Besides, given how things went tonight, I’d be even more foolish to throw away a potential lifeline for pride. If nothing else, it’s an insurance policy should things go sour once again. Holding onto it is simply the sensible thing to do.
“You keep that one,” I tell him, purposefully not bringing up its replacement and putting my back to him as I toss down some more fresh straw. “Perhaps you can convince some poor sap that it’s worth thousands if you ever get bored with pulling cards. Or, sorry, what was it again…trains? That one of the lies I heard you tell Maddock? That you own a railroad?”
“First,” Cypress says, sounding so offended that I can’t help but turn my head again, “I did not lie. I told him I made my fortune with trains. Which is true. As for owning a railroad or cars or whatever else, he added that bit of flourish on his own. They always do.”
“Who isthey?”
“Second,” he continues as if I hadn’t interrupted, “I only take advantage of people who already have far too many advantages to speak of. Far more than they deserve.”
The sudden coldness in his voice is enough to stop me from what I’m doing, and I let the rake rest as I study him. “And how do you determine that?”
“Apparently the same way you do,” he says, the darkness in his expression fading as quickly as it came. “I see their tells. The ones they never think to hide.” His eyes narrow, assessing. “Are you really not going to divulge mine, Aiden?”
I roll my eyes, hopefully covering the way my pulse skipped when he said my name, but I catch that grin of his before I get back to work, walking to grab a few big bales of hay from the aisle so I’m not sleeping on the wet floor if it floods with the rain. “Considering those tells might be myonlyadvantage, no, I still don’t think I will.”
“Oh, I don’t know.” He sighs, continuing to watch me as I carrya large bale with each hand back into the stall. “I can make out at least a few otheradvantagesfrom where I sit.”
“Then sit somewhere else,” I snap at him, wondering when he’s going to leave so I can get some sleep, but given how comfortable he seems sprawled out on his horse’s back, I suspect he has no intention of moving anytime soon. “And don’t be saying my name like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like we know each other. Just because Maddock gave it to you—”
“Maddock didn’t give it to me. Well, not knowingly.”
“Says the thief,” I mutter in reply to his half-answer.
He smiles again before continuing, “I overheard him say it when you arrived in town. Outside the hotel.”
“Thought that was you,” I say, glaring at him when he appears delighted for some reason. “Why’d you ask me for it then if you already knew it? In the alley?”
“Seemed polite.”
“Polite,” I repeat. “Funny thing to worry about when you have a habit of picking up things that don’t belong to you. Anything else you manage to lift?”
“Yes,” he replies with zero hesitation. “You have a deal with Maddock. That’s the paper he gave you at the saloon.”
“Christ.” I let the bale drop against the wall, raising a hand to lift my hat only to remember it’s not there. A distracted slip-up that seems to amuse him more.
“If it helps, I don’t know all the terms,” he reassures me. “Sadly, the walls of the hotel are only so thin.” He waits. “But if you’d like to tell me—”
“Why thehellwould I tell you?”
“Well, perhaps,ifyou told me,” he says slowly, “I could help…”
“I don’t need your—”
“Pity, I know.” His mouth presses into a tight line as he thinksover his oncoming argument. “But if we were to have, say, aligned interests…”
“We don’t.”
“We might.”
“We do not have alignedanything,” I say, more forcefully this time, and I could almost swear that I see him flinch. “Whatever you’re up to, I want no part in it. All I want is to make it through the end of this week, get paid my share, and get gone.”
“I see,” he says, voice quiet again. “And where exactly are you and…” He gestures toward the mustang who has at last hunkered down in the corner of the stall, clearly having decided to ignore us. “Apologies, I don’t know his name.”
“He doesn’t have one,” I say, tone clipped.