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‘MY LIFE IS OFFICIALLY over, Grace.’
Hettie stared out of the bungalow window and scraped with her fingernail at spot of dried paint on the glass.
‘Hairline fracture of my femur. I’ll be in plaster for six weeks. I can’t ride, I can’t drive and I’ll be on crutches.’ Hettie gave up on the paint mark. ‘Gregor is lending me Tiff, although I’m not sure Tiff knows yet. Bert is a diamond. I think he’d like to move in. But – and this is the worst of all...’ Hettie lowered her voice to a whisper. ‘Bill Harding says Fiona has offered to muck out and ride his horses until I’m out of plaster. Dear God, Grace, what did I do to deserve this?’
‘Fiona? I can’t believe that girl has offered to help out of the goodness of her heart. There must be an ulterior motive!’
‘Gregor maybe?’ She didn’t really care why Fiona had chosen this moment to reappear in her life, she was just thoroughly fed up that she had. ‘My yard is going to be run by a secretary, a convalescing pensioner and my worst enemy.’
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GRACE HADN’T BEEN FAR off the mark. Fiona had not, in fact, offered to help at all. What she had done was sniggered when her father told her that Hettie had broken her leg, and his indulgence of his daughter had run out at that moment.
‘You can muck out and exercise my horses until Hettie is able again.’
‘Hah! I don’t bloody think so, Daddy. How could you suggest—’
‘It isn’t a suggestion, Fiona. You will muck out and ride my horses until Hettie can do it again.’
Fiona was stunned into silence for a moment. Her father was behaving very strangely. She pursed her lips and looked at him from under her lashes, wide-eyed, to express her astonishment at his lack of understanding. ‘But Daddy, I simply haven’t got time.’
‘Find the time, pet.’ And when his daughter went to speak he raised a hand to stop her. ‘If you don’t, Fiona, I will cut off your allowance. I will cancel your credit cards and I will take back your car. I may also start asking rent for this house. Consider this a chance to start doing something useful with your life.’
Fiona snatched up her iPad and jabbed at the screen, holding it up so he could see. ‘Look!’ Business-like now, she pointed out that she had already told him that she had plans for a career. Her voice grew strident. ‘None of my plans include clearing up shit after horses!’
Bill squinted at the screen, but he couldn’t see much without his reading glasses. He shook his head.
Fiona edged closer, rested her head on his shoulder and wheedled in her little-girl voice. ‘I know I’m incredibly lucky to have you as my daddy. I simply need more time to find the right path in life. You must be able to see how humiliating it would be for a daughter of yours to have to muck out stables at a two-bit livery yard.’ She peered up at his face and squeezed out a couple of tears. The final weapon in her armoury, they had always worked before.
Bill’s sigh was heavy-hearted. ‘I can’t make you do it, pet. But if you’re not at Hardacre tomorrow, I will be back for the car keys and your credit cards, so have a good think.’
Fiona hurled her iPad at her father’s departing back and screamed when it smashed on the kitchen floor. ‘Daddy, why are you being so bloody horrid? I absolutely will not do it!’
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HETTIE SCOWLED AS SHE hopped across the yard on her crutches, supervising the mucking-out, unable to criticise the efforts of Bert and Tiff, and unfit to do the job herself. She tried to sweep up some of the mess they were making, but holding a broom and two crutches was ridiculous, and when she set one of them down, the best she could manage was to sweep a small circle around herself.
Tiff noticed her exasperation. ‘Hettie, stop watching. You’re making it harder on yourself, and it isn’t making our job any easier. You can’t do it, so you’ll just have to put up and shut up. It’s only for six weeks. Go and do some admin, or play with the kittens, and leave us to it.’
The angry bump of Hettie’s crutches on the concrete as she hopped back to the lean-to caused Tiff and Bert to raise their eyebrows at each other.
Fiona’s red Mini swung into the yard and jolted to an abrupt halt. Her strident voice carried to those on the yard. ‘I’m here to ride Daddy’s horses, and I’ll need them tacked up.’
Hettie frowned and turned around as best she could. Bert put down his fork to do Fiona’s bidding, but she wasn’t having that. Fiona could help, but no way was she giving out bloody orders. ‘I’ll show you where their tack is, but you’ll have to tack them up yourself.’
Fiona glared. Hettie guessed that Fiona probably hadn’t tacked a horse up since pony-club days, and she might have relented had Fiona not strode imperiously towards the tack room, overtaking her en route, and stood with her arms crossed and her fingers tapping until Hettie caught up.
‘Thank you for helping.’ Hettie forced the words out as she lurched past Fiona. Then she retired to the lean-to and shut the door, as best it would shut with its broken handle.
It was chilly in there. The draughts that found their way through the gaps in the walls carried a reminder that autumn was upon them, hat-and-glove weather around the corner. The grass in the paddocks she could see from her stool had already faded from lush to dormant.
