The Horsewoman(29)

“We had a goddamn deal,” he said.

“And now we don’t.”

“That’s it?” he said. “Care to explain?”

“You wouldn’t get it.”

I got out of the rocking chair and walked across the living room and opened the front door for him. He walked past me, close enough for me to smell his cologne, turned when he got to the driveway.

“You’re telling me that she’s walking away from a million dollars now, even though you all know I get control of the horse in a couple of weeks?” Gorton said.

“Crazy, right?”

“You really don’t care to tell me why?”

“She changed her mind,” I said.

I shrugged.

“If it’s any consolation to you, Mr. Gorton?”

“What?” he snapped.

“Shocked the hell out of me, too.”





TWENTY-NINE



The night before.



I THREW EVERYTHING I had at Grandmother, queen of the manor, if you could call Atwood Farm a manor.

I reminded her that I’d been told my whole life that we weren’t in the horse business for the money. That if it were only about the money, she wouldn’t have basically mortgaged her whole life to have enough money to get a share of Coronado. She’d done it because she loved Mom enough to give her this chance. And this horse.

No go.

“We keep talking and talking but arriving back at the same damn place,” she said. “And that means this place. Your grandfather and I built it up from nothing. It’s been the last fifty years of my life. First with him, then with you and your mom. You know how much I hate to do this. But there will be other horses.”

“Not like this one.”

“Maybe not,” she said. “Maybe not. But your mother was on her way to the Olympics with Lord Stanley before he went lame.”

By then I only had one bullet left.

“Then sell my horse,” I said.

“Sell Sky?” Mom said. “You don’t mean that.”

“Yeah, Mom,” I said. “I do.”

She knew how much I loved the horse. So did Mom and Grandmother. We’d all known it from that first day I’d ridden her. And even though I hadn’t done nearly enough with her last year, nobody was blaming the horse. We all knew that every year when WEF would start up again, there was an Irish trainer named Dermot Morgan who’d try to buy her. I’d always give the same answer. She wasn’t for sale.

“I’d never let you sell that horse,” Grandmother said.

Like we were back on the same side all of a sudden.

“It’s my horse,” I said. “And even though she won’t command nearly what Coronado would, I know what Dermot has offered in the past.”

“You’re coming off your worst year,” Mom said.

“Wasn’t Sky’s fault,” I said.

“You’re willing to place that kind of bet on yourself?” Grandmother said.

At least I had her attention. Still had her talking. Even I wasn’t sure whether I was bluffing.

“Damn straight,” I said. “Dermot writes me a check, I hand it over to you, and we all get ready for the Grand Prix.”

“Have you spoken to your father about this?” Mom said.

“He says it’s my horse and I can do what I want with her,” I said.

I actually hadn’t spoken to him since the night after Mom had been thrown.

Grandmother was staring at me.

“You’d seriously be willing to do this to get one more chance on Coronado?” she said.

“One hundred percent,” I said. “Daniel’s right. I can win on this horse. I should have won today.”

The living room windows were open to let in the night air. One of the horses in the barn gave a loud whinny, but no one spoke.

It was Mom who finally did.

“Becky’s right,” she said. “It was never about the money with you, any more than it was with Dad.”

She gave her mother a long look and said, “What would Dad say if he were around?”

“Now who’s not being fair?” Grandmother said.

“Me,” Maggie Atwood said. “Because we both know the answer.”

“Clint Atwood would have poured himself another whiskey and then said we were going to let it ride,” Grandmother said.

She slowly and deeply breathed in, let it out even more slowly.

“God forgive a fool like me,” she said now, then looked directly at me. But she was smiling.

“We let it ride,” she said.





THIRTY

Gorton



“WHAT DO YOU mean the old bat changed her mind?” Gorton heard now on speakerphone.

He was driving east on Southern Boulevard, on his way to the bridge that took him from mainland to island and finally his home on Ocean Boulevard. What he and his friends jokingly called “the hood.”

“That’s what the little wiseass just informed me,” Gorton said.

“Our Becky,” the man said. “You’re telling me that they passed up the money?”

“That’s right.”

He thought he was going to make the light before the bridge, didn’t, saw it go to red and the drawbridge begin its slow rise toward the sky.