Taming of the Two

It was a chilly, misty morning and Kate could hear the thundering hoofbeats on the turf long before the horse actually appeared from the mist, running all-out, white puffs of steam coming from his nose.

He was beautiful.

Her father had named the horse Kate’s Flight, in honor of her and in reference to his sire, so she felt a special affinity for the chestnut stallion. As much as she hated the gamble of this lifestyle, she loved the majesty of the animals and the heart they showed every time they hit the track.

The story of Black Gold—crossing the finish line with a shattered leg, to complete his final win—was never completely out of her mind. The horses loved to run and, more than that, they loved to win, there was no doubt about it.

So she smiled as she watched Kate’s Flight barrel past in the predawn light.

“Quite a horse,” a voice behind her said.

She turned to see a man walking toward her through the mist. He was tall and dark-haired, with piercing dark eyes and the sort of chiseled jawline usually reserved for the cover of a romance novel. He looked familiar, but it took her a moment to realize why.

When she did, it was with a start. “So it’s not a rumor. The prodigal son has returned.”

He smiled, that movie star smile she remembered better than she ought to. “I’m as surprised as anyone.”

She’d heard rumors that the Devere Ranch was in trouble. “Here on family business?”

He nodded.

She looked at him for a moment, then said, “Look, I’m sorry things aren’t going well over there. I was sorry to hear about your dad’s death last year. Your mom must really miss him a lot.”

He shrugged, noncommittal.

“I really hope you can help her get it all straightened out,” Kate offered.

He looked at her with surprise in his eyes. “I appreciate that.”

“So what brings you here this morning? I haven’t seen any of your trainers around.”

“Actually, I’m here to see your trainer.” He nodded toward Victor and Kate’s Flight. “Or, more specifically, your horse.”

“Really? Why’s that?”

He kept his eyes fastened on the horse’s workout. “I’ve got a colt I think I can run against him. I just wanted to check him out first and talk to Victor about it.”

“Oh.” She thought about that for a moment. It made sense. If he could run a colt against the son of Fireflight and win, it would do wonders for the credibility of Devere’s breeding. “I see.”

“Does that worry you?”

Everything that had anything to do with failing on the track and losing financial security worried her. “Not at all.”

He nodded, his tightened jaw betraying an attempt not to smile. “Good.”

“I mean it.”

“I’m sure you do.”

She frowned and turned back to the track, where Victor was walking toward them. He was small but powerfully built. Every time Kate saw him, the thought came to her that he was shaped like a shoe horn.

“Hey, Kate.” He waved a meaty arm at her. “You take that dog to the vet yet?”

Victor had been telling her Sierra was getting too thin, so, even though she thought it was old age, she’d finally given in and made an appointment. “We’re going this afternoon.”

“Good girl. Better to check it out.”

“I agree.”

He nodded and turned to Ben. “Hey, Ben.” He smiled and put a hand out. “Good to see you again.”

Ben shook his hand. “Thanks. Looks like you’ve got a winner on your hands out there.”

“You know it.”

“How would you feel about running him up against one of mine?”

Victor laughed and ran a hand through his sandy-blond hair. “Bring it on.” He looked behind him and signaled to the jockey on Kate’s Flight. “You talking about that colt from Sunuawa?”

Ben smiled and nodded. “You’ve heard.”

“Hey, word travels. But I’d love to see what your boy can do. You know where to find us.” He turned to Kate and said, “I don’t want to interrupt you two, so I’ll see you later.”

“You’re not interrupting us!” she said quickly, but he was already leaving. Obviously, Bianca had shared her harebrained plan about Kate and Ben with him.

She watched him go, wondering what on earth to say to Ben, who was still standing beside her.

“So I hear you’ve got the technology for Fireflight to sire more,” Ben said, looking sideways at her.

“It’s not for sale,” she said quickly.

“No?” He looked surprised. “I was misinformed, then.”

“It was for sale. My father sold some, but there’s very little left now. As I’m sure you can imagine, offering Fireflight’s bloodlines is our ace in the hole.” She thought about that for a moment. “So to speak.”

