He saw her approach and smiled with that particular expression of his that hovered somewhere between admiration and provocation. “I had begun to wonder,” he called across the field, his voice carrying easily in the still air, “if you might’ve come to your senses.”
Lottie urged her horse down the slope. “I am, alas, quite mad.”
“I feared as much.” He guided his stallion alongside her with ease. His gaze travelled over her in a manner that was not, strictly speaking, gentlemanly. “New habit?”
“Yes. Do you approve?”
“It is violently distracting.”
“Good.”
He laughed. “Shall we?”
“Indeed,” she said, wheeling her horse towards the narrow path. “The course runs through the west grove, across the stone bridge, along the northern edge of the lake, and past the oldchapel ruins. The first one to scale the old hunter’s lodge and touch the weathercock atop the roof shall be victorious.”
“We are to scale the roof?”
“Of course.” She glanced at him over her shoulder. “Do try to keep up, Mr Deverell.”
“Only you,” he called after her as she trotted away, “would devise a contest that ends in trespass and the possibility of a broken neck. I find myself wildly inclined to best you badly.”
She pulled up just short of the tree line, turning her horse. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes bright with mischief. “Hush. This shall be our starting point. The moment you say the word, we ride.”
“On the contrary, Miss Tolliver. I believe it only proper that the honour be yours.”
“Very well.” Lottie’s answering smile was all teeth.
She leant forwards in the saddle, her body already aligning with the motion she craved. Her seat was light but sure, her posture perfectly attuned to the familiar gait of the chestnut beneath her. He shifted restlessly, snorting and pawing at the turf, his nostrils flaring as though he too could taste the challenge. He was hers—spirited, clever, a touch too unruly to be considered safe by Society’s standards, as the dull creatures Aunt Belinda kept were—and she trusted him as she trusted the beat of her own heart.
“Three…”
Deverell shifted beside her, every line of him coiled like a whip.
“…Two…”
Both horses stamped the earth, necks tossing as they sensed the promise of flight.
“…One.”
They sprang forward like arrows loosed from a string, hooves tearing at the ground and the wind roaring in their ears. Lottie’sgelding surged ahead. Her riding hat flew back at once, caught only by its ribbon, and she gave a whoop.
She had always loved to ride—not along Rotten Row, all decorous posture and promenades, but like this: unbridled speed, wind at her cheeks, and the earth racing beneath her in a glorious blur. In the country, she rode every day—twice, if she could manage it under Aunt Belinda’s watchful eye. In such moments as these, she remembered herself: not a young lady or a daughter to be arranged, but a creature of motion and wild joy.
Deverell kept pace at her side, his mount as sleek and dark as a shadow. He looked maddeningly composed, but there was something else in his face—something bright and delighted and very nearly boyish—that told her he was loving every second of it. He called to her, though the words were lost in the wind between them; she caught the curve of his grin and returned it without hesitation.
Branches whipped past them as they thundered into the west grove.
“Is this”—Deverell’s voice rose above the pounding of hooves—“the part where you politely allow me to win?”
“I do nothing politely, Deverell!”
A flash of black to her left—his stallion gaining, Jasper’s form all elegant ease, damn him—and then they burst from the trees and onto the open rise.
The stone bridge loomed ahead, but Lottie’s gelding didn’t falter. They reached the foot of the bridge first.
Lottie bent low. She was flying, faster than sense, faster than scandal, and God, it felt glorious.
From behind her came Deverell’s voice. “You mean to kill us both, don’t you?”
