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Tara paced throughout the house, stoking the fires in the bedroom, great room, and basement. Winter storms called for diligence, and that she had. It was guts she lacked, so she was praying they wouldn’t be a requirement tonight.
Charlie, her one-eyed cat, stepped into her path. She picked him up and buried her face in his gray fur, his rusty purring helping her throttle back the tension. Think.
If the road conditions kept Jake away, she wouldn’t have to follow through and tell him. She’d be safe.
The soft ping of her phone had her reaching for it. Afraid, yet eager.
LV’G OTT A’PORT
He’s coming.
Her stomach did a backflip as her mind raced through the implications. She lowered the big cat to the floor. “What have I done?”
Making her way to a chair before her legs gave out, she dropped her head between her knees and waited for the blood to work its way back to her brain.
Once the tingling left her fingers, she sat up—with great caution—and drew a long, lung-filling breath, then exhaled slowly. Life was marching forward, not allowing her an opportunity to change course.
She surveyed the room, wondering what Jake would see. Would it be the overstuffed couches and chairs grouped around the huge stone fireplace? The wall dedicated to photos of aircraft, or the opposite wall of windows?
Feeling suddenly exposed, she slid the wooden blinds closed and headed for the kitchen area to do the same there. Not that there were neighbors within a couple miles, but still. It was cozier this way.
Too cozy. Intimate.
She quickly opened everything back up.
“Hours,” she said to Charlie. “He won’t be here for hours. I need to relax.”
She checked the dinner in the oven, then threw herself onto a couch. She’d try to read for a while.
#
Jake leaned over the steering wheel as if being closer to the windshield would make it easier to see. It wasn’t exactly a white-out, but he couldn’t see more than fifty feet in front of the car. The only thing keeping him on course was the wall of cleared snow along the shoulder.
He’d been on the road for nearly three hours, and had long since finished the giant cup of coffee and two doughnuts he’d bought before leaving the airport. He wished he’d thought to bring along more food. He did have a bottle of water, but he’d save it in case of an emergency—like getting stuck in a snow bank overnight.
He rolled his shoulders, then let go of the wheel one hand at a time to flex his fingers and shake some life back into them.
The instructions she’d sent him said the end of her road was marked by a big yellow store, and a glimpse of bright yellow had him searching for a gap so he could turn. He eased the rented SUV past the half-buried exit sign and checked his odometer because she’d said her place was exactly four kilometers from the store. He was to watch for a red mailbox.
Which was nearly buried, but he spotted it. Tires crunching, he maneuvered the long, curved lane with care, eventually coming to a stop in front of a long, low house. Big place. The porch light was on and the building was surrounded by trees. Odd, he saw no windows.
He grabbed his bag and waded through knee-deep snow to the cleared porch. He banged the snow from his shoes and opened the screen to knock on the interior door, but it swung open on its own.
“Tara?” he called out.
“In the kitchen,” she answered.
He shrugged. He could do country casual. He hung his jacket on a wall hook, dropped his bag on a wooden bench, and left his shoes on the thick mat beside several other pairs of men’s shoes.
He followed the rich aroma of hot food to find the kitchen. And Tara.
Sexy.
Where the hell had that come from?
Look at her. Tall, skinny, faded blue plaid shirt to her knees, thick black leggings, gray work-socks, hair scraped into a long ponytail, no makeup... Definitely not his type.
Yet, somehow, she was.
Jake shook his head and cleared his throat. “Hey.”
Without a word, she lifted the lid off a big cast iron pot and steam billowed out.
“Smells awesome.”
She served up a large bowl of beef stew and opened a foil package. The sight and smell of hot bread had his mouth watering, almost distracted him from the awkwardness of her silence.
She took the full plate to a tray already set up in the living room. “Sit. Eat. Milk, water or coffee?”
“Milk, please. You’re not—”
“I already ate.” She left him there.
Ravenous after the long drive, he shrugged and devoured the meal, studying her as she tidied up the kitchen. He’d assumed that her request for him to come to her home had meant she’d be more comfortable on her own turf, yet she was tension personified while wiping the counter for the third time.
