Leaping Hearts(42)

There was no way they were going to make the oxers, A.J. thought desperately as she tried to rein him around. The angle was all wrong.

She tried once more to shift her weight back and to the side. Sabbath’s breath was coming in great steamy explosions and she felt his body heaving under the tremendous pistons of his legs. She knew if they didn’t slow down, they were going to get hurt. Missing the turn at that kind of speed meant they would have to jump the ring’s fence or crumple into the corner in a heap.

That thought must have dawned on the stallion because, in the nick of time, he came about and shifted direction like a gale-force wind. It was too much, too late. They took the first oxer wide and scaled its mammoth girth at a thick angle. This meant they had to cover more horizontal distance than they would have if they’d approached the jump head-on.

A.J. heard his back hoof strike a rail hard but didn’t have time to dwell on whether it hit the ground. They were so far off course, she’d have to steer them hard right so they didn’t make the second jump harder than it was, or worse, miss it altogether. Even more alarming, she had only one stride to correct their direction. She knew if she leaned too far or pulled his head too much, they’d take the jump off-balance, and that wouldn’t just be bad form; it was dangerous. They could both end up sprawling over the towering fence and, between their speed and its height, that could mean serious injury.

In a split second, it occurred to her the only way they were going to get over the oxer without getting hurt was if she let go and gave him his head. If Sabbath wanted to take the jump, he would. If he shot around the side of the oxer, it was better than her face-planting in the dirt, bouncing off the oxer or him injuring himself.

As soon as she loosened her hold on his head, Sabbath responded with a quick jab to the right. They sailed over the jump but lacked the good approach that would have let them clear it cleanly. As they landed, she heard the unmistakable sound of a rail hitting the ground.

Crossing the finish line, A.J. felt a measure of relief. The round hadn’t gone well but it wasn’t a complete disaster, either. Considering that Sabbath was prone to be more trouble than just being genetically disobedient, she figured she’d gotten off pretty easily.

But they hadn’t won. Not even close.

The announcer proclaimed their time and their eight faults. With Philippe’s clean round and the other riders who had only four-faulted, she knew they weren’t going to place.

Devlin was the only person she saw in the crowd.

“How do you feel?” he asked, walking up to them. He took the reins to give her a break.

“Okay, I guess.”

He thought she looked discouraged and he sympathized. It had been an exhausting round for him to watch. He’d tracked every movement of the pair, willing them to clear each of the fences cleanly, his hands clenching and unclenching each time they left the earth and returned to it. He’d been caught up in the drama with the rest of the crowd but the stress had been compounded by a very special concern for her.

“You did a good job.”

A.J. tugged her helmet off. “Considering the potential for complete chaos, I suppose so.”

Devlin knew just what she was feeling. She’d been born with a competitor’s need to win and, like the color of her eyes, it was immutable. Even though she and the stallion weren’t ready to take an event trophy yet, he could feel her disappointment at not winning as if it were his own.

A.J. dismounted and they were walking Sabbath away from the ring when the final competitor finished and his results were read over the loudspeaker. As they headed back to the practice ring to walk the stallion out, the silence between them was filled by the noise of the crowd and then, shortly thereafter, the proclamation that Philippe Marceau had won.

After Sabbath had been cooled down, and Chester went to work grooming him, A.J. took a break and went over to the various booths where tack and riding apparel were being sold. As she meandered through the velvet hats and leather boots, breathing in the smell of fresh leather spiced with a whiff of the barbecue being started for lunch, she ran the round over and over in her head. The stallion’s actions and her responses. The way he’d felt over one jump and another. The battle into that final turn. The stallion’s abrupt choice to take that oxer after she’d given him his head.

A.J. knew Sabbath wanted to jump. That was what she’d learned again when she’d loosened the reins and left the choosing up to him. His abrupt correction, which she couldn’t have pried out of him by fighting in that short amount of space, told her he wanted to feel the clean air over those fences as badly as she did.

The revelation troubled her. It meant he was fighting her for the sake of fighting and that was a bad sign. Locked in a battle for control, he seemed to value the warring over his instincts to fly. And that would put an end to her ambitions for them as sure as more of those rails bouncing off the dirt.

A.J. was about to return to the trailer when she overheard two competitors talking.

“No wonder they call that holy terror Sabbath,” one was saying. “That horse’ll put the fear of God right in you.”

“He fought her tooth and nail,” the man’s companion agreed. “Every single jump. That woman’s got to have arms of steel.”

“At least he didn’t fly off into the crowd. You hear what happened at Oak Bluffs?” Both men laughed.