Conviction Read online

  He did have a helmet for me to wear, though. I’d been expecting to don a cowboy hat, maybe a pair of fringed chaps, but the only thing he made sure was that I was wearing boots with a heel and that I had the helmet secured on correctly.

  “Now, I don’t expect Sweetpea to spook at anything,” he said. “But for at least the first couple rides, I recommend that everyone wear a helmet.”

  “That’s fine,” I said, knowing I probably looked like a fool in this one, but did that really matter? I was about to get on a horse for the first time and then I’d really be looking foolish.

  “So, this here’s the stirrup.” He touched one of the bell-shaped wooden things attached to a leather strap, connected to the saddle. “You always mount and dismount a horse from the left-hand side. Sweetpea could care less which side you did, but some horses get freaked out if you try from the right.”

  “I’ll try to remember that. How come the left? I’d think it’d be the right.”

  “It’s tradition, really. Back in the day, when people rode horses into battle, they’d wear their swords on their left, so they had to get on from that side.”

  “Huh,” I said. “Interesting.”

  “You’ll stand sideways against Sweetpea like this, put your foot in the stirrup, and then swing yourself up and bring your other leg over her side.”

  “Um sure.” I copied how he’d just been standing, grabbing the horn of the saddle, sliding my left foot into the stirrup.

  “You can hop once or twice to get momentum,” he said.

  I took two little hops and then tried to jettison myself up into the saddle. I didn’t have nearly enough oomph, though, and for one humiliating second I thought I was going to land right back on the ground in an undignified heap, possibly spraining my ankle in the process. But then I felt Ollie’s hand, right on my lower back—actually, an inch or two lower and it would’ve been my ass—pushing me up, then steadying me, and finally I was seated there in the saddle.

  For all the jostling that had just happened, Sweetpea stood there perfectly still. I wondered if she’d fallen asleep.

  “Good.” Ollie patted my knee. “Now, get right foot into that stirrup, and remember to keep your heels down.” He handed me the reins. “When you ride western, you hold both reins in your right hand. So, when you want the horse to turn, you press the reins to the side of her neck. If you wanted her to go right, for example, you’d move your hand to the right, so the left rein is pressing against the side of her neck, like this.” His hand covered mine and he pushed it gently to the side, the rein pressing against the side of Sweetpea’s neck. She swiveled her head to the right and started to swing her rear around, taking a few steps.

  “To get her to stop, just pull back. You don’t have to do it too hard, especially with her.” He made a clucking noise with his tongue. “Now, why don’t you just let her walk. You can cluck at her, or gently squeeze her sides with your legs. She’s got a real smooth gait, so all you really need to do is sit back and get used to the feel.”

  Sweetpea seemed to have a better idea about all of this than I did. I’d exerted only the tiniest bit of pressure on her sides and she was already moving out toward the fence. And maybe her gait was smooth as melted chocolate, I didn’t know, but as she took that first step, I lurched forward and grabbed the horn, the front of the saddle, her neck, anything my hands could find. I could only imagine what a trainwreck I must’ve looked like, but Ollie wasn’t laughing at me. Not out loud, at least.

  It was such a strange sensation, to be atop this animal that was just ambling along. It was different than driving a car or riding a bike, because you were in control. The car or bike did not have a mind of its own. The car or bike was not going to decide to, say, take off at breakneck speed and not slow down until it felt like it. Sweetpea did not seem as though she’d be up for anything even remotely close to that, but still, I was overcome with the urge to be safely back on the ground.

  Stop it, I chided. Don’t be afraid of doing this. Children do this.

  “Just try to relax,” Ollie called, as Sweetpea walked a slow circle around the corral. “Sit up a little straighter, if you can, drop your hands a bit. Yeah, like that. Good.”

  I’d been hunched over, as if that might offer me some more stability. When I straightened up, though, it felt as though I was sitting deeper in the saddle, my legs more firmly around Sweetpea’s sides. I tried to relax and let my body move with her movements.

