The Only Seconds that Matter

CHAPTER 1

It had been a while since Victor had literally eaten dirt, but now he was facedown in it doing a mental checklist of each limb to see if anything was broken.

Behind him someone called his name, but by the time Jade’s boots came into view, he had pushed himself to a sit, happy to report that he was in minimal pain.

“Oh my God, are you alright?” Jade asked frantically, bending over him.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Victor huffed, brushing dirt off his T-shirt. “Where’s the horse?”

“Over there.” Jade pointed a finger toward the gate connecting the indoor ring to the stalls beyond it. The bay mare was standing quietly and watching them with ears pricked, as if she hadn’t tried her damnedest to break his spine in half ten seconds ago.

Victor hoisted himself to a stand with a wince, feeling sore on the left side where he’d landed. He limped for a moment, but when Jade whined in sympathy, he held up a hand.

“Nah, I’ll be fine. I’ve suffered worse.

” He had, but when he was in California, he felt far more comfortable going to the doctor for a broken bone.

In Oklahoma, the story was different. If this stupid horse had put him in the hospital, he might be tempted to sell her to a local trader and wish her well on whatever journey awaited.

“Well.” Jade put her hand on her hips, and they stood in the ring a moment observing the mare together. “You wanna keep working on her?”

At eighteen, he might have said yes. He could be a really stubborn son-of-a-bitch when he wanted to be.

Now he was past thirty and trying to run a training facility to pay the bills.

He didn’t have the time to waste on a seven-hundred-dollar auction purchase.

This mare had bucked him off the day after he bought her, and he’d spent two weeks on groundwork and desensitization, hoping that she just needed a tune-up.

He’d also spent a hefty vet bill getting her x-rayed and checked over.

It felt like two weeks wasted when she’d bucked him off even harder the second time around.

“I can reach out to my contacts, see if there’s some old cowboy willing to buy a project.”

“Alright, maybe do that,” Victor replied.

Jade nodded. She was only nineteen, but she’d been a real asset since she’d shown up for her interview as assistant trainer. The moment Victor had spotted her nails painted in the colors of the bisexual flag, he felt like he could trust her.

Victor walked off to catch his horse. She stayed put to be caught, and when he opened the gate, she walked behind him like an obedient pup.

After untacking her and putting her back in her paddock, he returned to the barn.

Jade was there, her flannel shirt rolled up to her elbows and a phone in her hands.

“I just called a family friend who’s kind of like the human Facebook of horse people contacts. She knows everyone.”

“What’d she say?”

“She knows a guy who might be interested in the mare. He’s bought a few of her rejects before to work on the feedlot, and he used to ride the rodeos professionally until a nasty injury made him retire. She said feedlot work is a good job for a sour horse.”

“Sounds perfect. She give you his number and name?”

“Yup.” Jade pulled a note from her pocket and handed it over. On it was her barely legible scribble with a name and number: Johnny Stearns, 405-555-7821. “You want me to call or would you prefer?”

“I can call,” Victor told her. “It was my decision to buy the stupid horse.”

Victor went to the small office built beside the tack room, which wasn’t much, just a desk and his tablet which he used to accept and make payments.

The office chair was probably older than Victor was, and the fake leather had worn away a decade ago, revealing a white fabric beneath.

It creaked in protest as Victor tossed himself into it and grabbed his phone to call.

“Yullo?” came a voice after the third ring.

“Is this Johnny Stearns?”

“Yeah, what you need?” Johnny asked in such a thick Oklahoma drawl that it sounded like a parody.

“This is Victor Ortiz-Bennet. I’m a horse trainer in the area, and I was given your name as someone who might possibly be interested in a, uh, challenging prospect.”

“Well, tell me what you got and I’ll let you know what I think.”

“She’s a five-year-old registered Quarter Horse mare I picked up at auction.

Got some Poco on her dam’s side. She has a clean bill of health, easy to catch, fine to work with on the ground, vet check was clean.

