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Without turning back to her,I mash my helmet atop my braided hair so I’ll look as anonymous as possible in case any more photographers have shown up and raise my hand in a wave. It’s hard enough to have to ignore Mariano every day and blot him from my thoughts at night—hands resolutely above the duvet—but it’s even worse to have totalkabout him every waking moment with Aunt Dottie.
But as gloomyas the weather—and my mood—are, the atmosphere is festive and bustling. The hounds romp and whimper and bay and cavort with excitement. Horses whinny to one another from where they’re tied to the vans they arrived in. And I get to spend a day on horseback traipsing about the countryside. That thought almost lifts my spirits, until I think about how much I’d rather be traipsing aboard Teena.
I checkmy phone for the last picture EFF sent me of my special girl. It’s just Teena, her head stuck out of her stall door, staring down the barn aisle, her ears pricked with curiosity, her eyes soft and warm, like she’s looking at someone she likes.
‘Wishing you were here,’is all the message says.
Me too,Teena girl, I send back, not via text but via a telepathic message on our special frequency. I let out a sigh, square my shoulders, and head straight to the horse van emblazoned with Mummy’s garishTS&Klogo.
Peter,our groom, has trailered our mounts over for the day, and I’ve arrived early to lend a hand. There’s no chance he’ll be able to get all our students’ horses ready if he’s moving at his usual snail speed.
But,in the shock of the season, the horses are all tacked up. Henrietta is fiddling about under a saddle flap, tightening Kahlua’s girth strap like she’s done it a million times. We haven’t even taught the students to tack up their horses, so how she knows how to do it—and with skill—is beyond me. She straightens while I stand there in shock.
“Hark! Lolly!”Pippa’s voice, megaphone loud, precedes her, and she waves enthusiastically as she rounds the trailer. “I’m in terrible need of assistance, and yon Polo Professional is too busy to weigh in.” She gives a quick head tip toward the other side of the horse van, where the rest of the horses must be tied. If only Mariano was tied along with them.Not now brain. That’s all done with. No tying Mariano up and dripping jam on his…Pippa must see some souring in my expression as I battle my own thoughts. “But first”—she draws a silver engraved flask from the inner pocket, unscrews the cap, takes a long pull, and holds it out to me—“some liquid fortification!”
Though it’s never stoppedanyone before, drinking while riding has potential repercussions for one’s ability to balance while jumping hedgerows, stone walls, banks, ditches, streams, and whatever else the hunt might encounter. But we’re not with the first flight. We’re only riding as hilltoppers, and the most excitement we’ll likely get during what amounts to a quiet countryside hack is trotting across a field. I take the proffered flask.
I’ve takentwo long draughts of the smoothest whiskey known to man, exceeding what is customary and polite, when Pippa holds out her hand for the flask. “Tell me, Lolly. Have I got the numnah in the right place?” She gestures toward Kahlua’s saddle pad.
“Looks perfect to me.”I give her a smile. “Is Miss P, I mean Rum Punch, on the other side? With—”
“With Mariano. Yep. He’s um…”Pippa shrugs. “Never mind. Peter’s over there with him getting the rest of the horses saddled. Maybe you could just make sure I did everyone up right, first?”
I do as she asks,performing a quick safety check of the three horses Pippa has readied, all surprisingly perfectly tacked up. As I’m working on that, Alan (sans prosthetic dick), Henrietta (our royal in hiding), and Chris (sorry you’re just a dentist, Chris!) and his wife (she of the giggle and swoon in the presence of yon Polo Professional) arrive, all clad in regulation black hunt coats, beige breeches, boots, and helmets. Though I’ve been part of this world ever since Mummy made her money, there’s part of me that balks at the ostentation of it all. The ability of the rich to properly outfit themselves in expensive, niche clothing at a moment’s notice is still, frankly, staggering.
“I hopeyou’ve not put me on that Sapphire again. She’s stubborn.” Of course, Alan would start the day off with complaints instead of pleasantries, and why is it no surprise that the label he gives Sapphire is my least favorite of all the things people like to call horses who fail to be mind readers.Stubborn?A horse generally isn’tstubborn, it’s confused or uncomfortable or scared or any number of other things a sentient being with its own mind might be, and if one onlylistens…
Mariano’slast words to me—You must listen—echo, and I have to force the memory, the unpleasant doubt that I’ve been unfair, from my mind.