  “You can grab her mane, too,” he said.

  “I can? I’d be afraid to—I don’t want to pull it too hard.”

  “You can yank on it as much as you want and she won’t feel a thing—horses don’t have nerve-endings in their manes.”

  “Really? I didn’t know that.” I reached down and grabbed a handful of mane and gave it a little tug. Sweetpea didn’t react at all. I tugged a little harder, and still, no response. “Wow,” I said. “That’s really interesting.” I thought back to my childhood, when my own hair had been waist-length, and the crying and screaming that would often end an otherwise perfectly fine day when my mother insisted that we comb the knots out of my hair. No nerve endings certainly would’ve been useful then.

  I think I got a little used to it, as we walked circles around the corral. I could only imagine how riveting this was for Ollie, but he didn’t look bored, and every so often he’d call out with a suggestion, or, once or twice, a bit of praise. I was good, it seemed, at remembering to keep my heels down.

  I wasn’t sure how many circles Sweetpea and I walked, but my ass and the inside of my thighs started to feel chafed. Ollie had me stop her, and then I was able to dismount, remembering to do so from the left side. My legs felt wobbly.

  “Not bad, Wren,” he said.

  “Thanks. Certainly not cowgirl caliber, but I’m working on it. Show me what you can do.”

  He almost looked embarrassed. “Maybe another time,” he said.

  “Please?”

  I thought he was going to refuse but then he nodded and took the reins. He easily swung up into the saddle, one graceful, fluid motion. He clucked at Sweetpea, and she immediately perked up and started walking at a brisk pace, ears pricked forward. She started to jog, then lope, all the while he sat easily in the saddle, like this whole thing was second nature. She sped up a little, then slid to a sudden stop, practically sitting down. Then she turned in a circle, keeping her rear legs in place and moving only her front. He made it look so easy.

  He rode her back over to the fence. “Sweetpea here used to compete in reining events,” he said. “She’s still got it in her.” He patted her neck and she bobbed her head.

  “That was great!” I said. “Makes me wish I could do something like that.”

  “You can,” Ollie said as he hopped down from the saddle. “Just takes practice.”

  “I don’t know. I felt pretty uncoordinated up there. You looked so . . . it just looked so natural for you.”

  “Well, I’ve been doing it a long time. It’s like cooking for you, I bet. It’s something you’ve done for a while, and you’re accustomed to it. You should see me in the kitchen—it’s a complete disaster.”

  “Maybe I should give you some cooking lessons some time,” I said. “Cooking has actually been very therapeutic for me. Sort of like meditating, except not nearly as boring. I tried meditating before and I didn’t have much luck with it at all.”

  “You know, I wouldn’t mind learning a thing or two in the kitchen. I might have to take you up on that.”

  “I’d be more than happy to show you. You can’t be any worse in the kitchen than I just was right now on a horse.”

  “You really weren’t that bad.”

  He smiled at me. God, he was handsome. And, before I could stop the words coming from my mouth, I was asking him if he wanted to go down to the swimming hole a few miles away, right before you got into town. I was thinking we could do that and maybe get a bite to eat at the restaurant on the way back.

 
“It’s hot enough today to go for a swim,” he said. “I haven’t been swimming in a while.”

  “Well, let’s do it then.”

  “I should probably be back by four or so. Got evening chores to do and then Garrett told me he wanted me to go up to the house tonight, have a talk.”

  I nodded. “Hmm. Sounds serious,” I said, mostly joking. “I’ll make sure you get back on time.”

  12.

  Ollie

  It had been a hell of a long time since I’d last been swimming. Not that I hadn’t thought about it, though, especially on those hot days, trapped inside Reynolds, the air thick and pungent with the smell of body odor and piss and spoiled milk. What I wouldn’t have given for the chance to come out to one of these swimming holes, where you could stand on a boulder and jump into the cold water, so clear you could see the fish swimming twenty feet below.

