Malcolm stood turned slightly away, pouring coffee into a cup. He had his nerve. Surely, in this circumstance, smarting off to the boss could be expected? I took another deep breath. Since I couldn’t smart off, I’d no idea what to say.
“Don’t you think I can get my own breakfast?” is what came out.
He jumped and poured hot coffee on his hand.
“God damn it,” he said.
“Oh, shit.” I grabbed his arm and shoved it under the tap, turning on the cold water at the same time. “I’m sorry.” Served him right. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”
“What are doing sneaking up on me like that?”
“What am I doing? What are you doing in here?”
My fingers didn’t reach all the way around his wrist, but I could feel the bones, and his blood pumping under my thumb. Against my palm, the fine hairs on the back of his arm felt rough. He flexed his fingers, moving tendons and ligaments, and I released him, stepped away. I never, ever should have touched him. Shit.
The night before flooded back, and my face went hot. I must have been as red as his hand. He’d sat with me, that was all. He’d touched my elbow to lead me into the living room. At some point, though, he’d lifted me off the couch and put me in bed. I was asleep, but my body remembered the strength of his arms, the hardness of his chest under my cheek, the few steps he held me against him, how he’d gently lowered me to my mattress, covered me. His fingertips had stroked a few stray hairs off my face.
“Excuse me,” I said. I retreated to the bathroom, heart pounding. There, I filled the sink with cold water and submerged my face for as long as I could. Drowning held a certain appeal, but I’d lived through worse than this. I pulled on the jeans and shirt I’d worn the day before, hauled a brush through my hair, and ran wet fingers through it. Today had low humidity. My brown locks flowed past my shoulders in smooth waves, as if I’d done something to make them look good.
I returned to the kitchen where Malcolm had cleaned the coffee from the counter and floor, and put the bacon on paper towels. “Okay,” I said. “Where were we? Oh yes, you were going to explain what the hell you are doing in my apartment at…” I glared at the clock on the microwave. Holy cow. It was past nine.
Malcolm stirred the scrambled eggs. “How do you like your coffee?”
He leaned against the counter, too relaxed. He filled all available space and sucked the oxygen out of the room too, or so it felt to my lungs. He must have gone home, because he wore jeans and a navy, long-sleeved polo shirt, the sleeves pushed up to his elbows. His feet were bare. The clogs were at the top of my stairs. If he was pissed I’d overslept, I couldn’t tell.
“What?” I asked.
His gaze slid down to my feet. So, we were both barefoot, what of it? What of it was an intimacy that didn’t belong. When his eyes returned to my face, he smiled a little, enjoying my uncertainty, the bastard.
“You drink coffee, right?”
I pursed my lips, unsure of how to approach this situation. I had a right to be mad he’d let himself in. I invited him the night before, but that wasn’t a carte blanche, why-don’t-you-come-up-and-see-me-any-time kind of invite.
I noticed fresh flowers on my kitchen table, and it hit me that the horses weren’t whinnying for their breakfast. I pressed my fingers to my temples. The coffee smelled good. “Yes,” I answered. “With cream. But…” my eyes strayed to the stairs.
“I’ve already fed them,” he said.
Oh great. Again, my plan to get the skinny ones fat and the fat ones slim had been thwarted. Wait, how had I slept through that? It was a noisy activity, what with the horses banging their hooves on stall doors, and buckets of feed knocking into each other, and the metal scoop clanging. And, why were there flowers on the table?
“I found your feeding schedule.” He opened the fridge, pulled out the cream, poured some in a cup. “Good idea about separating them. Wish I’d thought of it.”
The night before I’d written feeding instructions on a white board in the tack room.
He caught me staring at the flowers, handed me the coffee. “Happy Birthday, Miss Parker.”
