Love At First Bite Part 33

Chapter Three.

Trying to concentrate on the ride and forget her escort, Anne took a familiar path through the fields along the north side of the manor house. The smell of rich dirt and clean air always made her feel better. Anne was a country girl at heart, if she could get on well enough in the city.

"What are my uncle's plans for the filly?" she called over her shoulder, expecting Merrick to be following at a discreet distance as he'd been told to do.

"I recall hearing your uncle say it wasn't your business."

She turned to find Merrick beside her. It didn't surprise her that he hadn't followed her uncle's instructions. Anne suspected

Merrick seldom followed anyone's rules but his own.

"As my uncle said, I have a fondness for horses and the stable. The gray filly has excellent lines. He isn't going to sell her, is he?"

Merrick's lips suddenly curled slightly at the corners. "No," he answered. "She's in season. He wants to breed her."

Anne realized why her uncle had refused to discuss the issue with her. Such things were not discussed in the presence of ladies.

She was always told to stay away from the stable when the breeding took place. The new stable master seemed to take delight

in saying something so shocking in her company. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction of making her blush again.

"To which stallion?" she asked. "I hope not Ascot, the large sorrel. He's too big boned. A colt produced by him would likely be too large for the filly to deliver. I'd personally choose Shadow, the charcoal stallion. He's smaller, and the coloring would suit, I'd think."

When Merrick didn't respond, she glanced toward him. His lips were still curled in that disturbing way that drew her gaze to

them, but in his eyes shone a glimmer of respect.

"My thoughts exactly," he said. "Your uncle doesn't strike me as the type of man to appreciate my advice, however, so I'll not be giving it."

"It is your right, isn't it?" Anne asked. "To advise him on such matters? I thought that was the reason he hired you to run his

stable."

He laughed and she saw the flash of his white teeth again. "He hired me to say he got the best. He likes the best, your uncle.

Your aunt, too, I'm thinking."

Now he had overstepped his boundaries. Anne bristled. Her aunt and uncle did always require the best of everything, but that

was beside the point.

"That is not a subject you are familiar with and you should refrain from pretending that you are," she scolded. "And aren't you supposed to be riding a proper distance behind me?"

The smile faded from his lips. "When I become familiar with the path, then I will ride discreetly behind you, my lady. If that is your wish," he added, as if the matter might be in question.

"Why wouldn't it be?" Anne asked defensively.

"I never said it was," he countered.

"You hinted at as much," she huffed. "You mustn't a.s.sume to know me or what I would or would not prefer simply because you made a mistake last night."

He lifted a dark brow. "Are you saying you didn't make one? Maybe you didn't mind giving me the wrong idea so much."

His easy ability to fl.u.s.ter her had Anne feeling a temper that was usually nonexistent in her. Instead of arguing with him, she turned her attention to the path, kicked her heels into Storm's sides, and took off. Anne let Storm have her head, both of them

familiar with the path. Merrick pulled up next to her a moment later.

Storm was fast, but Anne doubted that she could outrun the black. The stallion was bigger and stronger. Anne, however, sat lighter in the saddle. She was feeling a rebellious streak again and urged Storm into a faster gait. Ahead the path narrowed, leaving the open fields and winding through wooded ground.

Anne supposed it wasn't a considerate thing to do, forcing the man to follow her in a dead run across a path he was not familiar with, but she suspected she could leave him behind easily enough. He should be put in his place... although she was never one to really think of "places" and "putting people in them" before.

Maybe she only wanted to show off. Anne seldom had an opportunity to display her riding skills. The paths in London, Rotten Row and the like, were tame for her talents. A log had fallen across the path ahead and she and the mare took the jump easily. Deeper Anne wound her way along the path into the woods, always aware that the stable master and the stallion were nearly on Storm's rump.

When the path widened, Merrick was suddenly beside her. Ahead, the path narrowed again and she couldn't let him get out in front of her. Then it would be a case of him leading and her following. Anne urged Storm on.

