The Door at the Top of the Stairs (34 page)

Jesse knew this particular fox since she'd had to help Morgan put out food and worm medicine for all the foxes who had dens around the farm.

The two groups started back, Jesse walking far enough behind everyone to make sure she wouldn't have to talk. Following the hunt had been exhilarating, but all the laughter and socializing on the way back irritated her. She slowed Smokey even more, until she could barely hear the rest of the people in front of her. Hoof beats sounded close by, and she looked up to see Mary riding back to her.

"Well, what'd you think?"

Jesse shrugged and watched the ground again.

"You're an excellent rider, you know. I thought we'd have a wreck when Norm Roberts came off right in front of Smokey. I'm assuming you learned not to follow so close behind the horse in front of you?"

"Yeah."

"So will I see you on Sunday?"

"Can't you just hunt without all these people around? Just take the hounds out on your own?"

Mary rode next to Jesse a while, thinking. "Part of the fun of foxhunting is the camaraderie, and part of the skill of the Huntsman and Field Masters is working and following the hounds so everyone feels as though they've participated in the actual hunt for the fox. It's all interwoven into thousands of years of tradition.

It's just the way it is."

Jesse rubbed her temples, and Mary glanced at her. "Does your head hurt?"

"Just a little. I hate being around so many people, that's all."

Mary reached into her jacket and pulled out a flask. "Here, try some of this. It's a cold day remedy my mother used to bring out with her when she was the Master and Morgan hunted with her forty years ago. It might take the edge off being around so many people." She grinned as she handed the flask across the space between horses.

Jesse took a swig. Her throat immediately closed up as the liquid burned its way down into her stomach. Tears came to her eyes as she coughed, trying to open up her burned airways.

Mary laughed, reached for the flask and took a swig of her own, not choking quite as much as Jesse, but coming close. When she caught her breath, she handed it back to Jesse and wheezed,

“Yup, Mom was a pretty tough old bird." She wiped the tears from her eyes and grinned as Jesse took a much smaller sip, the two of them enjoying a relaxing ride as they followed the hunt back home.

By the time they reached the barn, Jesse couldn't care less how many riders were milling around, unsaddling their horses and laughing with each other. Some of the non-riding club members had set up tables in the yard, and a huge vat of chili and plates with rolls and butter awaited the riders. Both Jesse and Mary practically fell off their horses as they dismounted, and Jesse slid down and leaned against Smokey's front legs. Mary sat next to her and leaned back on her elbows.

When the hounds had been put away, Morgan and Ryland walked over and looked down at the two of them. Morgan grinned at Mary. “Your mother's recipe?"

Mary held up the flask and turned it upside down, with barely a drop leaving the lip.

Jesse slurred, “God bless Mary's mother." She held up her fist.

Mary raised the flask to Jesse's knuckles. “God bless Mom."

Jesse looked seriously at Mary and said, “I think I'll get a tattoo blessing your mother."

Mary started giggling and lay all the way down on the ground.

Jesse smiled sloppily up at Ryland, who took Smokey's reins from her. Morgan took Asiago's and they led the two horses into the barn. When Jesse lost her backrest she crawled over and lay her head on Mary's stomach. The two of them lay on the ground, enjoying their own brand of after-hunt festivities.

Chapter Thirty-Four

Jesse started riding regularly with the hunt, and Morgan and Ryland began systematically outfitting her with proper hunt attire.

They raided the closets of several of the wealthier club members, and what they couldn't steal, they purchased and told Jesse it would come out of her paycheck, which it never did.

It was during the hunts that Jesse's reckless disregard for her own safety became apparent. Although she listened to Mary as the leader of the second flight, she began to push the envelope whenever she saw the opening. If Mary rode in front of her, she'd veer off and take a jump the other members of the second flight avoided. She'd often "get lost," more out of boredom than anything else, galloping through the fields at an all-out sprint and jumping whatever fences she could find. The experience usually ended with a tongue lashing from Morgan and a several mile walk back to the horse trailers on foot.

