Free The Horsewoman by James Patterson Page A

said.
    They had made their way past some of the outdoor restaurants, over the bridge between the International Arena and its schooling ring, finally down a short stairway through some of the luxury boxes down to the in-gate. The jumps were stacked against the wall. The gazebo where the public address announcer sat was empty. Lit from overhead, the rings stood as quiet, Daniel thought, as a cathedral.
    They stood and stared silently at the ring where in a couple of weeks Becky and Coronado would ride, with so much at stake, for all of them.
    “I can’t do this without you,” Becky said. “I can’t lose you.”
    He turned to her now, the expanse of the arena behind them. Wanting to comfort Becky, Daniel moved into a moment he had often imagined. He put his arms around her, neither one of them moving. Daniel did not know if anyone might be watching them, nor did he care.
    Becky smiled and turned her face toward his as if to speak.
    “Callate,” he said softly, knowing she knew what the word meant in his language.
    Shut up.
    And then before he had time to think, Daniel was pulling Becky close to him and she was letting him and then his arms were around her, and they were kissing.

TWENTY-ONE
    DANIEL HAD NEGLECTED to yell “Incoming!” before he dropped two bombs tonight, one after the other.
    Dinner at La Fogata hadn’t started out as a date. But it had sure ended up as one. Dinner with a friend—or the friend who was your trainer—didn’t end with a kiss.
    It ended with two, actually.
    We didn’t talk about the first one as we walked to meet my Uber on Pierson Road.
    When the car showed up about ten minutes later, Daniel opened the back door for me. But before I got in, I was putting my arms back around him and initiating a good night kiss, one that lasted even longer than the first, neither of us caring that the driver was sitting right there. Certainly not me.
    “We’ll get through this,” was all I could think of to say when we finally pulled back from each other.
    “Who ever said any of this was going to be easy? For now, let’s hope for good news tomorrow about the horse.” Then he smiled at me and said, “Those were very pleasant kisses, by the way.”
    “Pleasant?” I said. “That’s all you got?” I shook my head, then said, “Callate.”
    The car dropped me home, and it took me a long time to get to sleep. I was way too jazzed, as I kept reviewing the whole day and night, start to finish, like I had them on a continuous loop: The injury to Coronado. The scene with Steve Gorton. The first bomb Daniel had dropped, the big one, about the possibility of deportation.
    Then the kisses, especially the first one, the one that transported me back to teenage me and Joey Wolfe making out for the first time in the back seat of a car.
    I would have been lying if I told myself I’d never wondered what it might be like, Daniel holding me and me holding him right back. But the last thing I needed right now was another complication in my life. Or a boyfriend. Especially as bombs kept dropping, not just by Daniel Ortega, all around me.
    Morning came and Doc Howser didn’t call. He might be treating another horse, or in surgery. I came downstairs for coffee and found a note from Mom on the kitchen table.
    Might as well do some real sweating while we sweat this out. Should be at the Wanderers Club awhile if you want to join me.
    When I got to the gym, I saw Mom before she saw me. She was seated at one of the machines, under the watchful eyes of Todd, who was as much her physical therapist as her trainer.
    Right after Mom’s fall, I’d done some reading about pelvic injuries, and learned that the recovery time varied from person to person, depending on how long after surgery it took for the fracture to heal enough to safely sustain weight-bearing exercises.
    She was doing arm pulls. Even using the lightest possible weight, her face was red with strain and she was sweating through her workout gear.
    “We can