Page 15 of Rough Stock
“I dunno. Somebody kept snatching all the covers off me,” he said with a chuckle as he unwrapped his breakfast.
“I bet you kept kicking them off and just wanted somebody to blame it on,” she offered, snickering.
“Uh-huh. You go with that story if it makes you feel better,” he said with a smirk. They sat in silence, eating the equivalent of fast food, until everything was gone except the coffee.
“What the hell’s going on here?” a voice asked, and they both turned to find Stag coming their way. “I’d ask to sit down, but I’ve got to be careful of the company I keep,” he said, his voice serious but the hint of a smile on his face.
“Yeah. We’re bad news. Terrible reputations. You know, cleaning up after ourselves and saying please and thank you and all that kinda shit. Wouldn’t want to get mixed up with the likes of us,” Jensen said with a chuckle.
“Well, this is it. It’s make or break time, y’all,” Stag said. “Tonight’s the night we’ll find out who’s going on and who’s going home.”
“Every go-round tonight will be wicked. I can’t wait.” Jensen was excited. His rides had been exceptionally good the previous months, good enough to keep him at the top, and he expected that evening to be no exception. “Shy, you did really well last night.”
“Thanks. I guess I’m out of team roping though, what with the lack of a partner,” she mumbled under her breath.
She could hear the shock in Jensen’s voice when he said, “I know I’m no pro, but I thought we did pretty good.”
Shyanna shook her head. “Yeah, but you can’t do that every night. You’ve got your own events to prepare for. You shouldn’t be helping anybody out, just concentrating on your own work.”
“I don’t mind, really.” He’d finished his food and was still sipping his coffee. “I can keep doing it until you find another partner,” he told her.
“I’m not going to find another partner. Nobody wants to rope with me,” she said, her voice low enough that Jensen had trouble hearing her.
It seemed Stag had heard her when he said, “Well, that’s what happens when girls get involved in a man’s world.”
“Girls? This is a woman, in case you haven’t noticed,” Jensen snapped back. “She’s got as much of a right to be in those events as any of us.”
“I’m just sayin’, you know how it is,” Stag said, and Shyanna could tell he was trying hard not to look at her. Why couldn’t the rest of the guys be as supportive as Jensen? One look up at him and she could tell Stag’s words were pissing Jensen off. They were pissing her off too, but she was used to it. Jensen, on the other hand, was such a good guy that he didn’t understand what she’d gone through all those years.
It was time to cut the tension and, besides, Shyanna had finished her food. “I guess I’d better get going. See y’all later.” As she stood, she picked up her trash and carried it to the nearest can before heading back to the barn. Rhubarb would be waiting for breakfast.
“I knowyour organization is smaller than some, and that’s where we’d like to come in and help,” the bespectacled man in the expensive suit told JimmyFuller, one of the founders of the USPCA.
“And how do you intend to do that?” Jimmy asked.
Wallace Bergman cleared his throat. “We can sign on as your chief sponsor, and the money will roll in.” What he didn’t tell Jimmy was that they’d expect to have all other veterinary medicines banned from the grounds. If there was a horse sick with something they didn’t make a medication for, well, sorry ’bout its luck. That’s how it would have to be, but that little detailwould be buried in the contract and by the time they realized it, it would be too late. Zesser Pharmaceuticals would wait and let them do whatever they wanted until they’d taken half a million dollars in sponsorship money. Then they’d pounce and enforce the stipulations of the contract. USPCA would’ve taken enough sponsorship money that they couldn’t pay it back, and they’d have to capitulate.
And once they were in the door, they could go to work. There had to be cowboys in their association who’d needed money or drugs, and Bergman’s ability to skim quality control deleted drugs gave him a big supply of illegal pharmaceuticals with which to make money for him and his minions. Rodeo fans would flock to their rodeos when they discovered they could get cheap pharmaceuticals right there in the stands, and ticket sales would soar. And that would be good for the USPCA too, even though they were clueless.
“I don’t know about that. There’s gotta be a catch. What is it?” Jimmy asked, and Bergman had to admit, the old cowboy was no dummy.
“No catch. Just our standard contract. That’s it.”
“You know I’ll have to talk to my partner about this before I can commit to it,” Jimmy informed him. Bergman had expected that. DaleGresham was an astute businessman, and Jimmy couldn’t make that kind of decision without talking to his partner.
“Not a problem. Just give me a call. I’ll be around,” Bergman said, standing and picking up his briefcase.
By the time he got to his car, he’d passed at least fifteen cowboys. God, they were a rangy-looking group. He’d be thankful when he got back to the city. Those raggedy country types completely freaked him out.
“And he sayshe can get us a lot of money if we just let them be our primary sponsors,” Jimmy explained to Dale the next day.
“What’s the catch?” Dale asked.
“I asked the same thing. He said there wasn’t one, just the standard contract.”
Dale knew better. “Did he leave you a copy of the contract?”
“Sure. You gonna read the whole damn thing?” Jimmy asked, laughing.
