“I’ve promised to train your horse to your liking, and I’ve also told you I’ll make sure you’re the kind of rider she’ll need once we get there.” I sighed. There was one more thing to add. Damn it. “I’m also not proud enough to be the first person to admit that I’m not a people person. At all. I don’t see the point of trying to be, either.”
He chuckled wryly. “It’s your way or the highway?”
I snorted. “Pretty much. There’s a reason I don’t normally allow owners to visit very often.”
That was news to him, clearly. “You don’t?”
Ah, something his PA hadn’t caught, then.
“No. I prefer quarterly visits. Every month sometimes, if it’s necessary or the owner lives close.” But not this. Not what he was going to do. “Which is part of why I’m snappy when I need to keep the business running like the well-oiled machine it normally is.”
He made a thoughtful sound. “All right. I can respect that.”
“Good. I’m saying you’re welcome to come to the ranch since you live very close, but don’t expect company. You can observe Ramona, hell, I’ll even make sure you get to hang out with her and eventually go on walks with her to bond. But if you’re going to be around, then you’ll also take riding lessons, and it won’t be me teaching you, either.”
Because like I’d told him, I already had my plate full.
“Who would teach me, then?”
I decided to ignore the “would” instead of “will.”
“Normally, that would be Demi, but she just had the twins so she’s not available. It’s likely going to be Gemma or maybe Mal, if he has time. They work for me so I can see if they have time in their schedules.”
“So you’re pawning me off to your minions to keep me out of your way?”
The humor in his tone was the only reason I didn’t snap at him.
“Pretty much. But if you ever call anyone on the ranch my minion again, I’m going to terminate our contract immediately.” Yeah, I didn’t quite snap, but….
“Noted.” He cleared his throat. “I guess I’ll have to come up with other things to do as well, since I’m living here now.”
I rolled my eyes, glad that he couldn’t see me. “That sounds like a rough life to have.” I glanced at the time again. “Look, I need to get to work.”
“All right. I’ll see you later.”
“Yeah. Bye.” I ended the call before he could say anything more.
It felt both a victory and a bit childish at the same time.
Because Ramona was such an inquisitive horse, I decided to take her to the agility course. She’d need to be solid on various surfaces later anyway, given that Carter would probably mostly do trail riding with her, so I thought why not let her familiarize herself with some of this stuff.
I hadn’t ridden her yet, because she didn’t have the muscles needed for that after being a broodmare for years. Having her do different exercises both in the arena and out of it would help with that pretty quickly.
Since I had a couple of more horses to train after her, I’d figured that if he showed up, I could hand her over for some grooming practice after I was done with her. There was always someone around to help out or oversee, which was definitely something they’d need.
I’d just taken her into the fenced course when I heard Gemma in the barn. As I thought would happen, Carter strolled out and smiled as soon as he saw his horse.
“What’s all this?” he asked, gesturing at the various obstacles.
I let Ramona off the lead so she could explore a little. “It’s a horse agility course. Or that’s what we call it. What it actually is, is our attempt at making a course that helps us desensitize horses to whatever we can think of to add here.”
“Huh.” Carter watched as Ramona walked over to sniff various things. “It really looks a lot like a dog agility course.”
“It does. Just horse sized.” I walked closer to where he was leaning against the top rung. “Things like the wobbly bridge or even the seesaw we just added are excellent practice for trail horses.”
I chuckled as Ramona pushed one of the hanging bags and branches we had rigged into a frame to walk the horses through. She spooked minutely, blew out a breath, and tried again.
“Clever girl,” Carter murmured, clearly pleased.
