animals that decided what they would and wouldn’t do, and the trainers knew better than to try to force them otherwise. Mick raised thoroughbreds, which he planned to race, some foxhunters, and two strings of polo ponies. To care for them, he had a staff of six grooms and exercise riders who reported to Tommy Flaherty, his Irish head trainer. Mick and Tommy had spent all spring and summer supervising the renovation of the farm’s sprawling network of barns, stables, run-in sheds, paddocks and fields, as well as the repainting of miles of post-and-board fences, which divided his land like a giant checkerboard. Now that the work was finished, the place looked magnificent.
I glanced at my watch as I walked into the main stable. Just past four-thirty. Feeding time. Tommy had a rule about not letting anyone in the barns until after four o’clock during the months the thoroughbreds were in training.
“These horses are athletes,” he told me once, in his lilting, musical voice. “They train hard, darlin’, and they need to get their shuteye. I won’t have anyone disturbin’ them.”
I checked first on my favorite—Black Jack—a thoroughbred whose glossy coat fit his name. His feeding tub looked full, but he still came to the stall window when I called him and nuzzled my hand, looking for an extra treat. One of the grooms pulled a carrot out of his pocket and handed it to me.
“Got any apples?” I asked. “He loves apples.”
“Give him an apple and he’ll drool all over himself. He’s just been groomed.”
“Sorry, buddy,” I said to Black Jack. “You heard what the man said.”
“And what would that be?”
I whirled around. Mick stood there, looking amused.
“That apples are off limits for Black Jack.” My face felt hot. I should have asked the maid to tell him that I needed to return to the vineyard after my meeting with Amanda. I should not have come here.
“We’ll make an exception for the pretty lady, all right, Jackie boy?” Mick nodded at the groom, who went to fetch an apple. “We’ll clean you up again after that messy apple, won’t we?” He rubbed Jack’s nose as the groom handed it to me.
“How’d your meeting go with Amanda? She’s running this auction like a bloody military campaign,” he said.
I fed Black Jack, holding the apple while he ate. Gentleman that he was, he avoided chomping on my fingers, though he enjoyed his treat with teeth-baring gusto and a glint in his lovely, liquid brown eyes.
“Jack Greenfield decided to withdraw the Washington bottle this afternoon. He wants to keep it,” I said.
Mick ran his hand down the horse’s neck, studying him. “Sorry to hear that, but it makes sense. The intrinsic value of that bottle is out of this world. I’m sure Jack reconsidered now that it’s getting so much attention.”
“It doesn’t make sense to me. Or the disabled and homeless kids who lost out.”
He stopped patting Black Jack and considered me. “I’m sorry you’re upset but you’re thinking with your heart, Lucie. Jack’s a businessman. I would have done the same thing.”
“Then you’re both cynics.” I walked down to the tack room, leaning on my cane, and found a towel to wipe the apple juice off my hand.
When I came back, Mick pulled me close and brushed a lock of my hair out of my eyes. “I’m not a cynic, I’m a realist. Have dinner with me tonight. I’ll cook for us. You’ll be dazzled by my culinary skills.”
“No.” I didn’t want him teasing me when I was angry. “No, thanks.”
“You have dinner plans already?” He cupped my chin so I couldn’t look away. “I thought not. It’s settled. You’re dining with me. I behaved appallingly the other night and I want to make it up to you.”
“Mick—”
“Please.” His voice was soft in my hair. “Say yes.”
I knew I would regret this. “All right,” I said. “Yes.”
I finished making the rounds of the stables with him before we went back to the house. Our last stop was the stallion’s barn and the stall which contained Dunne Gone, a bay with a white blaze on his face. Tommy was sifting through straw with a pitchfork, mucking the stall when we got there.
“You’re keeping an eye on that hock?” Mick asked.
“Doc Harmon’s comin’ here first thing tomorrow when he does his daily rounds.”
“Good. Get the farrier in, too. He needs to reset Casbah’s rear shoe.”
“Already taken care of.”
Mick nodded. “See you in the morning, Tommy.”
“’Evening, sir. Good evening, Miss Montgomery.”
We walked back to the house holding hands. “Casbah’s racing on Saturday at the Point-to-Point,” Mick said. “Along with another of my maidens. I’d like you to come. Amanda’s having her usual tailgate. We could meet there.”
I knew—though he didn’t say it—that he expected his horses to win at the Point-to-Point and he wanted me to see that.
“I’ll bring my grandfather,” I said. “He’s visiting from Paris. I think you’d like him.”
We had reached the terrace by Mick’s swimming pool. When I’d been here last spring, he and I had spent many evenings watching the animals’ beautiful silhouettes from this spot until the sun set behind the Blue Ridge and everything faded to black. When a horse is a champion he shows it. Even from a distance I had seen that regal elegance in Mick’s horses. They knew their destiny and what they were meant to do. With the weather cooling off, he and Tommy had swapped the horses’ routines so they now spent days outside and nights inside. Tonight I missed seeing them.
His housekeeper had already prepared dinner—steaks, baby vegetables, and a salad for two. All he had to do was throw everything together.
I looked over at the plates and cutlery already stacked on a silver tray. “When am I supposed to be dazzled by your culinary skills?” I said. “Is it when you set the table, or when you take the wrapping off that gorgeous salad?”
He grinned. “It’s when I open the wine. Come on. I’ve got something I want you to try. Shane got me a couple of cases.”
A bottle of Gevrey-Chambertin and two Biot wineglasses sat on another tray on the drawing room sideboard. A Burgundy, this one from a
I watched him uncork the wine. “Your drawing room looks lovely. Sunny did a wonderful job.”
“She knows what I like,” he said. “You’ll have to see what she’s doing to the guest suite upstairs. It’ll be ready in a few weeks when Selena moves in.”
One of his sisters? A cousin? “Who’s Selena?”
“My goddaughter. Youngest child of an old family friend from the U.K.”
“Why is she moving in?” I didn’t like it that I sounded like a jealous girlfriend.
He didn’t seem to notice. “She’s been winning a lot of prizes in Europe riding show jumpers.” He handed me a pale blue wineglass and touched his glass against mine. “Her father, Lord Tanner, thought perhaps she should get some experience in the States. I offered to let her stay here, though she’ll probably also spend time in Kentucky. She just finished up at Cambridge and planned on taking a year off before working, anyway.”
So she was about Mia’s age—twenty-one.
“It sounds like a great opportunity for her.” I drank some of my wine.
He took my glass. “You are so transparent,” he said, and kissed me on the mouth. “I think of her as a daughter.”
“I hate being transparent,” I said, kissing him back. “And it’s nice you’re doing this for her. I mean it.”
“Come on,” he said. “There’s something else I want to do.”
He brought me to his bedroom and we were rough undressing each other. No tenderness or caresses or words. Our lovemaking was primal and intense, perhaps because it had been months since the last time. I could not tell what drove him, but my own fierce need came from an ache that had burrowed so deep inside me I’d almost managed to forget it existed. The need to be loved—no, to be
What he gave in the moment was as good as it got. Sincere but not constant. Passionate but not besotted. In
