Lost And Found Family

“Then is there some good reason why you need to leave early today?”

“Rafe just called. Someone wants to see his—I mean our—condo today. He can’t get away from the barn right now.”

The excuse sounded real enough, and she knew the couple had put their unit on the market a week ago, but Emma was tired of excuses.

“Can’t you reschedule this showing? I know how important it is to sell the condo but—”

“If I don’t work full-time, how can Rafe and I afford to buy a house?”

“Money is tight for all of us right now, but if we don’t do more to keep this business going, there won’t be a paycheck at all. For either of us.” She told Grace about the lease that would expire at the end of the year.

Grace made no comment.

Was Emma being unfair? While searching for the right words, she riffled through the phone messages on her desk. She stared down at a number and the letters, ASAP.

“I see we heard from Sally Stackworth today. What’s her problem?”

“She doesn’t like the laundry room cabinets we ordered.”

“Drawer pulls, cabinets...is anyone happy today?” Melanie Simmons, thank goodness, was happy so far.

“Not at the moment,” Grace said.

Emma took a closer look at her stepdaughter. She walked toward her for a quick hug, but Grace moved aside and headed for the door. “Please don’t go yet, Grace. We need to settle this.”

“Well,” Grace said, her back to Emma as she twisted the doorknob, “at least you’re willing to deal with something.”

Before Emma could open her mouth again, Grace had left the shop. In the parking lot her hybrid car started up, and she pulled out without even a glance in Emma’s direction.

Emma stood in the doorway, watching the car turn onto the street, seeing Grace’s stony profile at the wheel. So much for her success in getting Melanie as a new client—assuming she liked Emma’s final bid. One wouldn’t be nearly enough, and now Emma would have to stay late to put out the newest fires with Sally Stackworth and Mrs. Turner. And hope the other two potential customers actually showed up. She’d have to rethink her talk with Grace—and try to figure out where they’d gone wrong.

Am I doing anything right?

* * *

IT WAS ALMOST dusk when Christian turned into the driveway at Mountain View Farm. The green-and-white sign by the gate proclaimed it was home to Tennessee’s finest, and famed, Walking Horses.

He hadn’t intended to stop, had in fact been on his way to see his mother, as Emma had asked, but in the end he couldn’t avoid the detour. He had another reason for this visit.

His hands shook as he unlatched the gate. He slapped them against his thighs, got back in his car and drove through. Then he relatched the gate behind him, and strained for a glimpse of the General.

Christian parked near the main doors of the barn. He got out, shrugged off his suit jacket, rolled up his shirtsleeves and left everything in the truck along with his tie.

On his way into the stable he skirted a wheelbarrow full of steaming horse manure. In the soft, late-afternoon air he caught its pungent scent. To true horse people, even that strong aroma was like perfume and Christian had been used to it since his early teens, when he started riding. Nearby, as he passed the indoor arena, he glimpsed several girls, also boarders, on their horses, but Rafe wasn’t there to give a lesson. He must have left work for the day.

So much for asking him to exercise the General more. Christian himself hadn’t been on the horse in almost a year.

Halfway down the aisle he halted, hearing the occasional stamp of a hoof, a sudden snort from other stalls, the far-off munching of grain. He inhaled the smells that had once made his heart glad. Fine leather and saddle soap. He’d loved each one, separate or mingled, since his first time on a horse. Still, the barn reminded him with crystal clarity of that fateful day.

So many times he’d come here with Owen, bringing carrots and gummy bears. He heard a familiar whicker and his spirit warmed in spite of what had happened and the lingering regret for his harsh words to Emma the other night, his harsh thoughts.

Still, for another second, he hesitated. He stood outside the General’s stall, his pulse beating harder, his hand lingering over the brass nameplate beside the door. It had come just to the level of Owen’s head then. He could still see in his mind’s eye the mounting stool lying in the aisle, the half-open stall door his child had slipped through, intent upon feeding gummy bears up close—too close, it turned out—to Christian’s horse.

Now the General stood at the open window of his stall, gazing out toward the pastures, as if ever hopeful of seeing the mare from the next farm, but at his approach the gelding swung his head around.

Was Christian imagining things? Or had the General glanced down, as if hoping to see Owen there? All at once he could hardly see the beautiful black-and-white horse for the sudden blur in his vision.

Emma hated the General. With good reason, but Christian had owned him for years, ridden him too long. Grace had, too, until she started college and married Rafe. They knew the General didn’t have a mean bone in his body. He’d always taken care of Owen...until that last time.

It was this place, not his horse, that Christian found hard to face.

His throat tightened. “Hey, boy.” The General ambled over to the stall door and, making the snuffling sound Christian viewed as his personal greeting, stretched his neck out to accept a pat on the sleek column of warm muscle.

Christian offered him a carrot from the bag he kept in his truck. The horse chewed, steadily sucking its length into his mouth like an efficient vacuum cleaner. His dark brown eyes seemed to glow with pleasure.

“Glutton.”

What was it Emma had said? That horse is just standing around in his stall, eating up money. After what he did to my family.

Christian grabbed a brush from his trunk in the tack room, unlatched the stall door, stepped inside and nudged the General back. The horse had gained a few pounds, which only made Christian feel more guilty for neglecting him.

“Okay, fatso. I want this coat to shine like a mirror.”

As he worked, he heard giggles coming from the indoor ring, and he felt a part of this place again. As if he really could turn back time. Those girls were novices, but they acted as if they were preparing for a big show in Madison Square Garden.

He envisioned the General not that long ago, getting ready to strut his stuff in some local ring, lifting each leg high in the “big lick” that was the Walking Horse’s learned signature gait as well as the slow, rolling natural gait that had covered ground so comfortably for many long-ago plantation owners. Riding him was like sitting in a rocking chair.

Christian leaned against the General’s side and let the brush drop to the sawdust-covered floor. There would be no more gaited shows, no competitions, no red or blue ribbons to hang in the tack room, no shot at a national championship. No more.

It was dark by the time he stroked the General’s velvety nose one last time, then latched the door shut and said good-night. Maybe he should take Emma’s advice to sell. Yet he couldn’t seem to.

Looking over his shoulder once, then again, he hurried down the long aisle to the open barn doors, out into the parking lot. He rolled down his sleeves, slipped into his jacket and got into his truck. He was already late.

As he drove away he could see the girls from the ring leading their horses back to their stalls, laughing and calling to each other. Christian headed for his mother’s house.

He wouldn’t come here again.

CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_1049d580-7259-53e0-81f3-c154fabe1d18)

FRANKIE OWEN MALLORY stood in the parlor of her home on East Brow Road, waiting for Christian. He was an hour late. On the mantel the clock chimed seven times. She was already tired, still exhausted from the fund-raiser last night, and it had been a long day.

He was her son, she told herself. Her only son. She would be glad to see him. But like many Southern women she was no shrinking violet. She could handle him. Emma had already hinted about the anniversary party.

Forty-five years.

“Mom?” She heard Christian calling from the entry hall. At last.

“In here,” she answered, barely raising her voice.