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  Jake reached back to touch his arm. “That’s good, really.”

  Yawning again, Rich eased himself off Jake’s rump in stages, grunting under his breath as he used one hand to physically shift his right leg. “You’re still pretty tight in places.”

  “I turned on the heater to the pool after dinner. By tomorrow morning, it should be warm enough for me to swim. That should help.” He started to roll over on his side to face Rich, only he suddenly grabbed at the covers.

  “You okay?” Rich touched his arm.

  “Yeah,” Jake said, his eyes looking a little unfocused. “Just a little dizzy.” He completed his turn carefully to prop his head up on his elbow.

  “Dizzy?” Rich frowned. He pulled his left leg underneath him so he could sit on his hip as he looked down at Jake. “That’s not right.”

  Jake wrinkled his lip dismissively. “It’s not a big deal. Happens sometimes when I get really tired.”

  Pinky walked up the bed and flopped on his side in the narrow space between them, draping his spine over Jake’s arm as though it wasn’t there. His loud purring, sounding very much like an old-style coffee percolator, was a little hard to ignore.

  Rich reached down to stroke him, which made the cat roll into his touch, the purr getting louder and raspy. “Well, you should probably call it a night, then. What are you going to do tomorrow?”

  “See Tom,” Jake said simply. He lifted his arm a few centimeters off the mattress, bracing his fingers and gently bumping the cat up and down. Pinky didn’t seem to care.

  Rich made a murmuring noise of assent. “Good idea.”

  “Something you said earlier struck me as odd.” Jake’s declaration was sudden, and Rich looked at him sharply. The bedside lamp lit up his irises, turning them almost as golden as Pinky’s half-closed eyes.

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah.” He spoke quietly, dropping his gaze to the cat again. “You said something about how the media would react to me ‘taking a gay lover.’”

  Rich screwed up his face, squinting at Jake with one eye shut as he twisted his lips to the side. “Nope, still not seeing the significance of that one.”

  Jake sighed and eased his arm out from under the cat, who retaliated by turning his back to Rich and pushing at Jake with all four feet. “You said ‘taking a gay lover.’ Not me coming out as gay. Come on, Professor. You were always the one who made such a big deal about using the right words for things.” He raised an eyebrow. “Why are you grinning like that?”

  “No reason.” Rich continued to smile. Jake hadn’t called him Professor in years.

  “Right. Pay no attention to the crazy man behind the screen, boys and girls,” Jake said. “So anyway, why’d you put it like that?”

  “Like what?”

  Jake made a little, high-pitched noise of frustration and mimed strangling something. The cat, attracted by the movement, rolled up on his head sideways and batted, upside down, at Jake’s hands. “Why would I be taking a lover instead of coming out?” He pushed himself up and snagged a pillow to swat Rich’s knee. Pinky took offense at this and scampered off the bed.

  “Because I, uh, thought that was the more accurate statement?”

  “Exactly.” Jake tucked the pillow behind his head and looked up at Rich. “The question is, why do you think that?”

  Rich found the lint balls on the bedspread imminently fascinating. He picked at them for a few seconds before answering. “Because I always assumed your sexuality was a bit… fluid?”

  “Really? Huh.” Jake placed one hand behind his head, which was another damn fine way to show off his shoulders and pecs. “I’d have thought….”

  “You’d have thought what? That my gaydar was infallible?”

  “It was certainly the most aggressive gaydar I’d ever seen.” Jake lifted one eyebrow. “I wonder what you were like before I met you.”

  “Gold stud earrings and a shaggy haircut. Matchbox Twenty and Justin Timberlake.”

  Jake laughed, and Rich grinned at the honking, pig-snorting sound.

  “You didn’t.”

  “I did.” Rich was rueful. “Embarrassing as it is to confess now. You have to admit, I had the hair for it.”

  Jake folded his lips over in an attempt to hide his smile. “Back then.”

  Rich poked him in the ribs. “Hey, everyone has to grow up sometime. I bet you were all about the Backstreet Boys. Or maybe Ricky Martin? Come on, fess up. Martin did it for you, didn’t he?”

