Lilac's Chance

Chapter Fifteen

Raised voices. Shouting. Noise.

My heart jerks as I curl up, eyes scrunched closed, pillow pulled to my chest as I wait for it to end. But it doesn't end- just begins to make sense.

"You can't let her go! She's-"

"Not ours to keep. Bona can't refuse," Hank practically growls.

My breathing stops. Are they talking about me?

"But why now? She's doing so well- he'd be an idiot to sell out."

"He'd be an idiot to say no to an offer like that. Last Chance's sale could pay the bills for years. How many colts do we have that you think could do that?"

Oh. They're talking about Last Chance.

"How many of our colts could get attention for Bonawinds the way she has? Besides, we've spent-"

They're talking about Last Chance.

A jockey's desperate instinct to keep her best- well, only- ride drives me upwards, yanking the blanket over my shoulders like a cape. Hank and Braydon are standing in the kitchen, square, jaws jutted and looking about to come to blows. "What's going on?"

"Tay Bona got an offer for Last Chance he feels like he can't refuse," Braydon snarls. Though his anger isn't directed at me, I can't help but remember when it was and narrow my eyes. And then I replay the words.

"Tay? Bona?"

"Our employer. Yours, too," Hank answers. He looks exhausted, though the sun cheerfully trickling through the windows is telling us it's only eight in the morning. "Though he lives elsewhere, traveling and throwing money at whatever he feels will earn him more."

I could relate. Dad used to spend months in Europe, searching for the next Big Horse to press the Piperson name onto the lips of every household in America. He'd found a few- Stormfire, Archer Angel, Duke of Pearls- but he'd never been satisfied until Bloodless Day. "How much did they offer?"

"Three hundred and fifty two."

"Thousand," Braydon adds unnecessarily.

I suck in my breath. That is not a random number. My favorite horse, Skip, had been purchased for $352,000 at a local auction. I remember the day well- the number, deemed lucky for me, how a then six month old Skip had bounced jubilantly into the horse trailer, how excited I'd been.

This isn't an offer for Last Chance.

This is a message for me.

I say, all casual, "do you know who... offered?"

Braydon looks sharply at me. He's backed away from Hank, but his arms are crossed and his face is drawn. Something beyond losing the farm's only racehorse is upsetting him. He's known Last Chance for years- has cared for her and watched her grow, from a bump in her dam's belly to the powerful racer she is today. And I've seen the way he treats the filly. He loves her. She's to him what Skip is to me, and when I try to imagine Skip being taken like this, all I feel is a cold hole in my stomach.

"No," Braydon says shortly. "But I'll bet you  do."

I don't reply.

"That's what I thought." With a disgusted snort, he stalks across the cottage and wrenches the door open. "I have chores to attend to now."

Hank and I watch him leave, and once the door has drifted almost shut, he takes in a deep breath.

"I'm calling him, right now." I brush away any words the old man has to offer and yank my phone off its charger, trembling as I punch in the familiar number. My anger is so consuming that I feel calm. I feel dangerous. And Hank just watches on with that heavy stare of his.