  We drove over in Wren’s Jeep Wrangler, which didn’t have the roof or the doors on. It was a bit unnerving to be sitting there as she sped down the road, and to see the asphalt zooming by.

  “I don’t know about that,” I said, edging my right leg over to the left a little more.

  Wren was sitting slightly slouched, one hand casually placed on the steering wheel, looking a hell of a lot more at home behind the wheel of the Jeep than she just did up on Sweetpea.

  “You don’t like it?” she asked.

  I tried to keep my eyes on the road in front of us, as it seemed somehow better when looking through the windshield.

  “It’s just kind of weird, I guess. A little freaky, going this fast with the road right there.”

  “It’s no different than driving around in your truck.”

  “I know, it’s just my truck has a door, so I don’t feel like I’m about to fall out.”

  She smiled. “You’re not the first person to say that, but I think that’s pretty interesting, considering I’m sure you probably wouldn’t think twice about going this fast on a horse, and that’s a whole lot scarier and there’s no seatbelt, and I, for one, would sure as hell fall off.” Her smile widened. “Or are you saying my driving scares you?”

  I laughed. “No. Not yet, anyway.”

  Surprisingly, there were no other cars parked on the soft shoulder of the road when we pulled up.

  “Looks like we might have the place to ourselves,” Wren said. “Although sometimes people walk in.” She grabbed a few towels from the back seat.

  We walked in about an eighth of a mile from where we parked. I felt good, excited at the prospect of getting to swim.

  Except when we got there, there was a slight problem.

  “I forgot a bathing suit,” I said. “Well, really, I don’t have one.”

  “That’s okay,” she said, unbuttoning her jeans. “I don’t have one on either; I was just going to go in my underwear.”

  She pushed the jeans down, revealing slender but well-muscled legs. Her underwear was pink with black stripes and looked like it very well could pass for a bathing suit.

  “That’s the thing though . . . I don’t have underwear on. Or boxers or anything.”

  “Free-balling it?” she asked with a grin.

  “Errr, yeah.”

  She shrugged. “Then I guess you’re just going to have to take your pants off.”

  “I’m not doing that.”

  “Why not? There’s no one else here.”

  “Yeah, but people could show up at any time.”

  “We’ll leave the towels right here on this rock, so if anyone else shows up, you can just swim over and so long as you get up here fast, you’ll be able to wrap the towel around you before anyone even notices.”

  “Sounds like you’ve got it all figured out.”

  “It’s just too nice of a day not to go for a swim.”

  She had a point.

  “Do you usually not wear underwear, or was today just laundry day?” she asked.

  “I usually don’t.”

  I’d stopped wearing underwear in high school because I hated the feeling of all that fabric down there; briefs were too constricting but boxer shorts were too baggy and wouldn’t be comfortable when I was riding.

  Wren looked around. She pulled her shirt off. Her torso was as toned and slender as her legs, and her breasts . . . . Well, I had to look away. She looked too damn good.

  “In I go!” she said after she’d thrown her shirt over her shoulder. She took a running leap off the rock and dove into the clear water. It did look incredibly refreshing. She resurfaced and bobbed there, watching me. “Come on!”

  I thought of all the guys back at Reynolds, who not only would give their right arm just for the chance to dive into this water, but who would also give their right nut, too, to have a girl like Wren calling for them to jump in after her.

  “All right, you’ve convinced me,” I said. I pulled my shirt off and shucked off my pants, then jumped in, feet first.

  The cold water swallowed me up and I let myself plummet before I stopped and started swimming for the surface. I opened my eyes and could see the blurred beams of sunlight shooting through the water. When I broke the surface, Wren was right there.

  “Hi,” she said.

  Then she splashed a big wave of water at me and dove away before I could return the favor. I dove after her, but she was fast and it had been a long time since I’d swam; there was no way I’d be able to catch her. So, I flipped over onto my back and let my arms and legs splay out to the sides and I floated, staring up at the big blue sky. And a few seconds later I could sense that she was right next to me again, and when I turned my head slightly I saw that she, too, was floating on her back.

