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Darcy’s stable was a clean, open space. Two of the large stalls were occupied: the black stallion, whose name plate read Volcano, and a fox gelding with a white blaze called Dancer. Bennet was immediately charmed.
They prepared their mounts and rode into the soft sunrise. Bennet’s gelding had a nice gait, smooth and wide. He wished he weren’t riding in jeans but at least they were stretchy, so chafing from the seams would be his only concern. He kept enough distance that dialogue was pointless. They rode at a good pace over solid trails, each with their gaze pinned ahead, fixed on their own goals.
The river had burst its banks and stretched into the paddocks either side, almost to the fence Bennet had failed to jump. The water was a stale brown, filled with debris, and the bridge Bennet used every morning was completely submerged.
Darcy moved closer, contemplating the view with equal disappointment.
“Looks like you’ll be staying another day at least.”
“I wish Lyon wasn’t on his own.”
“You care a lot for your brother.” A murmured statement, perhaps a little surprised-sounding.
“I’m trying to make things better between us.”
“Better?”
It was no secret. Darcy had been open about his own shortcomings and Bennet wasn’t so proud as to hide his. “I was an absent brother until our parents passed. I have a lot to make up for. I hope I can gain his trust. I hope I can help him realize his potential.”
Darcy shifted his horse but kept his gaze firmly on the river and the village beyond it. “He looks up to you. He’ll turn out fine.”
“You’ve seen us together twice.”
“I’m a keen observer, and I’ve fathered three children.” Darcy paused, expression pinching momentarily. “But you are right. I wouldn’t take my word for it.”
He spurred his horse back down the trail and let his stallion race toward home, not looking back.
Bennet, tipping his head and sucking in the freedom of the outdoors at dawn, followed.
He caught up to Darcy where the fence lines converged into a lane wide enough for two riders. “I don’t know your situation. But as someone who was rejected . . . it’s the worst betrayal a child can know.”
“I’m aware of my failings, Bennet. I don’t need constant reminding of them.”
“What I mean to say is I hope you figure things out with your son, and should you want advice from a gay man, feel free to ask.”
“I’m dealing with the situation.”
“By running away to the country?”
Darcy pulled his horse around, blocking Bennet’s path. He held Bennet’s gaze tightly. “If you assume I haven’t apologized to my son, you’re wrong. I did not take three months off work to figure out how to string some words together.”
Bennet gripped his reins.
“There is more to accepting than ‘sorry.’”
Bennet eyed Darcy’s straight, proud form as the unexpected, heavy truth of Darcy’s words sank in. That dark gaze flickered as it dipped over Bennet from loaned helmet to boot.
Bennet could have nodded, ended this conversation, but he’d always had a runaway mouth. “More to accepting than sorry. Like accepting your own sexuality?”
The stallion tossed his head as Darcy pulled him back, paling. He turned and rode hard, Bennet at his heels, toward the stables. Bennet jumped off his horse only seconds after Darcy and followed him into the dark.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You look at me as a fox does a rabbit.” Bennet’s feet crushed stray hay underfoot. “You like what you see, you stalk closer and closer, hiding deeper in the shadows of the brush. But I know you’re there, Darcy, and I know what you’re thinking.”
“What am I thinking?”
“That despite having convinced all the other foxes you’re vegetarian, you want to eat me.” Bennet led his steed into the stall, eyeing Darcy’s tight shoulders. “Am I wrong?”
No answer.
They took care of their horses, fed them, and left the stables with a squeal of the double doors. A wet breeze rushed over them.
Darcy stopped abruptly halfway up the path and turned to him. Bennet halted.
Frustration quivered at Darcy’s brow, dark eyes like mud after a storm. “Your eyes,” he said. “I like looking at them. But that is as far as it goes.”
He turned on his heel and strode toward his house.
Near the windows across the room, squares of light glimmered over Darcy’s stubborn features and his heavy, academic-looking text. He read with a thoughtful expression, his gaze not once straying from the pages. Perhaps to prove his earlier point.
The swish of paper, Bennet’s typing, and the occasional groan of their armchairs as they shifted were the only sounds in the room.
At twelve, they ate lunch, their conversation limited to what Bennet would like to eat, how Bennet took his eggs, whether he was still hungry. Then they were back in their armchairs and Bennet’s work swallowed him again, plunging him into a world of family, frustration and yearning.
