Everyone stared, huddled together there for a moment...the young man nodding with authority, Ben, Tom, Dawn, and Randy all shaking their heads. Then it was Randy who grabbed the groom by the arm, and so suddenly, it startled everyone.
“When did this happen?”
The young man swallowed hard and stammered, considerably more frightened now than when Tom had a hold of him. His head barely reached Randy’s shoulder. “About a m-m-month ago.”
“I need to know exactly when.” Randy pulled him closer then gave him a little shove for emphasis. “So you go find out when this happened. And don’t make me come looking for you. You understand?”
The young man nodded, hightailing it, and Randy turned to Ben. “I’m going to go find the vet assigned to the sale,” he said, already rolling up his sleeves. “He can check her or I will.”
Dawn was right behind him, sick to her stomach and on her way to visit the nearest ladies room. “See if you can find me a twitch,” he called to her over his shoulder.
She nodded, going one way, Randy another, and Ben leaned back against the wall, shaking his head.
Tom sat down heavily on a bale of hay. “It’s ironic as hell, don’t you think? One never knows.” He drew a breath and sighed as he looked at Ben. “Here we are...and the old coot’s daughter might be knocked up again.”
Within minutes, Randy had found a Dr. Greene, the veterinarian covering the sale, and explained the situation to him. He gave Randy what supplies he needed, offered to check on a possible ruling, and said he’d come to the barn as soon as he acquired the information.
Randy ran into the groom on the way back to the barn and dragged him along with him. Dawn was staring into the filly’s stall, thinking how terribly sad the whole story was, when Randy walked up behind her.
“Our little friend here says this all happened forty-five days ago.”
The young man nodded at Ben and Tom. “I checked with the maid. She remembered when they took him away.” No sooner said, he turned to leave.
Randy stopped him. “You’re not done. You get to hold her.” He took the twitch from Dawn and handed it to him. The young man didn’t argue.
Randy stacked several bales of hay just outside the stall door and had the groom back the filly up flush to them. If she was going to start kicking, it would serve as protection. When he got her into position, out came the plastic glove and lubricating jelly.
During the examination, his expression varied. He’d grimace, then frown and look off, then grimace again; this whenever the filly would hump her back and strain, a natural reflex when trying to expel something. Then he’d move, changing the angle of his arm somewhat, frown, look off, and grimace some more.
“Get her to relax,” he told the groom. “Come on, talk to her.” She was squeezing the life out of his arm. “No, don’t do that.” The groom was about to tighten down on the twitch. “Just talk to her.”
When she relaxed, he was able to palpate her. Dr. Greene soon appeared at his side. The two of them talked follicles then, heat cycles, and a few things Dawn had never heard of before. Randy joked with Dr. Greene at one point about trading places with him. Greene chuckled, saying no thanks, to look at the filly’s eyes. “I’ll pass,” he said. Though no longer straining, she’d taken to picking up one of her hind legs in an increasingly threatening way, first her left then her right.
“Almost done, Momma,” Randy said. “Hold on. Hold on...” The groom was cooing softly a mile a minute to her. “There now. There now.” Finally Randy eased his arm out and stepped back, turning the glove inside out as he peeled it off and dropped it to the ground.
He looked at Ben. “Well, I’m almost sure she’s not in foal, but...” He glanced at Dawn and hesitated. “I just wish there wasn’t so much at stake here. A hundred and thirty thousand dollars for a three-year old filly in foal to a stud pony...” He shook his head, as the tremendous weight of that statement hung in the air. He turned to Dr. Greene. “What did you find out?”
“You can void the sale. You should’ve been told of the possibility.”
Ben and Tom nodded, no doubt about it. “So now what?” Tom asked.
Ben shook his head.
“I wish I could be totally positive for you, Ben,” Randy said. “But it’s too soon.”
Dr. Greene concurred. “Maybe another week or so. But unfortunately, if you’re going to void the sale, you have to do it now before any money changes hands.”
