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‘I couldn’t help myself. And besides, everyone will start asking as soon as they realise I’m not drinking at the party tonight.’
Danyl’s usually quick brain stuttered to a halt, but Antonio caught on much more quickly. Antonio pulled Dimitri into a bear hug.
‘Another one? Already?’ Antonio demanded of his friend.
Pregnant.
Anna was pregnant.
But, rather than congratulating the happy couple, all he could do was look at Mason, who was refusing to meet his eyes.
And once again it felt as if the bottom had fallen out of his world.
CHAPTER SIX
April, ten years ago
DANYL WAS NERVOUS as hell. He’d seen Mason race a hundred times in the last few months. She was incredible on the back of a horse. Glorious even. But this was the biggest meet she’d ridden in and there was a sense of tension in the air. Mason had garnered the attention of many of the big syndicates and quite a few of them were here today, like him, just to watch her. Her training had been nothing short of furious. Six days a week, morning and afternoon, if she wasn’t with the horses she’d be in the gym, doing circuit training that would have cut even the fittest men down to size. By the time she collapsed on his sofa on the few days a week that she would stay with him, she would all but gaze dazedly at him while he ate his dinner. For some reason her training limited her to one—impressively large—meal a day.
Her dedication and determination put him to shame, and he’d used that. Somehow her drive had only ignited his. He’d always had good marks, but his tutors were beginning to see something else in his work. A creativity in his thinking that they congratulated themselves on unearthing. But it really didn’t have anything to do with them. It was Mason. Talking to her about his thesis, his projects, he discovered that she had a different way of looking at things and he met her curiosity and built on it.
The only time she shied away from any conversation topic was when it concerned her mum. They’d skirted around the issue, and each time he could see the scars and hurts caused by her abandonment. Each time he’d tried to soothe away that pain, and even if in his deepest heart he didn’t think his assurance, his affection, would ever be enough to fill the hole she’d left behind, it wouldn’t stop him from trying.
He ignored the vibration of his phone. It would either be the palace or Antonio or Dimitri, and he could afford to give none his attention right now. He was in the private members’ box, surrounded by his security detail, who were amusingly almost as concerned as he. Over the last few months, she had managed to wrap them all around her little finger.
His feelings for her had multiplied like a never-ending algebraic equation, increasing each day and each moment they spent together until it felt as if it would burst from his chest. He hadn’t quite put them out there though. He didn’t want to distract her, and he wanted to cherish this, these feelings.
A commotion began to build at the starting gate. They were about to bring the horses out.
* * *
Mason felt a little off. She couldn’t describe it any other way. She was worried about Rebel. He didn’t seem... And that was the problem. She just couldn’t put her finger on it. She’d mentioned it to Harry and together they’d checked him over, hoof to ear, checked the paperwork recording all the feed times and care instructions. Nothing had changed since yesterday. Harry had looked at her and said that she’d be fine. Implying that she was transferring her concerns onto Rebel. She knew that wasn’t it. This was what she loved. She lived for it. In the last couple of weeks she and Rebel had spent more time together than she and Danyl. She knew Rebel’s moods, his likes, his dislikes. She could tell if she was riding him even with her eyes blindfolded. And she’d trust him even then. But...
They were being called to the starting gate, and she guided Rebel more with her legs than the bridle and leads. Her fingers were callused and cold in the April wind. Her legs, muscles, were tired but ready, almost relishing the burn that was to come.
Her heart began to pound, with fear, with anticipation, with hope. This was the beginning of the thrill of the win, to prove how good she was. The chance to prove to her father that the time he’d spent with her all those years growing up wasn’t a waste. That the fact he’d chosen to stay, chosen to keep her—it was worth it. She wanted so desperately to see the pride in his eyes when she told him about her latest win. It was a drug she couldn’t quit.
And Danyl. Somehow her need to impress, to succeed, had enveloped him too. He was there, always, distracting when she needed it, laughing and loving when she needed that. He was incredible and her feelings for him were compounded e
ach day.
Rebel flicked his ears back and shook his head as they neared the other horses. Now wasn’t a time for distraction, however. Now was the time for her and Rebel.
She leaned down and whispered calm, soothing words into his ear.
‘It’s okay, Reb, we’ll just take this little road here and be back in the stalls for sugar and oats in no time. We have great things ahead of us, love.’
He leant his head towards her mouth, shaking her out of his way, or leaning into her words; she’d take the latter. Her hand stroked over the smooth, powerful length of his neck, the way he liked it best. And she allowed herself to smile. This was what it was all about.
* * *
The commentator blared across the crowds below and the starting bell sounded before Danyl had quite prepared himself for it, his eyes taking a little time to catch up, so that they were almost into the first corner of the flat before he could pick her out. His hands were wrapped around the private box’s white metal railing and in the back of his mind he felt that for the first time all his personal guard had their eyes on someone else: Mason. He’d seen her take Rebel out a lot of times when he’d been able to escape his studies and he couldn’t quite shake the feeling that there was something slightly wrong, slightly off about the smoothness with which they usually rode together.
The furious pounding of horses’ hooves and legs, the speed they were travelling at, rather than heightening his excitement, suddenly began to unnerve him. And, as if he could somehow sense the future, sense what was about to happen, he sucked in a lungful of sharp, cold air, just before it happened.
‘And she’s down. She’s down. Rebel and rider are down.’
The scene in front of him was shocking in its brutality. He’d seen Rebel stumble, his head dipped, and the sudden drop in speed forced the other riders either out of the way or into the back of him. It was a pile-up of horse flesh and limbs, and while the race carried on Mason was somewhere at the bottom of it.