“Hmm.” He nodded, keeping his eyes on the track and the horses that were running against each other. Kate’s Flight was leading the competition by a considerable margin. “Not at any price, huh?”

“Nope.” Then, as an afterthought, she added, “Sorry.”

“No problem.” His words were casual, but when Kate glanced at him she thought he looked grave.

“Hey!” a voice barked behind them.

Kate turned to face a squat, wizened old woman she’d noticed several times running the betting windows.

“One of you Katherine Gregory?”

Kate had to work to keep from laughing. “That would be me,” she said, adding the obvious, “Not him.”

The woman didn’t so much as crack a smile. “There’s a phone call for you up in the shop.”

Kate frowned. “That’s weird. Did they say who it was?”

“Think it’s your father or something.” The woman gave an exaggeratedly disinterested shrug. “He said he couldn’t get through on your cell phone.”

“That’s crazy. I don’t need to go all the way to the track shop to get a call.” She patted her pocket, looking for the phone she was sure had been there earlier. But it was gone. “Hmm. Okay, I guess I do need to go all the way up to the shop.” She started toward the main building, tossing over her shoulder, “Nice talking to you, Ben.”

He raised a hand in response.

The woman asked, “Ben Devere?”

“That’s right,” he said slowly.

“There’s a telephone message for you there, as well.”

Kate paused. “We both got phone calls up there?”

“Guess so,” the woman said.

Ben looked at Kate with a frown. “You don’t suppose that fence is down between the properties again, do you?”

She groaned. “I hope not. That was a mess.”

“We’d better go see what’s going on.”

They hurried to the building, up the stairs and into the darkened shop. “You’d think she could have left the lights on, at least,” Kate commented, feeling her way to the counter, where she remembered having seen a phone before.

“There’s something strange about this,” Ben said.

The door closed behind them and they both looked back at it for a moment. Then Ben found the light switch and the room was flooded with fluorescent glow.

Kate found the phone and picked it up, looking to see which line was on hold.

None of them were.

“For Pete’s sake.” She pressed line one and dialed her father’s number.

As soon as he answered, she asked, “Is everything okay?”

“Everything’s fine, Katherine,” he said. “Why?”

She frowned. “They said you were trying to get hold of me and couldn’t get through on my cell phone.”

“That’s nonsense,” her father said to her. “I didn’t try to call you.”

She was somewhat relieved, even while she was flummoxed. “What about Bianca? Where is she?”

“She’s at the track with Victor. With you, too, I guess, if you’re there.”

She watched as Ben poked around, looking for the message that had supposedly been left for him. An uneasy feeling snaked into Kate’s stomach.

“I gotta go, Dad. I’ll talk to you later.” She hung up the phone and rushed to the door.

“Hey, what’s going on?” Ben asked. “What’s the emergency?”

She got to the door and tried it.

It was locked.

Exactly as she’d suspected.

“I don’t think there is an emergency,” she said, not adding that there was going to be one just as soon as she got out of here and wrapped her hands around Bianca’s neck. “There’s been some sort of…mistake.” She jiggled the doorknob, hoping to throw the lock.

“Is that locked?”

Kate turned around and leaned her back against the cool door. “Yes, it is.”

“So we’re locked in here?”

“Yes, we are.”

He heaved a sigh and went over to the phone, muttering something about idiots in charge. He lifted the receiver and pushed a button. Then another. And another.

Then he tapped on the receiver button.

Kate watched with growing trepidation. “What’s wrong?”

“Phone’s dead.”

“I just used it.”

“Well, now it’s dead.”

“Do you have a cell phone?”

“No.”

This pushed her panic buttons. “What do you mean, no? How can you not have a cell phone?”

“I notice you don’t, either.”

“Yes, but I did.”

He looked at her too patiently. “Then where is it?”

“It must have fallen out of my pocket. Or something.” At this point she was sure Bianca was behind this somehow.

