She knew Tricia wanted her to spend the day at the spa if Jay deserted her, but Sophia wanted to ride. She needed to get out in nature and feel the wind in her face. It was rejuvenating. She missed riding. She missed her horse. She missed her old friends and the man she had just begun to love when he died.
“Hey, guys, I’m going to take off.”
“What, no dessert?” Paul commented, after having ignored her most of the lunch.
“I want to get my ride in before it rains.”
She took her large linen napkin to the salad bar and wrapped up a generous mound of delicately prepared carrot sticks meant for the guests, but perfect for Sophia’s horse adventure. Then she went to her room and changed into her old jeans, heavy sweater, and windbreaker brought just for this purpose. She texted Tricia that she would definitely not join her at the spa. Then she called her mother to tell her about the amazing retreat. Sophia wanted to share something wonderful and upbeat about her legal career.
* * *
In the lobby, the concierge had arranged for a golf cart for Sophia to drive to and from the stables. The carts were parked near the first hole where the golfers, including Paul, were waiting to tee off. Sophia saw Taylor was talking to Roger, Marvin, and Joe.
“Sophia,” Taylor called over. “Coming to golf?”
“No, I’m taking the cart to the stables to ride.”
Taylor called and waved, “Have fun on your ride!”
Sophia sat in the cart for a minute and watched Taylor’s group tee off. Marvin was first and addressed the ball. As he did, Sophia caught Roger glaring at her. She shuddered, not from the cold but from the look in Roger’s eyes. It was pure hatred. She remembered last night on the steps at the cocktail party, but knew Roger wouldn’t be any where near horses. She also doubted Detective Rutger would find any evidence in San Francisco against Roger. Now that she knew the true machinery of Thorne & Chase, she didn’t think any attorney hired there would be careless enough to get caught doing anything illegal, certainly not murder, not even Roger.
Taylor called Roger to tee up. Roger addressed the ball slowly and hit it hard and viciously. It veered to the right into the rough not far up the fairway. Joe laughed as he stepped up to take his turn. Taylor took his club out of his bag. Roger again glared back at Sophia.
Sophia took off as fast as she could. She wished Taylor had not called out and she had not shouted where she was going. But then, Roger was locked into his golf foursome anyway.
⌘
Chapter 93
Road Apples, Barns, and Beer
The stable was not far. Sophia pushed Roger out of her mind. She drove the cart down the center of the narrow dirt road lined with stands of eucalyptus trees being whipped by the cool wind. As the road curved around, she saw a small ranch encircled by a white wood fence with a wide-open white gate.
There were several horses tied up in front of a large red barn trimmed in white with attached white horse corrals on each side. Large paddocks fenced in white were in the meadow beyond to the right. Some horse trailers were lined up far to the right at the edge of a clearing near the trees.
Sophia parked her cart on the side of the dirt road near two cars outside the gate to avoid spooking the horses. She walked through the expanse of dirt-scattered hoof prints, avoiding the fresh road apples.
She passed a high stack of hay bales topped with a black tarp in preparation for the impending rain and saw a small red house to the left also trimmed in white. It had a sizable covered porch with a couple of ragged upholstered easy chairs. There was a cache of beer bottles, both capped and emptied, tucked beside one chair.
“Nothing new,” Sophia muttered.
She knew beer consumption was a stable hand’s typical way of getting through the day. Parked near to the porch was a canvas topped dusty old jeep, also a typical choice of stable hands for hay hauling and wrangling.
In front of the barn, there were seven horses lined up at the wood rail. Each had its bridle hung over the horn of its saddle. Each was tied to the railing with a dirty, worn rope around the neck, leaving a dusty ring on their coats.
As Sophia approached the little barn door marked office, she walked along the rail giving each horse a pat on the neck and carrot stick. As every horseman knew, she held the carrot sticks flat in her palm to avoid finger bites. She loved the velvety tickles as each horse lipped the carrot into its mouth, snorting and smelling as they did it. The last, the large strawberry roan, indeed nipped at her after his turn.
