Page 60 of Pulled From Both Sides
Chapter Seventeen
“Coke has lost his mind,” Balta snarled, slamming things around in the truck, rearranging things that didn’t need moving. “How can he think this will work?”
“Balta?” Joa stared at him like he was the one who’d lost his mind. “What’s wrong? What happened?”
It wasn’t what had happened, it was what was going to happen. What was going to happen was that they were going to lose another one—they’d lost Beau and Sam, now Jason would go.
He slammed both his hands against the tailgate, and Joa made a distressed sound. “You should come eat,” Joa told him. “The food is ready.”
They’d been cooking all day for AJ Gardner and his family, who had spent Christmas in and out of the hospital. One in the hospital heavy with a baby, more hurt in a car accident. They’d left Joa’s in a rush, gathering the others that they knew would come to help with the cattle. He felt like he’d been on a bad ride for too long. “Too much,doce. It’s too much.”
“I… What do you want me to do? I will do it. Just tell me.”
Tell him? They hadn’t trusted Balta about Jason—not until now. Months they had hidden this from him, like he was an outsider, untrustworthy. And now they wanted him to help?
Balta smacked the defenseless truck again. “Deus mio!”
“Okay. Okay, let’s drive.” Joa opened the truck door and manhandled him inside like he was a child.
Balta sat in the passenger seat while Joa vaulted into the driver’s side, then gravel sprayed when Joa drove away, fishtailing. The motion satisfied something in Balta’s soul.
Joa took off like a fuck-starved jackrabbit, taking him away from Pharris, from Ace Porter, from the long worried faces of everyone. The sky was steel gray, the wind making the clouds roll in the sky, and Joa put miles between them and the others.
Joa didn’t speak again until they slowed down where two roads met, and Joa caught his eye when he glanced from side to side. “Tell me?”
“Jason Scott, he is blind.”
Joa frowned, blinked, obviously surprised. “Whut?”
The word was so utterly Texan, so perfectly cowboy that it forced a smile from Balta. “When he hit his head, he hurt something. Some nerve to his eyes. He cannot see.” That news still stunned him, but add on what Coke wanted…
“That sucks. Is he gonna announce, then, or just let himself fade off?”
“Coke and Andy Baxter are teaching him to ride blind.” He heard himself say it, but it still sounded just as ridiculous.
“Like horses?”
“Bulls.”
Joa’s head tilted, lips pursing. “How?”
“Apparently, his eyes can still see. The brain cannot make sense of it. If he keeps his eyes open, he can ride.” A disbelieving sound tore out of Balta’s chest. “They want him to come back next year. Do small events this year.”
“He could do it. He isn’t like you—he rides with pure balance.”
Balta stared at Joa like he’d hit his head and began babbling in tongues. “How can you say that?”
“Because it’s the truth?” Joa didn’t back down. “Jason is small and light. If he can ride, it’s fooling people that will be the hard part.”
“Joa.Doce. Are you… Do you not understand?” Surely Joa saw how ridiculous this plan was.
“What’s to understand, Balta? Jason isn’t like you. There’s nothing but the ride. No hopes, no dreams—nothing but the ride.”
Balta slammed his hand on the dashboard. “Deus, Joaquim! He could die!”
“So he dies.” Joa pulled the truck over and killed the engine, the sudden quiet shocking in his ears. “He is blind,sim? Then what does he have? He can’t be a cowboy, he can’t be a man as he is, so he rides and dies like a man. This ain’t brain surgery. He’s dead now. Let it happen. What can it hurt? To try and live?”
Balta sat there, staring, for long moments. Joa never failed to surprise him, knowing what he knew. “They were not going to tell me, Joa. Like I’m just someone on tour, someone who can’t be trusted.”