- 11 -
I jerked my head around to look at what I called The Thing—an amalgamation of calendar, almanac, horoscope, and housekeeping hints. It included livestock gestation tables, weight and measurement conversions, and instructions on how to plant by the phases of the moon. It had been hanging on the wall when I arrived and was so fascinating, I didn’t replace it. In any case, I hadn’t turned it from April to May, what with all the excitement the day before. I took it down, flipped the page, and tacked it back in place. Sure enough, it was May first, and I’d forgotten my own birthday.
Malcolm used this lull to load two plates with bacon and eggs and put them on the small table. The only way he knew it was my birthday was if Penny told him. And the only reason she would tell him that was if she told him everything. Crapola. To think I’d been feeling sorry for her, even taken her off my “I hate your guts” list.
I sat at the table and considered giving Malcolm an earful of what I thought of his breaking and breakfast making. But the food smelled terrific, even if it wasn’t my usual fare. I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. After all, he’d brought a posy, and as much as I disliked having my privacy invaded, I rarely received flowers.
They were small and delicate and fresh. Purple, white, and blue, with tiny bugs crawling on the stems.
“Where’d you get the flowers?”
Malcolm swallowed a bite of his eggs. “In the woods.”
“You went down to the woods this morning and picked flowers?”
“Figured you could use cheering up.” He gently flicked the deep blue blossoms. “Bluebells. Dutchman’s Breeches.” He pointed to several rows of a white flower that did look like poofy little breeches. “Violets, and wild hyacinth.”
“Okay, okay. I’m impressed.” He could identify birds and flowers. “So, do you often let yourself into your employee’s living quarters and cook breakfast?”
“First time offender, your honor.” He put one hand over his heart. “I throw myself on the mercy of the court.”
He had an engaging grin, and I liked sitting at the table with him. I bit off a piece of bacon, narrowed my eyes. “Perhaps a short parole would be best, with time off for good behavior…if there is any.”
He hung his head and pretended to look repentant. “I accept your decision.”
I chewed and stared out the window for a while. The bacon was thick-sliced and peppered, greasy and good.
“Do you have any ideas about what happened to Norman, or why?” I asked.
The grin faded. I realized this whole breaking and breakfast making birthday surprise was as much a distraction for him as it was for me, and I regretted spoiling the mood by bringing up the situation.
He shook his head. “I didn’t know Norman very well. I hired him as a favor to Sandy. Dex One was against it, said he had a history of drug abuse. But Sandy promised he was clean. And there weren’t any problems.”
“Until yesterday.”
“Right. Until yesterday. I don’t know what he was into, but I guess he got in over his head.”
Yeah, in shit. “But whatever it was, who would want to put him in your manure pile?”
“I was up all night wondering the same thing. But I intend to find out. Whoever did this will pay.”
It was hard to tell what he was more enraged about—Norman’s death or the fact that whoever did it put him in his manure pile—but I think that last statement came out way stronger than he intended. He ran his hand over his unshaven cheek. He didn’t seem to bother with shaving when he wasn’t working.
“Look,” he said, “let’s avoid that subject for now. I propose we take the day off. Get out of here for a while.”
“You haven’t been here.”
“Another good point.”
“I’m not trying to make points.”
He stabbed at
his eggs. “Look—”
“How did you know it was my birthday?”
He took a moment to stare out the window. The view was mostly of the north roof of the barn.
“Your cousin,” he said. “Tell you what. Why don’t you get ready to go while I finish up with the horses. Meet me out front in ten minutes. We can talk in the car.” He rose and took his dishes to the sink, rinsed them off. Considerate.
I followed with my plate and cup. “Where are we going?” It might make a difference in what I wore, I told myself.
He left the kitchen, and I could hear him stepping into his clogs. “You’re new here,” he called back to me. “You decide. Zoo, art museum, brewery, the Arch…”
I kept the water running while I dumped the rest of the coffee. I shouldn’t spend the day with him, should I? I raised my voice to be heard over the water. “I can’t go with you. You’re the boss, and…what about your wife?”
