Gargantuan_ A Ruby Murphy Mystery - Maggie Estep [71]
“Ava?” I called out.
She said nothing and I started wondering if I was hallucinating.
“Don’t worry, Ben,” she said eventually.
“Worry about what, Ava?”
“Nothing is wrong,” she said, which I didn’t understand one bit. I hadn’t asked her if anything was wrong.
“I’m a little sleepless,” she added, taking a few steps toward me.
“Oh yeah?” I said, sitting up and bunching the blankets around me.
Ava came and sat at the other end of the couch. I didn’t say anything. Neither did she. She just sat there staring down at her bare feet as if they surprised her.
“Can we talk?” she said after a few moments.
“Sure,” I said, though in truth that was about the last thing I wanted. “Talking” consisted of Ava complaining about the world—and my listening. I’d mentioned Darwin to her a few times but she’d never seemed very interested. She preferred to rail on about her estranged jockey husband or the indignities of the job market—even though I’d never seen her actively look for work.
“How you doin’?” Ava asked me as if we’d just bumped into each other on the street.
“I’m doing fine, I guess,” I said, trying not to act like I thought she was a total lunatic.
“You’re comfortable here?”
“Sure,” I said. “I appreciate your hospitality.” We’d come to an arrangement. I was giving her seventy-five dollars a week for couch privileges. I would have preferred to sleep in a stall in the barn, but Carla wouldn’t allow it. So I’d agreed to rent Ava’s couch. She needed the money, I needed a place to shower and sleep.
“You’re a man that was made to take care of things,” Ava said then, out of the blue.
I squinted at her in the darkness.
“You’re destined to look out for powerless animals,” she continued. “It’s good you’re working at the track like this. Some people don’t treat their horses so good, you know.”
“Yeah?” I said.
“Sure, those big-shot trainers, most of ’em got enough money they can afford to go easy on a horse when something’s bothering it. And most of the working-class humps are in it ’cause they love horses and they wouldn’t do anything to hurt their charges. But there’s a nefarious element, you know. People that go running sore horses when they know damn well they’re about to break down.”
“Yeah. I know that,” I said, wishing she wasn’t talking about it and wondering why she was. The nefarious element as she called it was something I’d picked up on as soon as I’d set foot on the grounds back at Laurel Park. I knew there was some not-so-nice stuff going on, but I’d managed to steer clear of anything like that. Nancy Cooley had been a good lady who gave a shit about her horses, and my current employer, Carla Friedman, is well intended too. If she ever ran a sore horse, it would be because she didn’t know any better.
“It bothers me,” Ava said then.
“Can’t say I like it any either,” I told her. I was beginning to feel a little nervous, wondering why she was bringing this up, wondering if somehow she knew about what had happened back in Oklahoma.
“You’ve probably seen my husband by now. Attila Johnson? He’s an apprentice?”
“I’ve seen him around, yeah,” I agreed.
“You know why I’m not with him anymore?”
“No idea,” I said, praying she wasn’t about to spout out intimate details I didn’t want to hear.
“Well, technically we are still married. But not for long. That man did some bad things to some nice horses.”
I frowned and felt my blood stir. I was sure I didn’t want to hear this.
“Held some horses back in races. Now I hear it’s getting worse.”
“What do you mean?” I asked in a whisper.
“I mean I hear he’s maybe going to start doing worse than hold them back. Help some find their way into accidents. Fatal accidents.”
“How’s a rider gonna do that?”
“Oh, you’d be surprised,” Ava said.
“Why are you telling me this?” I asked her. At which point she’d just shrugged, gotten up, wished me