A Love Like Ours (4 page)

“Do you want to get married one day?” Amber asked.

“Sure. I just don’t know whether a husband is in God’s plan for me or not.”

“Are you easily attracted to guys you meet?”

“No.” In fact, it was unusual for any man to stir her. She got asked out now and then, sometimes said yes, and even more rarely felt sparks. Even when she did feel sparks, though, they started dwindling by the fourth or fifth date. She was always relieved when she convinced the guys to move on.

“Have you had many boyfriends?”

“No. You?”

“My story’s the opposite of yours.” Amber pulled the cookie box in front of her and closed its plastic lid. “I was a serial dater. You know that girl in middle school and high school who had one boyfriend after another?”

Lyndie nodded. Girls who dated anything with a pulse baffled her.

“That was me. In the end it left me heartbroken and penniless and the unwed mother of a baby whose father’s a sociopath.”

“A sociopath?”

“I wish it weren’t true, but it is. He’s in prison now.” They both glanced toward Jayden. His football had lodged between some branches. Repeatedly, he threw his soccer ball toward it, trying to free it. Amber’s fingers moved around the perimeter of the cookie box, crimping it closed. “When Meg took us in, I knew I’d been given a second chance I didn’t deserve. I got myself right with God, and I swore off men. With my lousy track record, I knew that even one attractive guy could mess up my priorities.”

“But now you’ve accomplished your goals.”

“Yes. I’m twenty-seven and I’m wondering if I trust myself enough to start dating again. I think I do. I think I’m ready.”

Twenty-seven, Mollie’s age. Vibrant, healthy Amber couldn’t have been more different from her sister. “Then go for it,” Lyndie said.

“If I do this, we’re
both
going to go for it. I’m not going to let my eligible upstairs neighbor sit at home with her paintbrushes on Friday and Saturday nights.” Amber grinned. “I wish you could see the horrified expression on your face right now. It’s comical.”

“I’m happy sitting at home with my paintbrushes.”

“You’re not afraid of Jake Porter. You’re not afraid of racing Thoroughbred horses. You’re brave, remember?”

“Not about the singles scene. It’s my weakness.” Lyndie would rather be unattached than deal with the singles scene, as her unmarried-and-thirty status proved.

Amber leaned her forearms against the table, her focus on Lyndie. “How about we make an agreement? In the next three months, we’ll each go on three dates.”

“With whom?”

“That’ll take some figuring out. But we can do it. We’ll help each other find guys to go out with. Just three dates, Lyndie. It’ll be good for both of us.”

“Can all three dates be with the same man, or do they have to be with different men?”

“Are you kidding? The same man would be great. Frankly, it’ll be a miracle if either of us can find a man in the next three months that we want to go on three dates with.”

Lyndie had come today for coffee and friendship, not to be roped into awkward blind dates with people half as appealing as her Cavalier King Charles spaniels.

“Think of it!” Amber said. “This will give us a reason to get dressed up—to wear high heels!”

“I’m not sold.” She’d never understood why women made such a huge fuss over men.

“Fine. I can see I’m going to need to bribe you.” Amber considered for a moment. “If at any point in the future you need someone to take care of your animals for you, I’ll do it.”

Lyndie sat up straighter. When Mollie went into the hospital next—it was a
when
not an
if
, unfortunately—she’d need help with her pets, and she hated putting them in a kennel. “I’d so appreciate that—”

“Not so fast, Miss Illustrator Lady. First you have to agree to three dates.” Amber extended a hand so Lyndie could shake on it.

Lyndie eyed the hand, then her friend, whose expression held
the glint of challenge. “You’re not as sweet as I thought you were,” Lyndie accused.

Amber released a huff of laughter. “I’m very sweet. It’s just that I’ve lived long enough to gain some street smarts, that’s all.”

“I have a feeling,” Lyndie said as she shook Amber’s hand, “I’m going to regret this.”

