SOUNDS REVERBERATED all around. Hor

SOUNDS REVERBERATED all around. Horses whickered and kicked out at their wooden stalls, impatient for their morning flakes of hay and rations of grain. Wheelbarrows landed with a heavy thud as they were set down upon the concrete flooring. The voices of the grooms talking while they worked their way down the rows of spacious box stalls accompanied the rhythmical scrape and clatter of grain being scooped out of the barrows and poured into rubber feed buckets. The noises of the barn at this hour—or at any time—were as familiar to Travis as the sound of his own breathing. This morning, however, they might as well have been miles away, for inside the barn’s office a tense silence reigned.
Travis stared in disbelief at the man sitting behind the scarred oak desk. For the past fourteen years, RJ Radcliffe had been mentor, friend, and father figure all rolled into one. Also his boss … only now his ex-boss if he’d heard correctly.
“What the hell are you saying, RJ? Have you lost your friggin’ mind?”
RJ’s tanned face grew mottled. “I think I made myself damned clear. And no, I haven’t lost my mind—I’ve only been a damned fool. But no longer. I’ve wised up. Here.” With short, angry tugs he ripped a check from the checkbook reserved for Rosewood Farm’s payroll and thrust it at Travis with a shaking hand. “Here’s this month’s salary, plus two weeks’ severance. I want you gone from Rosewood by five o’clock today.”
Travis made no move to take the money. Instead he looked at RJ’s hand gripping the check and thought of how much this man had given him. Knowledge. The kind of knowledge a teenage punk growing up on the wrong side of town could never have gained on his own. A sense of belonging. Rosewood Farm meant more to Travis than any other place on earth. Hope. Learning to ride and train Rosewood’s horses, some of the finest in Virginia, had allowed him to escape his sordid, sorry origins. RJ had offered him the chance to be known as something other than the good-for-nothing son of the town drunk.
In exchange, Travis had given RJ his unswerving loyalty and gratitude. Even when he’d hungered for the forbidden, he had forced himself to remember how much he owed RJ.
“Go on, take it.” The rough command broke into his thoughts. “Take this and get the hell out of here.” RJ was shaking with anger, and the paper check rattled in his grip.
Travis’s jaw clamped tightly in frustration. “I don’t want your damned money,” he ground out. “What I want is to know why you’re firing me.”
‘“Cause I know everything, you son of a bitch. You’re lucky I haven’t come after you with a shotgun.”
For an awful second Travis wondered if RJ had somehow learned about that long ago night. But no, that was impossible. He’d never breathed a word of it to anyone, and she—hell, she was gone, caught up in her glitzy world of parties and millionaire playboys. He’d seen the glossy magazine photos of her with a different guy in every shot. She looked as maddeningly beautiful as ever. Beautiful and distant.
Ruthlessly pushing aside thoughts of her, he laid his palms flat on the desk. “What are you talking about, RJ?” he growled. “You could be speaking Chinese and making more sense.”
“I’m talking about my wife, you shifty whoreson. I’ve had my suspicions for months. But I kept telling myself that I could trust you. That you wouldn’t stoop so low. Instead you played me for a fool.” He tossed the check so it landed by Travis’s hand and then grabbed a bright pink leather journal and shook it accusingly. “See this? It’s Nicole’s diary. I found it last night. It’s all here, all her secret meetings with TM. TM,” he spat, “as in Travis Maher—took me three seconds to figure who the son of a bitch was who was cuckolding me.”
Travis felt like he’d been sucker-punched. Outraged, he exploded, “Jesus, RJ, you don’t really believe I’d—”
“Go on, deny it, damn you! Look me in the face and deny that you’ve been sleeping with her! Go on! It’ll give me an excuse to tear you apart limb from limb.” Surging to his feet, he stood, chest heaving, his blue eyes lit with fury and pain.
Damn Nicole. It didn’t matter that there were probably a couple of dozen men in Loudon County besides him who had the initials TM, more than half of them happy to take whatever she offered. It didn’t matter that the idea of making love to Nicole Radcliffe was about as appealing as making love to a snake—and probably comparable. The damage was done. RJ ruled Rosewood like a feudal lord, meting out justice as he saw fit and brooking no opposition.
