Dark Horse

17

Jill let herself into Jade's tack room and turned on the small lamp that sat on an antique chest. She grabbed a jug of leather oil from the supply shelves, twisted off the top, pulled open the drawer with Jade's show breeches in it, and doused the pants with oil. She knew from looking in the catalogs those breeches cost at least two hundred dollars each. She threw open the armoire, pulled out his two custom-made jackets, and soaked them both, then did the same with his freshly pressed, custom-made shirts.

It didn't seem enough. She wanted more satisfaction.

She was supposed to have cleaned the stalls at the end of the day because Javier, the Guatemalan guy, had to leave early. But Jill didn't like pitching shit, and so she had simply stirred the bedding around to cover it. She snickered now as she went to the first stall and took out Trey Hughes' gray horse. She put the horse in the empty stall where Stellar had lived, then took a pitchfork into the gray's stall and uncovered the piles of manure and the spots wet with urine. The smell of ammonia burned her nose and she smiled a malicious smile.

Setting the fork aside, she went back to the tack stall and grabbed up the pile of clothes.

Jade would have a fit when he found this mess. He would know she had done it, but he wouldn't be able to prove it. And he was supposed to be in the showring in the morning. He wouldn't have any clothes. His horses wouldn't be ready. And Jill would be busy lying on the beach, getting a tan and looking for a hot guy.

She spread the clothing out in the stall, over the piles of shit and spots of pee, then went around and around the stall, stomping on Don Jade's expensive clothing, grinding it into the mess. This would teach him not to treat people like servants. He couldn't humiliate her and get away with it. Big asshole. He was going to regret what he'd done to her. She could have been his ally, his spy. Instead, he could rot.

"Fuck you, Don Jade. Fuck you, Don Jade." She chanted the words as she marched around the stall.

She had no fear of being caught by Jade. He was back at that snotty club, trying to impress some client or some woman. Paris was supposed to have night check, but Jill knew for a fact she hardly ever did it when it was her turn.

It didn't occur to Jill that someone from another stable might come through the barn, or that a security guard might be making rounds. She almost never got caught doing stuff. Like keying stupid Erin's car. Everyone assumed Chad did it because Chad had been there that night and he and Erin had argued. And Jill had once had a job at a Wal-Mart where she had stolen all kinds of stuff, right under her manager's nose. It served the store right, getting ripped off, if they were stupid enough to hire a guy as dumb as that guy had been.

"Fuck you, Don Jade. Fuck you, Don Jade," she chanted, happily grinding his clothes into the muck.

And then the stable lights went out.

Jill stopped marching and stood very still. She could feel her heart beating. The sound of it in her ears made it impossible to hear if someone was coming. As her eyes adjusted she could make out shapes, but the stall she was in was too far to the back of the tent to get much light from the big light pole out by the road.

Some of the horses turned around in their stalls. Some nickered-nervously, Jill thought. She felt around the wall blindly, trying to find the pitchfork. She'd left it on the far side of the stall. She turned her back to the door as she groped for it.

It happened so fast, she couldn't react. Someone rushed in behind her. She heard the rustle of the stall bedding, felt the presence of another person. Before she could scream, a hand was over her mouth. Her own hands closed desperately on the handle of the pitchfork, and she twisted around, trying to wriggle from her captor's grasp, breaking the hold, stumbling backward, swinging the pitchfork in a wide arch, hitting something. Her grip on the handle was too near the end of it, giving her little control or strength in her swing, and it flew out of her hands and thumped against the canvas wall.

She tried to scream then, and couldn't. As in a nightmare, the sound died in her throat. In that split second she knew she was going to die.

Still, she tried to run for the door. Her legs felt as heavy as lead. Her feet tangled in the clothes on the floor of the stall. Like a lasso around her ankles, the clothes pulled her feet out from under her. She fell forward, heavily, knocking the wind from her lungs. Her attacker came down on top of her from behind.

There was a sound-a voice-but she couldn't hear it above the pounding in her ears and the wrenching sound from her own throat as she tried to breathe and sob and beg. She felt the miniskirt being pulled up over her butt, a hand digging between her legs, tearing at the too-small thong.

She tried to pull herself forward. There was a terrible pressure in the middle of her back, then against the back of her head, forcing her head down, pushing her face into the manure she was supposed to have cleaned out of the stall that day. She couldn't breathe. She tried to turn her head and couldn't; tried to suck in air and her mouth filled with shit; tried to vomit and felt a terrible burning in her chest.

And then she didn't feel anything at all.