During the silence that followed, I shut off the tap and dried my hands, then poked my head around the corner. He stood at the top of the stairs with his back to me. In a rare moment of self-restraint, I kept my mouth shut and waited.
After what felt like five minutes during which I was glad to have the dishtowel to twist, he said, “My soon-to-be ex-wife doesn’t give a rat’s ass what I do with my time.”
In his voice, I heard old resentment and hurt, disappointment and relief.
“We sign the papers next week,” he continued, and faced me. “I can’t do anything about being boss, but I’d like you to consider a working partnership.” He headed down the stairs. “Ten minutes,” he said as he reached the bottom.
~~~
Ten minutes later I shut the door of a 1972 British racing green Jaguar XJ6 and strapped myself in. I’d seen a few when I’d been at school in England, and some still cruised Long Island, too, mostly on the East End. While I consider cars merely a means of getting from point A to point B, I had to admit to a long-held yearning to ride in one of these. I stroked the walnut dash.
“Glad you like it,” he said.
We sat there a moment, and I remembered the rest of my dream with Wastrel. We’d been galloping, bareback, no bridle, like you see sometimes in the movies. But there were other horses as well, loose and running and scared. Some of them looked vaguely familiar. I’d wondered about my first dream—Wastrel pawing the manure pile, then us finding Norman. No connection, I’m sure. Malcolm put the car in gear.
“Wait,” I said. I got out and checked the latches on all the gates, then did a quick run-through of the barn to make sure all was secure.
“Don’t trust me?” he asked when I’d clicked my seatbelt again.
“It’s not that,” I said.
He accepted this without comment and drove out, took it easy for the twisty hilly miles, and let the engine stretch when we reached the highway.
“So,” I said, “exactly what do you mean by partnership? As I see it, you own everything, and I do all the work.”
“You have a p—”
“Don’t say it.”
“Okay. Ever heard of sweat equity?”
I got a funny feeling in the pit of my stomach. Coming on the heels of the situation, I was afraid to think anything. But that feeling, it was the thrill of hope. I quashed it before it became expectation. “Are you offering something?” I watched him with my peripheral vision. He kept his eyes on the road and didn’t answer for a few breaths.
Finally, he said, “Maybe. A year is a long time.”
“I’ll be happy to get out of here alive with my letter of recommendation.”
Self-restraint remained an elusive virtue for me. Sometimes, I thought I should wear a shirt that said, “Help me, I’m talking, and I can’t shut up.”
Malcolm, on the other hand, said nothing. For miles. That gave me time to consider the implications of his maybe offer, and of his impending divorce.
My thoughts ran in circles, though, raising dust and little else. Without more information, I couldn’t weigh the pros and cons of a partnership. As for his divorce, that complicated matters. Sitting so close to him set my skin tingling, like an itch I couldn’t scratch.
After about half an hour of letting me stew, Malcolm piped up. “Given that Penny explained what you are doing here, it’s only fair you know I have a one-year deadline, too.”
“I’m sorry about what I said before.”
“Okay,” he said, and he gave my wrist a reassuring touch.
I fought the urge to yank my hand away and rub it, like I’d been scorched. He released me. He felt it too? What were we doing shut in this car for over an hour, anyway? How had things gotten so out of control? Oh, yeah. Norman. The little twerp. He’d ruined everything.
~~~
We’d decided on the art museum. By the time we arrived, I knew Malcolm’s father wanted to sell the land to developers. He’d given his son a year to prove the farm could make money. Otherwise, he was cashing in. Now, I understood the comment Malcolm had made about keeping the land to himself. He wanted to preserve it, not have hundreds of houses built on it. That was a sentiment I understood. Much of Long Island’s farmland had long ago been bulldozed into suburban sprawl and strip malls, and it wasn’t pretty.
Renting horses to the public brought in much-needed income. But it wasn’t in Malcolm’s long-term plan. He had many ideas. Many of these ideas relied on my abilities, or those of someone like me. Short-term, boarding and riding lessons seemed the best option. To me, the fewer lessons, the better. But liability was high renting horses for people to tootle around the trails, too.