  “It was Bryan Adams all the way for me.” Jake half closed his eyes, a self-protective mechanism Rich recognized from old. Or maybe he was just tired.

  “Oooh.” Rich expressed his appreciation. “‘Summer of ’69’? ‘Run to You’?”

  “‘Everything I Do, I Do It For You.’”

  There was a pause as Jake locked eyes with him. Rich was conscious of a lifting, soaring joy—as well as the need to quell it. They couldn’t go back down this road again. Or could they? The events of last night suggested they could. Still, Rich couldn’t shake the niggling doubt that this was all too easy. That they hadn’t yet met the biggest hurdles on the course.

  “We should get some sleep. It’s been a long day.” Rich touched Jake on the arm. It was important that he not seem dismissive, but the truth was, they really did need to call it a night.

  Jake sat up, and swung his legs off the side of the bed.

  “You could sleep here, you know.” Rich held his breath while waiting for Jake’s reply. Jake hadn’t really given him an answer regarding their relationship. It would be easier if Rich didn’t have to guess as he went along.

  Jake’s face was without expression. “I thought I’ head back to my room. You know, to get some sleep.”

  Rich chewed on the inside of his lip. “You can’t sleep here?”

  The sigh was almost imperceptible. “I just thought I’d sleep better in my own bed. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  He left without another word, shutting Rich and the cats into the room without a backward glance.

  Rich spent a long time staring at the ceiling in the dark after he’d gone, wondering just what the fuck had happened.

  Cats did not let one sleep late. Not that Rich was in the habit of it, but even on the days when he was seriously tempted, he couldn’t possibly ignore the way his cats would stomp around his head, patting his face gently, and then more vigorously, with soft velvet paws. If he showed any inclination to lie in bed beyond the time the first gray streaks of dawn began to light the room, Brain was certain to nip his ear. Rare was the time when he’d both ignore the alarm and the cats to risk bloody appendages.

  This was one of those days when getting out of bed was like starting a car that had sat idle for too long; engine sputtering in fits and starts until it finally caught. The downside of having to confine the cats up in his room was that the kitchen was far, far away. At home, he would have padded down the hall first thing in the morning and fed the cats while starting a pot of coffee. That would have bought him time to go back to bed for an extra half hour. At Foxden, their chorus of meows grated as he sat on the edge of the bed, mustering the strength to get up. A glance out the window showed a gray dawn and a light drizzle. He dearly wished someone would pay him to stay in bed today.

  The cats took standing up as an encouraging move, and redoubled their vocalizations, adding shoulder bumps into his legs as he staggered toward the bathroom. “There is no food in here. When has there ever been food in this room? Suck it up,” he told them as he shut the bathroom door in their expectant faces.

  A shower and shave later, he felt more human. He came out of the bathroom to find that the carpet at the edge of the door looked decidedly worse for the wear, roughened with bits of fiber sticking up in places. In horror, he knelt to examine the damage. The cats immediately began winding themselves around him, blocking his view.

  “Mittens,” he said sternly, picking Pinky up by the rib cage and glaring at him. The cat dangled unresistingly in his
hands. “That’s what Donald Stanford will make out of you. Fluffy mittens. For Chrissakes, guys, I can’t afford to replace the carpet too.”

  He had to push the cats back into the room with his cane as he squeezed out the door. He couldn’t risk letting them out until he knew where Donald Stanford was.

  Jake was in the dining room when he entered. Rich glanced at his plate, which was half-full. Jake seemed to be only halfheartedly pushing some scrambled eggs onto his fork.

  “Everything okay?” Rich inhaled happily when he lifted the covered tray to reveal a selection of bacon and sausages. He helped himself, spooning out eggs from the next dish over, his stomach growling in anticipation. A passing moment of guilt at the knowledge the cats still hadn’t eaten struck him, yet he knew they’d be fine until he figured out what parts of the house would be safe for them to roam. He took his seat across from Jake and tucked into his food. It wasn’t until Jake shrugged that he realized Jake still wasn’t eating normally.

