“Being a Graham ain’t easy,” Tyler’s daddy liked to say, but for better or worse the Graham name went some distance in paving the way for Tyler. To his credit, though, Tyler didn’t just live in the shadow of Doc Graham’s big white hat or David Graham’s commanding personality. From a young age, he formed his own shadow, in the best place a central Texas kid could: under a flood of Friday-night lights.
Tyler went to Elgin High, the same school where his dad had played quarterback and been a champion roper. Tyler had a thick neck, and he could muster a stern, don’t-fuck-with-this glare on picture day. He played receiver and cornerback, the positions dictated by his six-foot-tall, 165-pound frame.
After high school, Tyler moved on to Texas A&M, just like his granddaddy, and studied animal science. He graduated and came back to Elgin. With Tyler’s dad out of the family business, the Graham empire was Tyler’s to inherit if he wanted it. Now, at twenty-four, he had become the manager of all of Doc’s businesses. It was a big enough job that he’d been asked to give this interview to Southern Foodways. “We’re double-stacking cattle,” he was saying now. “We’re building pens as fast as we can build them, buying land—every piece of land we can pretty much put our hands on.”
Along with managing the cattle business, Tyler longed to return Southwest Stallion Station to its former glory. But it had been four decades since Doc Graham founded his stallion business, and things had changed. Breeding had modernized. Without Doc’s son, David, to keep up with the technology—to keep up with the times—Southwest Stallion Station had fallen behind.
Every stud farm needs a stud to hang its name on. In California, First Down Dash anchored a famous ranch called Vessels Stallion Farm. In Oklahoma, Lazy E was the dominant breeder, thanks to a topflight stud called Corona Cartel. In Texas, Mr Jess Perry had helped turned the Four Sixes (6666) Ranch into the state’s new top dog.
Southwest Stallion Station, meanwhile, had next to nothing. And for Tyler, the simple reality was that as much fun as it would be to run a major stud farm, it was fattening up those thirty thousand cattle that paid the bills. Feed ’em, shovel their shit, and on to the next. “This is where I started and that’s where I’m at,” Tyler told his interviewer.
At least until a good stud came along.
ELGIN, TEXAS
October 2009
One day, David Graham, Tyler’s daddy, was behind the counter of his Elgin feed store. This was typical. David had bought the store two decades before, after his falling-out with Doc, and he’d hardly changed a thing, from the wood-paneled walls to the black-and-white letter-board menu hanging behind him. There was a wood-paneled office in the back, adorned with mementos to both his own high-school glory and his son’s. There was a table out on the floor where he could bullshit with friends or customers. And there was a coffee machine to which he made frequent visits, refilling the same Elgin High mug, stained as it was beyond recognition. But most often he was there, behind the red countertop, holding court about better days, his elaborate storytelling punctuated by the occasional plunk of Skoal spit landing in the trash.
This day, though, was not typical. Not after Chevo walked in.
“Chevo” was the nickname of Eusevio Huitron, a successful Austin horse trainer who owned a ranch nearby and occasionally came in to stock up. He was built like a bowling pin, five foot five with a formidable paunch. He stalked the aisles with his typical fervor, looking for vitamins and going on in broken English about a new colt he had in his stables. David listened up.
Despite his falling-out with ol’ Doc Graham, David shared his son’s desire to see Southwest Stallion Station returned to prominence. Tyler was still working to catch Southwest Stallion up with the industry, stocking up on equipment that didn’t exist when the ranch was last relevant. He’d taken some flyers on cheap racehorses that might become decent studs, and he’d found some mare owners who were willing to do business. Chevo was one of those mare owners.
But Chevo was best known as a trainer, and he apparently had a new runner in his stables. The horse’s name was Tempting Dash. He’d run fast in Mexico, Chevo said, and in a couple of days the colt would run his first race in the United States, at the track up in Dallas. If he ran well, he would qualify for a big-money race later in the month.
David Graham listened from behind the counter. On the one hand, he knew that winning in Mexico didn’t mean much. As big as the unregulated match-racing scene was in Mexico, its sanctioned races didn’t draw the same level of competition as the circuit in the American Southwest. Nor was Graham particularly moved by Chevo’s boasting. Chevo loved to boast.
On the other hand, Graham knew that plenty of fast, well-bred horses had been coming north from Mexico lately. He also knew that Chevo had been working closely with Ramiro Villarreal, “the Horseman,” who seemed to have a bead on all the best young runners.
Most important, David Graham, after a lifetime in and around the breeding business, knew this: if his son, Tyler, was ever going to lure a real stud to Southwest Stallion Station, it was going to require a shit-barrel full of luck. If Chevo’s colt was indeed a topflight racehorse, then Chevo’s colt might one day be a topflight breeder. And the Grahams might be first in line to breed him.
“You got a chance?” Graham asked Chevo from behind the counter.
“Oh yes,” Chevo said, roaming the aisles. “Fast sonofabitch.”
“Really?” Graham asked.
“Oh yes,” Chevo said. “I’m gonna win it. I’m gonna win it.”
SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS
October 2009
“Hablas medio rapida,” Ramiro was telling his client, trying to get a handle on this latest development. “You talk kinda fast.”
It had been about ten months since Ramiro snapped up Tempting Dash at that SoCal auction. Now Ramiro was back in Texas, getting ready for one of the horse’s first big races in the States. He’d just landed in San Antonio when the voice of one of his top clients—maybe his boss?—called out through his Nextel push-to-talk.
Traditional cellphones were considered too traceable, so the Zetas relied on a two-pronged communication strategy. For instant messaging, they used BlackBerry’s encrypted system, which required knowing a user’s unique PIN. For conversation, the military-bred Zetas had pioneered a communication system that relied on radios like Nextel’s push-to-talk phones, which they believed were harder for the feds to intercept. To expand the network in Mexico, they installed antennae on buildings, trees, radio towers, and, in one case, the roof of a local police station. Until recently, they even had an in-house communications pro, nicknamed “Tecnico.” He worked out of a storefront radio-equipment shop in the Texas borderlands. But he’d been arrested, so the Zetas had resorted to kidnapping Nextel technicians and putting them to work.
One day they’d all be texting over