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  “You’re welcome,” she said sarcastically, picking up a stray napkin.

  He put down the notebook, reached for her hand to pull her down. She kneeled next to him, their faces level.

  “Babe, I paid for the pizza,” he said, cupping her face. She had to look at him or it would seem like she was pouting. “It’s only common decency that you should clean up. You’re not owed any thanks when you do something that is just common decency.”

  That was not the most ridiculous thing she’d ever heard in her life, surely. But there was something about it that was so absurd, negotiating gratitude, keeping a tally of whose turn it was to do a good deed. She laughed—just a little one, but stopped when she saw Michael was serious.

  “Fine, if you’re going to be moody about it, I’ll just go.” He gathered his notebooks, shaking off her protests and her restraining hand. “You’re welcome for the pizza,” he shot back at her as he slammed the door.

  Mal sat in the midst of papers and textbooks, staring dumbly at the door. They were just supposed to eat pizza, study, then make out. How had she screwed this up so badly? How had it ended with her studying the Civil War alone?

  It didn’t, really; Michael had taken her notebook.

  Mal shook herself out of her reverie. She had put up with an absurd amount of emotional manipulation from Michael, and she wasn’t going to do it again. Still, she couldn’t keep herself from thinking about Michael and what he must be doing back in Maryland. He was in that big new house all alone—she wondered if he’d kept the decorator she had hired, if he was going to stick with the “touch of fabulous” she had been talked into for the master bathroom. She hoped, although she knew it was foolish, that he had forgotten about her, or at least moved on. Bunny Ashton-Pierce seemed poised to help him move on.

  She tried not to spend too much time thinking about the improbably named Bunny, she of the fake boobs (Mal’s were bigger, if not perkier) and the bottle blond hair done right (Mal was no competition there). Bunny of the spray tans and the charity auctions. The last time she had seen Bunny Ashton-Pierce was at a Botox party where she only shut up about how the laugh lines were her husband’s fault—he was always such a cutup—to get an injection in the corner of her mouth. Mal didn’t quite remember Dr. Ashton-Pierce being a cutup. More of a handsy perv with an apparent fondness for natural breasts, but she’d sat silently in the corner, hoping no one would notice her since she was not too fond of needles and, frankly, had earned every damn laugh line on her face. Not that there were many. More of a fine suggestion of a laugh line to come.

  She didn’t have as many wrinkles around her eyes as, say, Keith did. But it was different for a man. Keith looked rugged with wrinkles, just like he would probably look distinguished with gray hair. Jerk.

  Anyway, Keith was a bully, just like Michael. Oh, maybe he wasn’t as outright manipulative as Michael was, and he didn’t seem to have Michael’s temper, but the way he patronized her, tested her with crappy (literally!) chores, kept Peanut away without telling her. The last thing she needed to do was put up with another bully.

  Mal stopped just short of the fence she was about to run into. She was pissed off, mostly at Keith for treating her like she was an idiot. No, mostly at herself for allowing herself to be treated like an idiot. Anyway, maybe she was overreacting to Keith—the last time he’d seen her with the dog, she had practically thrown up in his lap.

  No. She shook her head, determined. The minute she started rationalizing his behavior, that was the minute she lost control of her life again. She wasn’t going to let another man have that power over her, not since she had finally taken these few tentative steps away from Michael. Besides, what was Keith to her? Nothing. He was her fake future brother-in-law, just some dumb hick farmer with big hands and a nice butt.

  Dammit.

  She stopped suddenly at the sound of Peanut’s high-pitched bark. Mal had practically walked right into him, but he was on the other side of the fence.

  She froze.

  Then she looked at Peanut, his wet nose poking between the wide boards. He got down low, digging with his one front paw, leaning over to his side, trying to burrow beneath the fence. His tail was wagging manically. It looked like his butt was going to take off.

  It was sort of funny. Sort of cute. Peanut wasn’t scary. Just, well, energetic.