  “Yeah. Just not hungry, I guess.” Jake laid down his fork and leaned back in his seat, resting his elbow on the backrest of the chair as he looked out the French doors onto the wet lawn.

  Rain droplets traveled in eccentric rivulets down the glass doors, softening and muting the world outside. Rich could appreciate how green the grass had become. April was almost over. In a very short time, they would travel to the U.K. with The Moose and Kryptonite. The amount of paperwork he had to do was staggering, yet there was a shimmering excitement about it all too.

  Jake should be excited as well.

  “What’s up?” The horses would be taking a day off after the long ride from Kentucky. Jake had mentioned last night Rowan couldn’t come today, but that didn’t mean Jake was off the hook. Jake would probably work out in the gym, or more likely, Rich corrected himself, swim laps in the pool. There’d be time for a visit with Tom. Rich hoped Tom would be up to helping him walk through the tangled and complicated forms needed to get everyone into the U.K. in time for Branham. Maybe they could pick up another event in Europe and still get back in time for the Mandatory Outing in Virginia. The Olympic Eventing Team would make their final cuts then. Timing was critical with this kind of schedule.

  It dawned on him that Jake hadn’t answered. “Jake?” he asked. He took a sip of orange juice and watched him over the brim of his glass.

  Jake waved him off with a negligent hand. “It’s nothing. Rain’s got me down, I guess. I’m going to see Tom. Do you want to come with me?”

  Rich grimaced. “I’ve got some phone calls to make. There are some things we need to move on, now that we’re headed to Jersey Fresh next. I want to talk to Tom, but why don’t you guys catch up first? Where’s your father, by the way? I’ve got to figure out what I’m going to do about feeding the cats and where they can stay out of his way.”

  Jake played with his fork, tapping it briefly on the table. “He went back to D.C. He said he’d be back though. He’s really having a hard time with the cats here. I never knew he was allergic.”

  “Might be why you never got another dog,” Rich said, nodding as he chewed a strip of bacon.

  Jake’s hand on the fork stilled, and he withdrew it. “We never got another dog because I went off to summer camp when I was twelve and came home to find my dad had put Rocky to sleep without letting me know.” His voice was cold and remote.

  Rich looked up from his plate. “He killed your dog?”

  Jake shook his head sharply, then winced and rubbed his neck. “It wasn’t like that. Rocky was old and he’d been sick before I left. Bad kidneys. I know now it was the right decision. It’s just that no one told me. He chose to do it while I was away. I didn’t find out until I came home. It was a long time ago.” He stood, pushing the chair back from the table with an awkward crookedness.

  “Jake.” Rich caught him by the hand as he came past Rich’s chair. “I’ll go with you to see Tom if you want. Just give me a sec, okay?”

  Jake gave his hand a little squeeze before letting go. “No, you’re right. We’ve got a lot to do, and this way, I can judge Tom’s condition for myself before we decide how much we’re going to lean on him for all the detail work.”

  “You don’t trust me to get it right?” Rich raised an eyebrow at him, leaning back so he could look up into Jake’s face.

  “Admit it, you’re scared shitless you’ll screw it up somehow.” Jake flicked the top of his hair with a thumb and middle finger as he went around Rich for the door.

  “Oh ye of little faith!” Rich called out after him. He laughed when Jake saluted him with his middle finger. “Right,” Rich said to the empty room. “Finish breakfast. Feed the cats. Down to the office.” Just to be on the safe side, though, he’d have Tom look over everything before he faxed it.

  He glanced out the window. It looked as though the rain was stopping. Today might be the perfect day to implement a little surprise he’d been working on. He picked up his cell and placed a call.

  Jake got out of the car at Tom’s house, noting the ruts in the graveled drive. He avoided the puddles as he crossed through the misting rain to the wooden stairs that lead to the porch. There, he paused to shake the water off the hood of his parka before knocking.

  Carolyn answered the door. She blinked at him for a moment—as though she didn’t recognize him—and then pushed the screen door open. “Come in. Hang your coat up here. Boots off too.”

