Blaze breathed in, let it out, and squeezed the trigger.
The shot rang out clean this time. The can flew off the rock.
Marisol nodded. “Better.”
“Guess I just needed the right teacher,” he replied, shrugging.
“Don’t get smug,” she said, turning away. “You hit it once. The desert wind’s forgiving. A moving man won’t be.”
Blaze’s grin faded, but his pride remained intact. He reloaded. “Then I’ll learn to hit a moving man.”
“Good,” Marisol said. “You’ll need to.”
He didn’t understand. All this time, he thought he was a better shot. Perhaps it was different when he was under pressure.
This felt too...controlled. He had time to think. Maybe that was the problem.
Graycloud watched them from the shade of a mesquite tree, a small fire crackling beside him. He chewed a strip of jerky. He had been quiet all morning, and his eyes remained unreadable.
“You shoot like your father?” he asked.
Surprised at the mention of his father, Blaze looked in his direction.
“You knew my pa?”
“Didn’t have to,” Graycloud answered, shaking his head. “I’ve seen your kind. Men who aim with their hearts instead of their heads. Sometimes it makes them legends. Sometimes it gets them killed.”
Blaze holstered the revolver. “Which one do you think I’ll be?”
“Ask me when you’re still alive in a month,” the Indian said.
Marisol chuckled under her breath. “He’s right. You got fire, kid, but fire burns quick if you don’t learn control.”
Being referred to as a child wasn’t new to Blaze, but it felt odd in the presence of Marisol and Chato. Especially since neither of them looked a day over twenty.
It must have been the trauma that gave them so much wisdom.
“Then teach me,” Blaze said, folding his arms.
“I am,” she replied. “Now pick up that can. We’re doing it again.”
He groaned but obeyed, jogging to fetch the dented tin. When he came back, Marisol had moved the rock farther away.
“That’s twice the distance,” Blaze said.
“That’s the point.”
He raised the revolver again with his jaw set. The can blurred in the shimmer of heat. His heartbeat thudded steadily in his ears. He fired and missed.
“Too fast,” Marisol said.
He shot again. Missed again.
“Still too fast.”
He exhaled, anger creeping in. “Then how slow do you want it?”
Marisol stepped closer until she was beside him. “Slow enough to mean it.”