  “You’re nothing but a big bully, too, you know.” Mal thought about how long she’d been afraid, how she’d cross the street when she saw her neighbors out walking their dogs. Little dogs, who couldn’t attack her restrained on a leash and, even if they could, could do nothing more than bite her ankles. She rubbed the scar on her chin. She had been a kid. That dog was old, sitting in the sun, and she was just petting him. No, she was trying to get him to play, but he was old and wanted to sleep. Now she could see it clearly, the dog trying to inch away, but she kept tossing him the ball, pulling his collar when he wouldn’t chase it. So he nipped her chin and scared the hell out of her. He hadn’t really hurt her; she needed three stitches and had a scar smaller than some people’s acne scars. She hadn’t known anything about dogs, still didn’t. Except now she knew to leave them alone when they wanted to be left alone.

  Peanut, clearly, did not want to be left alone.

  During her reverie, Peanut had calmed down. He sat looking at her, panting, his front paw on the fence rail. It sort of looked like he was smiling.

  “You’re pretty cute for a bully, aren’t you?”

  He tilted his head, giving her that curious dog look.

  Mal took a deep breath. Even if she didn’t become best friends with Peanut, she couldn’t have every member of the Carson family, and apparently everyone who worked on the farm, spending their energy keeping her and the dog apart.

  “How about a truce? You don’t eat me, and I won’t throw up every time I see you.”

  Peanut let out a little bark.

  “OK.” She took another deep breath, steeling herself. She took a step forward, letting Peanut smell her hand. She must have smelled good, because he licked her. She flinched back and Peanut jumped off the fence and took a step backward.

  “Oh, OK. You didn’t mean to scare me. You’re just being a dog. Dogs lick.” She wiped her hand on her jeans. “No offense.” She smiled ruefully. Peanut took a step toward the fence.

  Mal squatted down, stuck her hand between the rails. “Can I pet you?” Peanut shoved his head into her outstretched hand. “I’ll take that as a yes,” she said, and began to stroke his head. When she scratched behind his ears, Peanut flopped to the ground, his three legs in the air. “Well, there’s no need to be such a slut about it.” But she laughed, and reached through to scratch his belly.

  “If I come through this fence, are you going to jump on me? Or can we take this slow?” Peanut tilted his curious head again, then let his tongue loll out to the side. “I guess you probably don’t speak English. OK, here I come.” She moved to the gate, just a few yards away. When she opened it, Peanut was there. He didn’t jump on her; maybe he did speak English. He just shoved his big body against her legs, then dropped to the ground again, rolling his stomach up to her. Mal laughed, then squatted down next to him and rubbed his belly.

  While she was making friends, one of the horses had come up to them. Peanut rolled up and sniffed the horse’s snout. The horse put his nose in Mal’s hair and snorted. She put her hand to the side of his face.

  “I feel like Snow White,” she said, half expecting a bunny, and then maybe a bird to sit on her shoulder. Peanut licked her cheek. “But maybe with a few more germs.”

  The horse lost interest in her pretty fast, and she let it go. She was too happy with Peanut, who rolled onto the ground and let her scratch and scratch and scratch. Then he got up, picked up a stick, and nudged her hand.

  “OK! OK, I get it. Here you go.”

  She was about to throw the stick when she saw Katie come charging out of the barn.

  “Who left the damn gate open?” she s
houted, sprinting past Mal and Peanut, who gave friendly chase. Mal turned to watch Katie go, an apology on her lips, when she saw the friendly horse. On the other side of the fence. Running toward the road.

  Chapter 8

  Mal wasn’t sure she had ever seen any person run as fast as Katie did, heading toward the main gate and the dirt road. She stood there dumbly, not quite taking in what was going on. Katie kept yelling, “Horse loose,” and, sure, there was a part in the back of Mal’s mind that understood that she had left the gate open and that, because of her, a horse was running toward the road and freedom, but that part of her mind was not connected to the part that told her legs to go, to run after Katie and, when she eventually caught up (dang, that girl was fast!), help.

  There was also the part of her mind that was distracted by the sight she caught out of the corner of her eye, of Keith racing out of the barn, swinging up on a saddle, and charging past her. He didn’t pause exactly, but he turned and shouted at her to “Come on!” So she ran after him.

