excerpt
over-work their mounts before the class and not leaving them
with enough energy for the show.
On the loudspeaker, Joel and Tanya heard their class being
called to the on-deck area. Joel and Tanya dismounted and
walked their horses back to the arena. As they approached the
arena, the entrance way started to crowd with some of the thirty
contestants in their class. It looked like every reiner in this part of
the world was in Great Falls for the show.
It was almost an hour before their numbers were called. Joel
went first; by then, they had watched some of the runs and they
were very impressed. Tanya had whispered the breeding of some
of the classy horses and the past successes of some of the riders to
him. Every once in a while, she would point out “this World
Champion” or that “Reserve World Champion” or someone who
had gone to the World’s last year. Joel quickly got the feeling that
he was in elite company. At the same time, he wondered how
Tanya knew so much about them.
Well, actually, Joel did know why she knew so much. Tanya
had never said anything to him about her experience, but he had
picked up the bits and pieces here and there. Joel had been working
with Tanya for only two or three weeks when he had overheard
Harry asking Tanya about her time living in Texas. Even
though Joel was outside cleaning a saddle in the shade of the
barn, he could hear the two of them talking inside. He knew that
he was eavesdropping, but this sounded like too good of a conversation
to miss. Besides, it would give him insight into the young
woman who had quickly become the head horse wrangler at the
Circle H.
From what he overheard, Tanya had been a reining protégé at
the young age of fourteen. She had been riding horses for her
daddy after school and on weekends. Back then, her dad still had
a decent local clientele and a couple of solid reining horses. But,
her dad wasn’t always in a condition to show the clients’ horses
at the shows so Tanya would often be his last-minute replacement.
From what he heard, it sounded like Tanya had been really
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