The announcer's voice comes over the broadcast: "And we'll have a six-minute delay while the crew reseats. That's Asher Addison's stock today out of Big Spring—the Hellfire string that's given riders trouble all weekend. Asher's been in the contracting business for the better part of two decades and his stock's been a fixture of West Texas rodeo since I was calling for the junior circuit. Always good to see him at our events."
I don't react.
I've heard that name on a broadcast a hundred times. Asher Addison is the stock contractor I’ve known my whole career.
He fixed my chute when I was sixteen at junior nationals and I never forgot it—he was kind to me when I was scared and the gate was stuck and Pops was in the stands losing his mind.
I was a kid. He was a man who helped me. He has been background to my life for almost ten years.
Spur goes still under me.
I feel him stop breathing.
Then his hand comes up to my arm and his grip tightens. "Dakota."
"What?"
"Look at the screen."
I look.
The camera is still on the chute crew.
The man in the tan hat with the cigarette is mid-conversation with the chute boss, gesturing with the cigarette in his hand.
The same hand. Two long drags, hold—I can see him do it on screen—and a third drag down to the filter.
"What is it?" I ask.
"That's him."
"That's who?"
Spur doesn't answer right away.
He's looking at the screen with the face that I have seen him use exactly once before in my life—the face he wore at the hand-off pen at Abilene when he saw the cut on the cinch.
The face of a man who has just placed the man he is going to kill. "Spur."
"That's the man from the bar."
"What bar?"
"The man Roan brought to Sharp to prospect. The one your father voted no patch on. The man who has been texting you photos and cutting your saddle. That's him on the screen."
The room goes still.
Pops sits up in the recliner. "Spur."
"Prez. Look at the TV."
Pops looks.
The camera is still holding on the chutes.
The man in the tan hat takes a final drag of the Camel Wide, drops it in the dirt, grinds it under his boot.
Then he looks up at the camera for half a second.
