Country Roads (32 page)

Darkside’s ears stayed forward and Julia brought the bit to his lips, pushing gently until he opened his mouth so she could slip it in. Ever so slowly, she brought the headstall up where he could see it and kept going until she could ease first one ear and then the other through it. She buckled the throatlatch and sagged in relief.

“Good job,” Sharon said quietly, as she released the reins and came forward to hold Darkside’s head. “George, we can use your help now.”

The groom was inside the gate before Julia even realized he’d opened it. Darkside seemed to grow so large he blocked out the
sun. The saddle on his back looked ten feet above the ground. She closed her eyes against the vision and counted to five as she drew in a breath, another five as she held it, and a final five as she let it out and opened her eyes. She unclenched the fists she hadn’t realized she’d made and scrubbed her sweating palms on her jeans.

“Ready, ma’am?” George had run the stirrups down to the bottom of their leathers and stood with his fingers laced together, waiting for her to put her knee in so he could help her up.

She’d dealt with Darkside’s fear. Now she had to deal with her own.

She nodded and stepped up to the side of the horse, stretching up to grasp the saddle as she’d seen her father and uncle do countless times. She fitted her knee in the groom’s hands and jumped upward. Propelled by George’s surprisingly strong grip, she found herself lying across Darkside’s back with barely any effort on her part. She scrambled around to swing her right leg over to the other side and sat upright as the big horse did a dance step under her.

“Whoa, boy, steady,” Sharon said, her voice both commanding and soothing.

George slotted Julia’s left foot, in its green cowboy boot, into the stirrup before she leaned down to hold the other iron to get her right foot settled.

She straightened and gathered up the reins in both hands, in imitation of the many times she’d watched various family members ride.

“Here, hold them like this,” Sharon said, showing her how to thread the leather straps through her fingers.

George checked the girth to make sure it was still tight.

“I’m going to lead you around the paddock the first time, all right?” Sharon asked.

Julia dragged her gaze away from the ground so far below her and looked at Sharon. The other woman’s expression went from questioning to concerned. “You okay, hon? You look a mite pale.”

Julia tried to swallow so she could speak but her throat muscles were locked up tight. She forced herself to take a deep breath and nodded.

“You got Darkside bridled,” Sharon said. “Maybe that’s enough for today.”

Julia shook her head, sucking in another breath before she croaked, “My uncle comes tomorrow.”

“Yeah, but I’m more afraid of Paul suing my ass if you faint dead away and fall off.”

The very real possibility of that occurring almost persuaded Julia to follow Sharon’s suggestion.

But she wasn’t riding just any horse. She’d been seeing Darkside in her mind and spilling him onto her canvases for months. She watched his elegantly curved ears doing a ballet as he listened to first Sharon’s voice and then hers. He stood patiently, waiting for her to stop allowing her past to cast its long shadows of fear.

He’d overcome his past enough to accept her inept fumblings with his bridle. She needed to follow his lead.

She cleared her throat. “I want to ride.”

“You got it, hon.” Sharon pivoted forward and clipped the lead line on Darkside’s bridle. “Okay, big guy, let’s take it slow.”

Julia felt the horse shift his weight and suddenly surge forward. Something between a sob and a gasp came out of her throat, and she hoped Sharon couldn’t hear the cowardly sound. She managed not to drop the reins as she grabbed for Darkside’s mane and twisted her fingers into it.

Her mind spun in a disjointed kaleidoscope: the creak of leather, the thud of hooves, the flex and push of huge muscles, the boards of the fence sliding past with the occasional vertical punctuation of a post, the metronomic bob of Darkside’s head, Sharon’s crown of red hair floating along beside his shoulder.

And then it all settled into place as she relaxed and let her body move with the horse, feeling the connection strengthen with each long stride he took. She watched his ears turning forward to see what was coming and backward to see what she wanted to do about it. She let go of his mane and felt the messages traveling back and forth through the reins.

“I’m riding a horse,” she said, the realization hitting her. She felt a knot deep inside her begin to loosen. “I’m riding a horse.”

“In fact, you’re riding the devil horse.”

“I’m riding Darkside,” Julia said, blinking as tears streaked down her cheeks. She leaned forward to bury her face in his mane. “Thank you so much, buddy,” she murmured to him.

“You’ve got an audience,” Sharon said.

Julia sat up and glanced around. Sure enough, every hand in the place had found some task that needed doing right outside the paddock. A few didn’t even bother to pretend to be busy, resting their elbows on the fence and watching.

The instructions her father used to shout at her stepbrothers sounded in her mind.
Heels down. Elbows in. Back straight.
She tried to follow them all. Somehow she transmitted something to Darkside in the process, because his head came up and his pace seemed to increase.

“Easy there,” Sharon said, pulling the big horse back. “Let’s keep it to a walk.”

They came around to the gate. Sharon unhooked the lead line and stepped away from Darkside’s head. “He’s all yours, hon.”

Darkside hesitated, and Julia clucked at him the way she’d heard her father do. The horse started walking again, following the fence line as though he was in a show ring.

Everything was fine until a rabbit bolted across the paddock ten feet in front of them. The horse stopped abruptly and threw his head up, slamming Julia against his neck. She grabbed at his mane to steady herself and dropped one side of the reins.

