Galloping Gold (5 page)

Pulling together,
Darby thought. It was the name of the Potters' therapeutic riding program, but it fit her and Hoku, too.

Hoku made the happy grumbling noises Darby had taken for hunger when the filly was in her corral up in the ranch yard. But now Darby knew it as a greeting.

Wait,
Darby thought suddenly. Was there really a difference between Hoku's exultant welcome and Sugarfoot's charging?

There was no time to mull over the question, because Hoku had reached the fence. The filly nickered, then lowered her head to look into Darby's face.

Darby dropped the tack and offered her fingers for her horse to sniff.

“Hey, beautiful girl. I'm finally here.”

Darby stroked Hoku's neck, and then laid her hand against her horse's cheek. Hoku blinked, but she didn't shift restlessly. She was happy exactly where she was.

They'd come close to losing each other when Shan Stonerow had tried to steal Hoku. First he'd tried fast-
talking. Then, when he'd lost in a court hearing, he'd stolen Hoku from a horse trailer in Hapuna town. But Darby and her friends had caught him before he'd escaped, and since then, Darby and Hoku had been together.

“This time for good,” Darby said. Hammering from the ranch yard underlined her words.

Darby let Hoku sniff her neck over the pasture fence. After a minute or two, Darby touched the bolt on the gate. It didn't make a sound, but Hoku backed off, tossing her flaxen forelock away from her eyes.

“Ready to go, girl?” Darby asked. “Me too. I think.”

H
oku didn't care that Darby hadn't brought wisps of hay as she often did.

“I think you like having a human herd member,” Darby said as she slipped into the pasture and dumped the tack on the grass.

She bolted the gate, then watched as Hoku inspected the gear.

Months ago, Darby had realized Hoku depended on scent and sounds far more than she did on her sense of sight.

“Zeroed in on that saddle first thing.” Darby watched as Hoku nudged the saddle, then worked her nose underneath and flipped it over.

Darby didn't expect any fireworks when she
mounted Hoku, but the filly made a habit of surprising her. If Hoku's mustang ancestry told her to protest the saddle with a one-horse rodeo, the broodmares and foals around them could be upset.

“Should we do this someplace else?” Darby asked her horse, and for a moment she heard wind chimes, both bamboo and brass; the green clapping of leaves; and the trill of birdsong. Darby shivered as if her great-grandmother, Tutu, had called her name.

Darby looked toward Pearl pasture and the forest beyond. She didn't see Tutu standing there, beckoning her toward the rain forest, but she felt her calling.

Darby took a breath and released it slowly. She didn't feel like Tutu was in trouble, but…

Hoku shook her head so hard, her ears smacked her head. The filly's effort was successful in chasing off a fly, but Darby knew it wouldn't be so simple to jiggle her own imagination back to reality.

“Taking our first saddle ride in the rain forest is a crazy idea,” she told Hoku. The young horses of Pearl pasture were a rowdy bunch. And once she and Hoku reached the forest, there'd be vines to trip over and low branches to duck under. It would be fun to ride out and visit Tutu, but not now.

When the filly began pawing the grass, Darby asked, “Bored? We can't have that.”

Moving quickly, Darby haltered her horse, snapping on the lead line, which would become a single rein when she was in the saddle. Then, because Hoku
had loved Darby's singing since the snowy day they'd met, she hummed an old disco song that was one of her mother's favorites. She couldn't remember its title, but she remembered singing along with her mother's CD player when they drove anywhere together.

As Darby whisked the sheepskin pad under the filly's nose, she thought of Sugarfoot again. Really, what was the difference between the gelding's charging and Hoku's greeting?

“You don't run up to everyone that way, do you, girl?” Darby asked as she rubbed the pad over Hoku's neck and shoulders.

Had Sugarfoot flattened his ears as he'd charged Mrs. Mookini? Darby tried to remember.

“A photographic memory would help,” she told the filly.

Her mental snapshot of Sugarfoot showed the gelding with his ears tipped far forward, as if he was overly excited.

She massaged Hoku's back with the sheepskin pad, then settled it in place and waited. “No big deal?” she asked her horse, and Hoku blew through her lips.

While the filly considered a bite of grass, Darby picked up the saddle and carried it around the horse, slid it along Hoku's sides, and finally placed it atop the sheepskin saddle pad.

Once more, Darby waited.

But Hoku only turned an ear toward her when Darby bent down to catch the end of the cinch. She
buckled the leather strap so loosely, it barely grazed Hoku's belly.

“How 'bout a little walk over to that rise?” Darby asked.

She led her horse for five minutes, then stopped to tighten the cinch one notch. She led her some more and took the cinch up to the next hole, repeating the process until the cinch was as tight as it should be.

