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good a time as any to tell you about it.”

CHAPTER 3
    W hen Anastasia had said that horses scared her, Mac had thought she had the usual garden-variety fear based on a horse’s size and her lack of familiarity with their behavior. Oh, no. He’d signed on to help her with something much bigger. By rights she should see a therapist.
    But therapists weren’t thick on the ground in Bickford. Besides that, she didn’t have a lot of time to mess around with driving up to Amarillo or down to Lubbock for sessions. Filming, and the publicity that would go with it, began in three weeks.
    He hoped his help would be enough. All he could do was his best. So far, this drawing exercise seemed to be working okay. She’d finished one sketch of Jasper and had begun a second.
    â€œWhen I was six,” she began, “I’d seen several movies where the girl in the story rode bareback . . . somewhere. Either she was racing over the plains or galloping on the moors or leaping stone walls in Virginia. It looked so easy.”
    He wished he could have known that six-year-old. He would have been a worldly kid of thirteen, though, and might have thought she was a nuisance. Adolescent boys just discovering their sexuality tended to focus on cheerleaders and seminude movie stars.
    She leaned closer to her drawing and added some detail he couldn’t see from here. He wondered if she’d forgotten about telling him her story. Just as he was about to prompt her, she started up again.
    â€œGeorgie and my stepdad each had a horse but my mother wouldn’t let me ride.” She glanced up from her work, her expression puzzled. “I never thought of this before, but do you suppose
she’s
scared of horses?”
    â€œMaybe. You could ask her.”
    Anastasia shook her head, which made her glossy ponytail swing gently. “She’d never admit it to me.”
    â€œI’ll bet it wasn’t easy for you to admit it to me, either.”
    â€œNo, but I had to if I wanted to fix the problem, and better you than anyone else I could think of.” She met his gaze. “Horses are beautiful, you know.”
    â€œI do know.”
And so are you.
Her shirt had a lot of green in it, which made her eyes seem more green than brown. She had really long lashes, too. At times they added to her sex appeal, but today, maybe because they were talking about her childhood, they made her appear young and vulnerable.
    â€œI had a professor who told us we could never let fear stand in the way of our art. I’ve been doing that.”
    â€œBut your pictures of the Ghost are great. I don’t see how they could get any better.”
    She smiled. “Oh, they will. Even watching the video you took that one time can’t replace firsthand experience. Just looking at Jasper tells me that. My drawings of the Ghost might be technically good, but once I see him, they’ll be so much better. I’ll be able to capture his spirit.”
    He gazed at her in admiration. “I can’t wait to see the picture you draw after you’ve seen him.”
    â€œI can’t wait, either.” She smiled. “But don’t worry. I won’t steal a horse and ride off into the night by myself. I learned my lesson on that score.”
    â€œThat’s what you did?”
    â€œOf course! I’d seen those movies.”
    â€œSix years old, never been on a horse, and you thought you could ride bareback all by yourself.” But around the same age he’d jumped off the roof wearing a cape, so who was he to talk?
    â€œI was barefoot and only had on a nightgown. I was going to race on Prince, Georgie’s horse, through a moonlit meadow. For all I knew, fairies and elves would show up.”
    His heart ached for that little girl’s brave fantasy.
    â€œI got on him and he started off at a walk.”
    He waited, knowing the story had to get worse.
    Her hand moved quickly over the