Courting Disaster

“I was…” started Demetri, then shrugged. “You know, never mind. I’ve been watching you work with the horses. You’re good.”

“I’ve been watching you race. You’re nuts.”

Demetri laughed. “So they say. You should come to the race on Sunday. I can get you tickets.”

“I’ll stick to the horses, but thank you.”

“If you need anything…” offered Demetri, his hand outstretched.

Marcus shook it. “Thanks.”

Demetri started back toward the driveway, but then stopped. No. He had other things to do here, as well, things more important than his family issues. He looked back at Marcus. “Is Hugh around?”

Marcus jerked his thumb toward the offices behind them. Demetri took off, leaving Marcus and Demetri’s own stupidity behind him. A three-story brick building sat between the stables and the main house, overlooking the exercise yard. Demetri found Hugh at the viewing window, watching two horses on the practice track. The old man never used a stopwatch for his horses; he had an innate knowledge for how fast they ran. Hugh was never wrong.

“Is that the new colt?”

Hugh nodded once, his eyes never leaving the glass. “Yeah. Something to Talk About. He’s fast. Faster than his daddy.”

For a few minutes they watched in silence, and Hugh was right. The colt was fast, blazingly fast, leaving the bigger gelding several furlongs behind. When the jockey pulled him up, the colt wasn’t even winded. It was a crime that as a Quest horse, he couldn’t race because of the ban.

“How’re you doing? Glad to have the wedding behind you?” Demetri added a note of buoyant high spirits to his voice. It wasn’t perfect, but he wasn’t feeling particularly chipper, anyway.

Hugh pushed back from the polished brass railing and looked at Demetri with a note of buoyant high spirits in his eyes. It looked fake, too. “The wedding was beautiful. Got another one in a month,” he answered. “Shane and Audrey. This one won’t be nearly as big. Must be something in the water.”

“As long as they keep it away from me.”

“I saw you dancing with Elizabeth at the party.”

“I didn’t go near her at the wedding.”

“Because you weren’t there…” Hugh said neatly.

“You asked me to stay away. I did.”

“Thank you,” replied Hugh, and Demetri wisely avoided telling him that Elizabeth would be singing at the race. Hugh would figure that one out soon enough.

“What’s the latest on the investigation?” asked Demetri, quickly changing the subject.

Hugh locked his hands behind him. “Brent’s working with the Jockey Association to track down a missing computer analyst from there. Hopefully he can tell us why Leopold’s Legacy’s sire was listed as ‘unknown’ in the backup data. But we don’t even know if he’s in the country or not.”

“The analyst lives in Lexington?”

Outside, the jockey was leading the two horses off the track, and when they had disappeared from view, Hugh abandoned his horses again. He ambled over to the conference table and chairs that were situated in the middle of the room, and tiredly settled into one of them. Demetri joined him there, not knowing what else to do.

“He was supposed to be living in Lexington. Brent’s been looking into his finances because his apartment has been cleared out. This fellow recently acquired himself a pretty house in Savannah. Eight thousand square feet with a five-car garage.”

Demetri arched a brow in surprise. “On a computer tech’s salary?”

Hugh frowned. “I’m not thinking he’s from a wealthy family, Demetri. The whole thing smells.”

“Does Brent have any more leads?” Surely there was something to follow up on.

“Not yet,” answered Hugh, the eternal optimist. But there was a time for blind optimism, and there was a time to face reality.

Demetri was tired of sitting still. He jerked out of his chair, needing to move. Something. Anything. “The stables are running out of time.”

“Do you think I don’t know it? Thomas looked beat this morning. I want to help, but there’s nothing.”

“But you bet for the funds for the wedding?”

Old gray brows settled into a solid line over the man’s eyes. “How’d you hear that?”

“I have my sources. Why don’t you bet on my race?”

“Come on, Demetri. I bet on you, and it’s even odds. That’s not interesting.”

“I’m not the favorite this time. Giovanni Marcusi is racing for McLaren. He’s put in a new Mercedes engine, 770 bhp. It’ll burn the paint off anything close. That alone should bring him in first on the pole. And he’ll probably take the podium, too. I want a private bet. You and me.”

Hugh looked at him, a wily glint back in the blue eyes. “For what?”

Demetri braced his hands on the table, feeling the momentary thrill course through him. He knew what drove Hugh. A lot of the same things that drove Demetri.

More. Everything was about more.

“If I win, you’ll take my winnings. Give them to Thomas to put in the stables. An interest-free loan. Payable when the Quest horses are racing again.”

“What if you lose?” asked Hugh.

“Bite your tongue. But if that happens, you sell me Leopold’s Legacy.” Demetri backed away from the conference table and watched the old man, waiting. Demetri knew his limits. He knew his capabilities. On Sunday’s race, Giovanni was going to lose. No matter what it took.

“I think we’re getting the better part of this deal. The horse can’t race.”

“Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, Hugh.”

Hugh smiled. “You’ve been practicing that line, Demetri, haven’t you?”

“It’s a bet?” asked Demetri, holding his breath.

Hugh nodded once. “You’re on.”

On Wednesday afternoon, Elizabeth moved her things from the Prestons’ into the Seelbach Hilton Hotel in Louisville and began rehearsing with her band at a little bar near the college. The place had not only great acoustics, but the ability to keep a secret, as well. There were times that Elizabeth went gunning for the fame—mainly when she needed something—but most of the time she yearned for a regular life without all the flash-bulbs blinding her, without all the reporters shoving a microphone in her face and without all the gossip columns making up wild-hair stories about her.

Ten years ago, when she was just starting to get noticed, she hadn’t thought much about walking the straight and narrow path, and keeping her nose clean; she didn’t have time for breathing, much less having fun. But then something happened. In a world where absolute fame corrupted absolutely, Elizabeth became the exception, and Tobey, being the smart man he was, had told her that she could milk her virginity all the way to the top, and so she had. As a cautious and prudent person, it hadn’t been hard up to now. As a rule, Elizabeth didn’t take chances. Not with her career, and not with men. She frowned—which she’d been doing a lot recently—because Demetri was making her think hard and long about her principles.

Yeah, her principles were a good bit of Pollyanna idealism,and a lot of wanting to believe that there was only one man for her, but there was also the sexy allure of putting a roof over her head, and food on the table. For Elizabeth, home and security meant everything.

Someday, when the restlessness inside her stilled, she was going to buy a little place in Woodford County, Kentucky, and spend her days watching the sunsets, drinking lemonade and learning to quilt. But for now, every morning she jumped out of bed ready to tackle something new, like next week’s concert, the continuing debate on the album cover with the art department at Five Star and the one thing that she tried to avoid thinking about. Singing at the race on Sunday.