Luke's Promise. Eileen Wilks

stopped dead, every muscle tense with disbelief. “Two weeks ago, when we met to discuss Ada’s situation, you said you were going to ask Maggie to marry you.”

      “She turned me down.”

      A peculiar tightness squeezed Luke. The acid that had eaten him for the past three months—ever since Jacob started seeing Maggie—dribbled out, burning as it went. Maggie didn’t want Jacob? “That’s hard to believe.”

      “Is that supposed to be a compliment?”

      “No.” Luke frowned. The problem wasn’t what he’d thought; therefore, the solution would have to change, too.

      “Why would Maggie’s father sell her horse?” Jacob asked. “I had the impression Malcolm Stewart’s main interest in his daughter lies in how many trophies she can bring home.”

      “Because the man’s a fool. I’ll lay odds it has something to do with that damned trainer he hired. Walt Hitchcock doesn’t think women should be allowed on the Olympic Team—or much of anywhere other than the kitchen and bedroom.”

      “Why would Stewart hire him, then?”

      “He’s got the credentials,” Luke admitted reluctantly. “Former Olympic medalist. Bronze,” he added with a faint sneer that, perhaps, a former Gold Medalist was entitled to. “Eleven years ago.”

      “Maggie’s an excellent rider.”

      “Yeah, she’s damned good. Not ready for the Olympics, though.” As always, Luke made his mind up in a flash. “Listen, Jacob, I’ve got to go.”

      “What about Fine Dandy?”

      “I’ll take care of Dandy. Maggie, too.” He headed for the door.

      “Luke! Dammit, wait a minute.” Jacob was a big man, half a head taller than Luke and thirty pounds heavier, but he could move quickly when he wanted to. When Luke reached the front door, Jacob wasn’t far behind. “What do you mean, you’ll take care of Maggie?”

      But Luke moved fast, too. When he wanted to. He hit the front steps at a run. “You’re not going to marry her,” he called as he climbed into his truck. “So I guess I will.”

      The pickup was already moving when he slammed the door.

      12:10 p.m.

      “Your father will be so upset.”

      “Here’s a news flash. I’m upset.” Maggie crammed a fistful of panties into the corner of the suitcase and sniffed. Other women cried, she thought glumly. Take her cousin Pamela. Pamela cried beautifully, her eyes turning bigger and bluer with every tear. Not Maggie. Her nose got red and runny, but her eyes stayed dry.

      “He isn’t going to like this. You know what he says about your poor impulse control.”

      “At least I won’t be around to hear him say it.” Which was the whole point of making her escape now, while Malcolm Stewart tended to the important things in life—making money, crushing opponents. By the time he returned from his business trip, Maggie would be somewhere else.

      Anywhere other than here, in his house.

      “It’s so unpleasant when you and your father are at odds. Are you—are you angry with me, too?”

      She looked up and sighed. “No.” What would be the point?

      Sharon Stewart was a pastel woman. Eyes, clothes, hair, complexion—all were muted, but not to the icy clarity of sherbets or the welcoming warmth of spring. No, everything about her was tastefully understated to the point of invisibility. Her face was round, like her daughter’s, the skin soft and pale and pampered. Her eyes were uncertain. Always. Even now, those gentle blue eyes admitted no more than a faint, perplexed anxiety, as if all the more vivid emotions had been washed away.

      But her hands clenched and unclenched on each other, the knuckles strong and white. Broad hands, so much like her daughter’s. Peasant hands, according to Maggie’s father.

      “He’ll think I should have stopped you,” Sharon said anxiously.

      “Oh, Mom.” Impulsively Maggie moved closer, laying her hand over one of her mother’s. She caught the faintest whiff of Chanel. For as long as she could remember, her mother had used Chanel—discreetly, just a dab behind her left ear. The scent conjured memories of childhood hugs at bedtime. “Tell you what. Why don’t you run away from home with me? Then neither of us will have to worry about Father’s temper.”

      Sharon looked blank. “If that’s a joke, Margaret, it’s in poor taste.”

      “Maggie, not Margaret.” She sighed and pulled her hand back. “How many times have I asked you to call me Maggie?”

      “Your grandmother considers that a particularly vulgar nickname.”

      “I’m not my grandmother.” Although she bore the old harridan’s given name, for her sins. “Never mind. Pass me my address book, would you?”

      Sharon handed it to her, and she crammed it into the side pocket of her already-stuffed purse.

      “Where will you go? You don’t have any money.”

      “I have enough.” Especially since she wouldn’t have to pay for Fine Dandy’s stabling, feed, vet bills… Maggie slammed the suitcase shut. She had to lean her full weight on it, then fumble with the catches with her left hand. The cast made it awkward. “I’ll get a job.”

      There was no reason not to. Not anymore. Anger, dark and roiling, gave her good arm extra strength when she swung the suitcase off the bed.

      “But do you think…that is, with the economy so uncertain…”

      Maggie wanted to wince, so she grinned. “The Dallas economy is in fine shape. Don’t worry. I may be lousy at keeping jobs, but I’m great at getting hired. I’ll find something.”

      “If you’d just wait until tomorrow…. If you’d just talk to your father when he gets home. He is going to get you another horse. Walt Hitchcock said—”

      “I don’t give a holy hoot what Walt said!” She raked a hand through her short hair, striving for patience. “Father hired Walt, so he thinks the man is perfect. I don’t. Which is why Father sold Dandy—I wasn’t following the orders of his chosen trainer, so I had to be forced into line.” She remembered last night’s grimly polite scene with a shudder. “I don’t want another horse. I want Fine Dandy.”

      “Oh, honey.” Her mother raised a tentative hand as if she might pat Maggie’s shoulder, but didn’t complete the gesture. “That’s not the way it happened. You were hurt, and your father worries about you. He wants you to have a horse you can depend on.”

      She shook her head, incredulous. “You don’t really believe that. You can’t. This is hardly the first time I’ve taken a tumble since I climbed on a horse. Father isn’t— He doesn’t—” Fury boiled up, and the sharp tang of grief, too new and raw for words. “I messed up taking that drop jump. The fault was mine, not Dandy’s. I told Father that, but he wouldn’t listen. He never does.”

      Maggie’s nose was running again. She sniffed as she turned to open her closet. She wanted her riding boots. What she would do with them when she no longer had a horse she wasn’t sure, but she refused to leave them behind. When she came out of the closet, boots dangling awkwardly from her left hand, her mother was gone. No surprise there. Sharon shied from confrontations the way a timid mare started at every scrap of litter tumbled by the wind.

      Like mother, like daughter. Maggie grimaced and looked around for her purse.

      It was gone, too.

      Her first reaction was disbelief. It had to be here. She’d just jammed her address book in it. Yet the only possible reason for its disappearance was so absurd she put down her boots and hunted anyway.

      Not that there were many places to look.