Ben looked at Dawn, wanting to ask her how she felt about it, but couldn’t. Not if he was going to respect her wish that Randy not know how involved she was. He held his hands out. It was the only thing he could think to do. A rather helpless gesture he hoped she’d understand. Dawn nodded.
All right, he said to himself, and turned to Randy. “I’m a racetracker. Give me some odds.”
Randy smiled. “On her not being in foal?” He didn’t want there to be any misunderstanding.
“Yes.”
Randy glanced in at the filly; standing in the back of her stall, head down, ears pinned and pouting. “How’s two hundred to one?”
Ben smiled. “Good enough for me.” He tapped Tom on the arm. “You go make arrangements to have them shipped and I’ll go settle up.”
Tom and Ben drove straight through on the way back. Dawn and Randy on the other hand, stopped about halfway for something to eat. “I’m starving,” Dawn said, and as soon as she started to order, Randy found himself wondering if he’d have enough money to pay. He did a quick mental count of how much he had in his wallet.
“I’ll have the prime rib, rare please,” she said, “baked potato with extra sour cream. No butter on the potato please. And blue cheese on the salad, no radishes.”
The waiter smiled. “What would you like to drink?”
“A glass of light beer, preferably draft if it’s very cold. Otherwise, bring it in a bottle, no can please. I’ll pour it myself,” she added, smiling as she handed him the menu.
Her insistence on having things precisely the way she wanted them had been passed on to her by her mother, who’d been careful to point out that in order to have it that way, one must be very precise with their requests.
“Your order, sir?” the waiter asked, addressing Randy but barely taking his eyes off Dawn.
Randy handed him his menu. “I’ll have the same, but with Italian dressing on the salad.”
The meal was served to perfection, delicious, they each had another beer, and much to Randy’s relief, he had enough to pay the check. Dawn insisted on leaving the tip though, and he couldn’t help notice as she opened her wallet, that it was crammed full with credit cards. At least twenty of them, maybe more. He wondered how a groom at the track, who probably got somewhere between a hundred and a half to two hundred dollars a week, could have so many. Plus a wad of cash. And he was still thinking about it as they walked to the car.
Dawn yawned, covering her mouth with her hand.
Randy smiled. “Do you want me to drive?”
“If you don’t mind.” She linked her arm in his. “We started really early this morning. I’m exhausted.”
Mind? He didn’t mind. He wasn’t even tired. How could he be? His mind was a whirl of unanswered questions. He’d just spent another entire afternoon and evening with her, and still didn’t know anything about her...aside from the fact that she had a roommate, whom she didn’t phone today, that she cared a great deal for Ben and seemingly Tom, and that she loved horses.
They weren’t on the road five miles when Dawn stretched her legs to the side and burrowed down on Randy’s shoulder. She murmured something about the setting sun and not being able to keep her eyes open. Within minutes, the rhythmic sound of her breathing told him she was asleep. He adjusted the volume on the radio lower, and glanced at her and smiled. She was so pretty.
And the car. Driving it was every bit of what he thought it would be. On a stretch of road without another car in sight, he took it up well past ninety before easing up on the
gas, then did it again, just for fun. He loved driving it. But more importantly, and with every passing moment, quiet, vague, playing hard to get or not, he loved being with Dawn.
It wasn’t until he parked next to his truck at the racetrack and turned the engine off, that Dawn woke. She sat back, tucking some loose stands of hair off her face and into her braid.
“Hey, sleepy head...” Randy touched her cheek gently, so soft, and leaned close and kissed her… Then kissed her again...
The stable guard tapped on the hood, startling both of them. When Randy turned and rolled down the window, the guard peered in.
“Thought that was you, Doc. We’ve got an emergency in the first barn. A horse caught his neck on the sheet metal on his door and damn near slit his throat open. You better hurry. I haven’t been able to get a hold of anyone else.”
