15. Maximillian #3
“You were.” I look at her rather than the image of myself on her screen. “People should know that.”
“You told them I’m a better rider than you are.” She lowers the phone, her fingers closing around its edges.
“You are.” I remember the turn she took on the borrowed mare, the instant I knew I’d underestimated her. “You made that fairly clear when we met.”
“Max.” She glances toward the tack-room door, then back at me. “You withdrew from the title defense.”
“I withdrew from one event.” I hold her gaze. “I’m not retiring. I lose the chance to defend that title this year. I’m choosing to be here instead of there.”
“I didn’t ask you to do that.” She tucks the phone against her palm, leaving her other hand free. For a moment I watch it, remembering how it rested in Sovrano’s mane yesterday.
“I know.” I set my cup farther back on the bench so I can turn fully toward her. “It was my decision. You don’t owe me a different answer about us because I made it.”
She stares at me for a long moment. “Giselle has been texting me. Apparently she and my mother watched it together.”
“I imagine your mother has opinions.” I reach for the cup, then put it down again without drinking. Elle has had enough of those opinions for a lifetime.
“Several.” Elle’s mouth twists. “Giselle thinks you’ve humiliated her publicly.”
“I let people talk about her as though she’d become your equal in a few weeks.” I look toward Sovrano’s stall. “I should never have encouraged that.”
“Mother says I should be grateful you gave Giselle an interest.” Elle switches off the screen. “As if I asked you to take it away from her.”
“You didn’t.” I keep my eyes on hers. “I ended the lessons. I entered that exhibition. Your mother can be angry with me.”
Elle turns the dark phone over in her hand. “You said you love me.”
“Yes.” I wait until she looks up. “I do.”
“In front of everyone.” Her mouth moves as though she might smile, but she looks away before I can be certain.
“It seemed relevant.” I stand up from the bench, close enough to touch her if she reached out. “I needed to be clear about who I was talking about. You. Not someone I needed a replacement for.”
She looks up at me, and I see something vulnerable in her expression. “Why did you really withdraw? Not the press version. The real reason.”
I think about how to answer. The truth is tangled, hard to separate into clean threads.
“Because I could have done this months ago.” I gesture at the stable, the hills, the life she’s building here.
“I could have made time. I could have been with you when you needed me instead of telling myself the horses couldn’t spare me.
I kept choosing the competition calendar over you, and I told myself it was necessary, and it wasn’t.
” I pause. “Missing one event won’t end my career.
But I’ve already missed enough of your life. ”
She’s quiet for so long that I start to worry I’ve said too much.
“I want to go to the arena tomorrow.” She slips the phone into her pocket and looks toward the path we took yesterday. “With Sovrano. Around two, if that works.”
“I’ll be there.” I stay where I am, although I want to take the hand hanging loose at her side.
She looks back at me, holding my gaze long enough that I stop thinking about the interview altogether.
“Thank you.” She touches the edge of the bench, then lets her hand fall. “For saying I hadn’t agreed to it. I hated thinking everyone believed I was grateful.”
“I should have corrected it weeks ago.” I look at the place where her fingers rested on the wood. I want to reach for her and leave my hand at my side.
“Yes.” She meets my eyes. “You should have.”
She turns toward the house, and I nearly ask whether she wants company as far as the door.
Then she pauses to answer Rosa, who has come outside with a basket, and the two of them walk on together.
Elle tips her head to listen. Her hair slips over her shoulder, bright in the afternoon light, and I remember how easily I used to reach for a strand and wind it around my finger.
I sit again and finish the cold coffee. My withdrawal confirmation is waiting on the phone beside me.
I open it once more, and the disappointment is still there: the round I won’t ride, Dante waiting at home, the chance I have given up.
I don’t want Elle to have to soothe any of that.
For too long she was the one finding something else to do while I went where I wanted.
Tomorrow she has asked for me. She hasn’t promised to ride, or take my hand, or let me back into the house when we’re finished. I think of her saying she hated everyone believing she was grateful, and of all the times I accepted her silence as agreement because it let me carry on.
I put the phone away and carry the cup back into the stable. The clean bedding still needs spreading, and Deus has left the evening list clipped beside the feed-room door. At two tomorrow I will be where she asked me to be. I want that to become so ordinary she stops being surprised by it.
I want her to count on me before she knows whether she can forgive me.