Two long drags, then a hold, then a third drag taken right down to the filter.
A specific rhythm. A specific man.
I can't place him yet, but I will.
I set the bag back down and drink my coffee at the kitchen counter, watching the light come up through the oaks behind my cabin. After a while I shower, dress, lock up the cabin, and walk out to the round pen.
The mustang is grazing in the center of the pen.
He's been doing this for a few days now. The wild thing has stopped being wild.
I'm going to call Phantom this week and tell him the horse is ready to start saddle work, which means it's ready to be assigned to a brother who needs a project.
I've already done my work with him. He's not mine to keep.
Banshee comes up the path with two coffees as the sun clears the eastern fence. "Spur."
"Banshee."
He hands me the second coffee without asking.
Black, the way Banshee drinks it, the way I've stopped drinking it because Marlena has been making me drink hers with cream and two sugars at the clubhouse since she’s been around and I've grown soft about it.
I drink it black anyway because it's Banshee's and because we don't say no to each other's coffee.
He leans on the rail next to me, looks at the horse, and doesn't speak for a minute. "Quiet on the perimeter last night," he says.
"Yeah."
"Nothing. Dogs slept the whole shift."
"Yeah."
"Tracks at the north fence—none. Tracks at the access road—none. He's not coming back here, Spur. Not before Friday. He's saving it."
"I know."
"He's waiting for Abilene."
"How you holdin' up at the cabin?"
"We're holdin'."
"Phantom asked me yesterday if he should bring her over to the main house with the rest of them."
I look at him. "What'd you tell him?"
"Told him she's safer with you than with him. Cabin's closer to the gate. You're running point. He's running the family."
"He took it?"
"He took it."
We stand there for a while. The sun comes the rest of the way up.
The mustang shifts position in the center of the pen. He moves from grazing to standing, head low, ears soft.
He's listening to us the way a horse listens to two men he's decided are safe.
