"Would you like to?"
"Yeah, sure. Let's see him."
"Well, I'll warn you—he ain't too good with a saddle. We got him to stay still, more or less, but that's about as far as it goes."
"It'll have to do. Go on, now. I don't make deals on horses I ain't barely even seen yet."
The trainer comes in and helps with saddling the horse up. The boys would probably be a little annoyed they aren't there to see how quick it goes. That's how it works when you let a pro do his work, rather than a couple twenty-year-olds with fantasies of being rodeo stars.
They guide the stallion out. He pulls at the reins, but that's to be expected. He's still not used to the bit, still not used to any of it. But in the end, he comes along. He'd have to, in the end, but he realizes it before they have to drag him out.
The trainer gets up on the horse, and the black immediately starts in with his rodeo routine, trying to throw the man off. He sticks on. It doesn't take near as long as the last time for the black to get the notion that the man ain't coming off.
That's less on account of any special skill—though the man does seem to get the horse calm admirably well—as the black's last experience with the saddle starting to sink in. There's no way out of it, so he might as well just learn to deal with it.
The trainer takes him for a lap around. The horse takes commands surprisingly well, considering his demeanor. And then he gets the horse going faster, faster still. It's rough going, of course.
There's no reason that the horse should know anything about what it's supposed to be doing. It's been trained exactly not at all. Barely saddle-broken. But the way that the tall man, his suit jacket left hanging in the stables, has that big black monster running around—
It's still hard to say what Glen is thinking. The smile on his face might be wider, but it might be the same. It's always hard to tell. Philip throws away the idea of trying to get a read on Glen. A read on the trainer—well, that can come, after he gets off the horse.
But the scout's taking notes, either way. Philip knows better than to look at them. He writes something else down a second later, looks back up at the horse.
Phil Callahan lets out a long breath. Easy pickings. No problem. He can handle these guys. Now he's just got to make sure that nothing else can go wrong. Because if it can, it will, and with a horse this mean-spirited, it's bound to happen sooner than later.
Almost in spite of his worries, the horse draws up to a stop, and the trainer jumps off. He confers with Glen in whispers over the fence. Philip does his best not to listen.
That doesn't change the fact that he can see Glen's smile dip, just a little. He's thinking about something. The first read of the day. A serious thought. If he was just going to walk away from the horse, then he wouldn't think about much.
Now the only question is, can Callahan get the money he needs, or is this meeting going to end with him needing to make another round of calls?
Chapter Eighteen
At this point, it was hard to say what Morgan wanted more—to get drunk, or to have sex. Neither was going to happen. Not if she had her way. But that didn't mean that she wasn't thinking about it, because she absolutely was thinking about it.
The week had been a long one. No doubt about that. And as she wanted, well, whatever the hell it was that she wanted, one thought kept occurring to her.
Bubbling up out of her chest. Nothing she could to stop it, in spite of her best efforts. She didn't know how it would go in either case. She'd fucked up badly enough the first time she'd had dinner with him.
She'd been afraid to talk to Phil Callahan since the night that they got too intimate for any business relationship. But now, she was too tired for business, and the fact was, she'd promised to get the property in far too public a way to back off now.
She takes a deep breath and gets the phone out, dials a number. Callahan's number.
To her surprise he answers. "Yes?"
"Hello, um." She shouldn't have called. Stupid. "This is Morgan Lowe. This is Mr. Callahan, yes?"
"Speaking. What can I do for you, Miss Lowe?"
"I just thought—" I just thought I'd like to go out with you for a bit. Get some drinks. Maybe go back to your place. Or mine. Doesn't matter. "—Maybe we could, I don't know. Get some dinner. Maybe we could talk about your property."
He lets out a long breath. "Alright. Sure. I'm not sayin
g I'm selling, but fine. We'll talk about it."
He lets out a breath again. He's not happy about it, but he's considering it, which is a big change from before. Whatever happened, Morgan's gut tells her that he needs the money.
She should be happier. She should be practically god damned ecstatic. A single crack in the armor means that she's seventy-five percent of the way there. The hardest part is getting them to admit that they might sell.