Summer Games (35 page)

“Have you seen Cord?” She wasn’t able to keep her voice light. Asking about him was no longer a joke. She needed to know where he was.

Without even making a pretense of looking around the area for Cord, Thorne shook his head. He appeared older today, harder, and when he spoke, his voice sounded harsh despite his southern accent. “No, ma’am, I haven’t.”

She bit her lip against a protest. Where is he?

It had been Captain Jon, not Cord, who helped her care for Dev last night. It had been Thorne, not Cord, who drove the motor home from Rancho Santa Fe back to Santa Anita, where the final part of the Olympic three-day event would be held. It had been Thorne, not Cord, who discreetly guarded her when she checked on Dev late at night.

And it had been Raine alone who listened to the scanner’s erratic mutter. It had taken her a long time to achieve even a troubled sleep.

Maybe Cord came back while I showered and dressed, she told herself. Maybe he’s at the stable right now, saddling Dev for the last competition.

The thought that Cord might be waiting sent her running through the lacy shadows of pepper trees and down the green rows of stables. Her heart quickened when she saw Dev standing in front of his stall, all groomed and saddled.

He’s here!

Before she could call Cord’s name, Captain Jon walked out of the shadows to greet her. Disappointment turned in her like a dagger.

“Did you get Dev ready?” she asked.

“Yes. You need your strength for riding. Besides, he was too tired to do more than flatten his ears at me.”

She schooled her expression as ruthlessly as she would soon be schooling Dev. “Thank you.”

“How is your eye?”

“Just a cut.”

“Bled like a stuck pig,” Captain Jon said bluntly.

She shrugged and fiddled restlessly with the saddle blanket. There were no weights put into the pockets yet. They would be added just before Dev went into the ring.

Where is Cord?

“Raine.”

She gathered herself and turned toward Captain Jon. “Yes?”

“You didn’t let that French rider throw you,” the captain said bluntly. “Whether or not Elliot is here, you have an event to ride. You owe it to yourself, to your horse, and to us.”

Numbly she nodded her head. Then she took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Don’t worry, Captain Jon.” She stepped onto the mounting block, then turned quickly back toward him. “Are we still in the medals?”

He smiled widely. “That’s my rider! Yes, we’re right up there. The French and Brits have knocked down some rails. If your bloody great beast can refrain from knocking down any jumps, you’ll have a bloody great medal to show your grandchildren.”

It was an effort, but Raine managed not to groan as she settled into the saddle. She had only eighty minutes before she was due in the competition ring. She would need every one of them to get Dev loose enough to jump.

The way the stallion walked to the practice area told her that he would just as soon have stayed in his stall, thank you very much. She patted and praised him with a voice that was still a bit hoarse. Once in the practice area, she worked Dev carefully, using simple dressage exercises designed to ease the stiffness in his huge body. By the time they were called out of the practice area and weights were added on, the stallion was willing if not eager to face the jumps.

For once Dev stood quietly in the opening between the bleachers as he waited to be called into the jump ring. The flags and crowds were as colorful as they had been for the dressage event, but the ring was neither empty nor freshly raked. Instead, the area was filled with brightly painted jumps set in combinations that would force horse and rider to adjust stride and approach for each individual jump.

No fence was fixed or high. The horses and riders had already proved their ability to jump yesterday in the steeplechase and on the brutal obstacle course. Today’s event was simply to prove that horse and rider were willing—and able—to take to the field again.

There was a small round of applause for the rider who preceded Raine. His horse had refused once, costing ten penalty points, knocked down a rail for five points, and gone too slowly. Total, eighteen penalty points. Barely adequate.

Zero was the only score worth having.

Yet Dev was sluggish beneath her, and her own body lacked the strength and flexibility that had helped Dev yesterday. But the skill was still there, and so was the determination to do well.

Raine’s name and country were announced. As she brought Dev into the ring at a slow canter, doubts and nervousness dropped away. The stallion’s ears came forward when he spotted all the jumps. His gait was a bit ragged and difficult to ride, but otherwise he was willing.

