Red Feather Filly by Terri Farley Page A

but you’re not allowed to get mad until I’m finished talking, okay?”
    Jake would never make a salesman, Sam decided.He started off telling her that he was going to make her mad.
    â€œOkay,” she said. “Just out of curiosity, I’ll wait to bite your head off.”
    â€œThanks.” Jake drew a deep breath. “The filly doesn’t need a good rider. She needs a good friend.”
    â€œAnd I’m going to be her friend?” Sam asked.
    â€œHush,” Jake said. “I’m not sure I’ve got it straight. Don’t interrupt a minute.”
    â€œDon’t interrupt, don’t get mad…” Sam listed, rolling her eyes, but then she closed her lips and waited.
    â€œMac thinks she might trust you. And if you trust me, it might be sort of like a character reference. Does that make sense?”
    â€œYeah. I used to think that if Ace could just talk to Blackie for me, he’d know it was okay to trust me, even though he’d been hurt by other people.”
    â€œRight,” Jake nodded vigorously. “So this is what I think. We start meeting every minute we have time between now and next Friday, to make a plan on how to catch her.”
    â€œNext Friday? Jake, we only have two weeks. We can’t throw away one of them.”
    â€œWe won’t. We’re going to plan. Think about it, Sam. Once we have her, we need to spend every waking moment—cancel that. Every moment, waking or sleeping, with her. You know, that’s how warriors did it. They let their war ponies sleep in their tents. And sheikhs in the desert? Their war mares slept intheir tents and their kids cuddled up and slept with them. Imagine, hundreds of pounds of potentially dangerous horse, and they let their little kids sleep by those hooves. It’s gotta be the way to win.”
    Sam nodded. Jake was probably right.
    â€œSo will you help me?” Jake asked.
    Help him. Sam turned the words over in her mind. That didn’t exactly mean ride with him, as his partner. How could she weasel it out of him?
    â€œOkay,” she said. “Until race day, I guess.”
    Jake looked as if he’d been kicked in the head. “Why—why just until race day?”
    â€œWell, you know, I’ll have to get my own stuff ready.”
    â€œYeah…,” Jake said. He stared at her as if she weren’t too bright. Then, all at once his expression changed to anger. “But you’re riding with me, right?”
    â€œRiding with you…?”
    â€œAs my partner,” he said in a forced calm, “in the race.”
    â€œWhat makes you so sure?” Sam asked.
    â€œAre you teasing, or what?”
    â€œNo, I’m just asking you, what makes you so sure I’ll be riding as your partner? Have we talked about it? Have you asked if I think Ace is up to it? Have you wondered for just a second if I made plans to ride with someone else?”
    It was quiet for a full minute.
    A flock of seagulls passed overhead, checked out the humans below, and prepared to land and seeif they’d dropped any food.
    â€œLike who?” Jake shouted suddenly, and the flock gave a few scattered cries, banked away from the shore and flew away.
    â€œLike anybody,” Sam yelled back. “Dad or Ryan or Pepper…”
    â€œRide with me, Sam,” Jake said, “and you won’t have idiot people—like me—thinking you’re a less-than-great rider. Especially your dad. I saw the way you flinched when Wyatt told you to be careful.”
    â€œOh, like you’ve gotten over my accident?”
    â€œI’m trying, but—”
    â€œBut, if I fell or something, would you decide the very day before the race that it was just too dangerous for poor little Samantha?”
    Ever since she’d come home, Jake had been protective of her. He still felt guilty over her accident years ago, because he’d been with her, because he’d