“Settle down, boy.”
Sophia smiled at the little protest and gave him another carrot stick.
There were eleven ropes hanging on the ground along the post for the absent horses out on rides. Sophia didn’t know which carrotted horse would be hers and she didn’t care. They all were bedraggled, beaten-down stable nags. She smiled and took a deep breath of the familiar smell of hay and horse and dirt. She felt at home, at peace.
The bridles and the saddles on the horses were old and covered with dirt and dust. Sophia remembered her soft, clean saddle and bridle. She had dusted them after each ride and saddle soaped them every few months. She knew her own pants would be the cleaning cloth for the saddle today.
⌘
Chapter 94
Boots and Saddles
Sophia’s communion with the stable horses was interrupted when a stable hand emerged from the barn followed by a young family. The mother held the daughter’s hand and the father, the boy’s. They were all quiet and serious except the girl, who had a huge smile that matched her wide eyes.
“Stand over by the mounting block and I’ll get your horses,” the stable hand directed the family.
He was spindly and young, but weatherworn and covered in dust from hat to boots. He removed his black hat and scratched his matted, dust-caked hair as he looked at the seven horses. The stable hand put back on his hat with a hand that displayed dirt under his fingernails that was as black as his hat. He walked up to Sophia.
“Want to ride, too?”
“Yes,” Sophia smelled the beer on his breath. “A couple of hours.”
“Might rain and there’s no money back.”
“That’s all right. I’m with Thorne & Chase staying at the Resort.”
“Oh, yeah. I’ve had you dudes before. Let me get this group started and I’ll get your room number.”
The stable hand then walked up and down behind the line of horses. He untied the strawberry roan that was a tall seventeen hands high. The girl’s eyes twinkled and she was jumping up and down with excitement.
“Dad, let’s put you on Strawberry here,” the stable hand said, leading the horse roan to the mounting block, a little staired platform for riders to mount from.
“You’ll get your turn,” the mother whispered to the girl, who was deflated at not getting on a horse first.
The stable hand tried to put the bridle on the strawberry roan, but it nipped at him, too. He quickly snapped the horse’s nose and quelled its protest at being sent out again so near dinnertime. The stable hand slipped the bridle on the reprimanded horse robotically and competently, seemingly unaffected by his beer consumption.
He got the father on, but the stirrups were too short.
“Put your leg up.”
The stable hand guided the father’s leg forward over the pommel of the saddle near the horn and adjusted the stirrup down.
He did the same with the other leg.
“Listen up everyone, a short lesson.”
He got the attention of the family and demonstrated with the father as he gave the lesson.
“Keep the balls of your feet in the stirrups. Don’t let them slide through or you'll be dragged if you fall. Pull back on the reins to stop. Pull left and right to turn the horse. Like this.”
The children watched the lesson. The father watched the mother, and the mother shrugged her shoulders.
“We’ll be fine,” she mouthed to the father.
The little girl jumped
again and clapped her hands when the stable hand asked her to get on a little painted horse called Sugar. Sugar’s head lurched at the clapping little girl bundle jumping around him.
“Hey, no clapping around horses,” the stable hand barked.
The girl stopped and ran to her mom.
“Come on, come on.” The stable hand was impatient, obviously wanting to get this over with and get back to his beers. “You're going to like Sugar. He likes you.”
The girl got on the horse and then was happy again. She was small, so the stable hand put her feet in the leather straps just above the stirrups. The girl nonstop patted Sugar’s neck and smiled. The son was very cool. When he mounted he didn’t smile or pat the neck of his black horse called Jet. But then Sophia caught the boy petting Jet and talking to him when he thought no one was looking.
The mother watched her kids like a hawk and got on a nondescript brown horse. Sophia knew the family hadn’t ridden before and that they should be in a group with a guide. So did the stable hand, but this was a low-budget operation, and he had already started his cocktail hour.
