“I’m gonna go radio that in. You get a hold of his daughter and let her know it’s safe to come on in and pick you up.”
“Will do. Thanks, Sheriff.”
He heard Rowdy mumble something, but he knew that he just needed to shove Lionel out the door before anyone else heard it.
Lionel lifted a hand as he walked out the door, and Brett watched him go all the way to his vehicle, where he picked up his handheld and started calling in something. He was going to assume that the sheriff was keeping his word.
“Hey, honey, why don’t you get a hold of Madison and tell her to come on?”
“I already texted her.” Rowdy’s phone rang, and he answered. “Hey, baby. Yeah, no, he’s leaving. He says that you can come on down and pick us up. We’ve gotta be out of town in an hour.”
“I’m on my way, Daddy,” Madison said, her voice back to chirpy and way less scared.
“You gonna be all right here for a minute, babe?” Brett asked. “I need to go lock up all my stuff in the shed and grab some tools.” The last thing he needed was his workshop being broken into and all of his shit stolen. He had an alarm on the workshop, in fact.
“I’m right as rain,” Rowdy murmured. “Me and Barney, hanging out.”
“I’ll be right back.” He couldn’t believe he was doing this. Hell, he couldn’t believe he had just told the sheriff to fuck off, essentially, but it felt good, really damn good, and he was super optimistic about this road trip.
He only hoped it didn’t go to shit like tomorrow.
Chapter Thirteen
“Man, your baby girl sure can shop,” Brett told him.
They’d stopped at the stockyards at Fort Worth, the dogs at the dog-friendly motel, a couple of cowboys paid to watch the trailer, and Madison was wandering around buying up boots and jeans, weird sparkly shirts and jewelry like there was no tomorrow and they were waiting on her so they could go have steaks at the Cattleman’s or at that barbecue place that he could never remember the name of.
“She absolutely can, and she’s been saving all her money. I reckon she’s about to spend at least a third of it probably.” Rowdy chuckled. “That’s her prerogative. She just graduated from college.”
“I detect no lies.” He loved how Rowdy treated Madison. Half indulgent father and half firm dad, almost like a boss.
It was surprisingly easy to do this ride with the dogs, sitting in the back and listening to the sounds from the front seat. Madison never stopped chattering. It wasn’t irritating, though. It was exciting. She had ideas for the ranch, and Brett had to say he felt as if Rowdy listened to her.
Rowdy didn’t agree to everything, but on the other hand, he didn’t pooh-pooh her. Ideas were shared, agreed to, challenged, or even improved on. He couldn’t quite imagine how big this spread had to be, but it was big enough for mustangs and horses and cattle. For alpacas and chickens and then elk. And deer in the back.
Fishing. Enough so that there were guided tours.
“Hey, where’d you go?”
He blinked over, then grinned at Rowdy’s words. “Sorry, I was woolgathering.”
Rowdy chuckled at him and shook his head. “I know if that girl doesn’t get a move on, I’m going to go have steak without her. I’m craving.”
“Can I ask you a question?”
“You can ask me anything. I may not answer, but you can ask.”
“How do you deal with the steak? It seems like it’d be really hard.” And Brett was curious to know what life was going to be like—even for a few weeks—living with a blind man.
“In a restaurant setting, yes, it’s very challenging. Sometimes. I get beef tips. Sometimes I get whoever’s with me to cut the steak up, but usually I ask if the chef would mind slicing my steak for me, and I’ve never had anyone say no.”
“Oh.” Well, now, he had never thought of that. “That is actually, uh, kinda cool. And I guess your house is set up just so?”
“You’ll find that, yeah.” Rowdy tilted his head back and forth as he spoke, and Brett wondered if he knew he was doing it. “Especially my part of the house. For instance, I have a little fridge on my side of the house, and it’s really important that the Dr Peppers go on one ledge, the beer goes on another ledge, the sparkling water things go on another ledge. So everything needs to go where it goes. Because otherwise I’ll end up drinking beerat, you know, noon. The main kitchen is way less drastic, and I usually ask. There are some things people don’t tend to leave out—knives, for example, on a counter are a disaster waiting to happen. I do ask that nobody moves furniture without giving me plenty of notice and the chance to function around it. That kind of thing. But really? Ithink, anyway, that I’m doing fine. It could be that my people are all just so good at making me believe I’m okay.” Rowdy seemed to look at him. “Are you worried?”
“No, I feel all right but?—”
“Pardon me.” An older man in Western wear came up gave him a nod, then gave Rowdy a smile. “Are you Rowdy Duran? The bronc rider?”