her robe, and left the bedroom.
'Rules,' Shane repeated, trying to figure out what his subconscious was trying to tell him. 'Everybody has rules.' He sat up in bed, his heart pounding because he knew this was important but didn't, for the life of him, know why.
He had spoken for ten minutes on the phone to the polo club guy. They didn't have rules; that was the point. The man had stated that all you needed was a horse and a team to play on. 'Rules,' he said again, as Alexa returned to the room.
'What?'
'Everybody has rules. You can't play without registering first.'
She turned off the light. 'Chooch is in his bedroom, conked.'
'Good.'
'What on earth are you talking about?'
'A dream,' he said. 'I was with Jody, watching a bunch of men playing polo, only they were hitting a baseball, and in my dream he said, 'You don't get to play unless you register,' that you can't play because there are rules…'
She looked at him. 'Okay, there are rules. How does that apply?'
'I don't know…' He looked at her and shook his head ruefully. 'Polo… Rules in polo. Of course, there're rules in polo. Shit.'
She smiled and kissed him then got back into bed. Shane hugged her, feeling her breath on his neck, the slow beating of her heart, and then, wrapped in her safe cocoon, he was quickly asleep.
He was back on the polo field. Only now he was petting a huge Arabian horse that poked his nose over the fence where Shane was standing. He knew, without asking, that the horse was Sir Anthony of Aquitaine. He was coal-black and eating a cube of sugar out of Shane's hand.
'I've never seen a horse as beautiful as you, ' he said in the dream.
The stallion snorted. His black coat was shining. 'I'd sure love to have a horse like you,' Shane said in wonder. 'If you ever have a colt… '
Shane suddenly woke up again, this time with a start. His heart was pounding, slamming in his chest. Shit, he thought as he lay in bed. What is this?
He got out of bed and quietly limped out of the room. Wearing only his Jockey shorts, he went down the hall, then out into the backyard, where he sat in one of the metal chairs and watched the quarter-moon ripple on the still water. His thigh had been bandaged with white medical wrap, but some of the stitches must have broken loose, because a dried bloodstain the size of a grapefruit had leaked through the gauze. He was going to have to get his wounded thigh redressed.
'Rules,' he said again softly, returning to his dream. 'Horses… Polo…' You can't ride
Why can't you ride? You can't own an Arabian horse without… Without what? Shit. He sat there turning it over in his mind. You have to register to ride… to play? Why do I want a damn horse, a colt? Why? I'd have to register. I'd…
He lunged out of the chair, headed into the house, turned on the lights in the bedroom, and put a hand on Alexa's shoulder.
She rolled over and glared at him. 'What are you doing?' she asked. 'Are you ever going to sleep?'
'Listen, if you ofrned an Arabian horse, wouldn't you have to list him with some kind of Thoroughbred registry?'
'I guess…'
'You do, you have to. There're rules about it. I think I read somewhere with all Thoroughbreds, you have to register them to protect the bloodlines and stud fees. Thoroughbred horses are registered at birth… When they're colts. There's some kinda Arabian horse registry.'
'So?'
'It'll have the address of the owner.'
'Unless his horse is registered to Blackstone Corporation in Switzerland, like everything else this guy owns.'
'Sir Anthony of Aquitaine?' Shane smiled. 'No fucking way. That horse is his status symbol. He might register his car or a house to the company, but this animal's a champion… It's in Papa Joe's name. Count on it. Jose is in the fucking horse registry, I'll bet you anything. It'll be somewhere on the Internet.'
She rolled out of bed and put on her robe. 'Let's get Chooch out of the sack. He's our best computer jock.'
It was so easy, it was almost ridiculous. The registry was called exactly what Shane had guessed: the Arabian Horse Registry. Sir Anthony of Aquitaine was in the stallion listings. Below that was a lot of stuff about his bloodline: out of this sire and that mare, going back six generations, but at the bottom was the owner's name and address, right there on the screen:
Jose Luis Mondragon
2457 Malibu Canyon Road
Malibu, California
Chapter 50
THEY CALLED TONY Filosiani from the Pacific Coast Highway, waking him up.
'Malibu?' he said after Alexa filled him in over her cell phone. 'You guys go in the county without Sheriff's Department jurisdiction and Messenger will throw one a'his Egyptian conniptions.'
'Then call him and get us some backup,' Alexa said.
'I'll try.'
Shane slowed down the Acura to make the turnoff from PCH onto Malibu Canyon Road. That two-lane highway climbed up into the coastal mountains, becoming a dark, treacherous, winding two-lane that widened periodically to include a center passing lane. The road snaked along a ridge above a deep river gorge, and they flashed by a sign that said they were leaving Ventura and passing back into L. A. County. Shane was slowing, looking for the address. There were very few intersecting roads on the two-lane highway and even fewer driveways. Shane had to be careful not to overdrive his headlights and shoot past 2457 Malibu Canyon Road.
Then he saw it.
The address was painted on a mailbox on the left-hand canyon side of the road. Shane braked hard, snapping his headlights off as he made the turn, heading slowly down the dirt drive into the canyon below. The driveway was rutted from a recent rain. It headed down, switching back and forth, into the narrow valley.
'Wait a minute,' Alexa said. 'Stop.'
Shane put on the brakes. 'What?'
'We can't go down there without Sheriff's backup,' she said.
'If Jody's down there, I want him.'
'You aren't thinking straight.'
'Is that any way to talk to your future husband?' he scowled theatrically. 'Gimme my ring back.'
'You're not man enough to take it, buster.' She hit him playfully on the shoulder with the back of her hand. 'If we wait, we get two things-we get backup, and we get jurisdiction.'
'I haven't had a shred of jurisdiction since I choppered outta that fuckin' hangar two weeks ago. And as far as backup goes, guess what?' She stared at him apprehensively. 'You're it.'
'Okay, but at least don't drive all the way down there. Let's find a hole in the bushes and park it.'
'Good suggestion. I've got enough Bondo in this sled already.'
They rolled slowly down the road, keeping the headlights off and the engine on, with Shane riding the brake.
Finally, they could see the roofs of some ranch buildings below, so Shane started looking for a place to stash