E
arly morning mist and darkness shrouded the training track at Whispering Creek Horses. Lyndie took a seat in the viewing stand, the metal bleacher hard, cold, and faintly ridged beneath her.

Like everything connected to Whispering Creek Horses, the track before her looked top of the line. It had been equipped with an irrigation system, starting gate, and modern lighting. Two riders were already out, one jogging a horse, the other working his mount at a gallop.

Below her and to the side, Jake stood against the inside rail just next to the track’s entrance. When he finished talking with one of his hand-walkers, he turned in her direction and sent her a burning glare.

It was so scathing that she almost laughed. How had he known she was here? She could have sworn she’d taken her seat silently.

He went back to ignoring her.

She studied Jake’s profile, wishing she knew more about what had happened to him in Iraq and how it had affected him. She didn’t know for sure the extent of his physical injuries. Did he have other scars? Lingering aches?

He wore the same brown hunting jacket and black Stetson he’d
worn the day before yesterday. His face remained as unsmiling as it had been then. He didn’t appear to share a friendly rapport with his employees, precisely. Yet from what Lyndie could tell, they fully respected him. One of his riders pulled up, listened attentively to Jake’s instruction, then set off at a trot. Lyndie’s veteran gaze tracked them.

Because of her cross-country move, it had been more than a month since she’d been on a horse. Too long. She never felt more like herself than she did on horseback.

Growing up, she hadn’t spent her weekends the way other girls her age spent theirs—playing soccer or swimming or attending birthday parties. During California’s racing season, she’d spent her Saturdays and Sundays sitting beside her dad at the nearby horse tracks. During the off-season, she’d passed her free time either drawing horses or sprawled on the living room floor watching them race on TV.

As soon as she’d been old enough, she’d started volunteering at the stables of local trainers. She’d mucked stalls, walked horses, run errands. By sixteen, she’d earned herself her first job as an exercise rider. Throughout college and the years since, many things had changed, but her riding never had.

For her, it was therapy. Riding worked her muscles while quieting the noise in her brain to a single focus: the horse. Whenever she finished a morning of exercising Thoroughbreds, she felt the way she did after a Pilates class—both energized and relaxed. Mentally reset.

She’d miss her horse therapy if she only did art. And if she only rode horses, she’d miss her creative outlet. Doing both was her way of straddling the best of both worlds. Not to mention, her income from her books plus her income from riding paid the bills.

Today she’d taken an optimistic approach and dressed in what she typically wore to exercise horses: leggings, boots, and a knit top under a lightweight jacket. Her helmet and vest waited in her Jeep if needed.

The sleek and muscular bodies of the horses became clearer as they emerged from the mist, their manes and tails tossing dramatically. Then Lyndie’s view of them obscured again as they journeyed away. The sight, so full of mystery and beauty, caused Lyndie’s imagination to stir.

She’d already done one book on horses and cowboys and a separate one on a kingdom full of pink and purple ponies. But the fairy-loving girls probably wouldn’t mind the inclusion of a horse—no, a
unicorn
—in their book. A fairy and a unicorn could set off together on some sort of quest. . . .

So far, finding her way with her fairy story had been like bumping around in an empty, pitch-black room. But suddenly ideas were shifting through her mind in a kaleidoscope of bright, fresh patterns.

“Good morning.”

Lyndie glanced up to see Bo approaching. “Good morning.”

Kindness radiated from his gray eyes, marked at the outer corners by laugh lines. Bo had a way of making a person feel comfortable in his presence. He was dressed similarly to Jake, but wore no hat. Though both brothers had dark hair, Bo shaved his close to his skull.

“Has Jake seen you here yet?” he asked.

“Yes. He didn’t look too happy about it.”

“Interesting.” Bo took her measure, half-smiling. “I remember how you and Jake were as kids.”

“So do I.”

“If we can convince him to hire you, I think you’ll be good for him.”

“I’d like to be,” she answered honestly.