Randy tilted his head back and sighed. “I’ll be right there.”
Dawn made a squeamish face. “Are you going to need help?”
“No. If it’s as bad as it sounds, there’ll be blood everywhere. You don’t need to be there.”
After he got out, Dawn moved over behind the wheel, adjusting the seat and getting comfortable before putting on her gloves. When she looked up at him, he was smiling at her.
“What?” she said.
“Nothing,” he replied, his smile lingering. “Just you.” The way she was, the way she did things, everything. He leaned down and kissed her. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Chapter Ten
It was after eleven the following morning before Randy got a break and made his way to the Miller barn. He checked the tack room first, which was empty, and called out for Dawn.
Tom poked his head out the third stall. “She’s gone.”
“Where’d she go?” Randy asked, walking toward him.
“I don’t know. She mentioned something about lunch with her cousin.”
Randy glanced at his watch. “Will she be back today?”
“Not until feeding time.” Tom eyed him curiously. “Why? What’s up?”
“Nothing.” Randy reached into his shirt pocket and sorted through his umpteen messages. “I just wanted to talk to her.”
“Guess it’ll have to wait.”
“I guess it will.” Randy started to walk away, but stopped. “Tell me, what do you know about her?”
Tom smiled. “Not much.”
“Come on, anything’s more than I know.”
Tom laughed. “My God, man, you spent four whole hours alone with her yesterday in that cracker-box car of hers, and you don’t know anything about her?”
“As a matter of fact, no. On the way there, we talked about where we were going. And on the way back, she slept.”
“At least she wasn’t eating.”
Randy laughed. “No, she did that first.” He glanced away, shaking his head. “Does she live close by?”
“About twenty minutes from here.”
“Where at?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never been there.”
Tom was starting to aggravate him. “Then how do you know it’s twenty minutes from here?”
“Because she said it was.” Tom grinned. “That’s if she doesn’t catch any lights.”
Randy folded his arms across his chest. “You’re having a real time with me, aren’t ya?”
Tom shrugged, his grin widening.
“Screw you,” Randy said, walking away.
Tom leaned out the stall. He’d had his fun. “Her address is on the bulletin board in the tack room. She wrote it there a long time ago for Ben’s accountant.”
Randy wrote down the number on his hand, thanked Tom, and left.
Ben had gone home early to wait for the arrival of All Together and the broodmare, and was sitting in the kitchen, Meg’s kitchen, drinking a cup of coffee. When his head started pounding with the second cup, he remembered he hadn’t taken his blood pressure pill. He went into the bathroom to get one and downed it along with two aspirins for his headache. They were his last. He’d have to get some more. This was the third headache he’d had this week. As he was walking back to the kitchen, he looked out the window and noticed the van had arrived.
George, his farmhand, led the broodmare down the ramp first. Ben greeted the driver and shook his hand. “How was the trip?”
“Well, aside from that one there raising hell the whole way,” he said, referring to All Together who was whinnying, tossing her head, and pawing. “Everything was fine.”
When George returned, he and the driver walked up the ramp and clamped a lead shank on her, removed the bar keeping her in place, unhooked her, and led her out.
Ben marveled. Without a doubt, she was one of the finest-looking Thoroughbreds he’d ever seen. And this, right off the farm. He could just imagine what she’d look like tucked-up and in racing condition.
On the ground, she whinnied and whinnied with her head high, darting her eyes in all directions as she danced circles around George.
“Here, I’ll take her.” Ben led her into the barn with a smile on his face. A smile that took on added meaning, when she stopped in front of a two-year-old colt’s stall, and promptly raised her tail and showed signs of being in heat.
He tugged at her, laughing. “Put it on ice, sweetheart,” he said. “You’re going to be a racehorse first.”
Randy was a good forty miles from the track at feeding time and having one of those days when nothing goes as planned. He didn’t get home until well past seven. He was tired enough to just have a beer and fall into bed, but he had something more important on his mind. He showered, dressed, splashed on some cologne, and started out.