But she’s got a bit of a bucking issue, and while I can work with problem horses, I honestly don’t have the time to do that with all the other paying clients I’ve got.

I was told you used to do the rodeo circuit? ”

“Oh yeah, back when the doctor let me, ha! Made good money for a bit, rode at the National Finals for five or six years, before I got kicked in the head. Maybe that’s why I don’t know if it was five or six years, Coulda been seven, ha!”

“I’m sorry to hear you about your injury.”

“Ain’t nothin’, really. That comes with the job. But it did put a stop to all that money and glory, and now I’m workin’ down at the Millers’ feedlot. You know what that is?”

“No.”

“You from these parts?”

“No, I moved here last year when I inherited my aunt’s boarding facility. You heard of Creekside Stables?” Victor replied.

“Is that the really nice place up on Route 217?”

“That’s it.”

“Damn. That’s a nice property! How many horses you got there?”

“Twenty-five.”

“Big place! You a trainer then?”

The conversation devolved into small talk.

Johnny seemed to like to chat, which Victor was not expecting.

Most of the men around here were the strong silent types, and when they did talk, they only wanted to talk about hunting or rant about some political thing that had Victor looking for the exits.

It’s why he mostly kept to himself. He dealt with clients to the degree that he had to so that he could pay the bills, but he didn’t get close to many.

After Victor was done summarizing his life story to Johnny’s approval, Johnny finally said he’d be interested in taking a look at her, if Victor could deliver her.

“I rent some barn space from the feedlot where I work,” Johnny explained. “So just come through the main entrance and drive around to the back. You’ll find me there at any time from six to eight, I’m usually with the horses.”

Victor agreed, and after a bit of additional small talk, Johnny finally hung up. Victor was happy that he might find someone perfect to work with the mare and maybe make a few hundred bucks in the process if he played his cards right.

* * *

Millers Feedlot was a place you smelled before you saw it.

At least ten acres were fenced off with metal corrals and inside was nothing but dirt and beef cattle being fattened up before they were shipped to slaughter.

There was no way Victor could have missed the place, even with the confusing array of different driveways.

Still, he wasn’t sure about Johnny’s directions, so he stopped the truck when he spotted two men on horseback headed up the road toward him.

After rolling his window down, he leaned his head out.

“Hey there,” he said, which drew their attention. The guy with a paunchy gut and a large handlebar mustache nudged his horse closer to Victor so he could hear him. “Do you know where I can find Johnny Stearns?”

“All the way back,” the man replied, pointing further down the driveway. “Till you can’t go no more.”

“Thank you.”

“Don’t let ‘im talk your ear off,” the man said with a smirk, then continued forward with his fellow rider.

Victor rolled his window back up to block off the smell of cow manure and carefully navigated the rutted gravel driveway to its conclusion.

To his right was an open-air barn with a long line of stalls connected to small outdoor paddocks.

Victor pulled into the grass and jumped out of the truck, wondering how he might track down a man when there didn’t seem to be anyone else around.

The barn was mostly empty, most likely because its residents were being used for work that day.

But there was one chestnut with a graying face and slightly swollen knees that seemed interested in saying hello, so Victor approached and offered her a hand to sniff.

Surely they weren’t using a horse this old for cow work?

“You the guy with the horse?” came a familiar Okie twang from behind him, and Victor turned.

Standing several strides away with his arms akimbo was a very tall and lean man with a face shrouded in the shadow cast by his cowboy hat.

Victor put his height around six-three, maybe six-four, most of it in his legs, each of which was hugged tightly by a dirty pair of jeans.

“Yes, I’m the guy with the horse,” Victor replied.

The man tilted his head so that the sun caught his friendly smile before he thrust his hand out to shake. “Name’s Johnny.”

“Victor,” Victor said with a vigorous shake of the hand.

“Victor. Anyone call you Vic?”

“Not really.”