“It's showtime,” Darby told the filly, but she looked around the surrounding hills hoping she didn't have an audience.

She saw no riders. The only movements were the swishing tails of horses.

As she clipped the halter rope into a single rein, she noticed that most of the broodmares were dozing. Two foals were prone, napping with closed eyes in the sunlight.

“Let's not wake them up,” Darby said to her horse.

She led Hoku to a rise in the pasture, just tall enough to make it easier to mount.

Without a plan, she set one boot in the left stirrup and swung lightly into the air. If she could have hovered like a windblown feather before coming down on Hoku's back, she would have, but she could only do her best not to disturb her horse.

When the filly's tail flicked, singing through the air, Darby made her arm muscles relax.

When Hoku's hindquarters shifted and she kicked a back leg forward toward the unfamiliar cinch, Darby
slipped her feet out of the stirrups and let her legs hang as limp as overcooked noodles.

Then Hoku's head swung around. The whites of her eyes showed as she strained to see everything on her back. Widening her nostrils, she sucked in the strange smell, but then she shook her head and Darby guessed Hoku had realized the saddle was the same object she'd sniffed and overturned on the ground.

Darby blew out a lazy breath and let her eyelids lower.

Hoku did the same.

Smiling, Darby stirred her legs against the filly's sides and Hoku stepped out, headed for the gate.

Yes!
Darby thought.

She didn't shout in celebration, but she kept humming that mysterious song.

“I don't care what it's called, do you, Hoku?” she asked.

The endurance saddle was comfy, and they got through the pasture gate as if nothing had changed.

They were about to pass Kanaka Luna's pasture when Darby heard a faint equine snort. To Hoku, it must have sounded like a taunt.

The filly's ears flattened and she sidled toward the fence.

“It's okay,” Darby crooned. “It was the mare, not Luna.”

As the stallion watched them go, Hoku shook off her irritation, but she wanted to trot.

“Sorry,” Darby said, and she kept Hoku at a walk in case the saddle felt different with her bouncing on it.

Instead, she headed for the hillside
S
's and Hoku's first frustration test.

Hoku took the first few turns at a walk. Then, just as Jonah had predicted, she pulled to go straight up the hillside.

“Nope,” Darby said. She kept the orange-and-white-striped rope tight, refusing to give the filly her head. Although Hoku danced in place, trying to show Darby a more direct way up the slope, she didn't break into a fretful sweat as she did when Darby made her obey in the round pen.

So Darby rewarded Hoku, allowing her to extend her stride and walk faster.

“As long as you do what I say,” Darby told the filly as they swooped around turns that doubled back over and over again.

The crest of the hill was in sight and Hoku had developed an ambling rhythm when the lyrics to the mystery song popped into her head.

“Stayin' alive, stayin' alive,” she sang, and the words were interspersed with giggles. What a perfect song for her brain to bring up while she'd been preparing to try Hoku under saddle for the first time.

As her laughter grew, she let Hoku trot, and by the time they reached the top, Hoku was almost running, whipping through each tight turn with the ease of a cow pony, and Darby was singing along.

“Stayin' alive, stayin' alive!”

Darby was happy. Her horse hadn't bucked a single time.

The song grew louder with each hoofbeat, and Darby meant to hold the last note until her breath ran out.

“Stayin' a-liiiiiiii…”

But Hoku shied at the sight of two mounted figures, making Darby's teeth clack together just before they reached the hilltop and ran directly into Cade and Pauli.

Darby knew the guys would blame her preoccupation on her horse. With Hoku carrying a saddle for the first time ever, of course she had to pay attention, but she was really looking down at her saddle because she was embarrassed by her loud singing.

“I told you we didn't have coyotes around here,” Cade joked.

Very funny
, Darby thought.

Cade rode Joker. The gray-and-white Appaloosa almost blocked her view of Pauli Akua. But Darby made out the silhouette of his cockatoo-crested hair.

Pauli attended her school and he was Tyson Mookini's best friend, but since Pauli and Cade had become buddies, Darby tried not to hold that other friendship against him.

After all, Pauli and Cade had pooled their money to buy Jellybean Jewel. Now Jewel lived in a newly repaired and enlarged corral on Cade's land near
Crimson Vale, and she even had a pasture pal, a pony named Honi.

I know
, Darby thought suddenly. She should casually tell the guys about Sugarfoot's encounter with Gemma Mookini. As Tyson's friend, Pauli might know enough about the family to guess what they'd do next.

She was about to mention Sugarfoot when Pauli brought up her singing again.

