Page 1 of Love Bound

Chapter One

Claire

I sit in the stiff sea grass on a giant slab of granite. A thick vein of rose quartz runs through the center of it and my knees are to my chest, my stomach in knots as I stare at the horse in the paddock. His head hangs low as if he’s trying to retch, belly extended, legs splayed out as he paces. All signs of colic, but it's not.

He was rescued from a burning barn. The owner—a skinny little man who reeked of cheap whiskey and his own shit—had doused the north perimeter with gasoline before he tossed the match. He made certain the animals he didn’t want to care for anymore were locked inside. Over a dozen scrawny laying hens, two cats, one parasite-infested pig, and two healthy lambs perished. The large, chocolate gelding screamed as flames raged. He bit through his tether and tore at the south-facing door with his hooves and teeth.

I'd had my morning swim already in the choppy capped bay, then picked up the call from George Johnson, Geo,—my sort-of adopted father—while peeling out of my wetsuit. Officially, he serves as our guardian, but I feel like his daughter. The fire chief’s son had the gelding trailered, and it was all he could do to not beat the crap out of skinny, wretched, Ernie Tolbert.

Would I take the horse?

Of course.

Would I take pictures and examine the charred remains of the other animals for the prosecution?

Of course.

In shock, exhausted, his right rump scorched with a six-inch ragged burn, the gelding walked slowly from trailer to paddock. Now, he refuses to eat or drink and slowly pads the perimeter in a circle—a sign of mental duress. And he needs to eat. His ribs spread painfully under his dull, brittle hair and the hollows above his eyes are sunken, darker even than his sooty coat.

My gaze shifts to the sea. It's a cold, gray, late afternoon in mid-September. On the coast of Maine, that means forty-degree nights and maybe sixty-degree days if we get lucky. I love the water. When little kids ask me what my favorite color is—and it's always little kids with sick dogs or kitties, bunny rabbits, or hamsters—I always smile and say, "Whatever color the sea is today."

There's a shout to my right, but the horse doesn’t flinch. Lobstermen are coming in with their catches, banding the lobsters their stern men missed. Echo Bay smells different in the early evenings after a good catch. Yes, saltwater and fog. Yes, pine and granite. But notes of boat petrol and the greeny brine of lobster also wafts. Now they're calling to one another, checking in—part of the late afternoon ritual.

Brighty, who should be retired, raises a hand in greeting.

I wave back.

He used to bounce me on his knee.

Now he walks along the little dirt trail in front of The Inn and passes it to get from the docks to where I sit.

The gelding blows hard and nickers as Brighty huffs up the hill. In this part of Maine, the roiling coastline is as irregular vertically as it is horizontally. Hills and cliffs buck up in one direction and jagged rocks jut into the sea in the other. The horse nickers again, but not to welcome this stranger to my rocky perch. The gelding's lungs are singed, and he tries to bring up phlegm. Pneumonia could be next.

Would I take him?

Of course.

"Hey, Docky," calls Brighty, a little out of breath, but loving his own name for me—a combination of ‘doc’ and ‘the docks.’ He fancies himself a punster. "Got yourself a new patient?"

I stand, the late afternoon sun's heat trapped under my windbreaker. "He's from Waldoboro. Did you hear about that barn burning? The one that was set?"

His face darkens. "What people do," he says, shoving his hands into his pockets.

"He's the only one who made it out." I shade my eyes against the afternoon sun.

"George bring him?"

"George and David."

"Sorry I missed 'em."

I know he means Geo, who lives in Portland now. He sees David, the fire chief's son, all the time at The Pines—the ill-aptly named diner perched on the town's bald, rocky cliff with no pines, maples, or birches in a three-hundred-yard radius. There are just sloppy wild roses growing along a sagging split rail fence.

Brighty's stern man yells something to him and Brighty waves him off. "He gonna make it?" he asks, looking at the horse.

"Don’t know," I say. "I can’t see into his lungs."

"You need that ultrasound gizmo thing, ay? Why do you take these cases?"