It was after one of these acts of not so subtle disobedience that Mary finally decided it was time to approach Morgan about moving her into the first flight. Morgan had blown "gone to ground" on the hunting horn and Mary had just finished counting heads to make sure all her riders were accounted for. Jesse was missing, and she noticed Sandra was gone from the first flight as well. She glanced at Morgan and recognized the storm clouds building as Morgan tried to locate Jesse. Morgan motioned for Mary to ride over to the stream where she was allowing the hounds to cool and water themselves. When she rode up, Morgan asked,

“Where is she?"

Mary shook her head. “I'm not sure, but Sandra's missing too.

I don't know whether they're together. I just thought it was curious they were both gone at the same time."

As Morgan watched her strike-hound cooling herself in the stream, Ryland rode up and sat quietly, knowing the tension in the air had to be about Jesse. Morgan raised her eyes to Ryland.

“Maybe it was a mistake, making her hunt. I can't have someone constantly flaunting the rules, Ry. I have rules for a reason, to make sure everyone comes back safely. It's not right for Mary to always have to baby sit an out of control rider."

Mary knew Morgan usually wouldn't budge on rules, but she thought she'd ask anyway. “Why don't you move her into the first flight? I think she's basically just bored with my group."

"I never put first-year hunters in the first flight. It's too dangerous."

Ryland put her hand on Barney's neck to settle him. “It's her first year for fox hunting, but she's a better rider than most of the people in the first flight. Maybe this case might call for an exception. It's either that or make her stay home, but if you want my opinion, I think she'll benefit from the club in the long run."

"I definitely don't have time to baby sit her and I'm not going to foist her off on Ron." Ron Harding was her field master who ran the first flight while Morgan hunted the hounds. He had no patience for Jesse and would actually prefer it if she were left behind. He believed in following the rules meticulously, and he thought anyone who broke them should be shot.

Ryland tried again. “Make her stay right behind you then; she can keep up."

"In front of the riders wearing colors? That would go over big." People who had demonstrated a certain level of ability and a loyalty to the club were awarded the club's colors, hunter green for the Myrina Hunt Club. They wore the green on the collar of the hunting jacket, and those who had earned the distinction rode to the front of the first flight.

Laughter floated up from the copse of trees they'd ridden through earlier, and after a minute, Jesse and Sandra rode out into the open and up to the group. Ron rode up to them, a stiffness to his back that meant trouble for whomever he'd singled out. Morgan rode over and joined the three riders, listening as Ron asked where they'd been.

Sandra smiled. “Well, I became separated from the group, and luckily Jesse found me. We followed the sound of the horn." She reached over and squeezed Jesse's arm. “She was just what the doctor ordered. I’d still be lost and frustrated if she hadn't come along."

Morgan watched Jesse rub her eyelids, then sit back and cross her arms. The glint of amusement she saw when Jesse raised her eyes told her everything she needed to know. Jesse raised her eyebrows at Morgan's glare and cocked her head as though daring her to call her out.

Andy's voice carried over the meadow as he called the hounds to order, and a thought suddenly occurred to Morgan. She swiveled around in her saddle and studied Mary, who was waiting by the stream with Ryland. At one point, Mary had been one of her whippers-in, only moving to the second flight as a favor to Morgan who had needed her in that position when her other Field Master had been taken ill with cancer.

Ron rejoined the other members of the club, and Sandra moved over to talk to her husband, who was visiting with some riders about the merits of the various breeds of horses used in foxhunting. Morgan swiveled back around and smiled. The amusement left Jesse's face, and she shifted nervously in her saddle, wondering why Morgan looked so pleased with herself.

The hounds finished cooling themselves, and Morgan called them to her and started walking toward home. She signaled for Ryland and Mary to join her as she led the hounds back the way they had come. Jesse fell in behind the second flight and rode by herself, wondering what Morgan was up to.

When both riders joined her, Morgan turned to Mary. “How would you like to become a whip again?"

As far as Mary was concerned, the only position other than whipper-in she cared to hold was huntsman, and she knew, with luck, it would be another twenty years before Morgan vacated that slot. "I would pay you to put me back in that position. Heck, I might even stop drinking Mom's recipe if I didn't have to stay with the second flight."