He tossed out the possibilities of a boarding-bed-and-breakfast, a retirement farm, a rehab facility, and even holding equine spirituality seminars. For the time being, he’d consider anything that would pay the bills, and he was open to suggestions.
We walked in silence after passing through the high-ceilinged, marbled entrance hall of the museum. We went through three galleries before he said anything.
“You’re quiet,” he said.
“You’re supposed to be quiet in here,” I whispered. “It’s like a library.”
“In that case, think they’d mind if we checked out one of the collection? This one would look good over my fireplace.”
He indicated a pastoral landscape I thought would do better in the fireplace.
“They would frown on that most severely. Remember your parole status. You don’t want to jeopardize that further.”
“Further?”
“Shush.”
He steered me to the restaurant.
“Enough whispering,” he said when we were seated.
I glanced at the menu. Malcolm’s breakfast had left me full. Especially since I hadn’t ridden or done anything to work it off. I ordered salad and snuck a peek in my wallet. Empty.
“I’m buying,” he said.
Did he have x-ray vision or something? He did have that square Superman kind of jaw. “No,” I said.
He sighed. “It’s your birthday, remember? My treat.”
“Okay,” I said. “Just this once.”
He smiled.
I was doomed.
After the waitress took our order, he asked, “Why don’t you teach riding? With your experience and training—”
“I thought Penny told you everything?”
“I don’t know what you mean by everything. She said you needed a year’s contract, and that was fine with me. Although, I hope it will turn out to be longer.”
“It’s a little soon—”
“I mean I hope the farm is doing well enough to offer more, if you want it. That’s what I meant.”
He’d fallen over himself pretty quickly to make that explanation. Which meant it wasn’t what he meant. Maybe. Oh, hell, I didn’t even know what I meant. But I was glad to learn Penny hadn’t revealed all my secrets.
“I prefer not to teach,” I said. “I’m not very good at it.”
I must have had a neon sign on my forehead flashing �
�big fat lie.” I hate lying, really I do. But I didn’t want to talk about this. It hurt too much.
“Have you tried?”
“Yes. It didn’t work out.”
“I see.”
He saw. Yeah, right. I felt myself squirm inwardly. But at the length truth will out. Shakespeare knew. I took one more stab at putting him off. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Try me.”
He wanted to know about me. Had a right to, I supposed. Fair enough. And he would understand. I could see it in his eyes. There was softness there, a safe place to land.
“Someone got hurt. A girl. Heidi. She was getting ready for a lesson. The others were already in the ring with me. They were taunting her, the others. They were mean. Heidi was always running late.” I reached back, smelled the barn and the soft, slightly damp footing of the indoor arena. Saw Heidi’s ready smile. “She hurried her pony in and didn’t double check the girth. Another rider…I had my back turned for just a moment.”
“The world can change in a moment,” he said.
I nodded. He did understand, but I hadn’t shared this with anyone who didn’t already know about it before.
“This other rider, she smacked Heidi’s pony on the back with her riding crop just as Heidi put her foot in the stirrup.”
I drifted away, my gaze on nothing in particular, the saltshaker, maybe. But the hot sting of tears brought me up short. I wiped at them and looked at him. No judgment, only compassion. It was okay to tell him.
“He jumped forward,” Malcolm said softly. “Her pony. And the saddle slipped.”
I nodded. “She fell…and got all tangled…and dragged…and her pony. He panicked. I stopped him as soon as I could.” I looked around the restaurant. It was a weekday. Slow. Only an older couple near the window. “I’m sorry,” I said.
“I’m sorry I asked about it. But it wasn’t your fault.”
“She died.” I said. “She had on a helmet, so her head was okay, but there were internal injuries. Liver, spleen, lungs, everything got all mangled.”
Candace Carrabus - Dreamhorse 01 - On the Buckle Page 9