“She’ll be fine,” Gorton said. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned watching this sport, it’s this: In the end, it’s not about either one of us, honey. It’s about the goddamn horse. You don’t have that, you have shit. And not just horseshit.”
“I’m not your honey.”
I felt incredibly tired all of a sudden.
“You got that right,” he said. “Not my type. Too mouthy.”
“At the risk of getting even mouthier,” I said, “I am curious about something. If all that matters is the horse, how come you were so fixated on getting me off Coronado after Mom got hurt? And then getting her off Coronado when Mom was back on him?”
“Rookie mistake,” he said. “Bought into Cullen’s bullshit for a little while, is all.” He shrugged and finished his drink. “Live and learn. But want to know my biggest mistake when I got into this business? I should have gone after McGill’s kid.”
“Wouldn’t she be the lucky girl,” I said.
I walked away then, the way Daniel should have. If somebody was watching us, I didn’t want them to get the idea that I was the jackass.
But Gorton couldn’t resist shouting after me, as a way of getting the last word.
“It must kill you,” he said, “knowing that if your mom wins on Sunday, I do, too.”
I waved without looking back and kept walking, picking up the pace as I made the turn at the end of the bleachers.
The truth was, I had nothing.
Even Steve Gorton was right once in a while.
ONE HUNDRED TWELVE
Maggie
BY THE TIME MAGGIE heard her name called by the in-gate announcer, Becky had just gone clean, and was on her way out of the ring as Maggie was on her way in.
Becky smiled at her mother and nodded. Maggie smiled back. Nothing left to be said, by either one of them. This was as close to the Olympics as Maggie had been since Lord Stanley. She didn’t want to think about that now, or Daniel, or how much might be on the line today. Tried to clear her mind, but couldn’t, couldn’t stop it from racing as she walked her horse out, and heard the public address announcer formally introducing her and Coronado.
All she had to do then was wait for the buzzer to sound.
When they were out there, Coronado was nearly perfect, fast and clean, running as well as he had all spring, no worries for Maggie, none, about the possibility of a time fault. Not today. No, this already felt like one of those dream days when everything was in sync between her and her horse, when Coronado knew what to do before Maggie even had to ask him.
They were four fences from the end when her left foot came out of its stirrup.
It happened out of nowhere, Coronado landing awkwardly after clearing the rollback fence. It had happened to her before. Happened to all riders from time to time. The last time for Maggie was her first time in Gus’s ring, when she’d first gotten back on her horse. Now she jammed the foot back in, same as she had that day. It was what you did. Remembered it hurting like hell at the time.
Today the pain felt as if the knee had exploded, as if she’d done something to the ligaments all over again.
Like stitches popping.
The pain shot up her leg, intense enough to momentarily blur her vision. Maggie bit down on her lip so hard she thought it might be bleeding.
But she rode through the pain. Had to. Pretended it was a bad muscle cramp. Three jumps left. Two a combination.
Keep going.
“Come on!” she yelled.
Not yelling at the big horse. At herself. The power in her riding came from her legs. She just couldn’t do it now, at least not with both of them. It was all Coronado now.
No problems on the combination. Just seven strides now to the last jump. Maggie told herself not to rush him. He had this. They had this.
Goddamn, her knee hurt.
One last long stride to the fence.
Coronado did all the work from there, even though Maggie’s heart briefly dropped a couple of floors when she felt one of his hind legs brush the rail.
It stayed up.
They’d made it around clean.
Maggie whipped her head around, saw her time, saw that she was a second under the time allowed. She was into the jump-off. The knee wasn’t hurting any less. But in that moment, it wasn’t hurting any more, either.
As she passed Gus, he looked up at her and said, “What happened there at the rollback? You looked like you seized up for a second or something?”
She forced a smile.
“Or something,” she said.
“You want to get off and walk around a little before you go back out there?”