  She wasn’t exactly brusque, but she wasn’t very friendly either. Jake hung up his damp slicker and toed off his boots. He followed her into the depths of the house, moving silently on socked feet behind her. Tom’s home was warmly familiar—a dark, narrow entranceway, with stairs on the right leading to the second floor, and bookcases on the left, making the passageway to the rest of the house even tighter than before. Jake recognized some of his favorites as they passed: Bradbury, Heinlein, Conan Doyle. A pair of work gloves and an old dog leash were stuffed into the shelves along with more books, this time Terry Pratchett and the Harry Potter series. Jake smiled, remembering evenings he’d stayed with Tom until his father had picked him up, becoming absorbed in one story after another.

  It didn’t smell the same though. Jake remembered a place that smelled slightly of old boots, wet dog, and the musty odor of many books. He was struck now by the scent of Murphy’s Oil, which reminded him pleasantly of saddle soap, but it was a sort of determined cleanliness just the same. Carolyn had been busy. The scent of chocolate hovered in the air as well. From the flour on her apron, Jake guessed Carolyn was baking.

  “He’s in the study. He’s having a good day for a change, but don’t be fooled by that. Don’t wear him out.” She indicated the room off to the side and continued on to the kitchen without looking to see what Jake would do next. Feeling like an intruder for the first time in his memory, Jake stepped into the room where he’d spent many an hour growing up.

  “Jake.” Tom looked up from his reading with a smile, glasses perched on the end of his nose. He took them off and laid them and the book aside. When he moved to rise, Jake stopped him with a wave of his hand. Tom settled back into the couch, and Jake sat across from him in the big easy chair. In the past, it had been covered with a heavy striped pad, the kind used under Western saddles, and matted with the hair of many different dogs. The saddle pad was gone now, as was most of the hair.

  It saddened him in a way he couldn’t explain. Sentimental over dog hair? Yet it felt like the end of an era just the same.

  “Tell me about Rolex,” Tom said, making everything all right again.

  They rehashed the competition, starting with the dressage tests and what had gone wrong and what had gone right. Tom had been frustrated by the fact the television coverage had been spotty, even on the all-equestrian network. Viewers tended to prefer the thrill of cross-country and stadium jumping over the precise beauty of dressage, unless it was a freestyle competition set to music. Tom wanted a blow-by-blow account of both tests before moving on to the stadium jumping. Of the
eight faults Kryptonite had accrued in the stadium round, four had been Jake’s fault. He’d let Kryptonite chip in an extra stride at the takeoff, and his hind feet hadn’t been able to clear the jump cleanly, dropping a rail.

  “Yeah, Rich called me out on that one too.” Jake knew his grin had to be rueful. “I should have pushed him a bit more on the approach, but you know what a fine line that is with him. I could have just as easily gotten a run-out or a flat-out refusal.”

  Tom leaned back against the sofa, nodding. “That second rail down though. That was just a lack of picking up his front feet over the final fence. He looked like he was getting tired.”

  Jake frowned. “He felt that way on the cross-country course too.” Not like The Moose, who felt as if she could jump the moon and come back for seconds. “You and Rich might be right. He may not hold up for the Olympics.”

  “You pushed him hard over the cross-country course. I’m not saying he didn’t need it. One of the best rides I’ve ever seen you put in on him. But what bee got in your bonnet before you left the start box?”

  Jake picked at the fabric on the chair’s armrest. “Father found out about Rich. He called just as I was getting ready to mount.” He caught Tom’s gaze and held it. “Did you know he’d paid Rich’s medical bills on the condition he have nothing to do with me ever again?”

  Tom’s face seem to age in front of him. Jake noticed the dark circles under his eyes for the first time, and how his skin seemed to hang off him. “Suspected. Didn’t know for sure.”

  “I don’t know how they found out, but the media was all over the substitution of trainers at Rolex, wanting to do a puff piece about Rich coming back from tragedy to step into your shoes in your time of need, with me, the poor little rich boy trying to make it to the Olympics without the benefit of a big stable behind me.” Jake scowled at the memory. “I felt like I was the star of a damned soup commercial or something.”