Hettie raised her hand and even managed to smile when Fiona rode past. Fiona didn’t wave back. From the window she watched Tiff and Bert, their heads bent in conversation as they worked, and the workmen in front of the stables. This was their second week on the yard, and the arena was coming on, the heap of crushed rock shrinking as they spread it across the ground, soon to be hidden by the rubber chippings due for delivery next week.
Six weeks since the open day, and things had been going so well.
Two months to the day since she’d broken up with Alexander. Hettie shivered and used her crutch to push the switch on the fan heater sitting on the floor. She should stop feeling so sorry for herself. With the arena taking shape she could use the downtime to push her teaching and to get her accounts up to date.
Gregor was the next to arrive.
Tiff shouted across the yard at him, ‘There are not many PAs who would put up with this!’ But she grinned as she said it and bent down to pick up the tabby kitten whose game with the dirty bedding in her wheelbarrow was scattering straw far and wide.
Hettie made coffee for the workers midmorning. The ride appeared to have lifted Fiona’s mood. She said thank you for the coffee Hettie passed to her and sat down at the table with Gregor, Bert and Tiff.
Hettie looked at them all, crowded into her lean-to, a mismatched group if ever there was one. Gregor was loud enough to mask any cracks in the conversation, and she smothered a surprised laugh at the look on Bert’s face when Gregor asked him what he did to ‘look after the boys’ when he was riding.
‘I sit on my arse, not my nuts. If your “boys” are gettin’ involved, you’re doin’ something wrong,’ Bert said, and even Fiona laughed.
The goose-stepping ginger kitten charmed them all, and Tiff cradled the other two on her lap. Hettie opened a second packet of biscuits when Bert finished off the first, and by the end of coffee break even Fiona had warmed up enough to flirt with Gregor, although the temperature dropped again when her father turned up.
‘Thank you, Fiona,’ Bill called after her rigid back. He lowered his voice to the group to ask how she’d fared. ‘Did she muck out as well?’ There was a general, reluctant shaking of heads. ‘Ah. Make sure she does tomorrow, Hettie.’
Hettie forced another smile while wondering how the hell she was meant to do that.
Gregor appeared to enjoy the drama and undercurrents. ‘Well, that was jolly! Now all we need to do, Hettie, is get Tiff back on a horse!’
‘Gregor, you know I won’t do that. I’m far too chicken.’ Tiff turned to explain to Hettie. ‘I fell off the last time I tried to ride, and it put me right off.’
Hettie smiled. ‘I’d be happy to teach you if you wanted to give it another go. Gregor’s horses are so well behaved you couldn’t fall off if you tried. Maybe we should get you back on board as well, Bert? At least it would get a couple of the horses ridden, and I’d feel better if I was giving you something back for all the work you’re doing.’
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REDFERN LIVERY SETTLED into a new, messy routine.
Hettie got more skilful on her crutches. She could teach, clean tack and even groom the horses that would tolerate her wielding a metal crutch – all but Lockie. Everything considered, she was doing okay.
Thanks to her support team the yard was still running, which meant there was money coming in, and her leg was mending. It wouldn’t be long before she could take back some of the work herself, though she was truly grateful for all the help. It could’ve been so much worse, she reminded herself, as she tried not to notice the blown straw littering the grass or the tools slung on the floor rather than hung in their proper places.
She felt quite positive until Alexander called at the yard to check up on Snoop and conducted his veterinary visit with brusque politeness. She would almost rather he’d raved and shouted. The formality and avoidance of eye contact was worse than not talking to him at all.
She wanted to grab him and shake him. She needed him to notice her. But his manner blocked her from even talking. She became defensive and monosyllabic in her responses to him. He didn’t ask her how she was when she limped to the field behind him. He put Snoop back into his pen, which had been moved to the field adjacent to Lockie’s.
‘So no one has to go past the black monster,’ Hettie said, in an effort to lighten the mood.
Alexander barely nodded.
She stood a moment to watch Lockie when Alexander had gone, aware that she was now completely neglecting him. He wasn’t a horse you could take on one-legged.
Fiona saw her standing there and nodded in the direction of Alexander’s departing car. ‘You know he’s knocking off one of his receptionists now? What is it with that man and shagging his staff?’
Hettie shrugged. ‘None of my business.’
She propelled herself into the bungalow, slamming the door behind her with a thrust of her crutch. She really hadn’t wanted to know that. Shit-stirring bitch. Her hands were shaking. Of course, Alexander was shagging someone else. Bastard. Talk about double standards. What she had done was so awful that he couldn’t even talk to her, but he could shag someone else and let her find out from Fiona! She picked up a magazine and hurled it across the kitchen. She felt sick, and she didn’t know if she wanted to cry or scream. She did know that if he came back right now she was ready to tell him just how much of a pig he was.
She tried very hard not to imagine Alexander’s hands on someone else, but when she pressed her eyes shut the image was there anyway.