Diamond Spirit by Karen Wood Read Free Book Online Page B

Chelpie’s lead rope from Grace and tugged. ‘Come on, Chelpie.’
    Grace pulled a face at Katrina’s back. ‘Poo-magnet!’ Then she walked back to Biyanga’s stable. ‘Are you all right, Jess?’
    Jessica opened the stable door, leaning on it to keep her balance as she swung it back and bolted it shut. ‘Yeah, I’m okay,’ she said flatly. Her whole head throbbed. ‘I might go and sit down for a bit.’ She felt angry at herself for being such a sook. She didn’t want to see the foals anymore. She just wanted to go home.
    Every time she went go near a horse these days, she was a total disaster. What was she thinking, coming over here with a bunch of people she didn’t know?
    She pulled out her phone and switched it back on.
    Mum, can u pick me up?
    Before Jess could switch it off again, the phone rumbled in her hand.
    She glared at it for a moment, then pressed the view button.
    Shara: yes, but I can explain, pleeease, we have to talk!!
    Jess’s first instinct was to smash the phone on the concrete floor. Instead, she sank to the ground and sobbed.

9
    ON SUNDAY MORNING, Jess rolled over in bed and stared at the clock. It was six o’clock. She’d had a weird dream that three bright lights were chasing her through a paddock, calling her name.
    The sound of hooves clattered beneath her window.
    Shara?
    Since yesterday’s text message, Jess had blocked her – from her phone, from email, from Facebook, and any other possible place she could think of.
    If she thinks I’m going to talk to her, she’s wrong.
    She pulled herself up onto her knees and peeked out through the curtains. At the bottom of the verandah steps, Grace sat on a brown horse, looking like a turtle with her neck craned forward and an overstuffed pack on her back. Jess tossed off her doona and shuffled to the front door, squinting in the sunlight.
    Grace motioned for her to come outside. ‘Your hair has gone crazy,’ she noted as Jess reached the bottom step.
    ‘Well, I’m still half asleep,’ Jess grumbled. ‘Do you always get up this early?’
    ‘Harry’s registering the foals today,’ Grace replied.
    ‘I guess that’s a yes.’
    ‘He lets Rosie and me help to name them. And we found that mare that went missing down on the river flats. She had her foal and it’s an Appaloosa!’ she said excitedly.
    ‘What mare that went missing?’
    Grace lowered her voice and said in a dramatic voice, ‘The foal looks a bit like Diamond!’
    Jess immediately woke up. ‘Wait for me.’ She ran back up the stairs and rummaged through the knee-deep squalor that was her bedroom. ‘Joddies, joddies, where are my joddies?’
    Hastily dressed, she crept into her parents’ room and whispered to her snoring father. ‘Dad!’
    ‘What is it, honey?’ asked Caroline from the other side of the bed.
    ‘Can I go with Grace Arnold to look at the foals again? There’s one that looks like Diamond!’
    ‘At this hour of the morning?’ said Caroline.
    Craig opened his eyes. ‘Where exactly are you going?’
    ‘To Harry’s place, to look at the foals. I went there yesterday, remember? There’s a new one that looks like Diamond.’
    Craig sat up. ‘Who’s Harry?’
    ‘He’s Grace and Rose’s uncle.’
    ‘Harry who? What’s his last name?’
    Caroline saved her. ‘They’re nice girls, Craig. We know them from pony club. Go on, Jess. But have some breakfast before you go.’
    Jess flew out the door before her father could object.

    When they arrived at Harry’s, Rosie, Tom and Luke were sitting on bales of hay on the back of a ute. Rosie waved enthusiastically. ‘Hurry up,’ she called. ‘We’re about to go!’
    Jess dumped her bike and ran to the ute. She climbed up next to Rosie, slipped on a loose biscuit of hay and somehow landed in Luke’s lap. ‘Oh, sorry!’
    Luke grinned but said nothing while she tried to climb off him.
    Harry hobbled down from the house with a clipboard and pen. He saw Jess clambering off Luke and gave her a