Claiming Christmas (Alex and Alexander Book 3)
Page 8
“Hi — that was a nice win you had there,” I stuttered. How do you come back with that kind of a greeting?
“Huh.” He grunted and went back to untacking the horse. “You with that Archer woman?”
“No — God no.” I couldn’t help it. Just the thought — ugh. “I’m not associated with her.”
“She thought she was goin’ to get some kinda bargain,” he said with satisfaction, pulling the saddle off and putting it over the side of the pick-up truck. “She must think we are some dumb folk.”
“She thinks everyone is dumb. She has no respect for anyone.” Why not.
“And what about you?”
“Me?”
“You think we’re dumb?” He put an arm across the filly’s withers and leaned on her. She fluttered her nostrils, too tired to be bothered. I longed to take her for a nice walk, give her a good shower and a liniment bath, do up her legs in bandages for the night and give her a hay-net of alfalfa and timothy. The sort of treatment she’d been accustomed to in south Florida, and that she more than deserved after the brave race she had run tonight.
“Not at all. But I do have something to talk to you about,” I rushed ahead with my words. “I have a client who is very interested in this filly; I’m prepared to offer you a good price for her.”
He smirked. “What price?”
“Name it,” I countered. I had no idea what a good price was out here.
He pretended to think for a moment, putting one hand up to his forehead and tapping at it. “Think,” he muttered. “Think think think. Oh! I have it!” He smiled beatifically at me.
“Go on.”
“She’s not for sale,” he said bluntly, and went back to work, pulling off her bridle roughly.
I swallowed and tried to get my heart out of my boots. “Sir, I’m prepared to pay —”
“Not for sale!” he interrupted, swinging the bridle dangerously. “You Yanks think you can just buy anything you want, don’t you? Get the hell out of here! You think I don’t know what this horse is? Go back to your damned auctions and your million-dollar studs and leave us alone.”
I backed away, my eyes on the snaffle bit at the end of that swinging bridle. I didn’t think he’d be above hitting a woman, that much was for certain. He’d already pulled a gun on me. “Sir,” I tried, desperate for one last attempt. “Sir, can I just leave you my card, and if you ever change your mind — ”
“Get out of here!” he bellowed, and the filly spooked, pulling back against her lead. “No more of you people at our tracks! By God, the next Yank out here is gettin’ shot, I swear it!”
“Tell ‘em Trav!” someone shouted, and then there were more men showing up from behind the trailer, teeth white in the dusk as they laughed at us. “Get out of here, go on Yankee, go home!”
I grabbed Kerri’s arm and we ran, not caring how foolish we looked, just certain that if we didn’t get the hell out of there very, very quickly, we were going to end up on the ten o’clock news. And not tonight’s broadcast, either. It would take the dogs and the mounted posse a while to find our bodies.
We were slamming around the truck cab as I drove entirely too quickly down the rutted old path, in a rush to get back to civilization. And it was only when we were back on paved road and putting miles between us and the bush track that Kerri asked, “What are you going to do next?”
I turned on the radio. A Christmas carol came wavering through the speakers, from a tower somewhere out in these forsaken sandy hills. All I Want For Christmas Is You.
I switched it to NPR.
I didn’t have a plan.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Wendy was getting pretty good at the posting trot. I watched her make her away around the training track all alone, alternating between rising with Betsy’s stride or trying to sit to it. It was a long hard struggle, but we all had to learn how to post and how to sit that bouncy gait. Once you had it, you had it — until you got on a horse with a completely different stride, of course. We’d cross that bridge when we came to it. If there was one thing I didn’t see in Wendy’s future, it was a horse of her own.
And that was a disappointment I took to heart. I rubbed Parker’s neck, slipping my hand into the warmth beneath his neck; it was a chilly day, December was starting to make its presence known in north Florida. Between the cold weather and the incident at the bush track, I was feeling fairly low this afternoon. It was amazing how just a few hours could bring about such turmoil in your life, such emotional upset and worry.
When this whole thing with Wendy had started, I hadn’t expected to get involved at all. She could come to the races that one day, and that was it. And then it was up to the Rodeo Queens to make sure she learned to ride, and she could figure out getting a horse of her own the way other determined kids with a passion and not much in their pockets always did — if it meant working for someone after school and on weekends, indenturing herself out… well, that was how it was done.
But then this whole thing with this filly had come along and… I couldn’t get the idea out of my head. That somehow, Christmasfordee had been Wendy’s Christmas present in truth. That the ungainly filly was somehow her destiny, and that Wendy was the filly’s destiny. That they could save each other.
Because I knew, as surely as I knew Wendy’s life would continue to be hard, even if her grandmother felt better after the holidays, even if her aunt looked up from her phone for thirty seconds to notice her little niece in the room, even if she learned to ride from a proper trainer, that by the same token the filly was going to have a hard life as well. She might have displayed heart and surprising speed at the bush track, but all the conditioning in the world wasn’t going to save her from simply being built to fail. She didn’t have the conformation to run hard and hold up. She shouldn’t be racing and she shouldn’t be bred, which was another tick in the Wendy column.
