Maria:
The message sits there longer than it should.
I read it once, then again, like maybe I missed something the first time. A detail. A correction. Anything that would make it make sense.
It doesn’t.
I’m already moving before I decide to. Phone still in my hand, I head downstairs, past the quiet hallway, past the staff who look like they already know something I don’t.
“Is there something outside?” I ask.
“Yes, miss.”
No hesitation.
That makes it worse.
The compound is wide. Open in that deliberate, expensive way where nothing feels crowded and everything has space to exist properly. It takes a few seconds to cross it, but right now it feels longer. I can hear something before I see it. A soft shift of movement, controlled, steady.
Then I see it.
I stop.
A white stallion sta