Instead of dwelling on Mariano,I give Alan what any woman would recognize as a patronizing smile. “We’ve decided you’ll ride Schnapps. And Hettie will have Sapphire.”
“Good luck!”Alan guffaws and slaps Hettie on the back. “I hope Schnapps listens better.” Alan shoots a look at Sapphire, completely oblivious to the fact that Hettie has perked up at the news of her horse for the day. She said she’d been riding to hounds, so perhaps this is a reminder of the life she loves? Who knows? She’s been so quiet as to barely make an impression, but she’s Pippa’s problem, not mine.
My job isto make sure Alan doesn’t go off on a tear again. Schnapps is what’s known as a packer—a million-year-old horse who knows his job and will do it regardless, and in spite of, rider error. He’s also creaky with arthritis, slow as treacle, and half asleep most of the time—and good natured all the rest. He is, in short, both a terrible polo pony and worth his weight in gold.
Pippa setsabout fixing the messily knotted stock tie at Henrietta’s neck, murmuring encouragements while Alan stalks off toward a cluster of regular members of the hunt. Pippa hands Hettie the flask, the two of them deep in their whispered conversation. Liquid courage has fortified the British through far worse than a drag hunt. Here’s hoping she has more, because we’re all going to need it.
Peter’snowhere to be seen when I come around to the other side of the trailer. It’s just Mariano, his back turned to me as he stands alongside Miss P. If only he wasn’t a confabulist, a split-tongued fiend, a down-and-dirty, heart-swindling cad.
If only he’dtold me the truth. In real time. Instead of letting me find out online. If only he wasn’t the epitome of everything I hate—a lying liar who played me from the start—he’d set my wick alight, and together we’d burn. For the splittest of split seconds, I almost allow myself to relent at the sight of him in his tight-fitting breeches, murmuring in Spanish to the filly who is standing with her head lowered and her eyes half-closed, clearly loving his ministrations.
Almost.
I’m goingto ignore the fact that he’s putting in the last of the twenty-four button braids dotting her neck, making her look like a real hunter. She is, in fact, so new to theTS&Kstring that she’s the one horse without the roached mane customary for polo ponies, making her the only horse of ours to sport braids for the hunt. He’s done a beautiful job, this man who knows how to make perfect, neat plaits. And he’s saved me at least an hour of finger-aching work.
My head and heart riot,duking it out for ascendancy. My brain knows I must have nothing to do with him, but my heart is already reaching out, begging the universe to turn back time and make him the man I thought he was. Sadly, the little brain in my pants doesn’t eventryto resist his magnetic pull. She’s all over him like bees on honey.
He twiststoward me before I have time to turn tail and run. I let my eyes go flat and my mouth turn down. “You should have just roached her mane and saved yourself the time.” Mariano startles at my voice and Miss P’s head shoots up, but he somehow manages to keep his grip on that final braid.
He smilesdespite the coldness of my words and my blatant lack of gratitude for what is truly the nicest of nice things. What man knows how to braid so perfectly? A man with nieces he loves, that’s who.Shut uuuuuuuuuuuuuup, heart. I hate you. Not as much as I hate him, but you’re stomping on my last nerve.
“For you,Lolly, I have all the time in the world.” And then he turns back to finish the final braid. “The horses are ready,sí?”
“They are.”I keep my voice terse, tight, unfeeling.
“Then you should go.Be social! Better yet: keep Alan from getting so drunk he falls off. Or find a way to make Henrietta, who seems to prefer we call her Hettie now, enjoy her ride.” I don’t like that he is sending me away. Have I done something wrong—other than no longer being his lover, which doesn’t count?
Apparently,I’m not very good at hiding my feelings because, like Pippa, he intuits my confusion. “You are always getting all the horses ready when it is not your job. Go. Enjoy. Rum Punch will be ready for you when the hunt starts.” For one flash, I think of Stephanie and how to her I was always invisible—just ‘the barn help.’ It’s strange to have all the work I do with the horses be noticed and, dare I say, appreciated.Too little, too late, Lolly. Remember who is he. What he did. Why you have every right to be mad as a viper.I leave his orbit before my heart betrays me, though that pull—that magnetic pulse in my panties—screams for me to touch him.