  Miss Libby was standing closest to the front gate, waving a big white sheet. Chase had run up and closed the front gate, and Keith was dismounting, standing a few yards away. The horse charged up, and Mal thought for sure Libby was going to be trampled. But she waved and shouted and the horse turned, first to the right, where Keith was waving his arms, then to the left, where Katie was doing the same thing. Then toward Mal.

  “Wave your arms and make a lot of noise!” Keith shouted at her. So she did. She felt like an idiot, but it seemed to be doing the trick, because the waving Carsons were coming up behind the horse, closing the circle and slowly moving toward the barn.

  When the horse was back in her stall (Bob was her name. A girl horse named Bob.), Keith went in there with her, toweling off her shivering muscles with a blanket, speaking soothing words. Chase was putting Keith’s horse back in his stall, putting up the saddle. Libby went back to the house to finish hanging the laundry out (which explained the sheet) and told them supper was in ten minutes. Katie just stood at the stall gate, fuming.

  “Who the hell left the gate open?” she demanded.

  “Cool off, Katie,” Chase said softly.

  Katie stomped her foot, and Bob mimicked her. “It was Mal, wasn’t it? What the hell was she doing with the horses anyway? I know she’s from the suburbs, but how stupid do you have to be to miss the basic common sense to close the gate behind you so the damn horses don’t run into the road!”

  “Katie!” Keith had raised his voice to a grown-up authority voice. It wasn’t much louder, but it still silenced Katie. “Knock it off. This isn’t the first time Bob got out, and it won’t be the last. So let it go, leave Mal out of this, and go help Libby with dinner.”

  “Oh, I see, you just want to send the woman back to the kitchen!”

  “No, I want to get you out of this damn barn so you stop spooking Bob.”

  Katie paused at that. She gave Bob a scratch on the nose. She was still a little agitated, but she stomped appreciatively. So did Bob. Katie turned to Keith. “Fine. I’ll go help Libby but only because I’m starving and I want to eat. From now on, you’re in charge of babysitting Luke’s little stray.”

  “Watch it, Katie.”

  Katie turned and jumped gracefully over a pile of tack before continuing her storming, petulant exit toward the house.

  Mal was not so graceful. Trying to sneak out of the barn, she tripped over the tack in the stall she had been hiding in. She landed, gracefully, she hoped, on her face. Scrambling up, she looked over to see Keith and Bob, their heads poking out of the stall.

  “I was just, uh, I was just going. I’m going to go,” she said, and ran toward the house.

  Dinner that evening was a tense affair. Mal knew it was her fault, but nobody would even look at her. Libby had told Mal that usually when one of the Carson children did something wrong, they would be crushed under the weight of their father’s disapproving gaze, then punished, then comforted by Miss Libby. But Mal was not one of the Carson children and leaving the gate open was not her fault, really. She didn’t know.

  In between saying grace and passing the chicken wings, Cal said, “Nobody let that girl go about on her own until she learns how it’s done.”

  It was not said unkindly, not entirely, but Mal thought she probably would have preferred if he went back to ignoring her. She bristled. Another bully.

  “Yeah, next time I might burn down the barn or muck out the feed pile.” And then she laughed, a short, tense sound. Looking at the blank faces around the table, she thought maybe it was too soon for jokes. So she kept her head down, dug into her food, and waited for the meal to be over.

  As soon as she could politely excuse herself from the table, which was about half an hour after she wanted to, she went up to her room—Luke’s room—and dug around in her bag for her cell phone. She had bought it at a big box store around Morgantown. It was one of those really basic pay-as-you-go phones. She had put a hundred dollars worth of minutes on it, figuring it would be good for emergencies, but also feeling a little like a drug dealer since she could throw the phone out any time she wanted. Untraceable.

  She had yet to use it, although she had given Luke the number. He hadn’t used it either, hadn’t called since he’d been gone, but she needed him now. She needed to talk to him, and she needed him to get her out of here.

