Taking Chances: Kayla's Chance

“Mik turn the damn truck around and take me back to the track,” I demanded.
“Not a chance. You need x-rays.”
“I already know my nose is broken. What can the doctor do that I can’t do? He’ll take x-rays, stick one of those stupid butterfly bandages on my nose, and tell me to take ibuprofen for the pain.”
“Better safe than sorry Kay,” Bo said. “You could have a concussion.”
“He dumped me on my ass, not my head.”
“Well personally I would be very disappointed if something happened to your ass.”
“Nothing is wrong with my ass. I’ve fallen on it enough to know if something was wrong. “
“You’re also probably running on adrenaline right now,” Mik said. “Something may start to hurt later.”
I opened my mouth to retaliate but Bo cut me off. “Stop arguing jockey girl. I’ll dray you into the hospital if I have to.”
“And I’ll help,” Mik seconded as we pulled up to the emergency room entrance.

Two hours later my mother dropped us back at the track. As I predicted, my nose was broken, I had a butterfly bandage, and ibuprofen for pain.
We heard Dingo before we saw him. The stall door was shut both top and bottom, and the colt was kicking for all he was worth. Mik was sitting on a tack trunk as far down the row as he could get with his fingers shoved into his ears.
“Where’s Dad?” I called over Dingo’s racket.
Mik looked up at me and took his fingers out of his ears. “What?”
“Where’s my father?” I raised my voice over to sound of hooves against wood.
“Talking with the stewards,” he called back.
“Why don’t we take this outside?” Bo called loudly.
We all latched onto the idea and exited the shedrow. Even outside, at the end of the row, we could still hear Dingo having his fit.
“Fill us in,” I demanded.
Mik ran a hand through his hair. “They took a urine sample and it tested positive for etorphine.”
“Morphine?” I asked.
“No etorphine,” Bo said. “Elephant juice. It’s a thousand times more powerful than morphine and used to tranquilize elephants but for some reason with horses, it acts as a mild stimulant.”
“Mild?” I demanded, gesturing towards the noisy shedrow.
“If he was give more than the recommended dose it could make him really sensitive to weight. Or anything really. Sounds, lights, crowds. With extensive use, it could alter his personality.”
“How the hell did it get into his system?” I demanded.
“I don’t’ know anything about etorphine,” Mik said. He looked at Bo. “Is it a powder or a liquid?”
“Liquid,” Bo said. “Most of the time it’s administered with a syringe but I can imagine that it could be put into his food if he would eat it.”
“Who fed this morning?” I asked.
We looked down the aisle at the stall we used as the office which also held the feed and tack. Without waiting for a response, I strode down the aisle to look at the cart; Bo and Mik on my heels.”
The six feed buckets were stacked and ready to be taken out for PM feeding. I flipped the chart back to this morning. There was a comment that had gone unnoticed: Supplement for Dingo? And signed: Jaime.
“It was in his food this morning,” I said quietly. “Jaime questioned it.”
I wasn’t uncommon for supplements and feed amounts to change daily so it wasn’t surprising that Jaime hadn’t said anything.
Mik took the chart and looked it over. “If it was in his food, anyone could have put it in, even someone from another barn.”
As we spoke, Bo was going through the buckets to search for Dingo’s. He retrieved it and sniffed it. He coughed. “Well it sure as hell doesn’t smell like grain.”
Mik took the bucket.
“Don’t sniff too deeply,” Bo cautioned.
“Well this makes us look guilty as hell,” Mik said. “It was in his feed; no one said anything or reported it. Damnit we have a clean record, we don’t need a spot on it!”
Just then my father joined us. No one had heard his approach due to Dingo’s continued abuse to the stall. He looked much older, his face was drawn and pale, his eyes downcast.
“What happened?” we all demanded.
My father took a moment to answer. “They’re doing a full-on investigation before they start pointing fingers. But they want Dingo gone and I’m banned until they sort this mess out.”
“Shit,” Bo said.
“I was lucky. They’re not charging me…yet. And I can still train at the other tracks…until they ban me there too. But Mik I expect some of your dad’s clients to pull their horses out of the barn when they hear about this.”
“Why would they? There isn’t any proof that you did anything wrong.”
Bo held up the bucket of feed. “I hate to burst your bubble.”
My father took the feed from Bo. “What’s wrong with it?”
“Sniff,” Bo said.
My father took a whiff and coughed like Bo had. “When did this get in here?” he demanded.
“Jaime made a note in the morning feed that there was something in his feed,” I said, showing him the chart.
He snatched the chart and read it over. “Jaime!” he bellowed.
“She can’t hear you over Dingo,” I said because the colt was still going all ten rounds with his stall.
“Somebody tell her to get in here,” he snarled, then took out his own cell phone. He dialed a number and started talking. It was hard to make out his words over Dingo and all I caught was “found”.
I pulled out my phone and texted Jaime that my father wanted to see her pronto.
My father talked on the phone for a good five minuets in which time I got a response from Jaime that she was on her way. As soon as he hung up and put the phone back in his holder, Jaime appeared at the doorway.
“Why the hell didn’t you say something about this?” my father demanded, indicating the bucket.
Jaime’s expression was blank for a moment. Then she seemed to understand. “Isn’t it a tranquilizer? I thought we were trying to calm him down. He was getting them every couple of days when he started acting up. I thought it was kind of odd so I wrote it down.”
“You know damn well we don’t trank the horses, especially before a race!” my father snapped.
“Well it’s not like I put it in there,” Jaime defended herself. “The PM feeder put it in.”
“Who was that?” my father said, looking back at the chart. His eyes snapped back up and looked directly at Bo.
“Yeah I fed last night,” Bo said. “But id didn’t put anything in Dingo’s food. There wasn’t a not to put anything in it, and there wasn’t anything in it.
“Anyone could have put it in,” I said, coming to Bo’s defense. “The food was sitting out here all night. If whoever was on night shift went to the bathroom or to make rounds, someone could have slipped in, put something in his food, and left.
“Well I just got of the phone with the stewards,” my father announced.
“What?” Jaime demanded. “Now we’ll all be questioned.”
“They’re investigating before they point fingers. I don’t want a mark on anybody’s record. So if answering a couple of questions is what it’ll take to get to the bottom of this, then so be it,” my father said.
The stewards spent the next two hours questioning everyone on Stopwatch’s payroll. They asked questions about Dingo’s behavior before and I after I got on him, his past workouts, and the list went on. They spent the most time with me, my father, Jaime and Bo.
“Well I’m the top suspect,” Bo announced as we drove back to the hotel.
“Why do you say that?” I asked from the back seat.
He turned around to face me and counted the reasons off on his fingers. “I was running from social services as a minor, I’ve worked for stables with drug violations, and I fed last night. The etorphine was barely wet this morning so it would have had to be put in last night.”
“They don’t have any proof,” I said.
“Guilty by suspicion. And they certainly have that.”
“This is a lovely atmosphere to introduce myself as a major player in the industry,” Mik muttered.
“Well at least they’ll remember your name,” I tried to lighten the atmosphere.
“And it’ll get worse before it gets better,” Bo warned.