Travis straightened to his full height. His voice was flat and hard when he spoke. “You’re wrong, RJ. Maybe someday you’ll find out just how wrong.” Without another word he turned, strode to the door, and yanked it open.
The slamming of the door startled the hands that were mucking out the stalls. Felix, who was nearest to him, hurriedly set his pitchfork against the stall door. “Everything okay with you and the boss?”
Travis’s gaze swept up the row of stalls, where the horses he trained were munching their hay contentedly. He looked at the faces of the men who’d stopped their morning’s work out of concern for him. Damn it, these were his friends. This was his life.…
“No kidding, man, what went down with RJ?” Tito asked.
Too choked with emotion to answer, Travis gave a quick shake of his head and made for the tack room. Bypassing the bridles and leather girths hanging neatly from their hooks, he grabbed his suede chaps off the wooden peg and slung them over his shoulder. Then he crossed the room that carried the unique scent of leather and saddle soap and the undimmed memory of a beautiful, reckless young girl standing nearly naked before him and grabbed his saddle off the rack with a vicious curse. From behind came the scratchy sound of footsteps. He glanced over his shoulder and shame churned in his gut. Would Ned believe RJ’s accusation?
“Hey, Travis,” he said by way of greeting. Pushing the brim of his battered straw fedora up his forehead, he fixed Travis with his canny eyes. Ned had practically grown up on Rosewood Farm. A horseman of the old school, he possessed the kind of deep knowledge that comes from a lifetime of looking at and listening to horses. He knew a thing or two about the man they both worked for, too. “So what was all that hollerin’ about?” he asked. “I could hear RJ practically all the way from the south pasture.”
“He found Nicole’s diary,” Travis answered. “Read it, too. According to him, I’m her lover.”
Ned let loose a string of curses before lifting the paper cup in his hand and spitting a brown jet of tobacco juice into it. “That woman is pure, one-hundred-proof trouble. And RJ’s a dang idiot where she’s concerned. Did you set him straight?”
“No point.” Travis flipped open the lid of his tack box and grabbed his saddlebag. With the saddle propped against his hip, he slipped the cover over the well-oiled leather and zipped it shut. Setting the saddle down beside the tack box, he straightened. “RJ’s fired me. Looks like you got your old job back.”
Ned’s weathered face went slack with shock. For a second Travis thought the wad of chaw wedged against his lower lip might splat on the floor, but then his friend’s mouth began working—double time.
“What the hell! I don’t want my old job back! I’m so damned long in the tooth, I should be put out to pasture. Problem is, I ain’t got no use for TV and I can’t abide bingo. What in blue blazes is he thinking? Has he forgotten we’re showing at Culpeper—tell me who’s going to ride Harvest Moon if you’re not around?”
“Afraid that’s not my problem, Ned. I’ve got a few of my own—like finding a new job.”
“Now, wait just a minute, son. I’m going to go in there and give RJ a piece of my mind—”
“Don’t bother. You know RJ. No point in us both getting sacked.” Dropping his folded chaps into the tack box, Travis shut the lid and glanced around the tack room. The ache in his gut intensified. Beside him Ned was shaking his head in disgust and muttering into his cup of tobacco spit about blind fools. Abruptly he raised his head. “You should call Hugh Hartmann.”
“Hugh Hartmann? Down in Richmond?”
“Yeah. He’s got a nice place with at least thirty boarders. A lot of money walks into his barn looking to buy hunter or jumper prospects.”
Travis considered for a moment. Richmond. That was far enough away for him to forget the name Radcliffe. Perhaps even far enough away to stop thinking of her. Maybe.
He gave a short nod. “Thanks, Ned.”
A half hour later, the back of Travis’s SUV was loaded with all his worldly possessions: his tack box, saddle, two duffel bags of clothes, and a toaster oven. He slid behind the steering wheel and turned the key in the ignition. The SUV’s engine roared to life. But his foot remained heavy on the brake while his gaze swept over the barns and the seemingly endless line of fenced pastures.
Rosewood’s broodmares were already out and grazing in the late-summer sun. In an adjacent pasture, yearlings cavorted, racing one another, bucking, nipping, and squealing their high spirits. God, they were beautiful. He had helped foal a number of them, had worked with all of them.