  “Isn’t this nice?” she said. “Much better than riding a horse.”

  “I don’t know about that, but it is nice. And you did great, by the way. On the horse.”

  “I find that hard to believe, but thanks.”

  “This is nice, though,” I said. “I thought about it a lot when I was in—” I stopped, because I hadn’t talked to her about this yet, but it seemed like something maybe I should mention, if we were going to be hanging out. Which was I wasn’t expecting to do, but was hoping might happen again. “You may know already,” I said. “This being a small town and all. Maybe you heard a thing or two about who I am, where I’ve been. If you haven’t, I guess it’d probably be good if you heard it from me first. I was in prison, for seven years. I killed a man.” The water was up around the sides of my face, nearly touching the corners of my mouth, so my ears were submerged and my voice sounded muffled, disembodied, almost like it was someone else talking. Could she even hear me? I turned my head and looked at her.

  “I did hear something about that,” she said.

  “Well, it’s true.”

  “Funny. Most of that gossip usually isn’t.”

  “That doesn’t bother you?”

  “Are you asking if I’m fearing for my life right now?”

  “No, I just . . . I don’t know. I think some people might have second thoughts about hanging out with someone who’d been to prison.”

  “No one’s perfect,” she said. I thought she was going to continue, but she didn’t. She seemed content to leave it at that, and, if she was, then I guess I could be, too.

  I made it back in time for the evening chores, and once the horses had been watered and grained, I made my way up to the main house. I was curious as to what Garrett wanted to talk about, though that curiosity waned when I saw that Jacob and Keith were there too.

  We all sat the dining room table, and I could tell by the expression on Keith and Jacob’s faces that they didn’t know why they were here, either. We all looked expectantly at Garrett.

  “Now, there’s a reason I wanted us all to get together again,” Garrett said. He threw a stern look in Keith and Jacob’s direction. “And it’s not because the last meal we had together went so well.”

  I sat there, wracking my brain as to why Garrett had invited us all up here again. Last time had been so excru
ciating I about wished I was back at Reynolds.

  “We want to first start by saying that we’re not trying to create any conflict here,” Marie said.

  Garrett nodded. “That’s right. And this is probably a ways off, anyway, but it’s the sort of thing that everyone will need some time to think about.”

  “I’m not so sure I like the sound of this,” Keith said.

  Jacob remained silent, though he kept looking over at me as though I had some knowledge about whatever it was Garrett was going to say.

  “Well, why don’t you have a listen first and then you can decide how you feel about it,” Garrett said. He cleared his throat. “Marie and I aren’t getting any younger,” he began. “And while we both love what we do here, we’re getting to the point in life where we’d also like to go out into the world and see what else is out there.”

  “You’re selling the ranch,” Keith said, visibly perking up. “That’s understandable.”

  “No.” Garrett shook his head. “We’re not selling the ranch, at least not right now. We’ve looked into buying a condo in Florida, though, and I think we’ve found one we’re going to purchase.”

  “Florida?” Jacob wrinkled his nose. “Are you serious?”

  “I have an aunt who lives in Naples,” Marie said. “I spent a lot of time there in my childhood, and I always hoped to go back. Not year-round, of course.”

  “So, you’re making Dad move,” Keith said, sounding like the petulant teenager he must’ve been.

  I looked down at the worn wooden tabletop and let my eyes fall shut. I took slow, deep breaths, and imagined that I was falling through an endless black hole. I’d started doing this at Reynolds, sometimes to simply pass the time, others to block out the chaos. The talking at the table continued around me, and though I could hear it, I was simultaneously able to tune it out and not truly hear what they were saying. There was a lot of back and forth. And then one sentence jerked me out of fall.

  “If he’d like, Ollie is going to take things over.”

  My eyes flew open. “What?” I said.