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“Attila, this is Jessica Dunn, Oat Bran Blues’s owner,” Violet introduces me to the woman.

“A pleasure,” Jessica Dunn says, extending a hand to shake. Her grip is firm and her smile is genuine. She’s an elegant, kind-seeming woman who, Violet has told me, is a successful painter who one day got it into her head to buy a racehorse. Muley is the first horse she’s owned and this will be his first start under her ownership.

“He’s a fine horse,” I tell her.

“I’m very fond of him,” she smiles, and brushes a strand of long hair from her eyes.

I kiss Ruby for luck then walk over to Muley, who Henry and Sophie, the groom, have led from his saddling stall.

“Do your best,” is all Henry says as he gives me a leg up.

I feel Muley quiver a little under me. The horse has a sensitive back and it takes him a minute to absorb the weight of a rider. I stare at his ears and talk to him softly, letting him do what he’s got to do to get ready.

As Sophie leads us onto the track and over to Juan and his pony horse, I feel Ruby at the rail, watching me. Ava used to turn up now and then to cheer me on if she was having a good day. But I can’t remember the last time Ava had a good day or even spoke to me coherently. And, to be honest, I don’t want to be thinking about Ava right now.

Muley loads into the gate without fussing but then spooks when the assistant starter climbs up into the stall. The colt rears and I almost get pitched off. I’ve barely got my feet back in the stirrups when the bell goes off and the gates open. Muley takes an awkward step and nearly falls to his knees. For a moment, I imagine the worst but the colt gamely recovers and lurches ahead. He’s a big colt but capable of using himself well and he’s got some speed. He accelerates powerfully and in a few strides has caught up to the last horse in the pack. I keep a hold on him because, surging as he is, he’s threatening to clip heels with the horse in front of him. I feel him fighting me. I click off the seconds in my head and calculate that the frontrunners are setting an honest pace and if I plan to really try to win this, I’ve got to catch up. Soon.

I steer Muley three horses wide to the outside of the pack and then let him loose a little. He passes two horses. We’re coming around the turn now and I try to keep him as close to the rail as possible without bumping into a gray colt running to our left.

“Careful, junior,” the gray’s jock, Richard Migliore, calls out to me.

I ignore him. Bad enough he’s calling me “junior” when I’m only five or six years younger than him, but I’m not even that close to his damn horse. I feel myself getting angry. Muley picks up on this and, probably thinking I’m mad at him, surges ahead again. By now we’re almost around the bend so I let my horse go. He passes one more colt. I ask him to switch leads, which he graciously does at once, catching up with the two frontrunners now. Luis Chavez is on the favorite, a little chestnut named Saint Maybe who has his nose in front of a long-shot bay. I see Chavez look over his shoulder, watching me and Muley coming up to Saint Maybe’s hind end. I hear Chavez chirp to his horse but nothing doing, Muley’s on a rampage and we go flying by the chestnut, fighting the bay for the lead. As the bay’s jock hisses at me to forget about it, our horses eye each other and Muley sticks his nose in front. The other colt fights right back. We’re about three jumps from the wire and there’s nothing between the two colts. I show Muley the whip and this pisses him off so much he surges one last time, getting a nostril in front of the other colt at the wire.

We’ve won.

I stand up in the irons and ask Muley to pull up but he’s still angry about my showing him the whip. He’s the kind of horse that knows his job and resents being reminded of it. Now he wants to teach me a lesson. I let him run another furlong before getting tough with him, pulling on him until at last he slows down. I turn him around and start slowly cantering back to the winner’s circle.

As Muley winds down to