The Canadian Horse - Jim Overstreet

The Canadian Horse is the fourth novel in the Rodeo in the Blood series. In the opening scene, C.R. Winchester steals a steer wrestling horse in Canada and smuggles him into Montana where he brands the horse with his own iron. Although C.R. intends to use the horse to further his own rodeo career, he is forced to sell him after he is jailed for a hit-and-run driving fatality. Rusty Blackstone, Warren Weston and Casey Jones buy the horse to take the place of Rusty's great steer wrestling horse Apache. The aftershocks vibrate throughout the story, all the way to the National Finals Rodeo.

Even after coming to terms with her ex-husband, Warren Weston, Jenny finds that managing the Westmont Ranch that her six-year-old son, Todd, inherited from his grandfather becomes more difficult. The ranch appraisal comes in much higher than expected, creating a major tax liability. Her desire to hold the ranch together and the impossibility of paying the IRS from net income forces her to consider options that she hates to contemplate. She is not afraid to use her womanly wiles to make the best deal she can.

Rusty and his long-time traveling partner, Casey Jones, qualify once more for the NFR. When Casey heads south at the end of the regular rodeo season, Samantha "Buckshot" Baldwin goes with him. Although his job on an oil pipeline falls through, they find temporary work on the border wall.

Now working for Running W Real Estate and Ranch Management Company, Warren is resigned to finishing one place out to the top fifteen steer wrestlers who compete in the National Finals Rodeo. He is driving north to one of the ranches that he oversees when he gets a call from the PRCA commissioner telling him that he is in the Finals because one of the qualified contestants has torn up his knee.

Rusty, Warren and Casey wind up practicing together in New Mexico to prepare for the NFR. That's where they meet the Canadian horse. Although they ask C.R. to price him, he initially refuses. Later, after Rusty's remaining horse, Boots, is injured, and C.R. needs to post bail and hire an attorney, they work out a deal. It's when the horse's previous owner shows up at the NFR to claim him that things start to fall apart. Can the tall man from Canada prove that the horse is his? And how will that affect Casey's chance to win a Championship.