The Ranch

“Saddle broncs. That's easy.”

“Show-off.” She was excited about it. She loved rodeos, and she'd been planning to go anyway. He invited her to come see him at the pens, and she said she would if she could find him. It wasn't always easy for her to get around either. If people recognized her, it would restrict her movements, and she might even have to leave if people really surrounded her. She never went to public events like that without a bodyguard, but she didn't want to this time. She was just going to go in her bus, with Tom, and Zoe and Mary Stuart. And Hartley, if he wanted to join them. But Tanya could hardly wait to see it. And she had just the outfit for it.

She was like a kid going to the fair when they got dressed that night before dinner. She came out of her room wearing soft beige suede jeans with fringe down the side, and a matching beige suede shirt with the same fringe and a suede neck scarf. And she had a cowboy hat exactly the same color. It looked very Western, but she had bought it all in Paris, and the suede was so soft it felt like velvet on her body.

“Wow! You Texans!” Mary Stuart complained. She had worn emerald-green blue jeans and a matching sweater, with black alligator boots from Billy Martin's. And Zoe was wearing stretch jeans with a Ralph Lauren military jacket. As usual, they were the best-looking group in the place, and Hartley had started calling them “Hartley's Angels,” which amused them.

It was a lively dinner that night, and Benjamin was running all over the dining room while his mother was threatening to go into labor. She said it had been a traumatic week and she couldn't wait to get home to Kansas City that weekend, and Mary Stuart couldn't blame her. It was not the kind of week you would have wanted to have while eight months pregnant, but Mary Stuart was happy she'd met Benjie. He made her sign his cast for a second time, and right after dinner, they went out to Tanya's bus and left for Jackson Hole with Hartley. He had agreed to join them at the rodeo, and he was enthralled by the bus as they drove there. He loved it.

“I can't believe this,” he said, amused by all of it. “And I thought I was hot stuff with a Jaguar.”

“I drive a ten-year-old Volkswagen van,” Zoe confided to him, and he laughed. But it was for a good cause in her case, every penny she had she put into the clinic to buy medicine and equipment.

“I'm afraid the literary world can't compete with Hollywood,” he said apologetically. “You beat us hands down, Tanya.”

“Yeah, but look at the shit we have to put up with. You people work like gentlemen. The people I deal with are savages, so I deserve this.” She justified it and they all laughed, but no one begrudged it to her, not even Hartley. She worked hard for her money.

And in the comfortable bus, the time passed quickly on the way into Jackson Hole from Moose, and half an hour later they were at the rodeo, and they were nearly half an hour early. The ranch had gotten them great tickets. And it all had a familiar smell and feel to it that reminded Tanya of her childhood. It was just the way Tanya remembered it when she was a little girl. She used to ride her pony over and watch all of it. And when she was a little older she rode in it a few times, but her daddy said it was too expensive, and she wasn't all that crazy about horses. She just loved the excitement. It was like the circus.

They took their seats and bought popcorn and Cokes, just as an official of the rodeo approached her. She wondered if there was something wrong, if they'd had a death threat or a security problem, the man approaching them looked extremely nervous, and Hartley became instantly protective and stood in front of her as the man approached them and asked to speak to Tanya.

“May I ask what this is about?” Hartley asked politely, sensing some kind of danger, or imposition at the very least, as she had.

“I'd like to speak to Miz Thomas,” he said with an accent Tanya recognized easily as Texas and not Wyoming. “We have a favor to ask her.” He peered over Hartley's shoulder at her and added, “As a fellow Texan.”

“What can I do to help you?” She stepped forward. She had decided he was harmless, though annoying.