She leaned across the table toward Richard, a slight wave of vertigo putting a sharp edge on her anger. “Would you like to know about the horse who burned to death at my place?” she asked him.
The table fell totally quiet. Billie heard voices from other tables, laughter, calls for the waiter. But their table was hushed. She watched Richard register what she had said. His eyes flicked side to side, as if checking for ways out. She felt a regrettable pang of attraction to his stocky body, curly hair, a tug of sympathy and recognition that he felt trapped because he wanted her.
“Okay, tell me,” he said, wary, resigned, unsure why she had focused on him.
Well, Billie thought, he’s going to find out.
Images from her Google search rose before her. Images of Hope in her stall the night Billie first saw her, images from the show.
“Billie,” Josie laid a warning hand on her forearm.
Billie pulled away, balled her hand into a fist. “She was a walking horse filly,” she said to Richard. “Just a baby. A yearling. I got her at your show.”
“I don’t have a show,” he sounded defensive to her, relieved.
“The walking horse show,” she clarified. “Last weekend. At the showgrounds. That show that you were at.” She was aware that her grammar was flawed and her s’s sounded extra sibilant.
“Okay? So?”
“Okay?” she asked. “‘Okay’? You know what that means.”
“I’m sure I don’t.” His voice was low, clear, and angry.
“You’re a liar,” she said.
“And you’re drunk.”
Billie considered this and decided he was probably right. She was drunk. But not drunk enough. She was still seeing Hope’s burned body. She was still thirsty. She grabbed Josie’s glass and drained it.
“Hey!”
“Sorry, Josie. Thought it was mine. I’ll buy you another.”
Sam leaned across his wife. “Billie you’ve had a horrible day. We’re all sympathetic. How about calling it quits while we’re still friends? Josie and I’ll drive you home.”
Billie liked the way Josie’s wine had her feeling, like Peter Pan flying over London. She wasn’t ready to leave DT’s. DT himself stood with a couple of beer mugs in his hands, looking at her. Billie noticed that her vision was extra sharp. She saw everything.
“You are part of that world,” she told Richard.
“Excuse me?” he asked.
“The world of gaited horses that go to shows,” she explained. “Like that little filly. Just a baby! You know what?” She stood up to draw attention to herself then realized she already had everyone’s attention. The whole big room was thick with listening.
A few years ago, she’d gone to a boxing match with Frank, when they were still married. He was doing a feature on the featherweight champion, a fine-boned muscly man with freckled skin who was pretty enough to model for GQ and bright and outspoken enough to be interviewed for Frankly. “The Allure of Blood Sports” was the title Frank had planned for the piece. It never ran; Billie forgot why. Maybe the guy had lost a fight, got his aquiline nose smashed, or maybe something else had happened. Whatever. Standing up in DT’s, she remembered that she loved the feel of ringside, the flecks of sweat, the thuds of gloves on flesh, the deep grunts. She loved the way men looked at each other before attacking. She loved the way she felt before she fought.
“You,” she pointed at Richard, “are part of that whole world that tortures horses. I’ve been reading up on it. Burning their legs with acid and wrapping them in chains!” She was playing to the room. She spoke loudly so everyone would hear her and was pleased at the gasp that followed her accusation.
Josie buried her face in her hands. Billie ignored her.
“Here now, Billie,” Sam handed her a big glass of something. “Try this.”
Billie drank, not liking the taste. Maybe it was gin, which she didn’t like, but hey, it was still a drink. Richard stood up, said something to Sam, and walked away.
CHAPTER 11
BILLIE WOKE AT home with a don’t-lift-your-head-if-you-want-to-live hangover that brought with it a huge thirst, nausea, and a sticky shroud of guilt.
She lay on her stomach on the futon and tried to reconstruct what had happened between then and now. She couldn’t come up with much. Who had she insulted? How had she gotten home? Where was her truck? If it was here, at home, had she driven it, and if she had driven it, had she hit anything or anyone?
She licked her cracked, parched lips. She could tell that her breath stank.
Where was Gulliver? She sat up fast, saw him watching her from the end of the futon, and quickly lay down again to wait for the room to stop whirling.
When she was able to open her eyes again, she saw the light on the answering machine blinking. Then her cell phone beeped to tell her she had a message. Hashtag’s owner, Kristine. “Heard you had a fire out there! Call me!”
Gulliver, now tucked up under her arm, licked her chin.
Billie decided that she probably hadn’t killed anyone or she would have woken up in jail, not on her scruffy futon with her dog beside her and her head dividing into wedges. The one time she was jailed, she’d been arrested for assault. Frank sent her to a loft in Tribeca to interview a family accused of molesting their foster children. She went to use the bathroom and mistakenly entered a bedroom where the foster mother was in bed with one of the kids. Billie lost it. The foster father called the cops. The cops called Frank, who bailed her out and got the charges dropped.
She’d written a good article.
She drifted away again.
She heard people talking nearby. She wanted them to be quiet, so she ignored them. Someone said her name. She tried to ignore them some more. But they were
