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She was almost sure of it.

And now Delaney didn’t know what the hell she was supposed to do with that.

10

The last of the saddle soap came out from under Claire’s thumbnail with the edge of the rag. She dropped the rag into the bucket and stepped out of the tack room into the aisle.

Mid-morning light lay in a long stripe down the boards from the south doors. One setup left. The second unit had the wide shot down at the creek pasture, and then they’d break down their tents and move on to the next location.

She brought Ranger off the cross-ties and led him out into the yard, checked the girth, and swung up. The gelding settled under her at once and stood waiting on the word, ears forward. That was what she needed out there. Maple took her cue from whatever was beside her, and the mare had enough on her mind today.

Delaney had looked steady the first few days. Claire made herself leave it there. The barn two nights ago wasn’t on the schedule. Her own fingers at Delaney’s jaw a beat longer than they should have been. Delaney’s mouth starting to open. None of it changed the job.

Claire rode out along the fence line and through the gate to the creek pasture. A handful of crew stood near the catering tent with coffee and clipboards. The camera was already set at the far fence, and Nadia wanted one wide shot of June crossing the grass alone before they moved on to dialogue. Simple. Claire had walked the route herself that morning and approved it. A gentle loop, no soft ground, nothing in the mare’s way.

Delaney sat straight in the saddle fifty yards off, dark hair braided tight down her back, work shirt rolled to her elbows. Claire’s eyes went to the line of her shoulders, then to the reins, sitting in her hands the way they were supposed to now. Loose on the buckle. Two weeks ago the woman had held them in a knot.

Claire nudged Ranger into a jog and swung wide so she came up on Delaney’s left.

Delaney’s head turned. Claire looked at the mare.

“Keep her at a walk until I say otherwise.” She kept her voice where the crew couldn’t hear it. “We’re not rushing this.”

“Understood.”

One word. Nothing in it but the job, no echo of the barn. Good. Claire had spent two nights going over the same facts the way she went over a trail before she took a green horse down it. Delaney was twenty-six and she was leaving in three weeks. The rescue expansion was sitting on this production finishing without any problems. That was the whole calculation.

She put Ranger ten feet off Maple’s shoulder and waited.

“Quiet, please.” A voice behind the camera. A radio crackled once and died.

Claire scanned the tree line, the grass, the far fence.

Maple moved off at a walk, head low, ears loose. Delaney’s hands stayed soft. Claire watched the mare’s back feet track straight and even. Seven days of corrections and Delaney had turned all of it into muscle memory. Not many people did that. It was impressive.

They crossed the shallow rise with the creek opening up beyond it. The light was good. Claire let her attention narrow to the horses, the footing, and the distance left to the water.

Metal hit metal behind them. Loud as a shot.

Claire’s head came around before the thought finished. The grip stand had gone over sideways into the generator housing, a sandbag sliding off its base, and the noise was still rolling out across the pasture and coming back off the trees.

Maple’s head came up. Her ears went flat. Then she went.

Not the crow-hop Claire had braced for. The mare spun left and flattened out into a gallop, straight down the open grass along the creek.

Claire had Ranger moving before her hands caught up with her. Heels, then rein. The gelding came out of the walk and into a lope like he’d been waiting all morning for it. The gap between them held even. Maple was running.

Claire knew where the mare would go before the mare did. Past the creek bottom, where the bank dropped away and came back up hard. Then the far fence, forty yards of it, closing fast. Somebody’s coiled cable lay loose in the grass past the catering tent, and there was a light stand at the corner of it that she’d told them twice to move.

Delaney went back in the saddle. Half a second of daylight between her seat and the leather, the horn cutting up toward her thigh, both reins jammed down into one fist. Then she came down off-center and stayed on, one boot driven deep in the stirrup.

Claire put Ranger into a run and took the angle on Maple’s shoulder.

Then Delaney’s voice came through. Three words Claire couldn’t make out from that distance, low and level, no panic anywhere in them.

Maple’s stride came apart. Shortened, rooted, stopped. The mare stood with her head dropped and her ribs going like a bellows, and Delaney was still up there, one hand closed on the left rein, heels down, weight centered. Exactly the way Claire had drilled it into her for seven straight days.

Claire’s grip changed on her reins.