gray T-shirt in front of the mirror doing bicep curls with thirty-pound dumbbells. “How’s my girl?”
I fluffed my frizz. “As you can see from Kristi’s work of art, I’m going undercover.”
He broke out into a face-eating grin. “Congratulations, I know you’ve been waiting to lead a case for a long time.”
“Well, it’s not exactly what I had in mind.” I flopped onto a padded bench beside the neat rows of dumbbells on a rack.
“You can do it. I have faith in you.”
And his boat-wide smile made shoveling manure suddenly sound like a true opportunity rather than a punishment.
Jimmy was the only one who understood how hard I’d had to work to hide my condition and make my handicap look effortless. He understood because his older brother, Mario, had an arm ripped off above the elbow in a motorcycle accident when he was eighteen. Jimmy had grown up watching Mario endure the long process of fitting an artificial limb and the painful and frustrating hours of practice that went into rehabilitation.
“Hey, guess what?” he said.
“What?”
“Kara’s pregnant.”
For whatever reason, Jimmy tried to reassure me every time I came to the gym that if an ugly, one-armed, junkyard dog like his brother could find a beautiful woman to marry him, then my finding a partner was definitely in the cards. I’m not sure he understood how superficial men in my social circle could be. “When’s the baby due?”
“Right before Christmas.”
“Give him my congratulations.”
Jimmy put both hands up and backed away. “Heck, no, he’s already feeling too proud of himself.”
I laughed and picked nervously at a nail that Kristi had so thoughtfully stripped of polish and clipped nearly to the quick. “So, what do you think?”
He frowned and that meant I wouldn’t like the answer. “I think you should wear your workout leg.”
“Oh, no, please, Jimmy. It’s so ugly.”
He sat beside me on the bench and wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “The pretty leg will crap out under the load and your residual limb won’t be as comfortable. You’re heading for hard work, sweetheart. You’ve gotta take care of yourself.”
Coming from Jimmy that didn’t feel like a reproach, but the straight truth. I leaned against his shoulder. “How will I hide it? No one’s supposed to know who I am.”
“Wear pants. Now that it’s getting warmer, that’s a bummer, but it’s the best option. I had Kristi find you a couple of pairs of boots and fitted them with Talux feet.”
I sighed. The carbon active heel would help me walk with a fluid, natural motion in a variety of terrains. Most of all, the unit could withstand moderate impact activities that my lifelike, silicone-covered cosmetic leg couldn’t—even with its computer controls. But none of that altered the fact that the metal workout leg was butt ugly.
Jimmy scrunched his bushy eyebrows and got all serious on me. “I need you to do me a favor.”
“What’s that?”
“You gotta promise me you’re gonna take care of yourself. Two of my three kids are down with some sort of spring flu, and Linda’s driving me crazy as it is. I don’t want to have to worry about you, too.”
Linda being his wife who only drove him crazy because he loved her so much. Sometimes I wished he wasn’t married because, with him, my leg would never be an issue.
“I promise.”
“You’ll be expending more energy than you’re used to, so you’re gonna have to increase your calorie intake. If you lose more than five pounds, your prosthesis won’t fit properly and you could end up with all sorts of problems.”
Keeping weight on wasn’t a new issue for me. “I promise I’ll eat.”
He glared at me with the ball-shrinking gaze that was said to have cowered more than one CIA recruit. He forgot that it didn’t work as well on women. “Three squares. No skipping.”
I nodded. “I’ll pack energy bars.”
“That’s my girl.” He stood up and clamped his hands to his hips. “Now get on the mat and let me take you through the exercises I want you to do every day to keep your core strong and balanced.”
He understood me, but that didn’t mean he cut me any slack. “Backbreaker,” I teased.
His chuckle negated his scowl. “Drop down and give me ten.”
The next morning I glanced at the ugly workout leg leaning against the wall next to my bed at my Darien estate and groaned. Suck it up, Alexa. There was no use complaining. The workout leg was the best tool for the job I had to do.
An hour after getting up, I used my Ally Cross frequent-buyer card at a Starbucks before getting onto I-95, treating myself to a grande Americano and choking down an energy bar to keep my promise to Jimmy. In Norwalk, Connecticut, I switched over to the Merritt Parkway because the ride was prettier. My grip on the steering wheel tightened and I belted out a tune at the top of my lungs along with Gwen Stefani on the radio to keep my thoughts from filling my mind with doubts.
In Hartford, I merged onto I-84 and dismissed my building jitters by concentrating on finding the Ashcroft signs. Make that singular. The town was farther and tinier than I’d expected, and the clock on the dashboard was inching closer to seven much too quickly. Showing up late on my first day wasn’t the best way to start.
Once I found Ashcroft, I followed the stone wall surrounding the farm for a mile before I turned into the red-bricked pillared entrance to the equestrian center.
To say the place was grand would be an understatement. The state-of-the-art equestrian facility was located on fifty-five rolling acres of woodlands, hills and pastures. Miles of fence made from the white PVC that imitated wood planks and would last forever without needing fresh paint lined the roadway. Definitely not cheap.
The stable was as impressive as the château-inspired mansion where Patrick Dunhill lived. Brick-red paint and white accents kept the color scheme of the main house going. The cupola in the center of the roof matched the mansion’s turret. And the covered entry was a nice touch. I left the Focus in the parking lot and, with a bit of trepidation swimming around my stomach—which I blamed on the large cup of coffee rather than nerves—I headed for the barn office.
I could do this. I could.
Bart Hind, the manager, sat behind a black metal desk, barking into the phone to what, I gathered, was the feed supplier. His skin looked slept in, the folds and wrinkles ironed in as if he’d stayed too long in one spot. His hair had once been brown, but now was so shot with white that it looked dusty. He wore navy work pants and a plaid work shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows.
“Who are you?” he growled as he slammed down the phone.
“Ally Cross. You were expecting