Bitter regret added to the ache inside him.
Damn it all, just a few months back he and RJ had been talking about buying a new stud for Rosewood. There’d been so many things he’d wanted to do, so many plans for improving the stock, and now it was over. He slammed the heel of his hand against the steering wheel. Christ, hadn’t he always known deep down that he would lose his job at Rosewood, that he would lose everything he’d worked for, because of a Radcliffe woman?
Only trouble was, RJ had guessed wrong.
The corner of Travis’s mouth lifted as he imagined what RJ would have done if he’d leaned over the desk and told him just how far off the mark he was.

Hasil (Bahasa Indonesia) 1:

SUARA bergema di seluruh. Kuda whickered dan menendang keluar di kios-kios kayu mereka, tidak sabar untuk mereka pagi serpih jerami dan ransum gandum. Gerobak mendarat dengan suara keras berat karena semuanya ditetapkan berdasarkan lantai beton. Suara pria bicara sementara mereka bekerja mereka jalan ke deretan kios-kios kotak yang luas disertai mengikis berirama dan berisik biji-bijian menjadi meraup keluar dari barrows dan dituangkan ke dalam karet feed ember. Suara-suara dari gudang jam ini — atau setiap saat — yang begitu akrab untuk Travis sebagai suara nafasnya sendiri. Pagi ini, namun, mereka mungkin juga telah mil jauhnya, untuk di dalam gudang yang kantor keheningan yang tegang memerintah.Travis menatap percaya pada pria yang duduk di belakang meja kayu ek bekas luka. Selama empat belas tahun, RJ Radcliffe telah mentor, teman, dan figur ayah semua digulung menjadi satu. Juga dengan boss... hanya sekarang bosnya mantan kalau ia sudah mendengar dengan benar."Apa sih yang Anda katakan, RJ? Apakah Anda kehilangan pikiran Anda friggin '?"RJ kecokelatan wajah tumbuh berbintik-bintik. "Saya pikir aku membuat diriku jelas terkutuk. Dan tidak, aku belum kehilangan pikiran saya-aku hanya sudah bodoh terkutuk. Tetapi tidak lagi. Saya telah wised. Disini." Dengan tarikan pendek, marah Dia merobek sebuah cek dari buku cek yang diperuntukkan bagi Rosewood Farm payroll dan dorongan di Travis dengan tangan gemetar. "Di sini adalah gaji bulan ini, ditambah dua minggu pesangon. Aku ingin kau pergi dari Rosewood oleh lima o'clock hari."Travis membuat tidak bergerak untuk mengambil uang. Sebaliknya ia memandang RJ tangan menggenggam cek dan berpikir berapa banyak orang ini telah diberikan kepadanya. Pengetahuan. Jenis pengetahuan remaja punk tumbuh di sisi yang salah dari kota dapat pernah memperoleh sendiri. Sense of belonging. Rosewood Farm dimaksudkan lebih untuk Travis daripada tempat lain di bumi. Harapan. Belajar untuk naik dan melatih kuda Rosewood's, beberapa terbaik di Virginia, telah memungkinkan dia untuk melarikan diri keasalannya mesum, maaf. RJ telah menawarkan kepadanya kesempatan untuk dikenal sebagai sesuatu yang lain anak membuat kota mabuk.Dalam pertukaran, Travis telah memberikan RJ nya teguh loyalitas dan rasa bersyukur. Bahkan ketika ia telah hungered untuk yang diharamkan, ia telah memaksa dirinya untuk mengingat berapa banyak dia berhutang RJ."Ayo, ambil." Perintah kasar masuk ke pikiran. "Ambil ini dan mendapatkan neraka keluar dari sini." RJ gemetar dengan amarah, dan cek kertas bergetar di pegangan.Travis rahang menutup erat dengan frustrasi. "Saya tidak ingin uang Anda terkutuk," ia tanah. "Apa yang saya inginkan adalah untuk mengetahui mengapa Anda sedang menembak saya."' "Karena saya tahu segalanya, Anda bajingan. Anda beruntung saya tidak datang setelah Anda dengan senapan."Untuk mengerikan kedua Travis bertanya-tanya jika RJ entah bagaimana telah Pelajari tentang yang lama malam. Tapi tidak, itu tidak mungkin. Ia tidak pernah punya