“Whatever. Let’s stop talking about what we can’t do and figure out what we can.” He frowned and looked around. “First thing is, we should look for keys.”

“Okay. Good.” Hope surged in Kate. Surely, Bianca hadn’t been that thorough. They began riffling under the counter and in the cash register, looking for a key.

At one point they both put their hands in the same cubbyhole at the same time and Kate pulled her hand back as though she’d touched a snake.

Ben looked at her for a moment. “Something wrong?”

“No, I—” What could she say? How could she explain what looked like such a distasteful reflex? “I was startled.”

He kept feeling around the cubby before pronouncing, “And for nothing. There’s nothing here.” He stepped back and folded his arms in front of him. “We’ll have to figure something else out.”

“We could break the window,” Kate suggested, gesturing toward what she thought was obviously the only thing left they could do.

“Kate, it’s a racetrack. They plan for security breaches. That’s not glass. It’s thick Lucite. You couldn’t break it if you tried. Not without a power tool.”

“Do they sell power tools in here?” she asked halfheartedly.

“Afraid not.”

They both looked at the inventory of horse-themed T-shirts and sweatshirts, key chains and the like.

“If it wouldn’t appeal to a thirteen-year-old girl, I don’t think they sell it here,” Ben concluded.

Panic began to rise in Kate’s chest. “So, wait a minute, you’re saying that we actually can’t get out of here? We’re stuck?”

He looked as if he was ready to give some smart-aleck answer until he looked into Kate’s eyes. Then his expression softened and he said, “I didn’t say that. We haven’t exhausted all the possibilities yet. Not by a long shot.” But he looked doubtful.

She didn’t care, she’d take it. “I have a Swiss army knife, do you think we can do something with that?”

“Hand it over. Let’s see.”

She reached into her pocket, thinking what a good thing it was that she’d gotten a splinter earlier because she’d ended up pocketing the knife after using the tweezers in it.

But when she handed it to him, he looked at it dubiously.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Well.” He turned the knife over in his hand and opened the small blade. “I was sort of picturing something a little bigger. But this might do.”

He went to the door and started working at the lock.

Kate went up behind him and watched over his shoulder. “Guess those years of juvenile delinquency might just be coming in handy, huh?”

He shot a look at her. “I’d hardly say I was a juvenile delinquent.” He worked more on the knob and said, without looking back, “But yeah, I guess you could say so.”

There was a click and for a moment they both sucked in their breath in anticipation. But when he tried the knob, it was still unmovable.

He closed the knife and started to hand it back to her.

“You can’t give up,” she said.

“I’ve got to. This place is built with security in mind. They designed it exactly so that people couldn’t do what we’re trying to do now.”

“So that’s it? You’re just…quitting?”

He laughed softly. “Well, it’s not like we’re going to die here. They open the shop a couple of hours before post time. Someone will be here soon.”

Kate looked at her watch. “It’s six-thirty in the morning,” she said, her breath feeling tight. “Post time isn’t until seven o’clock tonight.”

He looked pained. “That’s right. I was thinking 1:00 p.m.”

“Only on Sundays.” She began to knead her hands in front of her, noticing her palms were growing damp.

He sighed and leaned back against the counter. “Well, this bites the big one, that’s for sure.”

To Kate, it felt as if the walls were closing in. “We’ve got to get out of here.”

“We can’t,” he said absently. “God, you have always been such a bundle of nerves.”

“I have not!”

He met her eyes. “Sure you have. Always.”

Anger rose in her, temporarily obscuring her growing claustrophobia. “How dare you say something like that to me. You, of all people, who did everything you could to make me a bundle of nerves.”

He shook his head. “I didn’t do anything any kid my age wouldn’t have done.”

“You did everything that no other kid your age was doing. We all watched, amazed, as you put glue on the teachers’ chairs and gum on the chalkboard and—”

“Nothing scary about that.”

“Well, no, not about that—”

“So what’re you blaming me for?”

She gave a humorless spike of a laugh. “Plenty. Believe me.”