And racing on those tracks, with those bull-ring proportions, those tight turns, that terrible footing? I shook my head. “No.” I said aloud, and Parker’s ears flipped back to listen. But I didn’t have anything else to say. She ought to be Wendy’s horse, and I was horribly frustrated that she couldn’t be.
Horse and rider were coming back around the turn. The weak winter afternoon light shone down from the deep blue sky, accenting the oaks turning brown along the rail, Betsy’s fuzzy ears which pricked as she zeroed in on Parker in the gap, Wendy’s face red with exertion as she huffed and puffed her way through another ten strides of posting trot. “Good job!” I shouted. “You can walk now!”
She pulled up Betsy with obvious relief and they came walking over to join us at the gap. “That was hard,” she panted.
“You did so good,” I told her. “You’re almost ready to canter by yourself.” She’d only cantered right next to me, on the leading rein. But I figured she’d been riding for more than a month now, so I was probably being too cautious. “Next time,” I promised.
And Wendy smiled that brilliant smile of hers.
Back at the barn, rubbing the sweat from the shaggy ponies with towels, Wendy asked me what I was doing for Christmas. I thought. “Not much,” I admitted. “We were going to go the Keys for a few days, but we have runners the week beforehand and I don’t know how many times I can drive to south Florida in a month. I’ll be glad to move the horses back here when Tampa opens. What about you?”
She shrugged and rubbed Betsy’s neck with the towel. “Nothing really. My aunt is going to Pensacola to be with her mom. My grandmother said she’ll order us something for dinner and we can watch a movie.”
I swallowed over the lump that was rising up in my throat. “That sound since. Do you have a favorite Christmas movie?”
“I like Harry Potter,” Wendy admitted. “And The Little Mermaid.”
“Me too,” I said. “You should watch both of those. And think of me when you’re doing it.”
“I will,” Wendy vowed. “I think of you every single day.”
***
“Oh yeah?” I came into the living room and leaned over the back of the couch, planting a kiss on his cheek. “I had the most wretched afternoon. Poor Wendy. I can’t even stand it anymore.”
“Did she fall off?” He was pulling up a website. “It happens.”
“No, it’s just her entire life. I can’t stand her life.”
He put a hand on my hair. “You’re doing a good job brightening it up. I’m sure she appreciates you.”
I remembered her words, the seriousness in her face: I think of you every day. “I wish I could do more.”
“Look — ” he put the tablet in my hand and pointed at its glowing face.
I gasped.
***
“Linda, listen —”
“We don’t have the funds to keep a horse for someone, Alex, I’m sorry.” Linda smiled apologetically and tightened her grip on her red Starbucks cup. “We provide a one-time only commitment. In this case it’s riding lessons for a year. How much would it cost to pay for the life of a horse in one installment? That’s an impossible request.”
A sprightly rendition of Sleigh Ride started up over the cafe speakers, which I thought just added to my argument. “Linda,” I said patiently, which is not the most common way for me to speak to humans, “I am going to take ownership of the horse. That way there’s no question about who is paying her bills. But I want her for Wendy. She’ll get six months off and then we’ll have someone help Wendy learn to train her. She won’t do the hard stuff, but she’ll help. And in a year or two she’ll be ready to show and she’ll have a great horse to do it on. Her horse.” I didn’t bother adding in the existential stuff about the horse obviously falling under Wendy’s spell or anything. I wanted my case to make sense from a rational point of view.
And it was starting to work. Linda was quiet, considering. She took a sip from her cup, massive tacky rings flashing under the LED lights of the Christmas tree next to our table.
“It’ll be a Christmas present — from all of us. The ultimate Christmas wish.”
“This was all supposed to be her Christmas wish,” Linda said doubtfully. “The trip to the races, a years’ worth of riding lessons. What will people think, that we’re going to buy their kids ponies? We can’t do that every year. We have a limit of five thousand dollars per wish. It’s in our charter.”
“Then it will be from me. From Alexander and me. Inspired by the generosity of the Rodeo Queens and a genuine desire to retire a deserving horse in danger.”
“You want to word it like that?” Linda arched a plucked eyebrow. “I don’t think Bill will like that. She’s being run at a sanctioned track now, so surely she isn’t as bad as off as you thought.”
I sighed into my coffee. Of course her husband, Bill Swanson, was one of the good ol’ boys, with his head in the sand, who didn’t believe any horse was ever abused or run past the point of safety in horse racing. “Fine. We’ll leave that part out. But I can assure you it’s true. This filly has no business running. However this guy has her juiced up and running like she did, it’s going to be the death of her.”
Linda fluttered her eyelashes, doing her delicate Scarlett O’Hara impression. “I’ll have to take it to the committee,” she said finally.
I put down my empty cup. Overhead, Sleigh Ride segued into Jingle Bells. Christmas really was all about horses, wasn’t it? “I’m claiming the horse the first moment I can.” I told her, getting up. “Let me know if you want the Rodeo Queens involved. But either way, I’m getting Christmasfordee.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“How do people live here? SERIOUSLY HOW DO PEOPLE LIVE HERE?”