menghirup Firman itu kepada siapa pun, dan dia-neraka, dia sudah pergi, terperangkap dalam dunianya gemerlap pihak dan Playboy jutawan. Dia telah melihat majalah foto-foto dirinya dengan seorang pria yang berbeda di setiap tembakan. Dia tampak seperti menjengkelkan indah seperti biasa. Indah dan jauh.Kejam mendorong samping pikiran nya, ia meletakkan palms nya datar di atas meja. "Apa yang Anda bicarakan, RJ?" Dia berkata sambil menggeram. "Anda dapat berbicara Cina dan membuat lebih masuk akal.""Saya berbicara tentang istri saya, whoreson licik Anda. Aku punya kecurigaan saya selama berbulan-bulan. Tapi aku terus mengatakan pada diriku sendiri bahwa aku bisa percaya Anda. Bahwa Anda tidak akan membungkuk begitu rendah. Sebaliknya Anda bermain saya bodoh." Dia melemparkan cek sehingga mendarat dengan tangan Travis dan kemudian meraih jurnal kulit merah muda yang cerah dan menggelengkan itu telunjuknya. "Lihat ini? Ini adalah buku harian Nicole. Aku menemukannya tadi malam. Itu semua di sini, Semua pertemuan rahasia nya dengan TM. TM,"dia meludah," seperti Travis Maher — membawaku tiga detik untuk mencari yang bajingan yang adalah cuckolding saya. "Travis merasa seperti dia telah menekan pengisap. Marah, dia meledak, "Yesus, RJ, Anda benar-benar tidak percaya saya akan —""Ayo, menyangkal, sialan Anda! Melihat saya di wajah dan menyangkal bahwa Anda telah tidur dengan dia! Teruskan! Ini akan memberi saya alasan untuk merobek terpisah ekstremitas dari ekstremitas." Bergelombang kakinya, ia berdiri, terengah-engah, matanya biru yang diterangi dengan kemarahan dan nyeri dada.Sialan Nicole. Tidak peduli bahwa ada mungkin beberapa lusin orang di Loudon County selain dia yang telah inisial TM, lebih dari setengah dari mereka senang untuk mengambil apa pun yang ia ditawarkan. Tidak peduli bahwa gagasan untuk membuat senang Nicole Radcliffe adalah tentang sebagai menarik seperti bercinta ular — dan mungkin sebanding. Kerusakan dilakukan. RJ memutuskan Rosewood seperti Tuhan feodal, menjatuhkan keadilan sebagai dia melihat cocok dan brooking ada oposisi.Travis diluruskan ke ketinggian penuh. Suaranya datar dan sulit ketika dia berbicara. "Anda salah, RJ. Mungkin suatu hari nanti Anda akan menemukan hanya bagaimana salah." Tanpa kata lain dia berbalik, berjalan ke pintu, dan membukanya.Membanting pintu kaget tangan yang sedang penyia-waktu keluar kios-kios. Felix, yang terdekat dengan dia, buru-buru menentang pitchfork Nya pintu kios. "Semua baik-baik saja dengan Anda dan bos?"Travis pandangan menyapu deretan kios-kios, dimana kuda-kuda yang ia terlatih yang mengunyah hay mereka puas. Dia tampak di wajah orang-orang yang telah berhenti pagi mereka kerja dari keprihatinan bagi dirinya. Sialan, ini adalah teman-temannya. Ini adalah hidupnya..."Tidak bercanda, manusia, apa turun dengan RJ?" Tito bertanya.Terlalu tersedak dengan emosi untuk menjawab, Travis memberikan kocok cepat kepalanya dan dibuat untuk kamar taktik. Melewati kekang dan kulit girths rapi tergantung dari kait mereka, Dia menyambar nya suede chaps off pasak kayu dan mereka tersandang di bahu. Kemudian ia menyeberangi ruangan yang membawa aroma unik kulit dan sabun pelana dan memori undimmed indah, sembrono gadis muda berdiri hampir telanjang sebelum dia dan meraih pelananya dari rak dengan kutukan setan. Dari belakang datang suara gatal jejak. Dia melirik ke atas bahu-nya dan malu bergejolak di usus nya. Ned percaya RJ tuduhan?"Hei, Travis," ujarnya melalui pesan pembuka. Mendorong penuh nya Fedora jerami babak belur up dahinya, ia tetap Travis dengan matanya canny. Ned praktis telah tumbuh di Rosewood peternakan. Seorang penunggang kuda sekolah tua, ia memiliki jenis pengetahuan