Grady Hart: The Re-Emancipation of Mr Amos Tanner (Episode 4, Part 6)

Morning light seeped through the dusty hotel room, a blade of sunlight cut across Grady Hart’s worn boots as he leaned back, arms crossed, hat low over his eyes. Shadows played across his face, deepening the lines etched by years of hard rides, gunfire, and things he kept locked deep. His gaze flickered now and then, a restless energy he couldn’t quite tamp down after last night.

Across the room, Sam stirred, stretching his legs, boots scraping against the rough-hewn floor. He groaned, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, glancing at Grady with that familiar sidelong look of his.

“So,” Sam finally broke the silence, his voice quiet but carrying a pointed curiosity. “What happened with the girl last night?”

Grady’s jaw tensed, but he didn’t move, just stared down at the floor, seeing something that wasn’t there. He thought about the day before, silently, and undetected following Defiance out to that farm on the outskirts of town, kicking down the door after he heard her scream from inside the farm’s shabby time-forgotten cabin. Seeing her being attacked by the large man she had clearly gone to settle business with. Putting that man down with his fists and then his boot and then, though the man was unconscious when he did it, knowing instinctively the sort of man who lay in front of him, Grady had removed his Colt and delivered his final blow to the man with a finalizing bullet. He hadn’t asked Defiance what it was all about. He didn’t have to. And he had slept like a baby. He looked back up at Sam and replied “Nothin that’s mine to tell,” he said, his voice low and flat. He wasn’t interested in questions or sharing. Some things needed to be left where they’d fallen, locked away. He’d taken care of what needed takin’ care of and that was it.