Cantering slowly, she waited for the buzzer that would signal the beginning of the timed event. When it came, she turned Dev toward the first jump. He took it easily, not pulling at the bit or fighting for a faster pace, leaving everything to her.

In some ways Dev’s laissez-faire attitude made the ride much easier on Raine. Her arms were simply too sore and tired for a tug-of-war with the powerful stallion. Unfortunately, he was just a bit too easygoing about the jumps. He ticked a bar with his back left hoof on the third jump.

The crowd groaned, but Raine wasn’t able to see whether the bar had fallen. She wouldn’t know until she saw her score at the end of the event.

A triple jump provided another heart-stopping instant. Dev’s hoof clattered against wood and the crowd groaned. Again, she couldn’t tell whether or not the bar had fallen.

“All right, boy. You’ve had your fun. Now let’s do it right.”

She collected Dev and turned him toward the last jumps. He finished with a clean show of agility and strength that brought an approving round of applause. Instantly, she turned to look at the scoreboard.

Zero. No penalty points. Dev had rattled the bars but he hadn’t knocked any down.

Smiling triumphantly, Raine threw her arms around Dev’s muscular neck and poured praise into his ears.

“Good show!” Captain Jon said as she rode Dev out of the ring.

She sighed and stretched her aching back. “He felt about as lively as a balloon full of water,” she said, worried.

The captain smiled and shook his head. “Ease up. It’s over, now. Home free, as you Yanks say.”

The words came as a shock.

Over. A lifetime of training, work, hope.

Over.

“Smile, Raine. You took us to the gold!”

Dazed, she looked at the caption while conflicting emotions swept through her, shaking her. It was an incredible feeling to win gold, to know that a lifetime of training had paid off so richly. Triumph exploded in her, but in its wake came the emptiness of knowing that something extraordinary had ended—all the sweat, all the fears, all the injuries, all the exhilaration of training and riding one of the best horses in the world to Olympic gold.

Triumph and emptiness and then triumph again, a starburst of conflicting feelings consuming her.

As though seeing them for the first time, Raine looked around slowly at the crowd and the horses and the rippling Olympic flags. Strangers cheering and laughing, applauding Dev’s achievement and her own. She smiled and waved back, sharing the moment of triumph with the crowd.

When another rider took to the ring, Captain Jon led Dev away. Emptiness surged up in Raine again. She looked at each face, each shadow, searching for . . . something.

Cord.

He wasn’t there.

Dev stumbled tiredly, jarring her. The sound of cheering had faded. No one was near except Captain Jon, and soon he would have to return to the ring. She would be alone.

Over.

The word echoed in her mind like her heartbeat. Her work was finished.

And so was Cord’s.

Is that why he left? Competition madness, lovers’ games until the Summer Games were over. And then . . .

Nothing.

Over.

The last of Raine’s strength leached out of her. She slumped in the saddle.

“Raine? I say, are you all right?”

She pulled the last shreds of her determination together. “I’m fine,” she said, her voice flat. “Just tired.”

Raine was still tired when she sat on a newly washed, curried, and polished stallion and received her gold medal alongside her teammates. The feeling of exhaustion vanished when she felt the crowd’s triumphant cry, people shouting and cheering until the ground trembled.

By the time the national anthem ended, tears were streaming down her cheeks. She didn’t notice. She smiled and waved to the cheering crowd, transported for the moment by the outpouring of emotion from people she would never know, people who had shared the intense emotions of the American Equestrian Team’s ride to gold.

Finally she and her teammates rode from the ring, leaving the thousands of well-wishers behind. The other members of her team were soon engulfed in the noisy, exuberant congratulations of family and friends and reporters.

Raine didn’t look around for her own family. She knew without being told that Cord wouldn’t allow them in such a public melee.

With the ease of long experience—and some discreet shouldering by Thorne and his men—she evaded the press. She hugged Captain Jon tightly.

“Thank you,” she said, smiling at him. “We never would have gotten past the first obstacle without you.”

Captain Jon cleared his throat and returned her hug with a huge smile, his Swiss reserve forgotten for the instant.

