TRY AND TRY AGAIN. There was no doubt what that meant. She stared at the last name on the list. Shameless. The print wavered before her eyes as she thought of the gallant filly running her race. The fire, the vitality, the pure joy—it could all be extinguished in a second.
This time she didn’t hesitate. Her fingers stabbed out Clay’s number. She couldn’t fight this alone.
“Whoever it was, he was here, Clay. Early in the morning, early enough to slip that note into the newspaper. Right outside the house.”
Clay watched Dakota pace back and forth before the picture window. She spun around, her eyes as fiery as gems. “What happened? With Dad’s horses? How much was sabotage, and how much was bad luck?”
“It could have all been bad luck. I always thought someone helped it along a little, when he could.”
“And you think that someone was Jerry Tanner.”
“Isn’t that what you think?”
“I don’t know! Lucy said the man was tall. Taller than Tanner, at any rate.” Frustrated, she ran her fingers through her golden hair.
He didn’t want to say it, but he had to. “Maybe Lucy lied.”
“Why would she do that? She saved Shameless’s life!”
“Maybe she saw her father, what he was going to do. She could have been protecting him.”
“You think she made up that story?”
“I don’t know. But it’s possible, isn’t it? She could describe someone who didn’t look anything like Tanner.”
“I’m so scared, Clay.”
He stood up, went to her. She didn’t object when he folded her into his arms. “I know,” he said softly. He wished he could hold her forever and keep her from harm.
“It had to be Tanner. To think that anyone else hated her that much— someone she didn’t know about—was unbearable. “He hated Dad for firing him, and now he hates me.”
“I always thought he turned Coke’s horses loose, broke his equipment, things like that. It would have been easy enough to do. There are a lot of people who need money at a racetrack. He could have hired someone with access—a groom, an exercise rider. But I don’t know if he’d go so far as to injure a horse.”
“He’s spiteful enough.”
“It would be hard, Dakota. How would he do it? How would he weaken a horse’s leg so that it would break on the racetrack? I don’t think Tanner is smart enough.”
She broke away from him and waved the note. “You think that was just bad luck? All four horses?”
“I think whoever is threatening you is taking some poetic license. He might be able to take credit for giving a horse colic or even giving him something that might cause a heart attack. But the other two—I don’t think so. Stupidity destroyed Blue Kite. That was Jerry’s doing, but it couldn’t have been on purpose. He still worked for Coke then.”
“But the oleander was real. She could have died, Clay.”
There was nothing to say to that.
“Ernesto can’t even tell me where he was, or why he was gone. I thought he was trustworthy. If Lucy hadn’t been there . . .”
“But she was.”
Dakota started pacing again. “Maybe I should fire him.”
“I don’t think he’ll make the same mistake again. Have you seen him? He’s dragging around like he lost his whole family.”
“I was going to take him with me to Ruidoso, make him my assistant trainer. Now, I’m not so sure. Maybe I should take Lucy instead.”
“You were planning to leave her here?”
“The truth is, I don’t need her. Ernesto’s the more valuable of the two. He can ride Shameless in her workouts. And up until last night, I trusted him to stay with her. I can’t afford to take them both.”
“I wouldn’t want to be responsible for a sixteen-year-old girl,” Clay said.
“No. It’s impossible. I’ll have to break it to her soon.” Dakota paced back and forth. “Some reward, huh? She saves Shameless’s life, and Ernesto’s the one who gets to go to Ruidoso. I still can’t believe he left the filly alone, after everything I told him!”
“Do you want me to ask him what happened? My Spanish is pretty good.”
“Will you, Clay?”
“You know me, McAllister. I aim to please.”
The day of the Santa Cruz County Futurity dawned sunny and already warm. The Futurity was late in the day, so Dakota went over to watch the earlier races with Clay. She nodded to Dan Bolin, who was having a beer with the Hispanic man she’d seen him with last week. The man wore the same straw cowboy hat, a guayabera shirt, and brown polyester western-cut pants. He had an apple-shaped figure—a large stomach and small rear end.
