takeoff, once Luke had reclined his seat and tipped his hat over his eyes, Tom pulled out the pages Jo Dace had given him. He began with the feature on Chris Baker, the winningest jockey currently riding. The compelling writing plus his own insider knowledge of Thoroughbred racing immediately sucked him into the article. His uncle was a track vet in California. He and Luke had visited a few times, following Uncle Tony on his rounds at the track. Jo’s account brought back the sounds and smells of the stable area as if he were handing his uncle instruments from his mobile clinic or eating his lunch with the grooms and hot walkers seated outside the horses’ stalls.
He put the first article down and began reading about the sailor who raced solo around the world. The ocean was a foreign element to Tom aside from a few trips to the beach with his aunt. Jo’s writing dropped him squarely onto the tilting deck of the sleek racing yacht; he could almost hear sea birds’ cries and wind whistling in the rigging.
Tom laid the pages on his lap. The lady could write, but the strength of her work depended on digging deep into her subjects’ lives. She wouldn’t settle for a few interviews and seats above the chutes at a couple of events.
Luke levered his seat upright. “What are you reading?” He grabbed the horse racing article and read silently for a few minutes. “Say, wouldn’t Shelby like this! I’ll bet she knows some of these people.”
“She left the Thoroughbred scene a long while back, but yeah, she probably would enjoy it.” His stepmother had spent most of her childhood at Acadia Downs in Louisiana, following at her grandfather’s heels while he cared for the horses and working as an exercise rider when she was a teenager. “I’ll have her take a look when we get home.”
“So now Joe Dace’s daughter is interested in bull riding?”
“I guess.” Her reasons for asking him made good sense, but he could think of a dozen riders with stories just as compelling and with more colorful personalities.
He reclined his seat with a soft groan, trying to ease his back, and closed his eyes.
* * *
ROLLING NORTH THROUGH New Mexico the next morning in Luke’s Explorer lifted Tom’s spirits; turning homeward always cleared his mind. He enjoyed New York City, a world removed from his natural habitat, but the gray winter skies and slushy sidewalks always made him homesick for the clean vistas of the Southwest. He sang “Thank God I’m a Country Boy” under his breath.
Luke glanced at him from the driver’s seat. “What are you so happy about?”
“Just glad to be heading home. Did your physical therapist get all the kinks out of your shoulder Saturday night?”
Luke laughed. “Oh yeah—I was real loosey-goosey by the time she left.” He sobered. “I read that other article Jo Dace wrote, the one about the sailor. If that’s her formula, she’s not looking to write about bull riding. She wants to profile a cowboy—you, right?”
Tom shrugged. He still wasn’t ready to talk about it; Luke would try to buffalo him into agreeing before he’d thought it through.
Luke punched his arm. “I reckon she could pick worse.”
Tom laughed. “Don’t try to turn my head with compliments. I’ll run it by Dad and Shelby before I make up my mind. We could all get sucked into the project.”
* * *
THEY DROVE INTO Durango close to noon. Luke turned onto the main street. “Let’s grab lunch at the Queen,” he said. “Dad’s going to put us to work the minute we get home—we might as well fuel up first.”
Tom had no objection; breakfast at the hotel buffet was a distant memory, and the ranch lay an hour’s drive farther west. Luke parked near the Victorian storefront of the Silver Queen Saloon and Dance Emporium. Most of the tables were occupied, but they found seats in the booth nearest the kitchen. Tom lowered himself into his seat a little stiffly; his back had cramped up again on the long ride from Albuquerque.
“Well, look what the cat drug in.” Marge Bowman stood at Luke’s elbow and pulled a pencil from her white topknot. “What’s your pleasure, boys?”
Luke circled her stout waist with one arm. “Sweetheart, you’re my pleasure. What’s today’s special?”
“Anything you want, lover.” She lifted his hat and planted a smacking kiss on top of his head.
“See why I can’t find a girl to suit me?” Luke said to Tom. “Marge has me spoiled for ordinary women.”
“My heart about stopped when you hit that fence yesterday,” she said to Tom. “Would you please get that bull rode so you can stop picking him?”
“I’m working on it,” Tom said. “Next time for sure.”
“Chicken-fried steak for both of you? And I just took a peach pie out of the oven. It’ll be cool enough to cut by the time you finish your meal.”
Luke clapped a hand over his heart. “I think I’ve died and gone to heaven. Bring it on, darlin’.”
Maybe Tom should be scornful of Luke’s glib tongue, but he secretly envied his brother’s gift of gab. If he agreed to Joanna Dace’s proposal, he’d likely end up playing a supporting role to Luke’s grandstanding. He’d always been the boring middle kid. No teacher had ever phoned his folks about his grades; the sheriff had never given him a warning for underage drinking. Luke had supplied enough drama for the two of them, and now his younger sister, Lucy, with her dreams of stardom, had picked up where Luke left off.
His phone rang and he limped to the men’s room before answering. He checked the caller ID. “Hey, Shelby.”
“Hey, yourself. You okay after yesterday?”
“My back’s pretty sore, but nothing’s broken.” Shelby understood bumps and bruises, what was and wasn’t serious. She’d been thrown more than a few times by skittish Thoroughbreds and still took an occasional hit while green-breaking horses.
“You want ice or heat when you get home?” she asked.
“Heat first, I think,” he said.
“Have you reached Durango yet?”
“We’re having lunch at the Queen,” he said. “You need something from town?”
“As long as you’re there, see if you can talk Marge out of a peach pie for your dad.”
“Do my best,” he said, and then he keyed off. He stuck his phone in his pocket, thankful anew that Shelby had drifted into their lives a couple years after his mother’s death. She was as different from his mom as a prairie falcon is from a happy barnyard hen, but her arrival had glued them back together as a family.
He returned to the table just as their food arrived, and they left after their meal with the remaining three-quarters of the pie Marge had cut for them.
An hour later Luke steered below the ranch sign with Cameron’s Pride burned into a weathered plank. Luke braked in the least muddy spot near the back door of the rambling log house. A dog as tall as a weanling calf rose from a sunny spot by the barn and approached with a stiff gait.
Tom
