glanced harmlessly off the thick thatch of light brown curls protecting the back of his head. But she had at least succeeded in surprising him.
‘Let go of me, you beast,’ she said, interjecting as much affront in her voice as she could. And began to struggle.
To her chagrin, though he looked rather surprised by her demand, he let go of her at once. Even so, it was no easy matter to wriggle off him, hampered as she was by the train of her riding habit, which had become tangled round her legs.
‘Ooohh...’ he sighed. ‘That feels good.’ He half closed his eyes and sort of undulated under her. Indicating that all her frantic efforts to get up were only having a very basic effect on his body.
‘You...you beast,’ she said, swiping at him with her crop again.
He winced and rubbed at his arm where she’d managed to get in a decent hit before overbalancing and landing flat on his chest again.
‘I don’t enjoy those sorts of games,’ he protested. ‘I’d much rather we just kissed a bit more and then—’
She shoved her hands hard against his chest, using his rock-solid body as leverage so she could get to her hands and knees.
‘Then nothing,’ she said, shuffling back a bit before her trailing riding habit became so tangled she had to roll half over and sit on it. ‘You clearly aren’t injured after your fall from your horse, though you deserve,’ she said, kicking and plucking at her skirts until she got her legs free, ‘to have your neck broken.’
‘I say, that’s rather harsh,’ he objected, propping himself up on one elbow and watching her struggles sleepily.
‘No, it isn’t. You are drunk. And you were trying to ride the kind of horse that would be a handful for any man, sober. What were you thinking? You could have injured him!’
‘No, I couldn’t. I can ride any horse, drunk or sober—’
‘Well, clearly you can’t, or he wouldn’t have bolted and you wouldn’t be lying here—’
‘Lucifer wouldn’t have thrown me if you hadn’t dashed across in front of us and startled him.’
‘No, he would have carried you on to a public highway and ridden down some hapless milkmaid instead. And you would definitely have broken your neck if he’d thrown you on the cobbles.’
‘I might have known,’ he said with a plaintive sigh, ‘that you were too good to be true. You might look like an angel and kiss like a siren, and have a fine pair of legs, but you have the disposition of a harpy.’
She gasped. Not at the insult, so much, but at the fact that he was gazing admiringly at her legs while saying it. Making her aware that far too much of them was on show.
‘Well, you’re an oaf. A drunken oaf at that!’ She finally managed to untangle her legs and get to her feet just as three more men came staggering into view.
‘Good God, just look at that,’ said the first of the trio to reach them, a slender, well-dressed man with cold grey eyes and a cruel mouth. ‘Even lying flat on his back in the middle of nowhere, Ulysses can find entertainment to round off the evening.’
Since the man with the cruel mouth was looking at her as though she was about to become his entertainment, Harriet’s blood ran cold.
‘I have no intention of being anyone’s entertainment,’ she protested, inching towards Shadow, though how on earth she was to mount up and escape, she had no idea. ‘I only came over here to see if I could help.’
‘You can certainly help settle the b-bet,’ said the second young man to arrive, flicking his long, rather greasy fringe out of his eyes. ‘Did he reach the C-Cumberland Gate b-before Lucifer unseated him?’
‘It was a wager?’ She rounded on the one they’d referred to as Ulysses, the one who was still half-reclining, propped up on one arm, watching them all with a crooked grin on his face. ‘You risked injuring that magnificent beast for the sake of a wager?’
‘The only risk was to his own fool neck,’ said the man with the cold eyes. ‘Lucifer can take care of himself,’ he said, going across to the stallion and patting his neck proudly. From the way the stallion lowered his head and butted his chest, it was clear he was Lucifer’s master.
Harriet stooped to gather her train over one arm, her heart hammering. At no point had she felt afraid of the man they called Ulysses, even when he’d been trying to roll her over on to her back. There was something about his square, good-natured face that put her at ease. Or perhaps it had been that twinkle in his eyes.
But the way the one with the cruel mouth was looking at her was a different matter. There was something...dark about him. Predatory. Even if he was fond of his horse and the horse clearly adored him in return, that didn’t make him a decent man.
He then confirmed all her suspicions about his nature by turning to her with a mocking smile on his face. ‘It is hardly fair of you to reward Ulysses with a kiss,’ he said, taking a purposeful step closer, ‘when it is I who won the wager.’
She lashed out with her riding crop and would have caught him across his face had he not flinched out of her way with a dexterity that both amazed and alarmed her. Even in a state of inebriation, this man could still pose a very real threat to a lone female.
Keeping her eyes on him, she inched sideways to where she’d tethered Shadow. And collided with what felt like a brick wall.
‘Oof!’ said the wall, which turned out to be the third of Ulysses’s companions, a veritable giant of a man.
‘You got off lightly,’ remarked Mr Cold-Eyes to the giant, who was rubbing his mid-section ruefully. ‘She made a deliberate attempt to injure me.’
‘That’s prob’ly ’cos you’re fright’ning her,’ slurred the giant. ‘Clearly not a lightskirt.’
‘Then what is she doing in the park, at this hour, kissing stray men she finds lying about the place?’ Cold-Eyes gave her a look of such derision it sent a flicker of shame coiling through her insides.
‘She couldn’t resist me,’ said Ulysses, grinning at her.
‘She d-don’t seem to like you, th-though, Zeus,’ said the one with the greasy, floppy fringe.
‘Archie, you wound me,’ said Zeus, as she got her fingers, finally, on Shadow’s reins. Though how on earth she was to mount up, she couldn’t think. There was no mounting block. No groom to help her reach the stirrup.
Just as she’d resigned herself to walking home leading her mount, she felt a pair of hands fasten round her waist. On a reflex, she lashed out at her would-be assailant, catching him on the crown of his head.
‘Ouch,’ said the drunken giant of a man, as he launched her up and on to Shadow’s saddle. ‘There was no call for that.’ He backed away, rubbing his head with a puzzled air.
No, there hadn’t been any call for it. But how could she have guessed the giant had only been intending to help her?
‘Then I beg your pardon,’ she said through gritted teeth as she fumbled her foot into the stirrup.
