Daniel resumed eating.
“Mostly bad decisions.”
Adrian laughed.
“I'd pay to see that.”
“You'd be wasting money.”
“I waste money every day.”
“That I believe.”
The table went quiet.
Adrian's smile vanished.
Then one of his companions, a thick-necked man named Bryce Nolan, reached down and took Daniel's cowboy hat from the empty seat beside him.
Ruth's face changed.
“Put that back.”
Bryce grinned.
“Relax.”
Daniel looked at him.
“Give me the hat.”
Bryce put it on his own head.
Too small.
The brim sat high.
Adrian laughed.
A few customers near the counter watched nervously.
Daniel did not raise his voice.
“Son.”
Bryce's grin widened.
“I'm thirty-two.”
Daniel nodded.
“Then you're old enough to know better.”
Something in his tone changed the room.
Bryce removed the hat.
But instead of returning it, he tossed it toward Daniel.
Bad throw.
The hat landed in the gravy on Daniel's plate.
Silence.
Adrian did not laugh this time.
Daniel stared at the hat.
It had belonged to his father.
The leather band was worn nearly smooth.
Ruth whispered, “Daniel.”
Daniel stood.
Bryce stood too.
He was perhaps six feet four and forty pounds heavier.
“You got a problem?” Bryce asked.
Daniel lifted the hat from the plate.
Gravy dripped from the brim.
“Yes.”
Bryce rolled his shoulders.
“What are you going to do?”
Daniel looked at Ruth.
“Do you have a clean towel?”
The question confused everyone.
Ruth handed him one.
Daniel carefully wiped the hat.
Bryce laughed.
“That's what I thought.”
He turned away.
Daniel spoke.
“Bryce.”
The man looked back.
Daniel placed the hat on the table.
“Pick up the chair you knocked over.”
Bryce stared.
“No.”
Daniel walked toward him.
Adrian leaned back, interested.
Bryce smiled.
“You want me to?”
“Yes.”
“Make me.”
Daniel stopped.
There are moments when violence announces itself loudly.
Fists rise.
Voices sharpen.
People back away.
This was not one of those moments.
Daniel simply looked at Bryce's stance.
Too much weight forward.
Right shoulder slightly higher.
Old knee injury on the left.
Daniel had not wanted to notice.
He always noticed.
Bryce shoved him.
Daniel moved half a step.
Bryce reached again.
Daniel caught his wrist.
Turned.
Stepped.
Bryce's body followed because joints were less interested in pride than men were.
One second Bryce stood over Daniel.
The next he was bent forward with one hand against the table, his shoulder trapped at an angle that made movement painful.
Daniel had not punched him.
Had not thrown him.
Had barely appeared to move.
Bryce gasped.
Daniel spoke quietly.
“The chair.”
Bryce's face turned red.
Daniel released him.
Bryce stumbled backward.
Nobody laughed.
Adrian stood.
For the first time, there was something new in his expression.
Not mockery.
Interest.
Real interest.
“Founders Day,” he said.
Daniel picked up his hat.
“No.”
“You don't even know what I'm asking.”
“Yes, I do.”
Adrian smiled.
“Get in the ring with me.”
“No.”
“One round.”
“No.”
“Whole town watching.”
“That makes it worse.”
Adrian stepped closer.
“Afraid?”
Daniel looked at him.
“Yes.”
The answer surprised everyone.
Adrian laughed.
“At least you're honest.”
Daniel put his hat on.
“Men who aren't afraid of fights haven't seen enough of them.”
He walked toward the door.
Adrian's voice followed.
“I'll donate fifty thousand dollars to the Dry Creek volunteer fire department if you fight me.”
Daniel stopped.
The fire department needed a new brush truck.
Everybody knew it.
Ruth closed her eyes.
Adrian smiled.
“And if you win, I'll withdraw the access petition.”
The café erupted in whispers.
Daniel turned.
Adrian continued.
“If I win, you sign the northern road agreement.”
Now Daniel understood.
This was never about sport.
Adrian wanted public victory.
Not merely land.
Submission.
Daniel looked around the café.
People he had known for decades.
Ruth.
Old ranchers.
Young workers.
A high-school teacher.
Two volunteer firefighters.
Adrian had chosen his battlefield carefully.
Daniel's voice remained calm.
“You'll put that in writing?”
Adrian smiled wider.
“Tonight.”
“One round?”
“Three.”
Daniel shook his head.
“One.”
Adrian laughed.
“You think you can beat me in one round?”
Daniel's expression did not change.
“I think one round is long enough to learn something.”
He walked out.
Behind him, Dry Creek exploded into conversation.
And by midnight, nearly everyone in the county knew that a millionaire had challenged the quietest rancher in town.
What nobody knew was why Daniel Hart's hands began trembling the moment he reached his truck.
Daniel did not drive home immediately.
He sat behind the wheel with both hands resting against the steering wheel.
The parking lot was nearly empty.
Music from the Copper Spur drifted across Main Street.
He closed his eyes.
For one second, he was not fifty-six.
He was twenty-three.
A different room.
Different lights.
Men shouting behind wire fencing.
Blood in his mouth.
