CHAPTER 3

That evening, Tonya and Royce were sitting at their small table enjoying hamburgers. Henry was curled up in her lap head-butting her hand, begging to be petted while his brother, Clive, sat on a chair watching them with half-closed eyes.

Tonya had found them in the stable yard three years ago, two tiny kittens, starving and terrified. She brought them home, fattened them up, and loved them back to health. Clive was a more thoughtful kind of cat who seemed to mirror Tonya’s moods. Henry was the more outgoing of the two, and spent more time in laps than his brother, just wanting to be adored. They were completely devoted to Tonya, following her around the house, sleeping with her every night, and gazing out the window after her each time she went out the door.

“I don’t know how you tell those two apart,” Royce said as he reached for the ketchup. “They look exactly alike to me.”

Both were white with gray tails and patches of bluish gray hair between their ears that made them look like they were wearing little skull caps.

Tonya scratched Henry’s head absent-mindedly, stirring her salad with the other hand, not really hearing Royce. She stared at her plate, wondering whether Royce had heard of the near-collision on the track that morning. Should she tell him? He was already opposed to her becoming a jockey. News like that wouldn’t make him any more open to the idea.

“Anything wrong, kiddo?” Royce asked, watching her play with her food. “You’re kinda quiet tonight.”

“Did you hear what happened with Mike Torres today, how he yelled at me after nearly running into me and Gus?”

“Yeah, Chris told me. Anything to it? I mean, he didn’t threaten you or anything, did he?”

“No, not exactly. He yelled at me and told me to stay out of his way. And he called Gus a runt!” Her eyes blazed at the insult. “Can you believe it?!”

“We-e-l-l...” Royce teased, “he is a bit of a shrimp.”

Tonya rolled her eyes. Her heart went out to the little colt. At three inches shorter than the other two-year-olds, Gus’s legs pumped up and down like pistons when he ran. But try as he would, he just couldn’t seem to keep up with the long-striding competition. He tried so hard in his first race that he strained a tendon in his left foreleg, and the injury had kept him out of training for months.

“Don’t worry about Gus. He’ll grow. They go through a lot of changes between two and three. He’s by Kingfisher, and that was a good-sized horse. We’ll have to wait and see if Gus has his genes. In the meantime, don’t be so touchy about him. And if you’re smart, you’ll stay out of Torres’s way, too.”

“I don’t know why he has to be such a jerk.”

“Mike has his faults, for sure, but he’s had a lot to overcome to get where he is. I guess that’s why he tries to be the best rider he can, whatever it takes.”

Later, as she lay in bed with the cats curled up next to her, Royce’s phrase kept coming back to her. Whatever it takes...whatever it takes. Maybe that was the key, being willing to do anything to achieve her dream of becoming a jockey. Not that she would try to imitate Mike Torres’s ways. No, she would be her own person, do things right, and take care of the horses, but she wouldn’t let anything stop her. “I’ll do whatever it takes,” she said out loud, causing the cats to look up at her. “Did you hear that, boys? Whatever it takes.”

Henry closed his eyes and snuggled closer to her. Clive licked his paw and began washing his face.

***

Several days later, Tonya woke from a sound sleep. She groaned, her hand coming down hard on the clock to stop the buzzing. This was the only part of racetrack life she hated, getting up at four-thirty. But Thoroughbreds were exercised in the early morning, and if she wanted to ride them, she had to be there.

She sat up and switched on the light. “C’mon, boys, move.”

Henry got up yawning and stretching, and then sat blinking in the lamplight, his tail wrapped neatly around him. Clive hopped off the bed and paced by the door, anxious for his breakfast.

She pulled on her faded jeans and riding boots, the smell of horses, hay, and leather drifting up. Tonya smiled. God, I love horses, she thought, even at four-thirty in the morning.

She ran a brush through her long auburn hair and tied it in a ponytail, then remembered that today was her birthday. Staring closely at her face in the mirror, she wondered if she looked any older and decided that she hadn’t changed much.

Coming out of the bathroom, she noticed the lights were off in the kitchen, which was odd since Royce, an annoyingly chipper morning person, always got up before her to make his beloved coffee. Surely he hadn’t overslept. She peeked into his room and saw the rumpled bedclothes. Royce was gone. Maybe he had an early appointment.

She fed the cats and poured herself a glass of milk, leaning against the counter as she drank it. She wondered if her dad had softened at all toward the idea of her getting an apprentice license. Neither of them had brought the subject up since last week. She hated to go against him in anything, but this was just too important to her. Nothing was going to stop her. Whatever it takes.