“Who is that?” Dakota asked Clay.
“Rudy Gallego. Trainer from Hermosillo. Ernesto’s been picking up rides with his stable all week.”
“Does he have good horses?”
“One of them’s in the Futurity. Gallego’s got the money to buy the best.” Clay frowned. “I thought he’d be at the dispersal sale. He likes Black Oak horses. With Coke gone . . .”
“Gone?”
“Coke wouldn’t sell to him. Gallego makes a lot of his money match-racing horses in Mexico.”
Dakota had grown up with the sad fact that match-racing existed on both sides of the border, although it was much more prevalent in Mexico. Match-racing wasn’t regulated; you could drug a horse up to its eyeballs. Consequently, a lot of horses ran without pain on unsound limbs and broke down because of it. Horses were literally run into the ground, but a voracious appetite and unlimited money made sure that there was always a fresh supply of unfortunates for the meat grinder.
She changed the subject. “Did you talk to Ernesto?”
“He says he was asleep in his trailer. Lucy woke him up.”
“That’s not what she says.”
“One of them’s lying.”
“Both of them have reason to.” Ernesto, to keep his job. Lucy, to protect her father. She sighed. “I’ll have to talk to her soon about Ruidoso.”
“If it’s any consolation, I don’t think ol’ Jer would go for it anyway.”
“Whether he cares or not, there’s no way I’m taking responsibility for a sixteen-year-old girl at a racetrack in another state.” Lucy was getting too attached to her, and she blamed herself for encouraging it.
Lucy’s company wore thin after an hour or two. Perhaps it was because she tried too hard. Or maybe it was chemistry—some people just didn’t click, which was hardly Lucy’s fault. Bottom line, Dakota didn’t want to have her underfoot in Ruidoso.
“She’ll be all right,” Clay said. “That kid’s a real survivor.” He was about to say something more, when Rita appeared at his shoulder. Dressed to the nines as usual—an ensemble of red, blue, and yellow.
It must be Primary Color Day.
Rita touched Clay’s arm. “Who’s a survivor?”
“We were talking about Lucy Tanner.”
“Your groom?”
Dakota nodded. Rita squeezed Clay’s arm. “I have the most wonderful news!”
“Oh?”
“I’m going to Ruidoso! Isn’t that exciting?”
Dakota smiled until her cheeks hurt.
“I just talked to Jack today. He thinks that one colt, Mr. Moon Rock? He thinks he’ll do well up there, so I’ve supplemented him into the Rainbow Futurity.”
“You did what?” Clay demanded. “That’s fifteen thousand dollars!”
“He did so well in the trials, so I told Jack, I said, why don’t we give him his chance? If he does well there, I’ll supplement him into the All American.” She looked pointedly at Dakota.
Clay shook his head. “He’s not in that class. You’re throwing good money away. There are other races at Ruidoso—”
“He was the second-fastest qualifier.”
“He’s a nice horse,” Clay replied, “but, Rita, he got lucky in the trials.”
“Talk about sour grapes! His time was faster than any one of your horses.�
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Clay’s face took on that shuttered look. Dakota knew he wanted to say that good horses might run a slower time in a given race, but they always rose to the occasion when challenged. A horse’s time didn’t mean that much. Class did.
“Suit yourself,” Clay said. “As you’re so fond of saying, it’s your money.”
“You’re damn right it is!”
Dakota, feeling uncomfortable, withdrew. She looked back and saw them still near the rail, looking like a married couple in the middle of an argument. The analogy made her wince.
Shameless won the Santa Cruz County Futurity by a half length. It was too bad Clay wasn’t around to celebrate with Dakota this time, but Rita clung to him like a red, blue, and yellow leech. Dakota couldn’t be bothered dealing with that. Simple congratulations were exchanged. Dangerously was second. Rita’s horse came in last, but from where Dakota was standing, the woman didn’t look all that broken up about it.