She’d disappeared by the time he finished, so he took his dishes to the sink, rinsed them, and looked around for the dishwasher.
“Don’t have one,” she said, coming into the room. “Go sit. I’ll be there in a minute.”
He wanted to argue, offer to wash up, but the closed expression on her face had him shrugging and doing as he’d been told. Something odd was going on.
He glanced around the room. Several comfortable seating areas, one wall of windows, the opposite wall covered with photos, and a fireplace bigger than any he’d ever encountered. The furnishings were dark leather, the floors looked like old planking, and there were brown rugs scattered around. Nothing fussy or female.
The place didn’t scream money, but based on its location and size, it was worth a bundle. He’d done his research.
Tara finally joined him, followed by a big gray cat who seemed to place himself strategically between them.
“What’s his name?” Jake asked, reaching a hand out but drawing it back quickly at the deep-throated growl.
“Charlie.”
“I don’t think he likes me.”
“He doesn’t trust men.” She chose a sofa, and tucked her legs up under her. “I’d like to get started, but first, there are rules. If you ever use my name or tell anyone you talked to me, I’ll deny ever meeting you. Do you understand?”
He nodded. “An anonymous source. No worries.”
“And once you leave here, I’ll never have contact with you again.”
That didn’t sit well with him. Yet, she was getting stranger by the minute so, yeah, best to stay far, far away. “Okay.”
She sucked in a big breath and held it for a minute before blowing it out. “I can’t just give you what you want. I can’t name names and point fingers. It goes against—”
She lurched up, went to the fire. Used a long poker to prod the burning logs. “I’m not a snitch. I won’t be responsible for people going to jail. But it has to be stopped.” She spun to face him. “I don’t want you to be here. I don’t want to be doing this. But it needs to be done.”
When he pulled out his phone, she quickly added, “No recording. I’ll get you paper.”
“I’ve a notebook in my bag,” he said, and headed to the entranceway.
“I moved it. Second door on the left.”
The bedside lamp was on, and it looked as though this was his room for the night. He set the bag on the bed. Checked for messages on his Meyers phone, sent a text that he’d be missing his return flight three hours from now, and suggested rebooking it for tomorrow afternoon.
When he returned to the living room with notebook and pens, Tara was tucked into the corner of the couch beside the fire with both hands wrapped around a coffee mug big enough to swim in. He would have laughed if his blood hadn’t been chilled by the cadaver-like expression on her face.
“I’m going to give you lists. It’s up to you to investigate, to separate the good from the bad.” Her voice was equally lifeless. “I’m mixing clean with dirty so you’ll have to work through them all.”
She began with twenty breeding farms from four different states, and he recognized many of the names.
“Next, I’m giving you people. Agents, owners, breeders, and again, some are clean, some aren’t.”
Jake filled pages as she continued with farm managers, stud managers, and even veterinarians. A broad range of people who could conceivably alter, hijack or bastardize, the procedures involved in registering a Thoroughbred.
She explained that although the process now involved DNA sampling and testing, and many of the culprits had been stopped, there were still a few thumbing their noses at the system, determined to beat it.
Following her to the kitchen when she went to refill her coffee, Jake shook out his hand, flexing his cramped fingers. “I haven’t done this much writing since I wrote to my dad when he was overseas.” Would a personal detail from him encourage her to relax?
She made no comment, merely tossed another couple of logs onto the fire, before curling up again to continue. “To find the connections between the horses and the people, you need to first find the wrong horses. The ones who have wrong registration papers. Create a series of spreadsheets. Start with the mares on each breeding farm. Chart their produce year by year, listing stud fee paid, price achieved at yearling sales, and earnings on the track. There will be patterns. Watch for the unusual and be suspicious of coincidence.
