Lady Eve's Indiscretion

“Some horses just have the certain spark, you know,” Eve said as they wound through the gardens. “They have a sense of themselves. The breeding stock have it more often, but my sister Sophie has a pair of draft horses…”

She nattered on, a woman enthralled with horses, while Deene speculated about just one more kiss, this one in the greening rose arbor. Rose arbors were intended to facilitate kissing—his own reprobate father had explained this to him not long after Deene had gone to university.

Except… Deene recalled the duchess, waving them on their way just a few hours prior, recalled the fear he’d seen on Eve’s face when the horses had startled… and recalled how long it had taken him to get his unruly parts under control after kissing Eve—being kissed by Eve—amid the lilies of the valley.

There was nothing wrong with kisses shared between knowledgeable adults, but that kiss had threatened to escalate far beyond what Deene felt was acceptable when neither party had intentions toward the other. Nonetheless, the scent that was supposed to evoke return of happiness would forever after bring to his mind a walloping passionate interlude with a lovely woman—who was enamored of his horse.

“So if we were to come back out here, say, next week, might you be willing to hack out with me then, Lady Eve?”

She paused midreach toward her tea—she preferred Darjeeling—and pursed her lips. “I want to.”

“Then, Evie, what’s stopping you?”

Now she glowered at the teacup. “Nothing.”

She was lying again, though he had to allow her the fiction. She alone knew the worst of the specifics, but it was common knowledge she hadn’t been on a horse for years.

“Tell me about your accident.”

She glanced up. “You aren’t going to taunt me by snatching away the invitation to hack out, dangling it just out of my reach, pretending it’s a matter of indifference to you?”

It was Deene’s turn to glower, for she’d just listed his best tactics when sparring with her. “Would that help?”

She sat back. “Sometimes it has helped. When you had me drive home from the park… I hadn’t even taken the reins in years, Lucas. To find myself driving a team right in the middle of Town put me quite at sixes and sevens.”

This was not an admission; it was a confidence. A puzzle she was sharing with him and only him, as intimate as a kiss and in its own way even more exquisite.

“I have faith in you, Eve Windham. You were a bruising rider, a thoroughgoing equestrienne in the making. I’d like to see you on a horse again, if that would make you happy.”

She did not beam a dazzling smile at him, which was the intended effect of such a pretty speech. She instead looked like—God help them both—she might tear up and start bawling right here on the sunny, sheltered back terrace of his country retreat.

This would necessitate that he comfort her, which might not be a bad thing if he’d had the first clue how to go about it.

“Beg pardon, my lord.”

Aelfreth Green stood, cap in hand, at the edge of the terrace.

“Aelfreth?” The lads had been as smitten with Eve as the damned stallion. Aelfreth would not have intruded on the lady’s meal for anything less than fire, loose horses, or other acts of God.

“Sorry to interrupt, milady, your lordship, but Bannister says you’d best come.”

Foreboding congealed in Deene’s chest. “Eve, you’ll excuse me?”

“Of course.”

He rose, visions of Willy cast in his stall, with bowed tendons and incipient colic befalling the horse.

“It’s Franny, your lordship,” Aelfreth muttered as they strode away. “She’s not passing the foal.”

Behind him, Deene heard a chair scrape back.

“Come along, Lucas.” Eve seized his arm and started towing him forward. “If it’s a foaling gone sour, there’s no time to waste.”

He extricated his arm from her grip. “Eve, it isn’t in the least proper for you to be in the vicinity when a mare’s giving birth.”

“Hang proper. I’ve assisted at foalings before. We raise plenty of horses at Morelands, you know, and just because I no longer ride or drive or… any of that, doesn’t mean we have time to argue.”

She was right, blast her. An animal that historically gave birth where all manner of predators could interfere developed the ability to get the process over with quickly—and did not develop any ability to deal with protracted labor.

“Miss might be a help,” Aelfreth added. “The mares sometimes want for another female when things go amiss.”

“For God’s sake, this isn’t a lying-in party.”

Nobody graced that expostulation with a reply, and when Deene got to the foaling barn, the situation was grim indeed. Bannister, the grizzled trainer and head lad, was outside the foaling stall, his expression glum.

“The foal willna come, your lordship. She’ll soon stop trying.”

A black mare lay in the deep straw, her enormous belly distended, her neck damp with sweat.

Deene started stripping off his coat. “What’s the problem?”

“The foal…” Bannister glanced at Aelfreth.

“Won’t come, I know. Have you had a look?”

Another glance—at Aelfreth, at Deene, at the mare, everywhere but at Lady Eve Windham.

She laid a hand on the man’s hairy forearm, as if they were great friends. “Speak freely, Mr. Bannister. Is it a red bag? A breech?”

“I dunno, mum. But she shoulda dropped that foal nigh thirty minutes ago.”

Deene did not swear aloud, but in his mind, he bitterly railed against a staff that had let him eat tea and crumpets for half an hour while a mare was in distress.

“Bring me soap and water,” Deene said, passing his coat to Eve and starting on the buttons of his waistcoat. “Strong soap and some towels. Eve, I urge you to get back to the house. Frankincense is a maiden mare, she’s small, and this is not going to end well.”

“Sometimes it just takes them longer their first time, Lucas. We mustn’t panic.”

She was studying the mare while Deene passed her his waistcoat and stripped off his shirt.

“And sometimes, panic is the only thing that will carry the day. Bring me the damned bucket.” He did not raise his voice in deference to the horse groaning and thrashing her way through another contraction.

Eve set his clothing on a saddle rack and started undoing the buttons of her jacket. “She’s a very petite mare, Lucas. You’d best let me do this.”

Deene stopped in the process of shoving his shirt at her. “Let you? Let you put your hand… No.”

“Yes, let me. I’ve done this before, and I’m good at it, Lucas. For once being petite is an advantage. Compare your arm to mine and think of the mare.”

She thrust out a pale, slender arm—an appendage perhaps half the diameter of his.

While Deene stood there, bare to the waist, anxiety for the horse nigh choking him, Eve dropped her arm and pointed at the stall.

“There’s your problem, Deene. You’ve got a leg back, at least.”

While the mare grunted, a single small hoof emerged beneath her tail.

“Milady is right,” Bannister said. “Foals is supposed to dive into the world, their noses atween their knees. That one’s hung up a leg.”

He shot Deene a look and turned to head down the shed row—to where the guns were stored in a cabinet in the saddle room.

“Lucas, don’t try to stop me.” Eve was down to a very pretty camisole and chemise, both of which left her arms bare below midbicep.

“I will allow you to try,” Deene said. “But only because there is no time to make you see reason.”

Aelfreth appeared with the bucket, and Eve started scrubbing her arm. “The contraction is passing, and