
“You don’t remember, do you?” Katrina asked.
“Remember what?”
“That I don’t know how to ride.”
Mandy turned. “That’s ridiculous.”
“No, it’s not.”
“Of course you know how to ride.”
Katrina shook her head, then tucked her loose hair behind her ears. “You guys used to put me up on a horse a lot. But I could barely hold on. I sure couldn’t control it.” If her horses hadn’t willingly followed her sisters’ and brothers’ animals back home, she’d have been permanently lost in the wilderness.
“I can teach you,” Mandy broke in.
Katrina laughed at that, deciding it was time to come clean. It had to be better than riding. “I’m afraid of horses, Mandy.”
Her sister’s forehead wrinkled. “What are you talking about?”
“They scare me half to death.”
“Why?”
“Because they’re big. They’re strong. They’re unpredictable, and one of them bit me once.”
Mandy shook her head. “You can’t put up with that. You have to show them who’s boss.”
“Does that sound like me?”
Mandy crossed her arms over her chest, leaning back against a stall fence and lifting one heel to brace it on the bottom rail, while the mare nudged at her ear. “I guess not,” Mandy allowed, firmly pushing the horse’s head away.
Katrina gave a self-deprecating grimace. “I can’t even boss around five-foot-two male ballet dancers.”
Mandy laughed at that. “I really could teach you.”
“To boss my ballet partners around?”
“To ride horses.”
Katrina took an involuntary step backward. “I don’t think so.”
“It’s easy.”
“Maybe so, but I don’t want to learn how.”
“But-”
“I’m only going to be here for a week, and there aren’t a lot of horses in New York City.”
