Silver Spurs and a Twelve Pound Heart

Author(s): Helen Newman Wood

Location(s): Northumberland

Genre(s): RomCom, Fiction

Era(s): Current Day

Katie Holland (24) has completed her Equine degree and coaching course, enjoyed two consecutive winters eventing and playing Polo in New Zealand and has her sights firmly set on becoming a top event rider. But her father has had enough of her ridiculous plans for a career and has found her a ‘real’ job with a property letting agency in North London. Tired of the meagre salary, her flatmate’s pink pubic hair in the shower and the enormous, grey knickers being washed in the kitchen sink, Katie hands in her notice and moves to Northumberland to start work for event rider, Roger Fleming Bowen (37), an aristocrat who was once the face on the posters which adorned the walls of her teenage bedroom.
Attracted to Roger at first sight, Katie keeps her feelings for him hidden. Unknown to her, Roger also feels an attraction towards her but has vowed to never again get involved with his staff, having learnt from the casual but disastrous relationships with them in the past. As they travel around Northumberland and the Scottish Borders on the competition circuit, they become close friends with secret benefits. Katie hopes he will eventually fall in love with her, whereas Roger thinks that due to her mature attitude and her lack of pandering, they are able to occasionally sleep together without it altering their friendship.
Katie wins the Scottish Championship with a difficult horse that no-one else has been able to get results from. Grateful for the training and knowledge he has bestowed on her, she gives Roger the set of silver spurs that she has won.
Spending a week away from home at an international competition near Inverness, Roger spends the night with Katie and she finally challenges him about their relationship. He admits he will never commit to her, owing to the age gap between them. After a disastrous cross country day, when the horse on whom she won the Scottish Championship suffers a heart attack, Katie decides she has no option but to leave Roger’s employment and go home to Dorset. Roger, wearing Katie’s silver spurs for the first time to bring him luck, secures a win with his own horse after a brilliantly ridden round of show jumping. Realising that he can’t bear to be without her, he confesses his feelings and asks her to stay with him. Back in Northumberland, they bury the ill-fated horse’s heart and celebrate the beginning of their relationship and the life of a horse who achieved the impossible, with Katie.

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