“For example. Look for a farm’s best producer—that is, the one who has the most successful foals on the track. You’ll notice that once in a while, she throws a real clunker. This happens. Sometimes it’s a change in stallion, or it might be a fluke. But note the year and check out the other mares on the farm. Did any of the lesser ones have a particularly stellar foal that year?”
“What exactly am I looking for? Bottom line.”
“A switch. It’s flag-worthy if a mare that produces high-priced yearlings has a couple with low earnings and yet, in those same years, a mare with relatively low-priced yearlings suddenly produces a high money earner. While this is not extremely unusual, and by no means a sure sign, it may be an indication of a switched identity.”
Jake looked up from his writing for a moment, but Tara pressed on with determination. “The switching of a foal can be for the profit of many different people. An agent can be involved in a switch and look like a genius when a horse he recommends out-performs its pedigree—there’s a good chance he’s contracted for a percentage of the earnings over a certain point.
“Or, a good mare has a crooked-legged foal, unfit for the sales ring, so a switch is made and a straight legged foal sells as hers for a big dollar. When the individual fails to live up to his catalogue page—that’s the listing for prospective buyers to read, complete with pedigree and race record of the family—owners may cut their losses and resell cheap, or gamble with a filly and send her to the breeding shed in hope of producing a decent foal and recouping some of their losses.
“Or perhaps a poorly bred filly is injured and is worth little as a broodmare prospect because of her lack of pedigree. A switch is made and now the filly has papers that state she’s from an exceptional breeding family and can be sold for huge money.
“The breeding shed is where the lies are either perpetuated, or her DNA test will create havoc. Or maybe she’ll die a mysterious death before the tests are done. And then—” Her voice cracked.
Jake glanced up and saw her chin bunch just before she pressed her knuckles to her mouth. He waited in silence as she struggled for control.
“And then, there are the insurance frauds. I think this is where you came in. Sometimes, accidents happen.” She swallowed. “And sometimes, accidents don’t.” She took a deep breath. “Sometimes good people make bad mistakes. But if they are really good people, they learn from them. If they aren’t, they go down a road that has a price, because always, no matter what, someone always has to pay. Somehow.”
Jake fought the gut-wrenching pull of her raw emotion—the urge to go to her, hold her hand, and tell her everything would be okay—because he had no clue what everything was.
He also didn’t know if anything would be okay.
“The possible scenarios are endless. The depth of possibility immeasurable. And the unwillingness of anyone in the business to blow a whistle is beyond the belief of the outside world.” She drew a long breath. “The racing industry and the horse world, in general, are filled with wonderful, honest, good-hearted people. People who treat me like family. People who step up when someone is in need. Who never hesitate to reach out a helping hand. But...”
She ran a shaking hand over her face. “There’s always the others. The few twisted and evil people who would do anything for money. Those are the ones I’m afraid of.” She sagged deep into the cushions as tears tracked down her face.
He sat motionless, staring into eyes that made him ache. She appeared to be out of words. Empty, as if she’d delivered a prepared speech.
“Are you okay?”
“Mmm.” She lifted the cup to her lips, then made a face. “Gone.”
“I’ll get you fresh.”
She shook her head. “Three trips this week. No sleep. Too much thinking.” Her voice faded as she shifted sideways, leaned her head on the padded armrest, and closed her eyes.
Jake studied the pale face darkened by deep shadows around her eyes. Watched her breathe, and once he realized she wasn’t going to wake up anytime soon, he eased the empty mug from her limp fingers, covered her with a blanket from a nearby chair, and barely resisted the urge to touch her cheek.
Thoughts ricocheted in his head and the questions were endless as he went to the kitchen and rifled through the cupboards, looking for an escape from his own mind.
Brandy seared a path down his throat as he stared into the fire, mesmerized by the flickering flames until Charlie padded across the room, hopped up, and hunkered down alongside Tara.
Jake decided to head for bed too, but stopped beside the intriguing woman. Her skin looked so soft. The movement of his hand was barely more than a thought when the cat’s growl had him pulling back to avoid the swing of a lethal set of claws.
“Okay, pal,” he whispered. “I’m gone.”