with her. ‘Yup, it’s the Monty.’
‘Wow, awesome. I saw him at Olympia, do you remember, Dad? Wow, when he did that last jump he was so amazing.’
Tom shrugged, trying to avoid saying no, Olympia had just been another day out, but Tab wasn’t listening anyway. ‘He was so brilliant in the Puissance. I mean, I was way back in the stands, but he’s here now. Mega, just, he’s… can I stroke him?’
They’d lost him, but his daughter was back to being interested again, which was good enough for him.
‘And this is Monty’s Mistake.’ Lottie had strode on to the next stable, obviously in tour mode, and got much the same reaction as before from Tabatha.
‘This place is just so cool.’
Who’d have thought anyone could be so interested in something four-legged that had big teeth at one end, hard hooves at the other, and excreted great piles of waste and smelly air constantly? But his daughter was transformed, so mission accomplished, even if it was easier than even he, with a bucketload of optimism, could ever have expected. Lord, if he could only keep her in this mood all the time. His concentration lapsed, a horse was a horse, all the same except they came in a variety of colours and sizes.
Apart from the odd wisp of hay in front of the stables, where horses had stood to chew and watch their neighbours, the concrete was as clean and tidy as if it had been constantly brushed, but there was no one in sight. The soft rays of spring sunshine filtered over the low roofs of the stable blocks, burnishing the old red tiles, dancing over the fading daffodils and the jaunty primroses and pansies. For some strange reason, Tom felt at peace. At home. Like he hadn’t felt since he’d walked out of the house they’d lived in since Tab had been born.
Even Lottie was relaxed here, she wasn’t looking at him like he was some alien that she was expecting to grope her with a third arm at every turn. In cut-off denim shorts, a faded polo shirt that had seen better days and her hair pulled through the back of a baseball cap, she looked the picture of health and a thousand times sexier than any woman he’d seen in a long, long time. She was also young, he reminded himself. And he wasn’t going to get involved with anyone. And definitely not the girl he was courting into taking his daughter in hand. Even if, with horse slobber on her shoulder, she still looked good enough to make him feel the first stirrings in his groin he’d felt in a long time. It must be all this bloody country air, he must have overdosed on oxygen and it was making him light-headed.
‘The thing is.’ The woman in question was staring at him with a clear, and unnerving gaze, and biting the inside of her cheek. ‘Well, I don’t usually give lessons.’ She sounded apologetic, like a doctor forced to give bad news. ‘I don’t know what Pip told you, but all these horses are, well…’
‘Unsuitable?’ Tom spoke gently, sinking down on to the worn bench outside the stable. Crossed his ankles and tried not to stare at her long legs, at the perfect dip of a waist. Which led to softly rounded breasts. ‘I could close my eyes.’
‘Sorry?’
She was staring, wide eyes with a hint of alarm. Shit, he’d said it out loud. ‘Nothing, sorry, just thinking out loud.’ If he’d been smarter he could have thought of something witty that sounded the same, but he’d need a week and a thesaurus.
‘Oh, right. Well. It’s not that I’m not saying Tabatha isn’t a good rider, well I don’t know, but, well, even if she was really good… Well, the thing is, Dad won’t let anyone on his horses unless he’s seen them ride, and I’ve only got the one horse and she’s very green.’
Tom held a hand up. ‘It’s fine. Honestly. We’ve arranged to get a horse on loan for the summer, from the stables that Tab used to go to. It’s arriving tomorrow. Actually, I was wondering if you had a spare stable.’ He glanced around, there seemed lots of empty stables.
‘It’s not a bleeding livery stables.’ The gruff tone announced Billy’s arrival and dispersed that last lingering of Tom’s erotic musings.
Tom had heard, on good authority, well, from Pip, that Billy was as easy-going as they came. ‘He’s a right laugh, everyone loves Billy’ had been her exact words, he remembered. Either, they’d caught the man on an off day, or his idea of a right laugh and Pip’s were on different planets. And he had thought, or hoped, he could trust Pip’s judgement.
‘She is, like, totally amazing.’ Tab was staring at the horse that Billy was perched on, and for a moment Tom thought he saw a softening of the man’s features.
‘She needs taking in hand, like a lot of females.’ There was a hint of a crooked smile, which Tom wasn’t that keen on. ‘So, you’re not here to put in an offer then?’ The question came out abruptly.
‘Sorry?’
Billy took that as a no. ‘Well, that’s okay then. Lottie be a darling and get her untacked, Tiggy seems to have gone AWOL.’
‘Dad, I need—’ But he’d jumped off the horse and strode off, tapping his crop against his boot. Lottie grabbed the horse’s reins, just as she started to wander after Billy, which was an annoying habit most of his horses developed. The need to follow him.
She needed to talk to Tom, then she needed to get home and changed so that she could get to the pub before Rory, Pip and Mick were too drunk to miss her. The last thing she wanted to do was run round after her dad just because the vague and unreliable Tiggy had wandered off again. Why her father had employed the woman, Lottie really didn’t know.
‘You have got spare stables though?’ Tom found that the further away the man was, the more relaxed he became.
‘I err.’ Lottie stared at him. If she didn’t get rid of them soon she wouldn’t have time for a shower before she headed to the pub, and all of a sudden she didn’t want to be smelly.
‘Great, I knew it. How about we just try it for a week or two? I’m happy to pay the going rate, I mean you’ve got everything here.’ He named an amount that made Lottie’s stomach jolt. Was that monthly or weekly? ‘Then, how about a lesson next week so you can assess Tab?’ She felt her head nodding, which it really wasn’t supposed to be doing. Amazing what the need to get rid of someone could do to your common sense.
‘Brilliant, see you tomorrow. Come on Tabby, I can see Lottie’s busy.’
He winked, put a fatherly arm around his daughter and was heading for the eyesore of a car before Lottie got the chance to ask what was supposed to be happening tomorrow.
***
Amanda James stood, a picture of restrained elegance, and stared out of the window at the vast expanse of immaculate lawn and felt a sudden pang for a vision of concrete. It wasn’t that she didn’t like it here, she loved it. But everything was so raw, animal-like. Even Lady Stanthorpe was as sharp, assessing and brusque as they come. These ladies might play golf and have afternoon tea, but their homes were freezing and their furniture passed on down so many years each piece had its own ten generation pedigree.
And an Aga was fine, when it bloody worked. That was the trouble, everything was such damned hard work. Even the talking, unless you had a degree in equine studies. God, how she hated horses sometimes, they were impossible to escape. Totally impossible.
It hadn’t bothered Marcus, he had a totally unshakeable self-belief that carried him through life untouched by the scathing comments and put-downs.
