Carolyn McSparren - If Wishes Were Horses

“No problem.”

She began to giggle. “You’re as dirty as I am.”

He shrugged and stood in front of her. “Dry cleaners clean.”

“Yeah.” She pulled herself up. At that moment, Pat came around the corner followed by Vic and Angie. “You fall?” Vic asked with studied casualness.

“Trusty quit dirty on me. I’m okay.” She cocked her thumb at Pat. “I think your daddy’s ready to go. And Pat, better wear jeans tomorrow.” She limped toward the lounge.

Mike watched her. She hurt considerably more than she was willing to let on. Maybe she’d cracked a rib. He ought to drag her to a doctor just to be sure. She’d never go. Hardheaded, opinionated damned female. He caught his breath. Great, he thought, now I’ve got two of them to worry about. Where in hell had that thought come from.

“WHO WAS THAT masked man?” Angie asked as she flopped down in one of the shabby leather club chairs in the clients’ lounge. The sound of Mike’s Volvo on the gravel driveway was just fading.

Liz lay stretched on the equally shabby leather couch.

Angie continued, “There’s something realty—grrrr—sexy about him.”

“I hadn’t noticed,” Liz lied. “You’re a married woman. You shouldn’t be growling at other men.”

“Shoot, I growl at everybody.”

“Unfortunately, so does he.” Liz sat up slowly. She was really beginning to stiffen up. “He’s Mike Whitten, the chairman of the board of trustees at Edenvale School. The guy we have to convince to give us their after-school riding program this fall.”

“That’s Mike Whitten?” Angie began to laugh. “God help you. Kevin knows him from the racquet club. Says he’s rumored to drink a quart of antifreeze every morning just to keep his blood circulating.”

“I can believe it.” Liz began to knead her shoulders. “He’s Mr. Iceberg to everyone except that kid of his.”

“Well, I think he’s gorgeous in a craggy sort of way. Anyway, enough about the intimidating Mr. Whitten. Am I back in your good graces?”

“Partially.”

Vic came in, dug a diet soda out of the refrigerator and took the club chair across from Angie. She looked her niece over carefully. “You really okay?”

“Sure. And feeling foolish.”

Angie sighed, leaned forward and dropped her brown hands between her knees. “Liz isn’t the only one feeling foolish.”

“Why did you leave us?” Vic asked.

Angie hunched her shoulders and took a deep breath. “After Frank died, I stopped winning. I knew it wasn’t your fault, but I thought if I went over to Mark I could start winning again. And I did, too, for a little while.”

“What went wrong?”

“God, everything. He started badgering me to sell both my horses and let him find me some better ones—meaning more expensive. He was furious when I refused, and even more furious when I decided to breed Boop against his wishes.”

“Why did you?” Liz asked.

Angie blushed. “It’s being around Kevin and all those babies. I wanted a baby—something to love, even if it was a foal. And I’ll move Charlie here too if you’ve got room for another jumper.”

“Absolutely,” Vic said.

“Okay,” Angie said. “I’ll leave you a letter of authorization to pick up Charlie tomorrow and bring him here.”

“And the problem of not winning that Mark was supposed to solve for you...?”

Angie shrugged. “I can’t ride Boop until her baby is six months old and weaned. Then it’ll take another three months to get her in condition to jump again. That puts us into next spring, so I won’t be riding any hunters unless I can pick up a few rides for some of your clients, or maybe even for Liz, if she’s got too many horses to ride.”

“We’ll be glad to have you,” Vic said.

“So you don’t care about winning any longer?” Liz asked. “Don’t believe that for a second.”

Angie sat up straight and held her hands out. “Hey, you two are far and away the best trainers I know. I intend to win with you. ValleyCrest is developing clout again with the pair of you. The people that matter are noticing you.” She raised her eyebrows. “You’re even starting to scare a few people like Mark. Goody, goody.”

LATER, after Liz and Vic shared a salad and a chicken sandwich, Liz bedded all her animals for the night, including Jacko the parrot, and climbed into her old clawfooted tub to soak her bruises in a herbal bath. As she sank into the blissfully hot water, she wondered what Mike Whitten was having for dinner with his Pitti-Pat. Healthy junk. She smiled. He had no idea she and Pat were conspiring against him.

She felt a tingle in the pit of her stomach as she remembered the feel of his muscular arm around her, his long fingers on her thigh. Much to her disgust she agreed with Angie. He did exude a kind of wild sexiness.

Liz hadn’t been interested in any man in a very long time. Not only were the pickings slim, but she told herself she didn’t have time for another relationship that would wind up going nowhere. Men did not like to share her attention with the horses. They resented the fact that the horses came first. Always had, always would. And so would the dogs, the cats and the parrots. Animals didn’t break your heart. Men invariably did.

But maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to feel Mike’s arm around her again. Would it be worth falling off a very tall horse to get him to touch her?

“Nah,” she said aloud and closed her eyes. “Although I could always fall off a shorter horse.”

CHAPTER FIVE

DURING DINNER, Pat gave Mike a replay of every moment of her first day at camp.

Mike thought she seemed happier than he had ever seen her. Her face was flushed...

He reached across the table and laid the back of his hand against her forehead.

“Oh, Daddy,” Pat snapped. “I don’t have any fever.”

“You’ve got a lot of color in your cheeks.”

“The sun does that.” Pat snorted. “Get a grip. I feel great!” She told him for the third time how she’d trotted that pony all by herself. A couple of times she nearly slipped and told him the truth—about how she stayed behind so that Liz could help her work through her fear. She managed to catch herself in time.

She was used to giving her father a heavily edited version of her activities. She knew he’d have a cat fit if he ever caught on to some of the things she did when he wasn’t around, and Mrs. H. had promised not to snitch on her. It wasn’t lying exactly. She didn’t want Mike to worry—well, not any more than he did, at any rate.

Maybe when he saw how much fun she was having he’d loosen up a little. She checked to see how he was taking all this. He had a goofy grin on his face. She got up to kiss his cheek.

And she kept up the chatter. Mike found he was listening with a tinge of jealousy. Pat was the only person left in his life who loved him. God knew he loved her. And now she seemed to be developing a crush on Liz Matthews. All his colleagues had warned him that sooner or later Pat would grow up and begin to move away from him.

Strange. He’d never rebelled against his parents. He’d felt no more for them than they had for him. They saw him as a certificate of deposit—tend it properly and the dividends would be worth the expense.

Well, he’d paid off handsomely by presenting them with a large trust fund that would make their years of retirement from the faculty at Berkeley more than comfortable. And then he’d walked out of their lives.

That was almost twenty years ago. He doubted they noticed that he no longer called or came to see them. His father would still be writing stuffy papers about the state of the economy for academic journals, and his mother would be so engrossed in her mathematical formulae that she’d forget dinner.