Page 10 of Deacon

I clean up the table, scrub the kitchen spotless. Outside, the men are fed and happy for the night, standing around on the porch. The smell of cigarettes and the sound of rough male laughter is so familiar, I barely notice it anymore.

That night, I lie on my side and stare into the star-laden sky.

Is this it? Did we go all the way across America just to be the same broken people on the other side? Because nothing changed for me except my belly is full, and now I’m miserably homesick at night.

I close my eyes.

Everything could still change. I want to believe it can.

CHAPTER THREE

DEACON

BEFORE

Every person who’s ever hurt me was a man.

Women, on the other hand, haven’t been anything but good to me.

It started with Amie, my foster mother, way back when I was John Williamson, not yet Deacon Ryder. Amie wanted two boys, but she only gave birth to one. I was the rejected twelve year old she landed on to fill that empty spot. God knows why. I’d been given back after an adoption and kicked around the foster system for years.

I was trouble. Even I knew that.

Her husband, Phil, was awful. Good women like Amie usually end up with awful men like Phil. It’s the way of things. He fucked around on her, fucked up her life, and fathered a piece of shit son to keep her from leaving.

He hated me. Amie told me it wasn’t my fault—we were just too alike.

Fifteen years old, I sit on the back of the ranch’s prize stallion, Deacon. Phil bought him a few years back and never did anythingwith him. Then, I started working with him every day in the morning before chores, on my own time. A year later, I won a state championship and a lot of money with him.

Turned out, I was the best trainer in that part of Montana—I just hadn’t discovered it yet.

Now, I train all the horses, and Phil cashes the checks.

The front door opens, and Henderson walks out, hat pulled low. He’s the biological son of Phil, the heir of Three Point Ranch. He’s like Phil but meaner than a snake, just tied up in knots about everything and everyone.

Behind him comes Phil. He used to kick me around and holler at me until I put his ranch on the map with Deacon and the other horses. Now, I’m the favored son, and Henderson is chopped fucking liver because he doesn’t bring in any income. I don’t like that much.

“John,” Phil barks.

“Yes, sir?” I take my baseball cap off, shoving it in my coat pocket.

“Paperwork’s done,” he says. “We’re going to the courthouse.”

Henderson gives me a disgusted glance and slinks away. My stomach turns over. I slide down and bring Deacon into the barn to strip his tack off. Phil joins me, holding out a handful of papers. There’s a coffee stain on the corner from where they sat at the breakfast table.

I stare down at them. I’ve never had a real name. John is the one the nurse who found me on the hospital steps gave me. I’ve never considered it mine. It doesn’t fit my face.

On the top line of the second document is a new name.

Deacon Ryder.

I stare at it, mouth dry. I know who John Williamson is. I’ve been him all my life. He’s a hard headed troublemaker with a talent for horses. I don’t know this Deacon Ryder.

I also don’t know why I couldn’t just have Phil and Amie’s surname. That would make the most sense.

“Why not your last name?” I ask.

“We’ll see how much you make at the fair next weekend,” Phil says, taking Deacon into his stall and shutting the gate.

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