“Then let me see what I can do. C’mon.” He led her from the stand to a position along the outside of the rail near where Jake stood. “Hey,” Bo said to Jake.

“Hey.”

“I’d like to see Lyndie ride. Is that okay with you?”

Bo might be the horse farm manager, but Lyndie knew that as
trainer, this track fell under Jake’s domain. The employees and these wildly valuable Thoroughbreds were his to command.

Jake looked across his shoulder and met her gaze, his eyebrows drawn down beneath the brim of his hat.

She returned his stare levelly, powerfully cognizant of the difference in their heights. He’d probably forgotten that her small stature and pleasant expression hid a backbone of iron.
Say yes
, she willed him.
Give me a chance, Tall, Dark, and Brooding. Say
yes
.

He said nothing. His attention returned to the track.

She peeked at Bo.

Bo appeared unruffled by Jake’s gruffness. Entertained, even. He beckoned to a hand-walker. “Juan?”

The man approached.

“Can you bring out one of the horses?”

Juan nodded. “Which one, sir?”

“Jake?” Bo asked.

Still, Jake hesitated. Still!

Lyndie caught herself biting her lip.

“Let’s get her up on one of the horses,” Bo prodded. “It’s the least we can do for Mom’s best friend’s daughter. Right?”

Jake exhaled roughly, his breath fogging the cold air. “Gold Tide,” he told Juan.

Lyndie could only assume Gold Tide was the name of a horse. Victory rang through her. “I’ll get my gear.” She took off before Jake could change his mind. All the way to her Jeep and back, she couldn’t quit grinning.

She’d donned her protective vest and secured the chin strap of her helmet by the time Juan met her at the mouth of the track with Gold Tide. The black filly stood calmly, her nostrils flaring to catch the morning’s scents.

Jake checked the Thoroughbred’s girth strap, then cupped his hands to offer Lyndie a leg up. With a powerful sense of déjà vu, Lyndie set her foot in his hold and swung into the saddle.

“Take her as easy as you can,” Jake said. “She’ll take a big hold of the bit. Keep her to an easy gallop.”

“Will do.” Excitement and an indisputable sense of rightness, of homecoming, twined within Lyndie as she and Gold Tide set off together.

———

Jake wasn’t sure what to do to his brother. Shooting him with a shotgun would be faster but strangling him with his bare hands would be more satisfying. “What do you think you’re doing?” he growled, his attention riveted on Lyndie as the mist did its best to steal her from view.

“I’m helping you,” Bo answered.

“You’re definitely not helping me.”

“I think I am. You just don’t know it yet.”

Bo, who usually knew what he was talking about, had no idea what he was talking about. Help him? His brother was dead wrong if he thought bringing Lyndie here would or could help him in any way.

Jake had been telling himself to be glad that he’d gotten his first visit with her out of the way. Since their families were linked, he’d known he’d see her from time to time. Their first meeting should have made him better able to handle future meetings.

It had gone the other way. Her unexpected presence this morning upset him just as much as her first appearance, if not more. Maybe because she’d broken into his private training session uninvited. Maybe because he’d been unable to get her out of his head since Tuesday.

It was ridiculous. Lyndie James had rarely entered his mind in recent years. It was only when something made him remember the first twelve years of his life that he thought of her.

He’d see a lake and recall that she’d been the one to hand him the knotted rope the first time he’d swung out over Lake Holley and jumped off. Dru would talk about shooting, and he’d remember the time he’d shot a bull’s-eye at their homemade slingshot target, and that Lyndie had been the one who’d clapped. An acquaintance of his would sprain a wrist, and Jake would recall the time he’d fallen out of a tree and broken his arm. On that day, he’d landed
on his back, and Lyndie’s face had been the first to block out the sun above him.

And
none
of that explained why she had the power to rattle him now. He was a thirty-two-year-old war vet. He hadn’t seen her in a long time and should feel toward her like he would a stranger. He wanted to feel that way about her. It made him mad that instead, her nearness slammed him with a confusing mix of resentment and protectiveness.

