Even a Diamond can be shattered...
After the owner of a security company is murdered, his sharp-edged wife goes on the run. Forced to abandon everything she holds dear - her home, her friends, her job in special ops - she builds a new life for herse...
I headed for the hay barn first. Filling the twenty-four haynets that got hung up in the stables for the horses to eat would take half an hour. They got one in the morning, one at lunchtime, and another in the evening. It wasn't my favourite job because of the dust, but at least it was quiet.
I was stuffing haynet number twenty when Susie and Hayley walked past, Susie pushing a wheelbarrow and Hayley carrying a mucking-out fork.
"What are you doing out here? Don't both of you have the day off?" I asked, knowing full well that they did.
"Uh, we thought we'd give you a hand," Susie said, carefully avoiding eye contact.
"I've been out here almost four hours. Nearly everything's done. Now, tell me the real reason you've dragged your asses out into the cold to shovel shit."
"Portia Halston-Cain's just arrived," Hayley said, as if that explained everything.
Portia owned three of the horses in my barn, but she rarely visited on weekdays, so I hadn't met her yet. Gameela, Samara, and Majesty, her Arabians, were all stunningly beautiful, but according to Susie, she only ever rode two of them.
"Why doesn't she ride Majesty?" I'd asked.
"That horse is far too clever for her. He's worked out she's not a good rider, so he just dances around until she falls off," Susie said, trying, and failing, to keep a straight face.
"Why the hell doesn't she sell him to somebody who can ride?"
"Because then she'd have to admit she can't. Plus he's pretty, and she imported him from Qatar for some stupid amount of money that she never misses an opportunity to brag about."
Majesty reminded me of Stan, which meant even though he was an arsehole, I still liked him. Plus he had the measure of his owner, which made me even fonder. Still, none of that explained why Susie and Hayley were traipsing out to see her.
"From what I've heard, Portia being around is a good reason not to be out here."
"Her brother's come with her," Susie said, a faraway look in her eyes.
"So?"
"Just wait until you see him."
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Wait until I saw him? Yeah, I could wait. I finished filling the haynets then returned to the barn to fetch the feed buckets, and when I walked in, it seemed as though everybody at the farm had gathered there.
Susie and Hayley were walking up and down, looking for non-existent poop, while Jessica and Marianne brushed horses that had already been groomed. Half a dozen girls whose horses lived in the other barns pretended to talk to them, and a couple more hovered around Arabella, another of the owners. Arabella was sitting outside her horse's stable, stuffing her face with crisps.
All heads pointed in the direction of Samara's box, and I could hear a high-pitched whine coming from inside. A whine I could only assume came from Portia.