She released the captain into the bearhugs of her teammates. Then she stood on tiptoe, searching for a man with black hair and ice blue eyes, a man who moved like a cat gliding through dusk, silence and strength combined.

She saw no one like him.

Still searching for Cord, she eased through the knots of friends and families. Absently she responded to invitations to victory celebrations with a wave and a smile. Soon she was at the edge of the crowd, where he had often waited for her.

There was no one standing patiently back in the shadows.

For an instant she stood absolutely still, feeling as though she was being torn in half. Part of her still thrilled to the triumph of Olympic gold.

And part of her simply wanted to walk away, to keep on walking until there was nothing around her but silence and space. For the first time she realized how tired she was, tired clear through flesh and bone to her soul.

The feeling wasn’t entirely new. It came to her after every competition, win or lose. Endings, not beginnings. Yet this time was also different. She had no desire to begin again, for there was nothing to begin. The ultimate Game was won, the highest goal achieved: Olympic gold.

And now it was over. Nothing to fight for, to work for, to train for, to risk for. Nothing and no one waiting for her.

She felt like a balloon released by a careless child, free floating high into the blue, higher and higher until cold shriveled the fragile envelope and it fluttered back to earth as a ruined shell.

Slowly she walked back to the motor home. Thorne was in his usual place, but the motor home itself was gone.

“Where’s Cord?” she demanded.

Her voice trembled despite her attempts to keep it level. She had so hoped that he would be here to see her wearing Olympic gold. She could hardly accept that she was alone, no one to share her triumph with, no one to understand why she suddenly felt empty.

“Ma’am—”

“Where is Cord?”

“I’m sorry, Miss Chandler-Smith. I no longer know a man called Cord Elliot.”

Raine called her father that evening, only to find out that he was already on his way to see her. He met her in her motel room, accompanied by two men who moved like Cord, calm and alert and strong. They searched the motel room thoroughly before fading back into the red velvet shadows like the accomplished bodyguards they were.

“Tell them to wait outside,” she said tightly.

Justin Chandler-Smith was weaker, thinner, and older than the men with him, but a single look was all it took to rout them. They left as quietly as they had come.

Her father walked over and hugged Raine hard. “They wouldn’t let me or any of the family near you during the games. Your mother and sibs watched on television. Said it was too great a risk. I stayed, but they still wouldn’t—”

“I’m used to it,” she said, not waiting for him to finish. “No apology needed.”

Chandler-Smith looked down into his daughter’s face. She looked older than she had when he watched her through binoculars on the endurance course. She should look elated, triumphant, relaxed. She didn’t. She looked like she was hanging onto control by a very fine thread.

He didn’t know what was wrong. He only knew that something was. He started to ask, then decided against it. She would tell him the same way she did everything else—in her own time, in her own way.

“That was a hell of a ride you made,” he said simply. “Half of me was proud. The rest of me was nearly too scared to watch. I had a good view, too. The man who scouted the land for me knew what he was doing.”

“Cord Elliot,” she said curtly.

“What?”

“Cord Elliot scouted the land for you.”

“Tell him thanks for me.”

“You tell him. He’s one of yours.”

Chandler-Smith held his daughter at arm’s length. “What is it, baby? What’s going on?”

She looked at him with hazel eyes that were nearly opaque. “Have I ever asked you for anything?”

“Not since you were ten and I missed your birthday party,” he said sadly. “You never asked me for anything after that.”

“I’m asking now. Cord Elliot. I want to know where he is, or at least to say good-bye.” Just to see him again. Just to hear his voice. “But everyone I ask about him, even the men who worked with him, say, ‘Cord who? Never heard of him.’ ”

Now Chandler-Smith recognized the change in his daughter. Pain and loneliness were etched into her face, her body, her voice. “You love him, baby?”

She closed her eyes. She had asked herself that question a hundred times a day. A hundred times a day the answer came back. Yes. Win or lose, yes.

And she was a thousand times a fool for loving him.

She had wanted to give him a permanent place near her fire, to save him from the freezing cold and night of the other world. But it was a world that he wanted more than he wanted anything else, including a life with her.