Bo came inside the track to lean against the rail next to Jake, casually hitching a boot heel against a rung. “Well?”

“I still want to strangle you.”

Bo had the bad taste to chuckle.

Jake had selected Gold Tide for Lyndie because he could depend on the filly to obediently do what Lyndie asked. Even so, worry circled through him so powerfully that he had to set his jaw against it. Exercise riders and jockeys were injured and killed every year when they fell on their necks, took a spill and were trampled, or got hung up in a stirrup and dragged.

As she galloped past, he noted every detail of her posture and balance. All these years later, her light hair still curled and snapped behind her. She still moved with a horse intuitively, which for some stupid reason caused his chest to ache. Her experience was evident in her form. She rode safely, expertly following the instructions he’d given her.

“The suspense is killing me,” Bo said.

“I can hope.”

“What do you think of her?”

“She’s good,” Jake admitted.

“Did you know she’s been exercising Mark Osten’s horses at Santa Anita for years?”

“No.” Osten had an excellent nationwide reputation.

“I gave him a call yesterday. He couldn’t say enough good things about her. He told me that she’s hardworking and reliable. He trusted her with horses he wouldn’t trust to other riders. She exercised Unhindered for him.”

Unhindered, a young horse full of raw power, had won multiple stakes races. Jake would never want to put Lyndie on an animal as headstrong as Unhindered.

“She’d be a great hire for us,” Bo stated.

Jake narrowed his eyes. Lyndie had only been riding his horse for ten minutes and already she had him anxious for her well-being and furious with himself because of it. Ninety percent of him wanted her to leave. The other ten percent had gone rebel. That part wanted her to stay, which scared him even more than the prospect of her taking a spill off Gold Tide. “I’m not interested in hiring her.”

“Why?”

“Too much history there.”

“Make new history. It’s time.” Bo stepped forward, bringing them shoulder to shoulder as they both continued to watch Lyndie. “She tried to jockey for a few years, back when she was twenty-three, twenty-four. She couldn’t get enough trainers to take a chance on her and had to give it up. Osten told me that if he’d known then what he knows about her now, he’d have put her on his horses.”

Jake grunted. “Don’t you have work to do, Bo?”

His brother laughed. “Nothing more important than this. You and I both know that good exercise riders are hard to find around here. She’s better than good. She’s the best prospect you’ve got.”

Jake held his tongue.

“It almost seems to me like God arranged the timing just right,” Bo said.

“Or that I’m the brunt of a bad joke.” Most of his staff had been with him for the full eight years that he’d been training for Whispering Creek. He rarely had available openings for exercise riders.

“Why don’t you just commit to take her on for the season at Lone Star?” Bo suggested.

Resistance sharpened inside Jake.

“Lyndie can start now and continue working for you when we move our horses to Lone Star’s barn in April,” Bo said. “When Lone Star’s season wraps in early July, she won’t go with you to New York for the summer because it would mean leaving her family. You’ll only be taking her on for a total of four months.”

Every spring Jake ran a contingent of horses at Lone Star Park’s track, located forty-five minutes from Holley, as well as a contingent in Florida under the care of an assistant trainer. When summer came, Jake took some of his horses to New York to race. In the fall, Kentucky. But Lyndie, who needed to remain close to her sister, would be limited to Texas.

“The season at Lone Star Park is fixin’ to start.” Bo said. “If you don’t hire her, one of the trainers there will snap her up. We treat our horses better than they do, Jake. When our horses get to Lone Star, they’re ready. Another trainer might put her up on a horse who’s not.”

How did Bo know what to say to push a knife into the softest parts of him? He didn’t want Lyndie working for him, but he wanted her working for another trainer ten times less.

Four months.

His work had been his sanity for a long time. It was all he did. Training Thoroughbreds to run to their full potential, his only goal. If Lyndie could assist with that goal, could he bring himself to deal with her for four months?

How much damage could four months do?