The Counterfeit Cowgirl by Kathryn Brocato Page A

out she was Becky’s daughter. At the same time, Felicity didn’t have it in her to deny her mother the comfort of being able to see her whenever Becky felt the need.
    “All right, Mama,” she said, resigned to the fact of her own soft-heartedness. “I’d better get some posters made, advertising the boutique and our web site. Maybe that picture of you in the fringed buckskin outfit — ”
    Becky shrieked. “Everyone’ll think I’m a hundred years old. You just wait, sugar. I’ll get Chester to send you one of the new shots. I look twenty, I promise you.”
    “Great, Mama,” Felicity said automatically. She rubbed her forehead again. “By the way, what’s the secret of staying on the back of a horse?”
    “A horse!” Becky almost screamed the words. “Don’t you dare try and ride a horse again. Are you trying to give your poor mama a heart attack? Listen, sweetie, you don’t need to prove you’re brave to your mama; your mama knows already.” Becky heaved a great sigh. “Law, you’re just like your daddy.”
    “No, I’m not.” She should have known better than to mention horses, but Becky had been an accomplished horsewoman in her youth. “I was just wondering, that’s all.”
    “Well, quit it. I won’t have my baby getting her poor little face all busted up again.” Becky muttered darkly about false friends and added, “And don’t you dare go buying yourself a horse. Do you hear me?”
    “Yes, Mama.” Now she’d done it. She’d be lucky if Becky didn’t turn up on her doorstep that evening, determined to prevent Felicity from thinking another thought about horses. “The last thing I have time for right now is a horse.”
    “Good,” Becky said. “How was the barbecue, sweetie? Any eligible bachelors?”
    “Come on, Mama. The barbecue was business.” Perhaps Becky would forget about horses in favor of casing the eligible bachelors in Foxe.
    “You ain’t goin’ blind, are you, sugar?” Becky asked.
    “Mama, I do not attend parties like a buzzard looking for prey,” Felicity said. “I’m more like a politician. I leave a business card in each hand I shake.”
    “You take after your daddy, sweetie,” Becky said fondly. “He could have talked a dog off a meat wagon.”
    “Puh-leeze, Mama.” Suspicion struck … Becky was taking the horse matter all too well. “Where are you?”
    “Where am I?” She heard sounds, as if Becky was looking about for a road sign. “I’m on my bus and just coming into Huntsville, Alabama, angel. Randy and me are having us a fine old time.”
    “I knew Randy was in on this,” Felicity grumbled.
    She hung up the phone thirty minutes later, feeling certain she had distracted Becky’s mind from horses.
    Her own problem still loomed. In less than twenty hours, she was going to have to mount one of the animals and attempt to ride it while at the same time imitating a super-cool cowgirl who had been born on horseback. Ordinarily, Felicity would have enjoyed the challenge. She just wished this particular one wasn’t quite so terrifying.
    It was her own fault. She’d let Aaron box her in until she couldn’t refuse to ride without looking like a coward. Pride, as Becky was fond of saying, always got a woman kicked in the teeth.
    The telephone rang an hour later while Felicity was brewing a cup of nerve-soothing chamomile tea. “Yes, Mama?”
    “No horses,” Becky said. “Do you hear me?”
    “Horses?” Felicity remained wonderfully innocent. “What on earth are you talking about?”
    Becky let an ominous silence build then artfully broke the tension as Felicity opened her mouth in another denial. “You’re up to something, Felicity Clayton. Don’t you think your mama knows?”
    “Mama, I am not buying a horse, I promise you.”
    “I don’t want you touching a horse,” Becky said. “I don’t want you even looking at a horse. If I have to come down there … ”
    Felicity promised immediately to eschew all horses forever and ever.