She left the mobile home and started toward the barn. The early morning mist hovered over the ground. Across the parking lot for the trailers and RVs were the long, low barns with their rows of stalls. Each barn had ten stalls facing out into a covered aisle where the horses were groomed and saddled. The lights blazed, casting moving shadows of the grooms as they hurried to prepare the horses for their morning workouts.

Strolling into the barn, Tonya spotted Billy O’Casey, one of the starting gate assistants, leaving the barn area and heading toward the track kitchen. She usually saw him climbing up and down on the metal gate as he and the other assistants helped the starter keep the horses lined up correctly for the start of a race. She had never seen him in the barn area before.

She noticed Alton Jeffers on a ladder in the shedrow. “Oh, hello, Mr. Jeffers.”

“Morning, Tonya.”

“You’re up early today. What are you doing?”

“Installing some more security cameras, here and near the jocks’ room. The board loosened the purse strings a little. Finally.”

“Security cameras, huh? I guess we’re coming up in the world.”

She stopped at one of the stalls where Luis Mendes was cleaning. “Hi, Luis. Have you seen my dad?”

“Buenos dias, mija,” Luis said as he straightened up and stretched his back. Tonya smiled at Luis’s pet name for her. Mija--a term of endearment meaning “my daughter.” He had helped Royce raise her since her mother’s death, and she was the closest thing to a daughter he would probably ever know. Luis was a cheerful little man with graying black hair and a wide smile. He had been with her father since the early days. The two men had been inseparable, drawn together by their mutual love for horses and fascination for racing. Luis had tried to be a jockey at one time, but always struggled to keep his weight down.

Now he was Royce’s assistant trainer and watched over the racing stable as if it were his own. “Señor Royce, he is in the tack room.”

Tonya started toward the door halfway down the shedrow. Opening it, she was shocked to see a dozen people crowded into the room, all standing around a small table with a cake topped with burning candles and writing in pink icing. There were grooms, stable hands, exercise riders, and jockeys from Royce’s barn. She had known some of them since she was a little girl.

“Happy birthday! Surprise!” they were yelling and laughing.

“Happy birthday, kiddo,” Royce said. “I bet you thought I forgot, huh? Come blow out your candles.”

Tonya thanked everyone, truly grateful for her adopted family. She went to her father and hugged him, then blew out the twenty-one candles, making a silent wish to be a jockey someday.

Royce began to cut the cake and put small slices on paper plates. Chris came over, and she handed him a plate. He leaned down. “Happy birthday, Tonya.”

Tonya smiled up at him.

Luis came in, grinning from ear to ear. “I thought maybe I give away the secret,” he said.

“No, Luis, I was completely surprised. Thank you all so much,” she said, turning to the group.

Alana Symonds approached, a spot of icing on her nose, and held out a small box. Alana had curly brown hair, blue eyes, and freckles across her nose. A few years older than Tonya, Alana was the only licensed female jockey at the track. Slim and wiry, making the weights was easy for her, no doubt to the annoyance of the male jockeys who spent their lives dieting and sitting in the sauna. Like all female jockeys, Alana struggled to break down the “testosterone barrier,” as she described it, and convince trainers to hire her.

Unwrapping the ribbon and pretty paper, Tonya found a tortoiseshell comb. “Alana, thanks. I didn’t expect anything.”

“I thought it would go with your hair color.”

Tonya didn’t know what to say. Being raised by her father since she was very small, she had been very much a tomboy. This sort of girly stuff seemed foreign to her. She did nothing with her hair except to pull it back into a ponytail and never wore make-up. But it was a very pretty comb, and Alana was right--it would match her auburn hair. “It’s beautiful. Thanks a lot.”

“So what are you going to do now that you’re twenty-one?”

“I thought I’d apply for my apprentice license.”

Alana lowered her voice. “How does your dad feel about that? I mean, I don’t bother trying to get mounts from him, knowing how he feels about girl jockeys.”

Tonya rolled her eyes. “Oh, he’s just delighted.”

“I’ll bet. Well, best of luck. I’ll be glad to have some company in the locker room. Have you ever seen the girl jocks’ locker room?”

“No. Where is it?”

“Under the grandstand. The décor will knock your eyes out. I think it’s called Early Garage Sale. Bring your own toilet paper.”

Royce was starting to clean up. He packed the remainder of the cake in a box and chuckled. “We can have this for dessert--for about a month.”