A voice screaming at him to finish.
Daniel opened his eyes.
“Not again.”
He started the pickup.
The ranch road stretched twelve miles east beneath an enormous sky.
By the time he reached home, the trembling had stopped.
His sister Claire was waiting on the porch.
Daniel saw her truck and sighed.
“You drive fast.”
Claire stood.
“You answer phones slowly.”
She was fifty-two, a veterinarian, and the only person in Dry Creek who knew almost everything about Daniel's past.
Almost.
“You heard.”
“Ruth called.”
“Traitor.”
“Ruth likes you alive.”
Daniel climbed the steps.
“So do I.”
Claire followed him inside.
“Then cancel it.”
Daniel poured water into a glass.
“Contract isn't signed.”
“Good.”
“It will be tomorrow.”
“Daniel.”
He looked at her.
Claire folded her arms.
“Tell me you're not actually considering this.”
“The fire department needs the truck.”
“Then let Cross buy it without turning your skull into a fundraising event.”
“He won't.”
“The ranch isn't worth your life.”
Daniel's face hardened.
“It isn't only the ranch.”
“What is it?”
He looked through the kitchen window toward the dark pasture.
“If I sign that road over because he threatened me, what happens next?”
Claire knew the answer.
Adrian would demand more.
Water rights.
Utility crossings.
Eventually land.
“He'll keep pushing,” Daniel said.
“So fight him in court.”
“He has twenty attorneys.”
“You have rights.”
“I know.”
“Then use them.”
Daniel smiled without humor.
“Courts are only free in textbooks.”
Claire pulled out a chair.
“Sit.”
“I've been sitting.”
“Daniel.”
He obeyed.
She studied him.
“When was the last time you trained?”
“Train what?”
“Don't.”
He looked away.
“Twenty-seven years.”
Claire stared.
“Seriously?”
“Maybe twenty-six.”
“And Cross trains every day.”
“So?”
“So you're fifty-six.”
“I noticed.”
“You limp when it rains.”
“Only when it rains.”
“It snowed yesterday and you limped.”
“Snow is frozen rain.”
Claire nearly shouted.
“This isn't funny!”
Daniel became quiet.
She lowered her voice.
“You promised.”
The word entered the room differently.
Daniel looked at her.
“I promised Dad.”
“And me.”
“I promised I wouldn't compete again.”
“You promised you were finished with that life.”
Daniel rubbed his hands together.
“I am.”
“Then don't step into the ring.”
He did not answer.
Claire stood.
“You still have it?”
Daniel looked toward the barn.
That was answer enough.
She closed her eyes.
“Oh, Daniel.”
“Nothing's been touched.”
“Then keep it that way.”
After Claire left, Daniel remained in the kitchen until midnight.
Then he took a flashlight.
He crossed the yard.
The main barn stood beside the horse paddock.
Behind it was an older structure his grandfather had built during the 1940s.
Most people assumed Daniel stored broken equipment there.
He unlocked the side door.
Dust filled the beam of his flashlight.
Old saddles.
Fence posts.
Baling wire.
A rusted plow.
Daniel moved to the rear wall.
He pushed aside a heavy wooden cabinet.
Behind it was another door.
The room beyond smelled like canvas and old leather.
A boxing bag hung from a steel beam.
A rolled wrestling mat rested against one wall.
Wooden staffs.
Focus mitts.
A speed bag hardened by age.
Photographs faced downward on a shelf.
Daniel turned on the lights.
He had not entered in four years.
His father, Samuel Hart, had built the room after Daniel returned to Dry Creek at twenty-nine.
Not to encourage him to fight.
To help him remember how not to.
Daniel unrolled part of the mat.
His knees complained.
He smiled.
“Good start.”
A voice behind him said, “Your guard is too low.”
Daniel spun.
An old man stood in the doorway.
Silas Boone.
Seventy-eight years old.
Five feet nine.
Thin white hair.
Denim jacket.
Walking cane.
Daniel stared.
“How did you get in?”
Silas lifted a key.
“Your father gave me one in 1998.”
Daniel looked offended.
“He's been dead sixteen years.”
“Keys still work.”
“What are you doing here?”
“Claire called.”
“Of course she did.”
Silas entered.
His cane tapped softly against the concrete.
Daniel watched him carefully.
Silas had once been Daniel's coach.
Before that, he had been a military combatives instructor, boxing trainer, collegiate wrestling assistant, and according to at least three unreliable stories, a man banned from two Nevada casinos for fighting.
Silas denied only one of those stories.
Nobody knew which.
“You look terrible,” Silas said.
“You're seventy-eight.”
“Exactly. What's your excuse?”
Daniel laughed despite himself.
Silas looked around the room.
“Been practicing?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Daniel frowned.
Silas sat on an old bench.
“So. Rich boy challenged you.”
“Adrian Cross.”
“I know his name.”
“Then why call him rich boy?”
“Because it annoys people who think money is a personality.”
Daniel leaned against the wall.
“He's good.”
“I watched video.”
“You know how to use the internet?”
Silas raised his cane.
“Keep talking.”
Daniel smiled.
“What did you see?”
Silas's humor vanished.