“See you in an hour. The weather will hold out that long,” he told the father. “I’d stick to the right trail. It’s flat and wide.”
“Come on, kids,” the father called, kicking his horse hard four times until it moved.
The stable hand gave each of the other three horses a swat on the behind and they followed at a slow walk away from their dinner. The father led his family down the right-hand trail. The little girl petted Sugar’s neck and talked to him.
Sophia looked on, remembering her own magical days as a young girl so excited about petting any horse.
She snapped a carrot stick in thirds and gave a piece to each of the last three horses. She wanted to save some for her horse.
The stable hand turned to Sophia and wafted beer breath her as he said, “I’ll take one of those carrots if you got any left.”
“Sure.” Sophia handed him only one and begrudgingly. “You have a lot of horses out for such a cold day.”
“Yep. Saturday’s always good.” He took a bite of the carrot stick, looked at the sky to the west, and added, “It may not hold two hours for you.”
“It might. It might hold three.”
“You can go as long as you want. I’ll charge your room for as long as you like.”
“Fine.”
“Or, as long as the horse doesn’t bring you back here for its dinner,” the stable hand muttered as he grabbed a form and pencil stub from a metal box on a bench for Sophia to fill out.
Sophia ignored the slight, knowing no horse took her anywhere she did not want to go. She used the knife-sharpened pencil stub to fill out the elegant logoed slip provided by the resort and long since wrinkled and fingerprinted with dirt by the stable hand. She handed the slip back.
“Ridden before?” The stable hand looked at his old Timex, similar to Sophia’s now demised, and then stuffed the slip in his shirt pocket.
“Yes. I used to own my own horse.”
“Yep. I’ve heard that before.”
“Seriously, I’m an expert rider.”
“Okay. I’ll take you at your word. I have a fresh one that needs exercising. It’ll save me a ride.”
“Great.” Sophia thought any horse would be better than the three left tied there. Besides, he should not be exercising any horse in his condition.
The stable hand grabbed the three remaining horses and took them into the barn. He came out of the barn shortly with a saddled and bridled horse prancing behind him, a chestnut mare with a long black silky mane and tail.
Just as he approached, Sophia’s cell phone rang. She took it out of her back pocket and looked at the caller ID. It was Detective Rutger. She muted the ring to vibrate.
“This here is Gypsy. She’s a good ride. Let’s get you up on her.”
“Great.”
She looked back at her cell. It had gone to message. She hesitated a moment and then turned it off and returned it to her back pocket. Sophia decided the detective could wait until after the ride. She needed time to herself, and what difference would an hour or two make?
“She needs to get out.”
“She’s beautiful.” Sophia stroked Gypsy’s face and gave her the last three carrot sticks before the stable hand put her bridle on. “What wrong with her left eye?”
“I don’t know, but it’s not so good. She’s still a hell of a ride. I take her out all the time. She’ll just shy from that side, but there’s no one much on the trail now . . . with the rain coming. Let’s get you up there.”
“Okay. I can deal with that.” Sophia patted Gypsy’s neck.
“Let’s see how you sit on her.”
Sophia mounted her from the block the family had used. She was happy with the fresh horse and also the extra challenge to her expert horsemanship that Gypsy’s shying problem would present.
“You got a good seat in the saddle. I bet you did have a horse. Use the left trail. It’ll take you about two or three hours and circles around back here at the end. You won’t get lost. There are meadows and a little creek to cross. You’ll like it. Watch the limbs. And watch out for the damn dirt bikers running up and down that hill just before the creek.”
“Okay, but I think my left stirrup could be longer.”
“Nope. It’s fine.” He walked away.
It wasn’t, but Sophia knew she would get no help from him. She watched him return to his chair on the porch and pick up his beer.