He waved the notion away with his hand. “That’s bull. But it’s totally consistent bull. You always made a bigger deal of things than you had to.”

“So I was nervous and hysterical, is that what you’re saying?”

He looked her up and down. “That’s about the size of it.”

“Meanwhile, you were perfect.”

“Not perfect.” He cocked his head fractionally and very obviously tried to keep from smiling. “Just normal.”

She made a sound of disgust and threw her hands into the air. “You are amazing.” She walked back to the door to try to figure out some way to work it open. “Absolutely amazing.”

“Thanks,” he said behind her. “I’ve heard that, but I never thought I’d hear it from you.”

She glanced back at him. “It wasn’t a compliment.”

This time he did smile. “I know.”

She gave him the evil eye as best she could. “Please tell me you’re not staying long.”

He shook his head. “Just until about seven tonight.”

“Wha—” She frowned. “You know I mean in town, not in this shop.”

“Ah, in town. Well, now. That depends how quickly I can get the farm back into shape.”

“Oh, good Lord, that could take forever,” she said before she realized what she was saying. She quickly added, “You’ve been in the business long enough to know that every time you think you’ve got it figured out, fate throws you another curve ball.”

He studied her for a moment before giving a single nod. “I’m not looking to hit the ball out of the park.”

He didn’t offer any more information and even though Kate wanted to know more about what he’d done in the ten years he’d been away, she got the distinct impression that she shouldn’t ask for more.

In fact, she decided her time would probably be much better spent praying vehemently that someone would come to let them out of here, so she didn’t have to spend any more time at all making awkward small talk with Ben.

But at least he’d distracted her from her feeling of claustrophobia. There was something to be said for that, because for a moment there she’d actually thought she might totally lose it.

Why, she couldn’t say. She’d never been claustrophobic before. Those close to her might say she was a little high-strung at times, but never irrational.

Looking at Ben now, she almost wondered if he’d picked up on her panic and tried to help her by purposely getting her mad instead of scared.

For the briefest moment, her heart softened toward him. But then she remembered that Ben Devere didn’t make selfless gestures for anyone, least of all for Kate Gregory.

Chapter Three

Three hours later they were still stuck in the shop and they had exhausted absolutely every possibility, and more than a few long shots, to free themselves.

“I saw this TV show once,” Kate said, “where they held a lit match up to the smoke detectors to set off the alarm.”

“I saw that one. The sprinklers went off and they got soaked.”

“But they got saved.”

“We’re not in danger, Kate. We don’t actually need to go to extraordinary lengths to get out of here before we run out of air, or die of dehydration or anything.” He went to the fridge and took out a cola and held it up in offer.

Kate shook her head, so he closed the door and opened the cola for himself, before sitting back down to drink it along with the bag of cheese snacks he’d pilfered from the register stand.

“That stuff’ll kill you,” Kate commented, watching him eat the junk food. “That’s probably more dangerous than being stuck in here.”

He laughed out loud. “Doing laundry is more dangerous than being stuck in here.”

She shrugged and returned her attention to the gossip magazine she’d found on the stand with the racing forms.

“What about you? Reading that garbage probably isn’t good for you.”

She set the magazine down and looked at him patiently. “It’s better than listening to you.”

“Maybe.”

She returned her attention to the magazine.

“Then again, at least I tell the truth.”

She set the magazine down again. “As opposed to who? Me or this magazine?”

He popped a cheese snack in his mouth and raised his eyebrows. “Guilty conscience?”

“Not at all. It just sounded as if you were accusing me of something and I was wondering what it was.”

“Hmm.”

“Don’t hmm me, what were you getting at? I never lie!”

“Never?”

She shook her head. “Absolutely never.”

“So if your sister asks if she looks fat in a certain pair of jeans—and you think she does—you tell her the truth, even if you think she does.”

Jeez, that situation had come up just last week. How did he know? “My sister isn’t fat.”

“I didn’t say she was. I only asked if you would tell her the truth if she wanted to know something like that.”