Unable to shake the feeling that this race was somehow anticlimactic, Dakota led her filly to the test barn, where the winner was always checked for drugs. Two hours later, after Shameless had been bathed and walked and seen to, Dakota drove home, zapped herself a frozen dinner, and settled in to watch Casey’s Shadow, the classic film about two subjects close to her heart: a little-known trainer’s bid to win the All American Futurity . . . and a father’s love.
As she watched, she found herself wondering what Clay was doing and if Rita was doing it with him.
PART TWO
THE RAINBOW FUTURITY
TWENTY-SIX
May
On the Friday morning following the Santa Cruz County Futurity, Dakota hitched the Black Oak trailer to her father’s truck, loaded up Shameless and Tyke, and followed her ex-husband up the winding Sonoita road to Interstate 10.
When Clay offered to convoy with Dakota “for security reasons,” Dakota was secretly relieved. Always at the back of her mind was the knowledge that if Lucy hadn’t been there that night, Shameless might have eaten the oleander and suffered an agonizing death.
At least she wouldn’t have to worry about Tanner. Despite what he’d told her, he wouldn’t be going to Ruidoso this summer. He’d be following the Arizona county fair circuit instead, where he’d have a better chance at winning races and making money.
Tanner might hate Dakota with a passion, but she counted on the fact that he was too cheap to drive all the way to eastern New Mexico just for revenge, when he could be winning purses at Prescott Downs.
The drive from Sonoita to Ruidoso was a familiar one, although she hadn’t driven this route in a decade. The last time had been with Clay—not something she cared to dwell on.
Ernesto would be riding with Clay’s groom. They would be pulling one of three six-horse trailers for the Bar 66, so Dakota drove alone, which was the way she wanted it. She had Affirmed, Alydar, and Refrigerator for company. Refrigerator crouched in her cat carrier, glaring balefully at the dogs. The retrievers, naturally effusive, occasionally remembered Refrigerator’s plight and curled up on the seat, looking guilty. Codependent dogs. How California.
Dakota punched in Rigoletto, turned it up to rock-and-roll levels, and settled in for the seven-hour drive. The morning sun glinted off the top of the horse trailer ahead. Tawny grassland and smoky-green mesquite shimmered in the golden morning light, enormous white wildflowers dotted the median. Cadmium-yellow billboards advertised everything from motel chains to “freeze-dried rattlesnakes” and “real Indian headdresses.”
A combination roadside diner and filling station offered the weary traveler this dubious enticement: BURGER—FRIES—GAS!
And once in a while there appeared a reminder Dakota could have done without. Little white crosses, sometimes combined with heart-shaped wreaths of paper flowers, marked the places where traffic fatalities had occurred.
The caravan stopped to eat in Deming. They took up a block on a little-used side street, lining up along the curb. A few people came out of their houses and watched unabashedly as if the circus had come to town. Clay and Dakota watered the horses and left one of the grooms with them, promising to bring him back a hamburger and fries. They walked to the Sonic Drive-In on the main drag.
The Sonic was the same. Menus complete with washed-out photographs of fried food were suspended in glass pods beside each parking space. “We ate here ten years ago,” Clay said. “Remember?”
“It’s not a real standout,” she lied.
The humor in his eyes showed he didn’t believe her. “I wonder if the cabin’s the same.”
That summer, she and Clay had honeymooned in her dad’s cabin. Neither one of them had been to it since then. She wasn’t too thrilled about facing all those memories again. They’d had a lot of fun that summer.
A lot of fun.
With every mile they seemed to drive deeper into the past. New Mexico’s glory years had been the nuclear fifties and the space-age sixties, and the older motels and restaurants reflected that boon to their economy. The words satellite and rocket figured into more than a few of the old neon signs. Atomic symbols and phallic missiles dominated the scenery. Past Las Cruces, the barren pockmarked land did look like a moonscape. Ahead, leaden-blue thunderclouds boiled above the desert town of Alamogordo. Dakota glanced to her left, where bare, volcanic ramparts dropped away from the road. Clay had told her that the San Andres Mountains would be the most likely place for the release of the Mexican wolves. Later in the summer, there would be a wolf rally at the White Sands National Monument nearby. Rita was one of the chief organizers.
