The Sherbrooke Bride (Sherbrooke Brides 1)

As a conversation effort it didn’t succeed.

Douglas looked off into the distance toward the Smitherstone weald, and said without preamble, “Tell me why you did it.”

Alex felt her heart begin to pound, low, dull thuds. The good Lord knew that there were many truths at work here. She would give him one of them and hope it would satisfy him, one that Tony had doubtless already pressed upon him the previous night. It was a good one, actually, the primary one, if one spoke from her sire’s point of view. “My father desperately needed funds, for my brother has just fled England leaving mountains of debt on his shoulders, and any settlement Tony made wouldn’t be nearly enough and—Don’t you see, my lord? Time was of the essence else we would have lost our home and—”

Douglas slashed his hand through the air. Garth took exception to his master’s peculiar behavior, twisted his head around and took a nip of Fanny’s neck. Fanny shrieked, rearing back onto her hind legs. Alex, taken off guard, cried out in surprise, flailed her arms to find balance, failed, then slid off Fanny’s rump, landing on the narrow path on her bottom.

She sat there, feeling as if her bones had been jarred into dust. She was afraid to move. She looked up at Douglas, who was calming his horse. He looked down at her, his eyes darkening to a near black, then quickly dismounted. Fanny, curse her hide, kicked up her back legs once more and wheeled about, galloping back toward the Sherbrooke stables.

“Are you all right?”

“I don’t know.”

“Luckily you appear well padded, what with all those petticoats and the like. Can you stand?”

Alex nodded. She came up onto her knees, felt a strange shock of dizziness, and shook her head to clear it.

Douglas clasped her beneath her arms and drew her upright. She didn’t weigh much, he thought, as he continued to support her. She did, however, feel very female. Finally, he felt that damned broom handle stiffen all the way from the back of her neck to her waist.

He released her. She weaved about, then straightened. “I’m all right.” She looked back toward the hall, obscured by two miles of trees and fields. “Fanny left me.”

And it was his fault, Douglas thought, wanting to howl because it meant that now he would have to hold—actually hold—this girl in front of him. He didn’t even want to look at her, much less be in her company, much less hold her.

He’d even have to talk to her, since it was all his bloody fault that she’d been thrown.

“You’re obviously not as proficient a horsewoman as you claimed, else you would have been more alert.”

As a verbal blow, it was the very best thus far, for it struck a killing blow to a pride inborn in her. She was not just a competent horsewoman; she was the best. She had ridden since before she could walk. She was beyond the best and above the best as well.

Her voice was as cold as the gaping shred in her pride. “Since your stallion is so ill-mannered as to take exception just because you fling yourself about on his back, yes, you are doubtless right.” She turned away from him and began the long walk back to the hall.

Douglas watched her go.

He should apologize.

He should take her up on Garth.

Well, hell.

Her riding costume was dusty and he saw a rip beneath her right arm. A good length of the hem had come unstitched and dragged behind her in the dirt. Her riding hat lay in the middle of the road and her hair was falling down her back. She was limping just a bit.

He cursed, quickly mounted Garth, and went after her.

Alex heard him coming. She kept walking. At this moment, she hoped he would rot, every beautiful inch of him. Suddenly he swooped down, catching her around her waist, and lifted her up to sit sideways on the saddle in front of him.

“I’m sorry, damn you.”

“That was most romantically done. Mrs. Radcliffe couldn’t have penned a more dashing performance.”

“Just because I didn’t wish to argue with you or dismount again . . . What damnable drivel!”

“I could have walked,” she said mildly. “It isn’t all that far.”

“You look like a ragamuffin. You look like a serving wench who’s enjoyed half a dozen men but didn’t please them sufficiently and got no coin for her labors.”

She said nothing, merely sat with that straight back of hers, looking off toward the side of the road.

“I suppose I’ll have to buy you a new riding habit now.”