“They won’t let him, the…the…chefe… You know,sim? With the money?”
“We ain’t telling the suits. Not even Ace, you know? None of them. We do this together.”
“Then what?” Tag asked. “Seriously, you get him to ride and he does. Then what? Someone’s going to know.”
He had no fucking idea. None. He was winging this, just the same as all of them, had been from the very start.
Thing was, he couldn’t let on. Jason couldn’t lay down and die. He needed to ride, so Coke would make it happen.
A man could only do his best, damn it.
Nattie had his back. “Then Jason will win the frickin’ title and have more money than God and he can do what he wants. Buy a guide dog. Whatever.”
“Right. Then they’ll make a movie and hire James Patterson to write a book based on a true story.” Dillon came wandering over, grinning at all of them. “Or maybe the book comes first.”
“Don’t be an ass, Dillweed,” Tag grumbled.
“Hey, the movie deal will be worth millions,” Dillon said. “Are you in, Balta?”
“I do not think this is a smart thing, but I will be in. I will help, but…” Balta stopped and stared Coke right in the eyes. “Sam can see and he isviolado,sim? Broken. How can we not break Jason Scott? How can we not break you?”
“I don’t care ’bout me. I was put on earth to be broke dick. I want this, Balta, and I intend to get it.”
“Hoss gets what he wants and we help or get out of the way,” Nattie said. “The big thing will be after he rides. The get off.”
Dillon shook his head. “No. The big thing will be the cameras.”
Balta snorted. “It will be the talk. Everything in this is about the talk now.”
That got Tag to nodding. “No shit on that. The damn computers and the phones and all. You already done opened this can of worms, we might as well have it all out.”
“There’s a lot of wrong,” Dillon said, coming over to sit next to him, leaning some. “But there’s good, too. Jason is the least social rider on tour. He doesn’t shake hands, he doesn’t dointerviews. He rides and he goes to the back, takes the fine rather than signing autographs. That doesn’t have to change.”
“Right. And he’s got Bax. Andy’ll have his back.” There was no question of that.
Balta nodded slowly. “All right. What is our… How you say? Timing? Life line?”
Tag chuckled. “Timeline?”
“Sim. Timeline.”
“He’s got to do some little rodeos, yeah, Hoss?” Nate looked at him expectantly, so Coke nodded.
“Yessir. He’s working on keeping his eyes open.”
Balta gave him a weird eyebrow wiggle thing and Coke shrugged. “He tosses cookies if he rides with them closed.”
“Ah. Yes. Me too.”
“The doc says he can still see with his eyes. It’s his brain that doesn’t process it correctly.” Dillon always understood shit better than anyone else.
Balta nodded like he got it, which maybe he did. Balta was one of the smartest sons of bitches he knew. It was just hard to tell because he spoke Brazilian. His English was… Well, it was like watching a movie with those subtitle thingies.
“Shit, y’all!” Hank pelted in from outside. “Ace Porter just pulled up out there with Cash.”
“What the fuck?” Nattie stood up, knocking his bench over. “Hoss?”
“Hey. Hey. Jase ain’t here. Ace is coming to check on AJ and the rest. No matter how much he’s in the money, somewhere he’s one of us. Stands to reason he’d come to offer help.”
