Neither Pedro nor Myrna saw the looks and smirks exchanged between Faith and Shay. Shay leaned over and kissed Faith quickly on the lips, and Shay slapped her ass as she walked away to gather Champ’s reins.
Pedro watched as Faith led the horse to the starting point and he went to where he would stop the timer. He frowned when he saw Shay with a stopwatch, but then he remembered that he had been doing Pedro’s job for the last couple of weeks. He nodded and waited until he got the nod from Faith,and fired off the gun. He was so shocked at what he saw that he failed to both start and stop his watch. Shay looked at him with a grin.
“Yeah, that,” he laughed, and showed the watch to Pedro so he could write down the times. They ended up running Champ three times before Pedro called a halt. Shay took Diablo out to the starting point and brought Champ back. He explained to Myrna that they wouldn’t take him back until after Diablo ran. He further explained that after Buster ran, then they would bring one horse out while Faith ran them. It was with the first three that they were kept at the side of the track at the same time.
When Diablo ran, Shay only wore a grin when he showed the watch to Pedro and let him write the numbers down. He was run three times before they switched to Buster. As much as Pedro thought he paid attention, he again failed to get the first set of numbers, taking them from Shay. He only shook his head and paid attention for the next two runs.
This time, Faith rode Buster off the track, hopped off, and Shay led him and Diablo away, and Myrna left with Champ.
“Well?” Faith asked as she looked at the stunned expression on Pedro’s face.
“Holy hell, Kid. My first question, how do you stay on?”
“It’s not hard, but it feels like I’m floating when I ride those three. The next nine are a different story.I don’t want to influence you, but you just witnessed the fastest three horses from that bunch. I’m not saying the others aren’t fast, but not as fast as those.”
“What is Naomi going to do with them? Will she keep them, or sell them?”
“No clue, she only watched them the first day. Said she didn’t want to micromanage us.”
“What about Cole?”
“Same thing. He said he trusts me, and would talk to you about the horses after you’ve seen them all run for at least a couple of weeks.”
“Damn, if I owned those three, I wouldn’t sell them to anyone. I’d figure out my silks and run them myself.” He and Faith exchanged grins, and he looked down at his paperwork when the next horse was brought in. For the next two weeks, he watched all the horses run, and every night he would make his own notes in the files, and if it was past a certain time, he would take them home to finish it after dinner.
One evening, he heard a giggle, and looked up to see Myrna standing on the other side of the table, staring at him. He felt his brows rise, “What?”
“Do you wear glasses?”
“What? No. I don’t need them.”
“Yeah, you do.” She picked up his phone and turned it to him.
“What’s this?”
“I snapped a picture of you reading. You squint, and hold the papers close. Do you trust me?”
“I guess, what are you going to do?”
“I have readers now, I had prescription reading glasses, but when I fled, I didn’t grab them. I had Laurie pick me up two pairs of each strength.” She picked something up off the chair and laid them on the table. Pedro saw several pairs of glasses. “These are not from a doctor, but they help. Try them.”
Pedro was skeptical, but he took the one with the lowest number, unpacked them, and put them on. He didn’t see any difference, so he went with the next one. There were five different strengths, and found the one in the middle was the best. He looked at her over the rims and grinned.
“How do I look?”
“Sexy and sophisticated at the same time.” It took several heartbeats before what she said kicked in, and she stared at him in shock.
Pedro shoved his chair back, and stalked toward her, with the glasses still perched on the tip of his nose. Just as he reached her, they stared at one another for a few intense seconds, and when he lowered his head, they were interrupted by heavy pounding on the front door.
“Go to your room,” Pedro said, and gave her a shove as he withdrew his gun and headed toward the door.
CHAPTER 8
Pedro looked backat Myrna and nodded when he saw her peeking through the almost closed door. With his gun down by his side, but at the ready, he unlocked the door, opened it, and breathed in relief when Shay stood there.
“Shay, welcome.” He stepped back and the smile was quickly wiped off his face when Shay entered, and several other men came in behind him. The looks on their faces gave him pause, and he looked up when he saw Myrna come out from her room. She immediately turned into a hostess, and everyone took her offer for a cup of coffee. She ended up making three pots before they all got one.
“What’s up?” Pedro asked when they all settled at the table. Clark had gone back out and brought in two more tables and more chairs for everyone. Looking around the table, he saw Duane, Clark, Jake,Tony, Shay, and several other men that he had forgotten their names. The man with the eye patch nodded at him.