yang mendalam yang berasal dari seumur hidup melihat dan mendengarkan kuda. Dia tahu satu atau dua hal tentang pria mereka berdua bekerja, juga. "Jadi apa adalah semua yang hollerin' tentang?" tanyanya. "Aku bisa mendengar RJ hampir sepanjang perjalanan dari padang rumput Selatan.""Dia menemukan Nicole diary," jawab Travis. "Membaca itu, juga. Menurut dia, aku kekasihnya."Ned melepaskan serangkaian kutukan sebelum mengangkat gelas kertas di tangan-Nya dan meludah jet coklat tembakau jus ke dalamnya. "Wanita itu adalah murni, seratus-bukti kesulitan. Dan RJ seorang idiot dang yang mana dia prihatin. Apakah Anda mengatur dia lurus?"“No point.” Travis flipped open the lid of his tack box and grabbed his saddlebag. With the saddle propped against his hip, he slipped the cover over the well-oiled leather and zipped it shut. Setting the saddle down beside the tack box, he straightened. “RJ’s fired me. Looks like you got your old job back.”Ned’s weathered face went slack with shock. For a second Travis thought the wad of chaw wedged against his lower lip might splat on the floor, but then his friend’s mouth began working—double time.“What the hell! I don’t want my old job back! I’m so damned long in the tooth, I should be put out to pasture. Problem is, I ain’t got no use for TV and I can’t abide bingo. What in blue blazes is he thinking? Has he forgotten we’re showing at Culpeper—tell me who’s going to ride Harvest Moon if you’re not around?”“Afraid that’s not my problem, Ned. I’ve got a few of my own—like finding a new job.”“Now, wait just a minute, son. I’m going to go in there and give RJ a piece of my mind—”“Don’t bother. You know RJ. No point in us both getting sacked.” Dropping his folded chaps into the tack box, Travis shut the lid and glanced around the tack room. The ache in his gut intensified. Beside him Ned was shaking his head in disgust and muttering into his cup of tobacco spit about blind fools. Abruptly he raised his head. “You should call Hugh Hartmann.”“Hugh Hartmann? Down in Richmond?”“Yeah. He’s got a nice place with at least thirty boarders. A lot of money walks into his barn looking to buy hunter or jumper prospects.”Travis considered for a moment. Richmond. That was far enough away for him to forget the name Radcliffe. Perhaps even far enough away to stop thinking of her. Maybe.He gave a short nod. “Thanks, Ned.”A half hour later, the back of Travis’s SUV was loaded with all his worldly possessions: his tack box, saddle, two duffel bags of clothes, and a toaster oven. He slid behind the steering wheel and turned the key in the ignition. The SUV’s engine roared to life. But his foot remained heavy on the brake while his gaze swept over the barns and the seemingly endless line of fenced pastures.Rosewood’s broodmares were already out and grazing in the late-summer sun. In an adjacent pasture, yearlings cavorted, racing one another, bucking, nipping, and squealing their high spirits. God, they were beautiful. He had helped foal a number of them, had worked with all of them.Bitter regret added to the ache inside him.Damn it all, just a few months back he and RJ had been talking about buying a new stud for Rosewood. There’d been so many things he’d wanted to do, so many plans for improving the stock, and now it was over. He slammed the heel of his hand against the steering wheel. Christ, hadn’t he always known deep down that he would lose his job at Rosewood, that he would lose everything he’d worked for, because of a Radcliffe woman?Only trouble was, RJ had guessed wrong.
The corner of Travis’s mouth lifted as he imagined what RJ would have done if he’d leaned over the desk and told him just how far off the mark he was.