“I'm pretty sure I heard howling.” Pauli tilted his head back and started to demonstrate, but Cade thumped him on the shoulder. “What?”

Cade nodded at Hoku.

“She's wearing a saddle,” he said quietly, “for the first time, and she still came up this hill just as pretty as you please. Nice work,
keiki
.”

If Cade's tone hadn't been so full of admiration, Darby would have snapped at him for calling her
keiki
. Kimo had been joking with Kit, calling Darby the can-do
keiki
, and the nickname had stuck. Even if she liked the significance of it—and she did—it made her squirm.

“Primo,” Pauli said. He gave the saddle a moment of confused study, then shrugged.

“How're
you
doing?” she asked Pauli, since he'd only begun riding a couple of weeks ago. He'd even found a pair of boots that fit him, which was a good thing. When Jonah had seen him riding the first day, with his frayed-hem jeans hanging over sandals with tire-tread soles, he'd forbidden Pauli to ride in shoes
without heels the next time.

“Pretty good,” Pauli said, patting Judge's neck.

The old bay horse had come from Nevada with Hoku, and the two were buddies. The filly surged forward to rub her muzzle on his neck. Judge lifted his head and gave Hoku's mane an affectionate nibble.

“Whoa!” Pauli yelled, pulling back on his reins.

“It's okay,” Darby said.

“They're pals,” Cade told him.

“That was kinda gnarly. I thought he was biting her,” Pauli said.

“He was, sorta,” Cade said.

“Love bites,” Darby explained. It was her turn to make the guys squirm, and the simple phrase did the trick. They rolled their eyes like eight-year-olds thinking of cooties, and shifted around on their horses, searching for something to say.

It was a perfect time to make her getaway, Darby thought, but then Pauli looked at Cade, jerked his cockatoo crest toward Darby, and said, “Ask her.”

“I told you, it's okay,” Cade insisted, then turned to Darby. “I told Pauli he could come to the luau on the Fourth of July.”

“Sure,” Darby said. “It'll be huge. All my relatives—at least the ones I know about,” she added, since she'd discovered an extended family she'd known nothing about before her arrival in Hawaii. “And the Potters, Patrick Zink, Kimo and his dad—”

“Good fun,” Pauli said.

“Guaranteed,” Cade told him.

Darby laughed. It was nice seeing Cade act like a kid instead of a serious paniolo. “Gotta go,” she said.

“You can ride with us, yeah?” Pauli offered.

“Nope. I have instructions from Jonah.” She almost explained that she was supposed to frustrate Hoku, but she was pretty sure a new rider like Pauli would be confused.

Darby waved good-bye and guided Hoku the back way into the ranch yard—down the switchbacks and up through the fold.

It was after five o'clock, Darby guessed as she approached the half-built house. Shouldn't the carpenters be finishing up for the day instead of dragging around orange cords, sweating, and using nods and hollers to communicate over the snarling saws?

She felt a little guilty for riding around, carefree, enjoying the tropical breeze that lifted her ponytail, while they were hard at work.

As Darby rode past, Hoku flattened her ears. She still hated most men on sight. She would allow Kit to come within touching distance of her, but she clearly didn't enjoy it.

All three of the workers flashed Darby a shaka sign and she returned the gesture.

She had ridden on only a few steps when one of them started using a nail gun.

Bam. Bam. Bam.

Hoku startled away from the loud sound and
Darby saw an opportunity to teach the filly that she was safe.

“You're fine,” she said in an upbeat tone, neither sympathizing nor criticizing.

She gathered her rope reins and pulled back. Hoku understood, but she didn't want to slow down or stop.

The tallest of the men noticed Hoku's agitation. He squatted in front of the guy with the nail gun and made a slashing motion across his throat.

In the sudden silence, Darby felt shy. Her old hiding habit returned without her permission. She shrugged her shoulders almost to her ears, so that she looked like a prairie dog peeking out of its burrow.

The tall man stood up slowly, pressing both hands to the small of his back. Darby noticed he wore a black support belt. She'd read that they really didn't work, but this was no time to share that information.

“Thanks!” Darby yelled, and then kicked herself. There was no need to shout with the power tools turned off. “Let's get out of here,” she whispered to Hoku.

The filly's steps were jerky, but she obeyed Darby's signal to walk to Pigolo's pen and halt.

After a single short squeal, Pigolo realized Darby was atop the horse. He snuffled in delight and scuttled toward the fence of his pen.

“My sweet little piglet!” Darby greeted him.

Megan accused Pigolo of starting Darby's life of crime because she'd stolen him from Manny. What else could she have done when she saw Cade's evil stepfather
kicking the orphaned animal? Every instinct had told her to just swoop in and scoop up the piglet.