Chapter 20: In Front of Everyone

Sage's POV

The county sale barn held three hundred people, and at six in the morning all the seats were taken.

They filled the bleachers and the aisles.

They stood along the back wall with their coffee, and the line of trucks outside ran down to the highway.

"Told you," Hank said at the gate.

"They came to watch," I said.

"They came to watch you get eaten." Hank's mustache lifted. "Let's disappoint them."

Wayne took my hand in the aisle.

He didn't let go, not past the church ladies and not past the men from the feed store.

He held on past the county commissioner too, who sat in the third row in a dark tie with his arms folded.

Lyle Kenyon sat in the front row with a bid card in his lap.

He saw our hands and grinned.

The auctioneer, a heavy man in a brown hat, started at ten and went through the early lots quickly.

Lyle bought every one.

He lifted the card for a dollar, and the auctioneer sold each head at that price because no one else would raise a hand.

By lot twelve the room was muttering.

"Lot fourteen," the auctioneer said. "Gentry Ridge, a bay filly by Cinder out of Carol's mare. Her name is Ember."

They brought her in on a lead rope.

She was fine boned and carried her head like her mother, and my throat closed.

The Texas agent sat three rows back with his paddle on his knee.

"I have one dollar," the auctioneer said. "Do I hear more?"

The agent didn't move.

I looked at Wayne. He was staring at the agent's face.

"Ninety-five," Wayne whispered. "He's not going to bid. They read the papers."

"One dollar," Lyle said loudly, and smiled at me across the ring. "Going once."

A paddle went up in the back.

"Five thousand," Hank said.

The room turned.

"I have five thousand from the gentleman in the cracked straw hat," the auctioneer said. "Lyle?"

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