  The sun had set while they were eating dinner, and as Mal stepped out on the front porch, her breath stopped at the blue glow of twilight, the first stars dotting the sky. She hadn’t been this far from the city in a long time, and she didn’t realize how much she had been missing the stars. She took a deep breath of the crisp evening air, wrapped her scarf more firmly around her neck, and called Luke.

  It rang and rang, and while it rang, she saw Libby pull back the curtain and, seeing it was Mal on the porch, give a friendly wave. Mal smiled and waved back, then stepped off the porch. She didn’t need anyone in the family to hear this conversation. She started walking.

  If there is a conversation, she thought, hoping not to have to deal with voice mail. She hated voice mail.

  Luke finally picked up, sounding a little breathless. “Mal? What’s wrong?” There was a lot of noise behind him, as if he was in a crowd. Maybe a bar.

  “Nothing! I’m fine, I just wanted to talk to you, that’s all.”

  “Mal.”

  She heard one distinctive voice above the rest. “Luke, are you at an auction or something?”

  “What? No! No, I’m at a party.”

  “It sounds like an auctioneer in the background.”

  “That’s just, a party trick. Hold on, let me go outside.” She heard a few mumbled “excuse me’s” and “hey, back in a minute,” and then the noise of the crowd faded. She could hear him perfectly. “What’s going on, baby?”

  “It’s nothing, really, I just wanted to say hi. Hi.”

  “Hi. Mal.”

  There was no use. She burst out crying. “Your family hates me. I let a horse out. I threw up at the dog.” As if speaking of the devil, Peanut came off the kitchen steps and nuzzled his nose into her free hand. The dog, at least, forgave her. She kept walking, Peanut trotting beside her. “The only thing I’m doing right here is eating Miss Libby’s cooking and mucking out stables.”

  “Why are you mucking out the stables? That’s a disgusting job.”

  “Please, Luke, it’s the only thing I’ve done right so far, unless Keith is too polite to tell me I’ve done it wrong. He’s probably in the barn right now, re-mucking everything. Jerk.”

  Luke laughed softly. “Baby, trust me. Keith is not too polite to tell you when you’ve done something wrong.”

  She warmed at that. Maybe she wasn’t entirely useless. Then she remembered how Keith had kept Peanut away without telling her, so maybe he was too polite. Then she remembered how he’d swung up on that horse to go chasing after Bob. She shook her head. That was not a very polite thought.

  She focused back on the p
hone. She was supposed to be talking to her fiancé. Fake fiancé, but still.

  “Tell me about the rest. How did you let a horse out? Did they get it back?”

  “Yeah, it was Bob. I left the gate open.”

  “Why would you leave the gate open at a farm?”

  “I didn’t think! This is exactly how your family is treating me, like this should be common sense. But it’s not common sense if you’ve never been on a farm before!”

  The more she thought about it, though, the more she came to realize it really was common sense. Horses were fenced in for a reason. She felt like an idiot.

  “OK, OK, you’re right. They should have explicitly told you not to leave the gates open.”

  “Stop, don’t patronize me. I know I did something really stupid. I’m just having trouble coming to terms with it. Give me a minute.”

  “It was Bob that got out?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, I wouldn’t worry about it. When Bob was young and could actually run fast, she got out at least once a week. That horse has serious wanderlust.”

  “Bob the Girl Horse.”

  “Yeah, she’s Katie’s. When Dad brought her home as a filly, her name was Princess. Katie flipped—you should have seen her. It was amazing. She kicked this tin bucket clear across the yard and shouted, ‘I’m not riding a horse named Princess!’ Cal was pissed.”

  “She seems attached to the horse now.”

  “Oh, she loves that horse. The next morning, we found Katie asleep in the stall. She announced that she loved the horse and that she was going to name her Bob. No matter how hard we tried to convince her that Bob was not a girl’s name, she stuck to it.” He laughed again. “She really loves that horse.”

  “That explains why she bit my head off when she saw her get out.” That wasn’t entirely true. Katie had bitten Mal’s head off behind her back, so to speak. To her face, she was very polite, and very cold.

  “She’ll get over it. Katie gets a little bit hot, but she’ll calm down. If she doesn’t apologize to you, I’ll talk to her.”