“Alex, please relax. And get your head inside the car. And roll the window up.”
“Alexander, this place is the seventh circle of hell and I am going to kill myself if this traffic does not start moving.”
“I’m sure there’s a traffic accident,” Alexander said primly. “We’ll get moving again soon.”
Not soon enough, I thought, hitting the button to roll the window up. All around me, lanes and lanes of concrete. All around me, rows and rows of unmoving cars, growling in the December heat. The temperature was eighty-six degrees. The palm trees were lifeless and still on an afternoon without a sea breeze. The air was heavy with oil and gasoline. It was a tropical nightmare. It was Christmas in Miami.
“We’re not going to get there in time,” I chanted nervously. “We’re not going to get there. You know who is? Mary Archer is. She’s going to get Wendy’s horse.”
Alexander sighed. “There is no way of knowing that. For all you know, she offered that man three hundred dollars for the horse.”
“Hardly! I offered him whatever he wanted and he said no way. He didn’t turn her down because she low-balled him.”
“I didn’t say that —” Alexander stopped himself. “It will be fine,” he said simply, and then he put the car in park.
Why not? We weren’t going anywhere.
***
Just as I’d told Wendy two weeks ago, we hadn’t planned on driving to South Florida again after our horses’ last races. We’d run Luna and Shearwater the week before. Luna came wilting from a big start to a fourth place finish; Shearwater ran late for second. I was happy for both of them, but ready for them to come home for a while. I hated having them so far from home; at least running at Tampa was relatively nearby. If the Gulfstream season had been lackluster, at least no one had gotten hurt.
But as soon as I’d seen that Christmasfordee had shown up on the works list at Sunshine South, I’d known there was no chance of avoiding Miami for the rest of the racing season. Somehow, that redneck owner of hers had gotten someone with a trainer’s license to take her on, and I had no doubt they were going to put her into a claimer as quickly as possible, to strike while the iron was still hot — and the horse was still sound.
And so while the Rodeo Queens debated whether or not they wanted to add their support to the project, I watched the overnights carefully, waiting for her name to be announced. When it finally came out, for a claiming race for maidens at six furlongs at the short Everglades Park meet, I couldn’t believe the date: Christmas day.
“This is all too weird,” Kerri said when I showed her, and I had to agree. The Christmas for Dee thing was getting stranger every minute. But that just made me more determined to make it happen. There was something here that was meant to be. There was something here that was destiny. And I was going to be the one to see it through.
Alexander, bless him, saw no problem with the scheme. “Thank God she’s not running at Gulfstream,” he commented after he agreed to the plot. “I’d much rather spend five grand on a pet than twenty.”
And I had to agree. The Everglades Park meet had much lower tags — and much cheaper horses to match them. After the race she’d given everyone at the bush track, I thought she actually stood a chance — if she was training the same way she had been a few weeks ago.
“She must have been on the uptick when Joey Armstrong bought her,” Alexander had gone on.
“Are you saying you were wrong to kick her out of the barn?” I was only messing around; Alexander would never admit he was wrong.
“Oh, I wouldn’t go that far,” he said, as usual not disappointing me. “She’s still a mess from a conformation point of view. That narrow chest and those spindly legs… no thank you. And the hooves will cost us, too, you know. But she might have been on the verge of finally breaking her maiden, yes.”
And so I thought she was today, too. My only hope was that I could get a claim in before she went to post. If she won at Everglades, her owner would be never sell — and there was a girl sitting in a trailer in Ocala, watching The Little Mermaid with her sick grandmother, who deserved this horse more than anything.
I rolled down the car window again and stuck my head out. “FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, MOVE! MOVE!”
***
But it took more than an hour for traffic to start moving. A few minutes after my last outburst, we watched the helicopter from the hospital landing in the distance, and then the police helicopters. “Someone is having a bad day,” Alexander commented. I nodded. I wasn’t the only one having a crappy Christmas, and neither was Wendy.
When we eventually got moving again, in fits and starts, I had all but given up on getting to Everglades Park in time. The aging old racetrack was far, far on the south side of Miami’s sprawl, built out in swamplands on fill dirt dredged up from early drainage canals, and populated mainly by mosquitoes when it wasn’t in use as a track. I still wasn’t sure what the motivation had been for building out here, but Everglades was apparently still a popular Christmas day attraction for a certain south Florida demographic: mainly the ones who drove rusty old muscle cars, judging by the cars surrounding us. The traffic to get into the facility, located on a two-lane country road, was backed up for miles. I took one look at the endless river of brake-lights and nearly burst into tears.
“What are we going to do?” I asked, and Alexander had just shrugged.
“Hope for the best,” he said.
It was twenty minutes to post and we were still a mile away in inching traffic when my phone buzzed. I squirmed in my seat and pulled it out. I looked at the screen a moment.
“What’s wrong?” Alexander asked.
“It’s Linda,” I said, puzzled.