“And certainly not dull,” Mom said.
“From the time he landed until I turned around and saw the time,” I said, “I’m pretty sure my heart stopped beating.” I grinned. “But only for a tenth of a second.”
“You rode great, honey,” Mom said. “Neither of those rails were your fault. You know I’d tell you if I thought they were.”
“It wouldn’t have mattered whose fault they were if we hadn’t picked it up the way we did at the end,” I said.
“But you did pick it up, that’s all that does matter now,” Mom said.
“Great jockeys talk about asking their horse in the stretch,” I said. “Not sure I ever really understood until today.”
“Asked and answered,” Mom said.
“Great horses have an extra gear,” Grandmother said, waving at a waiter and telling him she needed a damn drink, and she needed it right now.
“Top riders, too,” Mom said, patting me on the arm. “Your old mom is thinking that maybe you answered some questions about yourself today.”
Mom moved her chair close to mine then, picked up her phone, hit Play, and showed me the video of the round, breaking it down. For as long as I had been riding, she’d never been close to an easy grader. She was almost as tough on me as she was on herself. And her standard was to jump even higher than everybody else in the field. Mom’s score on any round I rode secretly mattered more to me than any judge’s, whether or not I won a ribbon.
I could see how fired up she was today, the excitement in her voice and in her eyes, pausing the round a few times, showing me places where I’d picked up time, even when I wasn’t pushing the horse, especially on what she called one ballsy turn where I went inside the flowers and not out.
“That,” she said, “was riding.”
“Good thing,” I said. “Or we finish out of the money. Pretty much in all ways.”
“There’s a great old sporting line,” Mom said. “What could have happened did.”
Then she was the one giving me five. As she did, we heard a loud explosion of laughter. About ten tables down from us, Steve Gorton was sitting with Tyler Cullen.
We watched as Gorton leaned across the table, said something to Tyler, who laughed his ass off until the two of them clinked glasses, finished their drinks, and stood up. As Tyler came around the table, Gorton clapped him on the back, then put an arm around his shoulder, like they were heading back to the frat house together.
Mom and Grandmother were staring at them the same as I was. “Well, pardon my French,” Grandmother said, “but there’s a couple of pricks who deserve each other.”
“Gee,” I said, “and we were all having such a nice day.”
“We’re still having a nice day,” Mom said. “And they do kind of make a cute couple, don’t you think?”
I was barely listening as I watched Steve Gorton and Tyler Cullen head down the ramp. As they disappeared through the tent door, I said, “At least we know who Gorton wants the next man up on Coronado to be.”
THIRTY-NINE
GRAND PRIX SATURDAY.
With a 7 p.m. start time, I didn’t do much to shorten my day by waking up—not that I’d slept much to begin with—at six in the morning. No point in trying to roll over and go back to sleep. That wasn’t happening. So I threw on some sweatpants and quietly went down to the kitchen and put on coffee. Drank two cups, went back to my room, got into my workout clothes and drove over to the gym at the club. Made myself promise not to look at the clock until I’d done my weight circuit, three sets on each machine, and at least twenty minutes on the treadmill.
Finished on the treadmill, toweled off, drank a bottle of water. Then looked at the clock.
Still just nine o’clock.
But three hours down.
I went to the barn and rode Sky, who was still riding like a dream, every damn day. If I could win tonight—because that’s what I was thinking, even if I wasn’t saying it aloud to Daniel or Mom or Grandmother or anybody—maybe I could start showing Sky again, even against Coronado.
Just not tonight.
Tonight, it was Coronado and me against the world.
I had to keep busy, or I was going to have an hours-long panic attack lasting until it was time to leave for the show grounds. My idle mind kept turning to the money, the million dollars Grandmother had passed up. Life-changing money for all of us.
In the end, she had placed a seven-figure bet on me.
Longest day of my life, I thought, and it wasn’t even noon yet.