“Huh. Alright.” Johnny reached up to tip his hat back, revealing more of his face.

He had the haggard look of a man who’d lived a hard life outside, his skin reddened by sun and laugh lines etched deep around his mouth.

He hadn’t shaved in a few days, so he was looking pretty scruffy; he didn’t come across as someone for whom personal grooming was held in high regard.

A long scar ran across his jawline, only noticeable in the harsh light of the sun.

His nose was also crooked, probably gifted to him by an ornery horse at some point.

His most noticeable feature was the deep blue of his eyes, which was evident even from where Victor stood.

All in all, he wasn’t what Victor would consider handsome, but he definitely looked interesting, and that was something in this part of the country, where every man in a cowboy hat blended together with all the rest.

“Nice set-up you got,” Johnny said, gesturing to the truck and trailer. “You do a lotta travelin’?”

“I do clinics throughout the state, sometimes in Texas.”

“So why you need my expertise?” Johnny asked with a hint of a smirk.

“I just don’t have the time to waste on a difficult horse at the moment.”

“Ain’t that the truth.” Johnny removed his hat to scratch at the sweaty hair beneath. His hair was darkened with moisture, but there was a red sheen to it. That might explain the fact his skin was more pink than tan. “She dump ya?”

“Twice, yeah.”

Johnny grinned. He was missing one of his canines, and the rest of his teeth were a little crooked. Typical rodeo smile, Victor thought.

“You’re never so good or advanced a horse can’t humble ya.”

Victor couldn’t help but smile at that. “They’re good at keeping me honest.”

Johnny laughed, then stalked toward the trailer. “Alright, get her off and let’s get this rodeo started.”

After Victor unloaded the horse, Johnny whistled, “Woo-ee, ain’t she a purty one,” as Victor led her around the trailer.

Johnny approached the mare and ran a hand along her neck and shoulder, then bent over to pick up her front foot. Then Johnny grabbed her hind foot and pulled her leg forward, holding it there for a few seconds.

“Can you walk her off?” Johnny asked, so Victor untied her and pulled her forward, first at a walk and then a trot. When they returned, Johnny nodded. “Lookin’ good so far.”

“She’s had a thorough vet check.”

“Never hurts to check though. Listen, my daddy was a horse trader, I seen it all. You would not believe all the tricks people get up to to make a lame horse sound. You got her at an auction?”

“Yeah. I’m not a trader though. I do sales sometimes, but we’re talking higher level sales, higher than 5k.”

“You like ‘em fancy, eh?”

“I just don’t sell anything I can’t stand by a hundred percent.” With a sigh, Victor gestured toward the mare. “Except this one, I guess.”

“I suppose I’ll trust your word. Where did you say you were from?”

They hadn’t discussed it, but maybe his lack of accent gave him away. “California.”

“I been there a few times for a couple rodeos. Nice state. Nice horses. You show?”

“I used to. I don’t do as much of that anymore.

It’s expensive and time consuming and not the thing I wanna dedicate all my time to.

” Victor wasn’t going to mention how fed up he became with his fellow reiners.

The amount of abuse that went on behind closed stalls for the sake of futurity money was far beyond what he was willing to tolerate.

He didn’t show horses to nerve-block their tails and yank on their mouths until the bit numbed their tongue.

All he wanted to do was ride and train good horses, and he could do that without riding two-year-old babies into the ground until they fell apart.

“What kinda riding you do? Penning?”

“Reining.”

“Oh, the fancy shit.”

Victor bit back a laugh. “I’ve trained some cow horses. Most of my horses can do anything.”

“Well, I ain’t much of a fancy trainer, but I do know how to keep my ass on a horse, and it sounds like that’s what this mare needs.

” Johnny leaned in closer to her head. “She’s got a bit of a mean eye.

Some horses are just born with a bit of spite.

Don’t mean they’re bad horses, just means they don’t take shit from nobody.

” Then he took the lead rope from Victor and led the mare toward the barn.