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Chapter 95
The Left Trail
Sophia rode Gypsy down the left trail at a brisk walk. Gypsy was eager and kept pushing her nose forward against Sophia’s grip on the reins. Gypsy fought for her head and to take off at a run. But Sophia held the reins tightly against Gypsy’s urgings. Sophia maintained Gypsy at a walk to warm her up properly and slowly.
“Whoa. Whoa.” Sophia pulled gently back on the reins each time Gypsy took her head and broke into a trot. “Let’s take it slow.”
The uneasy partners started down the narrow dirt trail, which crossed the tall green meadow grass toward a forest of yellow-leaved birch trees fluttering in the wind. Gypsy settled into a quick walk. The two had compromised.
The sky above the trees was blue-gray with thick white and black cumulonimbus clouds. It looked like the rain was far enough away to the west to hold off for some time. Sophia sat the saddle firmly as she felt the rhythm of Gypsy’s quickstep. Her heels were down deep behind the stirrups and she kept her weight on the balls of her feet. She had a very light seat in the saddle, which she knew Gypsy would respond to. But the short stirrup annoyed Sophia and made her feel unbalanced. She decided she would fix it after she worked off some of Gypsy’s nervous energy with a trot.
“Let’s go, Gypsy.” Sophia lifted the reins six inches above the saddle horn and forward, loosening them.
Sophia pressed into Gypsy with her knees and the horse moved into a fast trot. She was responsive to the lightest touch. Gypsy wanted to be there as much as Sophia did. Halfway through the meadow, something scurried in the grass to the left—Gypsy’s bad-eye side. She shied, side-stepping off the trail to the right. Sophia sat her saddle with difficulty. She was rusty, but knew she could handle this nervous horse if she stayed on her toes, literally, on the stirrups. Sophia liked the challenge.
Gypsy’s bad eye caused her to shy away from even the smallest things. Sophia remembered the day her horse, Taffy, made a lightning-bolt 180-degree turn at a canter when a rabbit ran across their path. Sophia had kept her seat then, and would now.
As Gypsy trotted through the birch trees, Sophia tested Gypsy’s mouth. She gently pulled the reins back. Gypsy stopped on a dime.
“Good girl.”
A soft sensitive mouth is no fun for a horse, but great for the rider because the horse is easy to control. Sophia smiled as she remembered Paul’s story about the horse with the hard mouth that almost rolled on him when it grabbed the bit in its t
eeth.
“Come on.” Sophia took Gypsy to a trot again and then pulled her gently down to a walk.
Gypsy was settling down and had learned who would be in control. Sophia relaxed and enjoyed the smell of rain in the air as the yellow birch trees began to blend with evergreens along the trail.
She thought about visiting her parents next Sunday with Taylor. Sophia didn’t like being circumspect about their relationship this weekend, if indeed there really was one, and she didn’t like Anne stalking Taylor. But she couldn’t think about that anymore.
* * *
As Sophia headed up the trail, a man and woman rode towards her on horseback in a cloud of dust. They fought to keep their horses under control, pulling the reins with one hand and holding onto the saddle horn with the other. The horses were stable-worn and garbed with dirty tack. They whipped their heads up and down, flinging spit on their riders in protest at being held back as they fought to gallop back to the stable for dinner.
“Slow down,” the man yelled, muscling his horse’s mouth. “Whoa.”
Sophia knew muscling a hard mouth like that would do no good. The horse would eventually try to get its bit between its teeth, clench down, and then take off in total control. The woman’s horse would follow. Sophia decided not to interfere and tell them that they needed to pull the reins intermittently and seesaw the bit to keep it free. Sophia expected their grip on the saddle horn would get them back to the stable, walk, trot, or run.
As the couple approached on the left, Gypsy sidestepped to the right and pranced into some tree branches. Sophia sat in the saddle, calmed Gypsy, and guided her forward.
“Hello.” The woman yanked back her reins as they passed Sophia. “It’s going to storm. You should head back.”
Lethal Lawyers Page 35