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“You probably can’t—won’t,” she amended, “and I don’t blame you. I’ve hardly been a model employee, and you owe me absolutely nothing. But I’ve run out of ideas. I’ve checked, and there are no flights to Ireland until next week, and I need to be there yesterday—”
“So?” he prompted.
She lifted her chin. “So I was wondering if you might know anyone with transport going over there?”
Dante huffed softly with amusement. “That’s a long shot, isn’t it?”
“It’s all I’ve got,” she admitted. “And as this is the time of year for checking out the yearlings and foals at the Curragh, I thought, maybe—”
“I’d take you there?”
Now she’d made her plea out loud, it did sound ridiculous. Dante clearly thought so.
“What would you be prepared to pay for this trip?” he asked.
Not “how much,” she noticed, but what would she be prepared to pay. She had to give it to him, Dante got straight to the point. “Anything,” she said bluntly. “Whatever it takes.”
He gave her a long, considering look. “I can always be tempted by the prospect of new horses.”
Rose Delaney, you’ve just been put in your place.
“We have the best horses you’ll find anywhere in Ireland on our farm back home,” she insisted.
Dante gave a slight inclination of his head. “Ireland’s always been a rich hunting ground for me in the past.”
If there hadn’t been such heat in his eyes, she might have taken him at face value, but she got the sense that he was playing her as a tiger might toy with a mouse.
Undeterred, she continued, “I can show you better horses than they have on the Curragh. One we’ve got in particular: Stargazer. He’s not fast enough to be a racehorse, but he’s agile and intelligent, and I know that with the right training, he’d make a great polo pony—” The words froze in her mouth as she remembered her father telling her that if he couldn’t repay his debts, all the horses would be taken from the farm. She had nothing to offer Dante.
“This horse called Stargazer,” Dante prompted. “Any good for stud?”
“No balls,” she murmured distractedly.
The sound of Dante’s laughter shook her round. “I hope you’re referring to the horse.”
She studied his face. It wasn’t so black and thunderous now. If she could take advantage of this brief break in the storm, maybe she could persuade him to help.
“Is that why you were crying?” he pressed, frowning. “Over a horse?”
She could be very emotional when it came to her pa or the horses. She could be very emotional full stop. She hid her feelings because it was unprofessional not to do so, but she had a fiery Celtic spirit and all that went with it, including the supreme highs and the desperate lows. If Dante couldn’t or wouldn’t help, she’d be heading for one of those lows, and that was a real time suck, and one she couldn’t afford. Desperate times called for desperate measures. Throwing herself on his mercy, she whispered, “Please help me.”
She should have known that playing the helpless female would cut no ice with Dante. “You were happy enough to leave your father in Ireland,” he pointed out. “Did it never occur to you that he could run into problems? And what about your brothers?”
“Away. And Daddy was all right when I left him.”
“You left the horses, including this precious Stargazer, without a second thought.”
“In the care of my father,” she explained. “But I didn’t leave them to be slaughtered,” she blurted before she could stop herself.
“Slaughtered?” Dante repeated quietly.
“The man who’s threatening my pa said if he doesn’t get his money, he’ll take the horses to the knacker’s yard.” She shrugged unhappily. “I don’t know what’s going on. I don’t think he’s even interested in horses. This is just a form of blackmail.”
“Who is this man?”
“I don’t know—some local thug who’s throwing his weight about while my brothers and I are out of the country. Will you help me or not? I’ll do anything—”
“Yes. I can see that,” Dante said calmly.
