was named after a fingertip of the Canadian River that had been divided by a knuckle of mesa tableland from its mother river. Though dry much of the year, miraculously, the springs occasionally rose from an aqueous source deep beneath the loam to quench the prairie’s thirst. Dally thought of it as the plains popped out in a sweat beneath a hot July sun.
Whatever fed it, he was grateful the springs still had enough water to cover the bullrushes. He strode past the Double D encampment, ignoring the circle of cowboys waving him in to join them at the cook fire.
“Too bad about Puckett,” one of them hollered at Dally. “Heard that arm jerker threw him plumb out the back door!”
“Ol’ Bone Buster’s just chomping his cud waiting for a chance at you, Angelo,” teased another. “Poor Gill was just a warm-up whooping, far as that brindle’s concerned. Sure hope your luck opens up so that brute’ll quit stomping so hard on the rest of us.”
Dally didn’t take the bait, knowing the men were teasing yet sincere about wanting the challenge between him and the mankiller to be finished—one way or the other. He’d stayed
around long enough to watch Puckett’s turn at the brindle and, though he had wished the Jacks Bluff ranch hand no harm, felt a sense of relief when Puckett didn’t stay on the full ten seconds. Still, he’d give him his due. Puckett had lasted seven seconds, longer than anyone before him.
The man deserved the round of applause he’d received when he’d gotten up and dusted himself off. Dally had gone over and shook his hand, extending Puckett the greatest compliment he’d ever given another man when he said, “That was some real try, partner.”
Instead of everyone congratulating Puckett for the length of time he had been able to stay on, they’d rushed in to get Dally’s comments on the near miss. There was always lots of big talk about the cowboys’ winnings and losses, but it seemed as if Dally’s intent to ride Bone Buster had cast a shadow over the rodeo and the possibility that someone else could break the bull’s winning streak. A shadow that loomed like a thunderhead and threatened to spill foul wind. A shadow that took away any sun that should have been shining on others at the rodeo.
Dally wanted nothing but a good dunk in the springs, some clean clothes and to settle into his bedroll for the night. He had walked away earlier to let the crowd focus their attentions rightfully on Puckett’s tremendous effort and decided that he should do the same here at the Double D camp.
He’d deliberately set his tent up farther down bank from the others, seeking a bit of solitude from the day’s speculation about him and the brindle. Listening to all the controversy got old, especially the part about the risk he was taking. It was his life, his risk. To hell with what anyone thought about it.
Who are you fooling, man, he told himself as he ducked inside the tent and immediately started peeling off his soiled vest and shirt. You care what she thinks.
Give Me A Texas Outlaw Bundle with Give Me A Cowboy Page 46