They passed the White Sands, which washed up to the road like chalky surf, dotted with dune grasses and dusty-looking shrubs. Farther into the park, the landscape was a rolling sea of white sand. It would be easy to get lost in there. Ahead, the storm clouds glowered in the hazy, New Mexico heat. Alamogordo stretched out at the foot of the Sacramento Mountains, which in this aqueous pre-storm light made Dakota think of the continental shelf dropping abruptly to the ocean floor.
At a stoplight in Alamogordo she saw a young woman trudging along the side of the road, looking tired and defeated. She reminded Dakota of Lucy; baggy T-shirt, jeans, backpack, short pixie hair.
Lucy’d tried everything to convince Dakota to take her along. When it got through to her that there was no chance, she’d hurled a dandy brush at Shameless and stalked off.
The brush had glanced harmlessly off the filly’s hip, but it made Dakota mad as hell.
Dakota wondered if Lucy had lied to protect her father. Tanner struck her as the type of man who would use his own daughter without a qualm. If Lucy had seen her father trying to poison the filly, she’d probably do anything to cover it up. Dakota had read enough pop psychology books and seen enough talk shows to know that abused children did some pretty strange things to protect their abusers, and there was little doubt Tanner abused Lucy. Just living in that pigsty qualified as abuse in her book.
The rain caught them just as the sign for Tularosa flashed by. Dakota stared at the horse trailer in front of her through the brimming glass, past the squeak-snap of the windshield wipers. Almost there.
As she slowed for the turnoff onto New Mexico 70, she surrendered to the thrill. The old excitement was back. Even the twin evils of Rita DeWeil and Jerry Tanner paled in comparison to the anticipation that increased with every mile. Rain pounded the roof of the pickup, but she saw holes in the clouds up ahead. She let out a whoop when she saw the first pine tree.
Dan Bolin drove home for lunch, feeling better than he had in weeks. Dakota McAllister was gone, and with her, half his worries. She wouldn’t be underfoot anymore.
He stopped by to see his two-year-olds. The barn and house looked a lot like the stables where he’d spent his youth back east. White colonial brick, gray slate roof, even spires—a la Churchill Downs—on either end. The barn had been built two years ago, before money got tight. Before Maria got sick from that goddamned virus that ruined her heart.
There were s
ix two-year-olds in all. All had been broken to saddle, although they’d never seen a racetrack. He patted one here, checked the legs on another, putting off the moment when he would have to go home. He hated to see Marie so sick, just wasting away. It was as if part of him was dying slowly. Helpless, impotent, he could only watch her fade away.
As he reached the house, Marie’s nurse bolted out the door and ran toward him. “Mr. Bolin! Hurry!”
Her face was flushed and her eyes were bright. It was either something very good or very bad. In the roller coaster his life had become, things seldom remained steady. He broke into a run, heart pounding in his chest. He always expected the worst, prepared himself for the words that would rip his life apart. He licked his lips, tried to speak. Is she gone? Couldn’t say it. Couldn’t put such a terrible thought into words.
“The hospital called a few minutes ago.” The nurse looked triumphant.
He couldn’t believe it. Well-being spread outwards from his heart to his limbs. It felt as if he’d just knocked back a shot of tequila.
He ran to the wall phone, fumbled with the receiver, punched the number he knew by heart. His knees were wobbly as a newborn colt’s. The impersonal voice of University Medical Center asked where they could direct his call. “Dr. Clawson. Cardiology,” he rapped out, feeling too important for this kind of byplay. Didn’t they understand that time was of the essence?
An interminable wait as the line rang.
A receptionist answered. “Dr. Clawson,” he said quickly. He identified himself, saying the doctor had called just a few minutes ago. Pacing, he was aware of the phone cord unraveling behind him. His heart surged like a locomotive in his chest.
Hurry, goddammit! Where the hell was he? He’d only called a few minutes ago. What’d he do, step out for a few holes of golf?
“Mr. Bolin?” The doctor’s voice boomed on the line. “Good news. We’ve found a donor. Can you get your wife here within the next hour or two?”
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