Page 27 of My High Horse Czar

No plastic bags in sight. No big shadows, either.

“Look, if you do understand me, how about this? You stay here, and if I can find my friend Gavriil, and if he has a place to keep you, I’ll bring him out here. Okay?”

He shakes his head.

The horse I’m talking to, as if he and I are having a conversation, shakes his head no. And I’m not even surprised. I’m bargaining with him.

Maybe they should commit me.

“This isn’t a negotiation,” I say. “You stay put. I’ll try to come get you.”

But when I start walking again, and then when I start jogging, he trots along even closer than before. When I stop, his huge head actually bumps into my back. I spin around again, angry this time. “I don’t even have a halter for you. I can’t very well go walking into a racing facility with a horse that’s just loose—”

He bumps the saddle with his nose.

“For the love—Quicksilver.”

He bumps it again, and this time he blows snot all over my arm.

I groan.

I can’t believe a horse is forcing me to do things. A horse that I don’t even own. But if I walk in there like this, with this big lummox of an idiot tagging along on my heels, they’ll stop me for sure. It will draw way more attention than if I lead him in there, all sweaty and tacked up. At least he’ll look like every other horse out there, more or less.

“Fine.” I grit my teeth and throw the stupid saddle back on. “Fine, but you have to listen to everything else I say from here on out. Okay?”

He nods.

My stallion nods.

And I take that to mean that he’s listening to me. Understanding what I say, and agreeing to behave. A stallion who was, until very recently, wild.

I’ve gone completely insane.

“Look.” I clear my throat as I’m putting the bridle back on him. “If you actually understand what I’m saying, I want you to—”

“Adriana?”

When I snap my head around, Gavriil’s standing behind me, just as handsome as ever. I’ve never broken my rule about not dating, but if I ever got close. . .it was with him.

“It is you. What are you doing here?”

My voice is small—embarrassingly small—and it cracks when I say, “I need help.”

He doesn’t pause. He doesn’t hesitate for even a second. He strides toward me, his arms extended. “Anything you need.”

And Quicksilver bites him, hard, right on the meaty part of his hand.

7

The first time I met Gavriil, he was mucking stalls at the nicest racetrack in Latvia. His very wealthy father had kicked him out, and he had left the country to really get away. He was taking any job he could get. After hearing his story, I lent him a hand, and he bought me a few beers at the local pub to repay me. With his dark hair and soulful, deep brown eyes, I knew I was walking a dangerous line.

For the first and only time in my life, I was actually tempted to date someone. It took all of my resolve and years and years’ worth of accumulated trauma for me to turn him down. When I saw him in Russia later, managing this racetrack, I nearly changed my mind.

Twice now, I’ve held firm.

But this time around, I’m meeting him without a single friend or supporter. I’m lost, and I’m confused, and I’m scared, and Gavriil’s face may be the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.

Even though he looks like he might shoot Quicksilver.

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