Dawn had also had a full day, and stood tired and hungry as she rummaged through the refrigerator. “When did you buy this yogurt?” she asked Linda.
“I don’t know, a couple of days ago. What’s the date?”
Dawn sighed. “The date means nothing once it’s open.” She checked the date anyway. Three days from now. “Did you open it yesterday or the day before?”
Linda shrugged. “I can’t remember. Isn’t there any more?”
Dawn shook her head, staring into the container. Apricot crunch. It looked good, still... She smelled it. It smelled like yogurt. “Jesus, why do you do this? How am I supposed to know?”
Linda had opened it just for a taste. She was on a diet. She was always on a diet. And she’d had a craving. “I wish you could appreciate my discipline,” she said, pointing out how she’d only had two or three tiny spoonfuls. “Instead of...”
Dawn sniffed the container again, then shook her head and dropped it in the wastebasket. Why take a chance? “I’m going to take a shower.” She started down the hall.
“Wait, I forgot to tell you, Ben called. He said to tell you the filly arrived and that she’s horsing.”
Dawn smiled.
“What’s that mean?”
“It means she’s not in foal.”
“Oh. I see. That’s good, right?”
“Right.”
Randy parked in front of Dawn’s apartment building, turned the ignition off, and just looked around for a moment. “Jesus Christ,” he muttered. They didn’t have neighborhoods like this back where he came from. In fact, the only other time he’d been anywhere similar was on an emergency call that turned out to be a pampered poodle with its own bedroom and color television. The growling, yapping, snapping little thing was having a bad day. It needed its anal glands expressed. Fun job.
He stepped down out of the truck and looked around again. What was Dawn doing here? Part of him hoped he’d gotten the wrong address. But there was her Jaguar. He shook his head in amazement and walked up the steps.
It didn’t surprise him to encounter a lobby attendant as soon as he opened the thick steel door and ventured inside. But it did unnerve him a little to see that the man was armed.
“May I assist you?”
“Yes. I’m here to see Dawn Fioritto.”
“Your name, please?”
/>
“Randy Iredell.”
“I’ll ring her. Please be seated.”
Randy was too antsy to sit down, and walked around the lobby instead, staring idly at the pictures on the walls. From somewhere, he thought he smelled Chinese food cooking.
Linda answered the intercom. “Yes, Richard?”
Randy turned. The voice didn’t sound like Dawn’s.
“There’s a gentleman here to see Dawn. Are you expecting someone?”
“No. Who is it?”
“A Randy Iredell.”
A momentary silence made Randy’s armpits start to perspire.
“Send him up.”
The attendant pointed to the elevator. “It’s Suite 503. Turn left when you get off.”
Linda clicked off the intercom, ran down the hall, and threw open Dawn’s bedroom door. “Your vet’s here!” she yelled. “Hurry and get dressed!”
The doorbell rang then, and she rushed back, pausing to take a deep breath before she opened the door.
Randy smiled. “You’re right,” he said, referring to her comment on the intercom. “I’m not expected. Is Dawn home?”
Linda nodded, silently agreeing with Dawn about how incredibly good-looking he was. Gorgeous was the word, and even bigger than she’d described him. “How tall are you?”
Randy chuckled. “Six four.”
Linda smiled, gazing up at him all dreamy eyed.
“Is uh...is Dawn home?”
Linda blushed. “Oh yes, I’m sorry. She is, yes, come in.” She stepped aside and motioned to the couch. “Have a seat. I’ll go get her.” She walked down the hall to Dawn’s room and after closing the door behind her, promptly started jumping up and down.
Dawn came out of the bathroom, saw her, and gave her a funny look. “What are you doing?”
“Didn’t you hear me?”
Dawn was still in her robe, her hair wrapped in a towel like a turban.
Winning Odds Trilogy Page 12