The Counterfeit Cowgirl by Kathryn Brocato Page B

Pointing out to Becky that she was over twenty-one and had been making her own decisions for years would have been unnecessarily cruel. She had long ago accepted Becky’s need to give motherly guidance.
    “No horses,” Becky repeated, and hung up.
    Felicity noted that Becky didn’t sound particularly satisfied and mentally kicked herself. She should have known better than to mention horses in the first place. She got out her address book and called each of her five cousins scattered around the state of Tennessee, and chattered about her vacation while she worked the conversation around to horseback riding. The tactic failed five times.
    “You know what happened the last time you rode a horse,” cousin Jennifer Mills warned. “Forget it, Felicity.”
    Well, she argued inwardly as she prepared for bed, so what if everyone found out she was a phony whose knees turned to jelly at the sight of a horse? She was selling image, not fact. Nobody really
wanted
to be a cowgirl these days.
    But something inside wouldn’t let Felicity confess to cowardice and abandon the ride. She’d have to face a horse down one of these days. It might as well be tomorrow, when she had Aaron present to provide the necessary grit.
    Felicity climbed into the lumpy bed, chuckling in spite of her fears. With Aaron’s contempt to spur her on, she might ride like Annie Oakley.
    • • •
    “I knew you wouldn’t disappoint us,” Aaron drawled. He stared appreciatively at Felicity’s riding outfit. “It’s a good thing we polished up the horses.” He looked down at his own dusty jeans and wrinkled, blue work shirt. “Too bad I didn’t have time to polish myself.”
    He stood outside the stables behind his house where two horses and two ponies had been tied to a wooden fence rail. The wide graveled drive leading to the building was bounded by a white, wood-rail fence and dotted with pecan trees. The stable looked even more imposing in the daylight than it had the night before.
    Felicity wasn’t in the mood to notice the pastoral beauty of her surroundings. Not even concentrating on Aaron’s broad shoulders and long, strong legs blocked the object of her anxiety from the forefront of her mind.
    The dreaded object twitched a muscle on his flanks and stamped his rear foot. The hollow clomp of Rhyolite’s hoof on the graveled walkway resounded through Felicity’s mind and body like cymbals clashing.
    She came to a dead halt. Rhyolite lifted his head and snorted at her. Felicity’s knees turned to rubber. Her heart quaked within her chest. But her face wore the smile a top saleswoman always wore in the face of migraine headaches, hostile prospects, and runners in her stockings.
    “Are you sure those jeans were made for riding?” Aaron asked.
    Felicity ignored him in favor of concentrating on deep breathing. She had worn a blue cotton shirt trimmed with red and a pair of red jeans so tight she had trouble zipping them up. When she looked at the height of the stirrup she was supposed to place her foot into, she knew the jeans — meant to help hold her erect — had been a major mistake.
    Rhyolite tossed his head and stamped his hooves again. She looked down at those hooves. They were the biggest horse hooves she’d ever seen. Stark terror arose in her throat.
    “Felicity, look at Donatello,” Pete said. “I brushed him myself.”
    “Felicity, look at Michelangelo,” Joey cried.
    Felicity turned aside to look. She admired the two well-brushed ponies. Cautiously stroking Donatello’s soft muzzle temporarily distracted her quivering nerves.
    Beside Rhyolite, a second horse just as big stood quietly. As Felicity’s frozen gaze rested on the other horse, he twitched his tail and stamped a foot.
    She was going to die this afternoon. She knew it.
    Pete patted Donatello’s neck. “Let’s go, Felicity. This is going to be fun.”
    Felicity got a grip on herself. She could do it. She could do anything. There was no reason to suppose disaster