makes you blind to reality.”
Alejandro stiffened. He took offence to that. Sebastien might be the only self-made man among them, older than the rest by three years, but they had all achieved success in their own right.
Leading his family company had been Alejandro’s birthright, yes, but he had been the one to transform the Salazar Coffee Company from a fledgling international player into a global household name as CEO. He had more than paid his dues.
Stavros threw away three cards. “Try telling us you would go back to when you were broke, before you made your fortune. Hungry isn’t happy. That’s why you’re such a rich bastard now.”
“As it happens,” Sebastien countered with a deceptively casual shrug, “I’ve been thinking of donating half my fortune to charity to start a global search and rescue fund. Not everyone has friends who will dig him out of an avalanche with their bare hands.”
Alejandro almost choked on the sip of whiskey he’d taken. “Are you serious? That’s what? Five billion?”
“You can’t take it with you. I’ll tell you what,” Sebastien mused, gaze moving from one to the other, “you three manage to go two weeks without your credit cards and family name and I’ll do it.”
Silence fell over the table. “Starting when?” Alejandro queried. “We all have responsibilities.”
“Fair enough,” Sebastien agreed. “Clear the decks at home. But be prepared for word from me—and two weeks in the real world.”
Alejandro blinked. “You’re really going to wager half your fortune on a cakewalk of a challenge?”
“If you’ll put up your island...your favorite toys? Yes.” Sebastien lifted his whiskey glass. “I say where and when.”
“Easy,” said Stavros. “Count me in.”
They all clinked glasses, Alejandro dismissing the challenge as one of Sebastien’s philosophical, whiskey-induced rants.
Until he ended up undercover as a groom in the Hargroves’ legendary Kentucky stables exactly five months later.
Five months later—Esmerelda, the Hargrove Estate, Kentucky.
Day one of Alejandro’s challenge
CECILY HARGROVE TOOK the turn to the final line of jumps at such a tight angle, Bacchus’s hind end spun out before her horse regained his balance, smoothed out his stride and headed toward the first oxer.
Too slow. Way too slow. Dammit, what was wrong with him?
She dug her heels into her horse’s sides, pushing him forward to give them the momentum they needed for the jump, but Bacchus’s hesitancy at takeoff threw their timing all off—only her horse’s pure physical power allowing them to clear the fence.
Jaw set, frustration surging through her, she finished the last two jumps of the combination, then brought Bacchus to a dancing trot, then a walk, halting in front of her trainer.
Dale gave her a grim look as she pulled off her hat, the hot summer sun sticking the strands of her hair to her head. Her stomach knotted. “I don’t want to know.”
“Sixty-eight seconds. You need to figure out what’s wrong with that horse, Cecily.”
Tell her something she didn’t know. With her second mount, Derringer, showing his inexperience in competition, Bacchus was her only chance to make this year’s world championship team. Fully healed from their accident last year, her horse was physically sound, it was his mental outlook she was worried about.
If she didn’t straighten out his head—this strange hesitancy he was displaying toward jumps he never used to blink at—her dream would be sunk before it had even started.
The only thing in this world that meant anything to her.
“Do it again,” Dale instructed.
She shook her head, fury and frustration welling up inside her to spur a wet heat at the back of her eyes. “I’m done.”
“Cec—”
She kicked Bacchus into a canter and headed for the barn, fighting back the tears. She had handled all the lemons life had thrown at her and Lord knew there had been a few of them, but this, this was not something she could fail at. Not when she’d spent every waking moment since she was five working toward this day.
Pulling Bacchus to a halt in front of the groom who stood lounging against the stable door, she slid off and threw the reins at him with more force than she’d intended. He caught them with a lithe movement, pushing away from the door. Hands clenched at her sides, she spun on her heel and turned to leave.
“You don’t cool your horse down?”
The unfamiliar low, slightly accented drawl stopped her in her tracks. Spinning around, she took in its owner. The new groom she’d seen with Cliff earlier, presumably. She’d been so preoccupied she hadn’t paid any attention to him. She wondered now how that had been possible.
Tall, well over six feet, he was pure, packed muscle in the T-shirt and jeans he wore. Slowly, furiously, she slid her gaze up that impressive body and found the rest of him was equally jaw dropping. His black hair was worn at a slightly rebellious length, days-old stubble lined a brutally handsome, square-cut jaw, his eyes the most sinfully dark ones she’d ever seen.
Her stomach flip flopped, a moment of sizzling hot, sexual chemistry arcing between them. She allowed herself to sink into it for a moment, to absorb the shimmer way down low, because it was something she hadn’t felt in a long, long time, if ever.
His blatant stare didn’t waver. Unnerved by the intensity of the connection, she sliced it dead. “You’re new,” she said icily, lifting her chin. “What’s your name?”
A dip of his head. “Colt Banyon, ma’am. At your service.”
She nodded. “I’m fairly sure then, Colt, that Cliff will have explained the finer points of your job to you?”
“He did.”
“Why then, do you think it’s okay to question how I handle my horse?”
He lifted a shoulder. “It seems to me you were having some trouble out there today. In my experience, spending some bonding time with your mount can help with the trust factor.”
The pressure in her head threatened to explode through her skull. No one dared talk to her like that. She couldn’t believe his audacity.
She took a step closer, discovering just how big he was when she had to tip her head back to look up at him, his dangerously beautiful eyes a rich whiskey fire lighting an inky black canvas.
“And from which school of psychobabble does that assessment come from?”
His sensual mouth curved. “My grandmother. She’s a magician with horses.”
The