"Even if you had a whip trainee along for the ride?"

Mary smiled and caught Morgan's eye. “You mean like a one-on-one where certain trainees would be under my thumb and couldn't get into any trouble? Absolutely. But I take back what I said about Mom's recipe. I think I might need it after all."

Ryland moved Barney close to Aristotle and reached over to rub Morgan's back. “My love, I think you are the best Master any club could ever have."

Morgan felt silly blushing at Ryland's praise, but her cheeks turned a healthy shade of red as she basked in the compliment.

Mary inconspicuously rode back to join Jesse, and the two of them sipped the recipe, more judiciously this time, as they followed the club to the trailers.

Christmas came and went, and Jesse was inordinately relieved once the holidays were over. She'd lost her parents at a fairly young age, and she’d never enjoyed being odd person out at holiday functions. Morgan began ground-training her with the hounds, teaching her the basics of becoming a whip. She'd started bringing Tums with her in the mornings because Jesse caused her no end of grief. It was one of Jesse's little pleasures in life.

After one particularly freezing cold day of hunting, Morgan and Ryland finished their day's work and headed off to bed earlier than usual. They'd been invited to hunt with a neighboring club the next morning, and since they had to get up early to get there, they were sound asleep by nine.

A cold breeze blowing through the house tickled Morgan's subconscious, and when the wind blew through her hair, she came fully awake. It was the middle of January, and there was no way they would have left a window open. She opened her eyes to a gun barrel resting next to her forehead, the curtains from their open bedroom window blowing gently in the breeze.

"So, you're finally awake. I wondered how long I'd be able to watch two women sleeping so soundly side by side."

Ryland sat up and unconsciously moved behind Morgan, pulling her nightgown up tight around her throat.

The man focused on her, then down at the fabric clenched in her fist. "Don't worry, my little lesbian, I haven't come for you. I've lost one of my sheep, and I believe you have her."

Morgan's blood suddenly ran cold. She saw the scar descending from the man's hairline to his eyebrow, and moved her eyes back down to meet his. She heard another man laugh, and she realized someone else was standing next to Ryland's side of the bed.

The first man, whom the women realized had to be Richard, reached over and slowly lifted Morgan's robe from the chair next to the bed. The other man did the same with Ryland's. "Here, put your robes on and let's go into the living room where we can all be more comfortable."

Both women pulled on their robes and walked in front of the men into the living room. Richard pointed toward the couch with his pistol and they walked over and sat. He took a seat in the wing chair and the second man stood by the window, watching the path to the barn. Richard crossed one leg over the other and said calmly,

“It shouldn't be long. Then we'll be on our way and the two of you can go quietly back to sleep."

They sat in silence, Morgan not sure what she could do, Ryland recognizing insanity when she saw it. A shot rang out from the direction of the barn. The man at the window turned quickly to Richard, who just shook his head. “Tsk, tsk. I told Miguel not to get too close to her, didn't I, Guillermo? Relax, my friend. She'll be here soon enough, with or without Miguel's help." Guillermo turned back to the window and continued watching the path.

Richard casually stood up, walked over to Ryland and sat next to her, draping his arm around her neck. He pointed the muzzle of his gun at her mouth and said happily, “Open up, my little lesbian."

Ryland opened her mouth and he shoved the barrel in. He looked at Morgan. “No heroics, or I'll blow her pretty brains all over your very nice couch." They sat like that for almost five minutes until Richard finally sang out, “Come out, come out, wherever you are."

Very slowly, with a gun aimed at Guillermo, Jesse stepped out from the kitchen into the open living room. "Don't turn around, Guillermo, or you'll be as dead as Miguel."

Guillermo froze, and Jesse walked over to him and took his gun. She tucked it into her belt, felt under his arms, around his waist band, and at the bottom of both pant legs. "Get on the ground, Guillermo."

Guillermo went to his knees, then down on his stomach. Only then did she turn her attention to Richard and the two women on the couch. "So Richard, you didn't die? Even the devil wouldn't take you, huh?"

Richard shrugged. “I'm here."