“This was nice of you, Dad. Thanks a lot.”

“Well, you only turn twenty-one once. Might as well enjoy it.”

Tonya decided this was as good a time as any to bring up the license again. She squared her shoulders. “I’m going over to the stewards’ office as soon as I’m finished with my workouts today to apply for my apprentice license.”

She held her breath, waiting for the usual angry outburst. But Royce just regarded her with a mixture of sadness and fear in his eyes. He leaned down and hugged her again then picked up the cake box and left the tack room.

***

“Hello,” the secretary said as Tonya entered the administrator’s office in the track’s small administration building that afternoon. “What can I do for you?”

She handed the secretary the application, her ID, and a copy of her medical certificate. “I’m here to apply for my apprentice jockey license.”

“Wait here, and I’ll see if Mr. Jeffers is available.”

Tonya sat down and scanned the pictures on the walls of great horses and jockeys of the past. Ron Turcotte on Secretariat, Bill Shoemaker on Swaps, Steve Cauthen on Affirmed. Not a girl in the bunch, she thought. Maybe I’ll change that, and my picture will be up there someday.

Alton Jeffers came out of the inner office and approached her. She stood up to greet him.

“I see you have all your ducks on the table, Tonya.” Tonya suppressed a grin. Alton Jeffers was known for his mixed metaphors and general slaughter of the English language. He had once handed Royce a wrinkled entry sheet and said, “Sorry it’s so moth-eared.” Jeffers was a stocky, middle-aged, former jockey with a slight limp. “All you need now is a test at the starting gate, and you’ll be set. I can meet you at the gate tomorrow morning if you like. Ride one of your dad’s horses over and be there around seven-thirty, okay?”

“Yes, sir. I’ll be there.” She paused at the door. “Mr. Jeffers, can I ask something? Did the videos show anything that would help find the person who killed poor Alfie?”

“Unfortunately, the camera in the shedrow was too far away from the last stall where they found him. We could see someone going into the stall sometime the night before he was found and coming out a while later. But there’s no way to identify who it was.”

“That’s too bad. Maybe the police can find fingerprints or something.”

Jeffers shook his head sadly. “Lieutenant Kubisky said he doubted there would be much evidence. I’m not sure he’s trying all that hard, though. We may never know who it was or why they did it. I wouldn’t worry about it, Tonya. Carlos or whoever it was is probably far away by now.”

“I hope so. Well, see you tomorrow.”

***

After a delicious dinner of roast beef, potatoes, and peas that evening, Royce sat reading his Daily Racing Form while Tonya sat at the computer. Henry was curled in her lap, and Clive was on the desk batting at the pointer darting across the screen whenever she moved the mouse.

“You’re in a good mood tonight, Clive,” Tonya said.

Royce looked up from his reading and gazed at Tonya thoughtfully. “Sometimes I worry about you, Tonya.”

“I know, Dad. I know you don’t want me riding races. I understand.”

“It’s not just that, although that’s a big one. Sometimes I think you spend too much time with the horses and those cats. Maybe you should get off the track more, go into town, do things with your friends.”

Royce had asked Tonya several times if she felt she was missing something by not having a permanent home, making friends her own age or going to high school in some little town.

Getting her high school diploma online had denied her many of the things other girls experienced--football games, proms, sleepovers, dates.

She wondered if there might be something wonderful and exciting she was missing out on, but decided that nothing could be as wonderful as riding and caring for Thoroughbreds. And what could be more exciting than being a jockey?

“Are you getting tired of my company?” she teased.

“Of course not. But you need more than me and the cats to keep you company at night.”

“I like your company. And the cats. And the horses, too. Besides, Alana and I are friends.” She paused a moment. “Hey, why don’t I school Gus in the gate tomorrow? He could use it.”

Royce looked at her sideways. “This wouldn’t have anything to do with you meeting Jeffers for your gate test tomorrow, would it?”

“Well, as a matter of fact...” Tonya said, wondering if anything happened on the track that escaped Royce.

“It wouldn’t hurt to give him a little more gate experience, I guess,” he said. “I could bring that filly over and school her at the same time. She’s been acting up so bad in the gate that the stewards won’t certify her to race. I never saw a horse rear like she does. She needs the schooling.”

Tonya was torn between delight that Royce seemed to be accepting the idea of her being a jockey and annoyance at feeling that he wanted to keep an eye on her. “Sure, why not?” she replied.

“Just be careful, kiddo. The metal monster and nervous two-year-olds can be a dangerous combination.”