Kate sighed. “I said I was honest, I didn’t say I was mean.”

“Which is it? Are you honest all the time or not? If you’re honest all the time, then it’s inevitable that sometimes you’re going to have to be mean.”

“I think a person can be honest and tactful.”

He took a swig of his cola. “Most people aren’t.”

She wasn’t sure what to say. She couldn’t honestly say she’d never told a little white lie. Who could? But if she admitted that to him, he’d pounce on her.

So instead she decided to put the heat on him. “What about you? Do you lie?”

“Me?” He wasn’t biting. “Sure. All the time.”

She couldn’t believe he was admitting it. “Are you serious?”

“Absolutely.” He gave a nod. “Ask me if you look fat in those jeans.”

She felt the blood rush to her face. “No, thanks,” she said, then had to wonder if she could believe an admitted liar when he said he was telling the truth.

He shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

“I will.”

“But you don’t.”

“What?”

“You don’t look fat. You look amazing in those jeans. I noticed it as soon as I saw you this morning.”

Her face flushed again, only this time with foolish pride. Then she remembered the context of their conversation. “Oh, I see, this is one of your lies, right? You got me.”

“No, that was the truth. But even if you looked like an elephant in spandex, I wouldn’t say that to you.”

“Thanks.” She frowned. “I think.”

He popped the last cheese snack into his mouth and crumpled the plastic bag. “You’re welcome.” He tossed the bag neatly into the trash can from a distance of about ten feet.

She watched him for a minute. “I don’t get you, Ben.”

He looked surprised. “What’s to get?”

She looked into his warm brown eyes and tried to figure out who he was underneath it all. She couldn’t even guess.

Before she could answer him, there was a key at the door and they both sprang to their feet, Ben wiping crumbs from his shirt and Kate folding the magazine neatly into its original shape.

They waited for what seemed like ages until the door finally creaked open and the familiar face of old Mr. Warner peered in.

He shrieked upon seeing Ben and Kate, then held his hand to his chest and asked, “What in tarnation are you two doing in here?”

“We got locked in,” Kate explained. “I’m so sorry if we startled you.”

“You didn’t startle me,” the old man said, but his pink cheeks told another story. “I just…that is…what in blazes were you doing here in the first place?”

“Someone told us we had phone messages up here,” Ben said.

Mr. Warner looked skeptical. “Since when do the Deveres and the Gregorys get their phone calls in the track shop?”

It did sound foolish, Kate had to concede. “Someone told us that was the case,” she said. “Of course it didn’t sound right, but we came to check in case there was an emergency at home. Turns out someone was just playing some sort of prank on us so they could lock us in.” She would kill Bianca. She would kill her gladly.

Mr. Warner tightened his lips into a thin line and looked from Ben to Kate and back again, before saying, “Get on out of here, you two. Before I take inventory and charge you for all the junk food you’ve been eating.” He looked at Ben. “I’m talking to you, Mr. Devere.”

Ben smiled. “Put it on my tab.”

“Indeed I will.”

Kate watched the exchange with something like admiration. Ben had always had the gift of being at ease with people, no matter how much older or crankier they were. He was a charmer, no doubt about it.

Fortunately she was long over falling for his brand of charm.

“You doing all right?” he asked her seriously when at last they emerged into the main building.

“I’m fine,” she said, humiliated beyond words that she had made the mistake of showing her weakness to him. But that was the definition of weakness, at least of her particular brand of claustrophobia; there was no hiding it. “Thanks.

“So I guess…” Their ordeal over, she wasn’t sure how to leave things. “I’ll see you later.”

He nodded. “By the way, Kate?”

“Hmm?”

“Seriously. You look amazing in those jeans.” He winked and before she could react, he was ambling down the hall, whistling tunelessly to himself.

And she was watching him go, reluctantly appreciating the fit of his own jeans.

“That was going too far,” Kate stormed at her sister when she got home. “I can’t believe you would do that just to try and, what, get me to fall for some guy? What was your aim?”

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