“Hey, buddy, easy. It’s just a little bitty bunny,” she said, as she felt his muscles bunch underneath her. She knew she couldn’t control him with the reins or her legs, so she used her voice. “You could squish him like a bug with just one hoof.”

She stroked his shoulder and murmured teasing words as he snorted and danced. She wished she could retrieve the flapping rein so he didn’t catch one of his hooves in it.

Finally, she could sense him relaxing. His breath no longer came out in loud, audible puffs. She gingerly leaned down over his shoulder and snagged the loose rein, gathering it into her hand and turning him back toward Sharon.

His walk was noticeably faster than before, but she let him set the pace, heaving a sigh of relief as Sharon stepped forward to halt their progress.

“You did good,” she said. “I was figuring out what I was going to say to Paul when you got tossed, but you got Darkside back under control.”

“Under control?” Julia gave a shaky laugh. “All I did was embarrass him into not running from a tiny little rabbit.”

“If you can embarrass this pain-in-the-ass stud, you’re a better horsewoman than I am,” Sharon said.

Julia made a moue of disbelief. “I think I’d better take some lessons before you turn me loose again.” She patted Darkside’s shoulder. “I got a little ahead of myself.”

“Maybe. You want to take another turn around on the lead line?”

Julia nodded. “If you don’t mind. It’s so amazing to me that I’m sitting on a great, big horse and not—” She stopped herself just before she said
having a seizure
.

“Not what?” Sharon asked.

“Er, not terrified.” Julia’s heart squeezed at the near miss.

“Well, it’s downright sensible to be terrified of Darkside, but there’s no reason to be afraid of most horses. I can put you up on a nice quiet ride for your next lesson.”

“No, I need to ride my whisper horse,” Julia said. She had so little time left with him.

“Lord knows he can use the exercise and the socialization. I don’t think I’ll be putting any of my other lessons up on him, though.”

Sharon led them once more around the paddock before Julia felt too guilty about pulling her away from her busy day and asked to stop.

She swung her right leg back over the saddle and braced her body weight on her arms as she kicked her left foot out of the stirrup. George caught her around the waist and helped ease her downward to the faraway ground, where her knees promptly collapsed under her.

“Happens all the time,” the groom said, grabbing her elbow to support her. “You ain’t used those muscles for riding before.”

“I wasn’t on the horse for that long,” Julia said, feeling her blush go atomic. She knew it was mostly the aftermath of sheer nerves. “I feel like such a wimp.”

Sharon chuckled. “George, I guess you’re going to have to handle the tack.”

Julia wobbled over to the fence and braced herself on it. She gave him an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry to add to your work.”

“Happy to do it after seeing the devil horse walking around as quiet as a lead pony at the track,” the groom said, already running the stirrups up their leathers.

Julia’s knees had gone from jelly to rubber, so she pushed off the fence and managed to stagger through the gate Sharon had opened. As she came out into the open space behind the barn, several hands nodded to her. She nodded back.

A young man carrying a water bucket walked past her and said, “Nice job, ma’am.”

Paul’s friend Lynnie came up and shook her hand. “You got a way with horses.”

“Just the one,” Julia said. “He’s my whisper horse.”

“So Sharon’s got you believing that stuff.” Lynnie walked away, shaking her head.

“Not me,” Sharon said. “Darkside’s got her believing it.”

E
RIC
’
S MAMA IS
on line one,” Verna announced through the intercom.

Terri only called if there was a problem, so Paul fought down a touch of worry as he excused himself to the client sitting in front of his desk. He picked up the receiver and walked over to the window, lowering his voice. “Is everything all right with Eric?”

“Eric’s fine, but his babysitter’s sick, so I need someone to pick him up from school and keep him until I get home from work. Jimmy’s on a job where there’s no cell phone reception, so I figured I’d give you a try.”

He glanced at his watch. He had twenty minutes before he’d have to leave. “Sure, I’ll take care of it.”

An idea was forming in Paul’s mind, bringing a smile with it. “Call my cell before you come to pick him up. I might be taking him to visit a friend of mine.”

“You’re a good uncle.”

“You’re a good mother.” He meant it.

Paul hung up and came back to the desk to fill Verna in. He’d been called on for last-minute Eric duty before and usually brought his nephew back to the office. Verna loved having a youngster to spoil. He wrapped up his appointment right on time and headed out the door.

Parking across from the school, he leaned against the Corvette until he saw Eric race out the school’s front door. He crossed the street and planted himself in the flow of kids.

“Uncle Paul! Did you bring the ’Vette?” Eric’s small face lit up like a Christmas tree. “Can you drive by the school so I can wave to all my friends?”

“Nice to see you too, and Gina has the flu but she should be fine in a few days,” Paul said, giving his nephew a head noogie to further muss his unruly brown hair.

Eric shrugged. “You didn’t look all serious, so I figured nothing really bad had happened to Gina.”

“It’s still polite to pretend to care.”

“I’ll pretend the next time, I promise.”

Paul laughed as he escorted his nephew to the car, slinging the boy’s backpack into the rear seat before Eric scrambled into the front. “Would you like to meet a friend of mine who’s an artist?”

“Like Pa?”

“Kind of like that.” Paul smiled at the comparison.

“Sounds cool.”

Eric made him cruise by the school at five miles an hour while he lorded it over his friends in their mothers’ minivans. As they passed the last clot of children, Eric pulled his head and arm back inside the car and said, “That was cool.”