My throat tightened. I stayed where I was, watching the set of his shoulders and the way he kept himself so tightly controlled. Everything about him seemed deliberate. Everything except the way he’d stepped in front of me.
Roman didn't speak again. He led the mare across the pen in slow, measured steps until her breathing evened and her ears stopped flicking back. Then he guided her toward the gate, opened it with one hand, and led her through without rushing her. She followed with her head low, calmer now, but still watching everything around her.
I followed him into the barn. He didn't acknowledge me. Just kept walking toward the row of stalls set back from the main pens, his stride long enough that I had to work to keep up.
“What happened to her?” I asked.
“Nothing I can prove.”
“But you suspect something.”
His boots kicked up dust, and he picked up his pace.
“Roman?” I asked, sure that he’d heard me.
“Let it go.”
Letting it go was the last thing I intended on doing. My assignment was to do a community piece about the rodeo, but my instincts were screaming that there was something going on. Something worth investigating. “If there's a problem with the supplier?—”
“There’s always a problem with someone.” He stopped at the mare’s stall, unlatched the door, and led her inside. She hesitated once, then stepped in and turned toward the back wall. He unclipped the rope, checked her water, ran his hand once along her flank, then backed out and secured the door.
I waited. “Slade's going to run her anyway, isn't he?”
“That's his call.”
“You already said that.”
“Then you already have your answer.”
He started walking again, toward the far side of the grounds where the construction noise faded and the land opened into scrub grass and scattered cottonwoods. I stayed with him. His shoulders tensed when he realized I wasn't dropping back.
“You don't think she's ready,” I said.
“I think she'll do what she's told until she doesn't.”
“And when she doesn't?”
“Someone gets hurt. Maybe her. Maybe the rider.” He didn't slow down. “Maybe both.”
“Then why not pull her?”
“Because pulling her means admitting the supplier sent bad stock. Means reworking the entire lineup. Means making calls Slade doesn't want to make.”
“So he's going to risk it.”
Roman stopped in his tracks, and I almost walked right into him before I caught myself. He turned. It was the first time he'd looked at me directly. He made full eye contact, and my chest registered it before my brain did.
“You think that's news?” His voice was low and controlled, but with something underneath it I hadn't heard before. “You think I'm going to hand you a scandal so you can write about how small-town cowboys cut corners and put people at risk?”
“I didn't say that.”
“You didn't have to.”
I held his gaze, refusing to look away from the scar slicing up his cheek or the expression that dared me to keep pushing. “I'm not writing a hit piece.”
“Then what are you writing?”
“The truth.”
