The Wild One (15 page)

“Now!” Jake shouted.

Sam clapped her heels to Ace's sides. He leaped forward as the final gate clanged open.

“Go on, Blackie!” Dad yelled.

Behind her, the stallion's hooves stuttered, held and raced after them.

Sam's heart echoed the thunder of hoofbeats. Both horses breathed loud with excitement, and then the Phantom ran beside them, beautiful once more.

How far left to gallop along this road? Sam knew she had to judge. A half mile? A quarter?

The Phantom held his head high, all senses alert. Eyes wide, nostrils open, he tested the breeze for anything other than sagebrush and juniper. He could have passed them, any time, but he matched strides with Ace, loping with long-legged care, unsure of the
earth beneath his hooves.

At Thread the Needle, they slowed.

“Take us home, Ace,” Sam said.

She leaned back a little, balancing so Ace could pick his way down the hillside.

The Phantom's warm hide rubbed Sam's leg. Even though the men with ropes had fractured her friendship with the stallion, a link remained.

The stallion ran headlong into darkness with a girl and a small outcast mustang as his guides.

A warm updraft of wind brought the green scent of the river. The lights of River Bend ranch were no more than a mile away, when the stallion surged ahead.

He left her.

Silent, except for night wind rushing through his mane and tail, the stallion ran, stretching so his belly brushed the ground.

Carefully, Sam drew rein. Ace slowed. They couldn't catch the stallion. The little gelding didn't try. His home was a place among fences, with plenty of water, and a snug, straw-deep stall when the snows came.

The Phantom crashed into the river. Waves surged for the shore.

At the water's edge, she slid from Ace's back and left him ground-tied as she waded in up to her knees, watching the stallion go.

He gained the other shore and shook the water
from his coat. Moonlight turned the droplets into silver dust.

The Phantom whirled, sighting everything around him, assuring himself of safety. Then, he made a graceful leap toward the mountains and freedom.

With each of the stallion's steps Sam felt reality settle around her. Her horse was gone for good.

Summer's magic had ended with Jake's anger, Slocum's threats, and a wild stallion running. Between now and September, she had an unfamiliar school, with Slocum's snobbish children, left to dread.

And then Ace snorted and stared into a darkness with only a twinkling of starlight to show the stallion swinging a wide turn back.

Sam ran, splashing through the river shallows. The current held her back, warning her the water flow was too strong to test. She couldn't go to him, and the stallion had turned too wary to come to her.

He stopped, knee-deep in silver water. His reflection wavered on the rills and ripples. Since they were alone, Sam shouted.

“Zanzibar!”

The stallion rose into the air, rearing as if his forelegs reached for the moon. Sam understood his neigh as if he'd spoken. From the wild side of the river, the Phantom promised to return.