Merrick swore, then loosened the reins to give the stallion more freedom. The animal lunged ahead so swiftly that Anne felt a sinking sensation. Her mare couldn't match the stallion's speed. Just as Anne had wanted to avoid, Merrick pulled ahead when the path narrowed and she was forced to follow instead of lead.

The path widened again and they were in a meadow. He slowed his horse, and when she pulled up beside him Merrick reached across and s.n.a.t.c.hed Anne from the saddle. She was so startled by the move she immediately struggled and almost toppled to the ground. A strong arm settled around her waist and he easily brought the headstrong stallion to a halt. Merrick let Anne slide to the ground and quickly dismounted.

"What do you think you are doing?" she demanded, for the second time in the s.p.a.ce of a few hours after being in his company.

He dropped the reins to the stallion's bridle and pulled her a short distance from the excited animal. "I'm doing my job," Merrick shot back. "Making sure you don't break your pretty neck while trying to show me up and put me in my place."

"I am a very accomplished rider," Anne defended. "I thought you would have noticed that."

Merrick stared down at her. For just a moment, his blue eyes softened upon her. "I did notice," he said. "But I won't have you getting hurt my first day on the job because you wanted to impress me."

Since she'd just more or less admitted she was trying to impress him, Anne saw no reason to deny it. "Did I impress you?" she asked instead.

A smile tugged at the corner of his sensuous mouth. "You're a skilled rider," he admitted. "You have lovely form. You might have given me more of a race if not for the sidesaddle. It weighs more."

Anne glanced at her horse, the mare having come to a halt as soon as her rider was no longer at the reins to guide her. "I hate the saddle," Anne admitted, then bravely announced, "I'd like to ride astride, like a man."

She expected her declaration to shock him. Even old Barton had been shocked when she'd announced the same thing at the age of twelve. Merrick simply shrugged. "Then why don't you?"

Of course he wouldn't understand. Anne would enlighten him upon the subject. "It isn't considered proper for a lady to... to ride that way," she informed him. "My aunt and uncle would never allow it."

Merrick glanced about the clearing. "I don't see your aunt and uncle."

Anne came dangerously close to smiling. How simple his life must be compared to hers. She envied him in that moment. Anne had spent the good portion of her life heeding all the rules of society in order to please her aunt and uncle. In order to win their love.

"My old groom, Barton, nearly died of shock when I suggested it at the age of twelve." Recalling Barton brought tears to her

eyes. Anne had been very fond of him. "He pa.s.sed on just last month. I miss him."

Merrick placed his finger beneath her chin and forced her to look up at him. In his eyes was an expression so soft it melted her heart. It took her off guard-reminded her of the power he'd held over her the night before. Anne pulled away and blinked back her tears.

"You must think I'm silly," she said, walking toward Storm to gather the mare's drooping reins.

"I don't know what I think," she heard him say to her back. "And I usually know right away."

Anne decided then and there she must squash her unruly feelings for a man she hardly knew. It would be much better if they

were simply friends. She took a deep breath and turned to face Merrick.

"Can we start over?" she asked. "I feel as if we've gotten off on the wrong foot with one another."

For some reason, her suggestion made him smile. Not a genuine one but more of a smirk. "Do you think you can geld me with an

offer of friendship? Do you think that will make me forget what you feel like, and smell like, and taste like?"

Heat exploded in her cheeks and shot through her body. Anne had never met a man she couldn't tame with a show of good

manners and an offer of friendship. But she sensed that this was a man unlike any she had met before. "I believe you have the wrong impression of me."

He sauntered toward her. "Now that's where you're wrong, la.s.s. I think I might know you better than you know yourself."

When Anne looked up at him, she tried to appear as calm as he usually did in her presence. "What does that mean?"

The softness returned to his eyes and Anne thought that expression alone might be more dangerous than the scent he'd put off

last night in the stable.

"You long to be something that you're not. I understand that well enough. You want things you cannot have. I understand that,

too. You want to ride your horse astride like a man, at midnight, in nothing but your undergarments. What are you running from, Lady Anne? Or are you running in hopes you'll find whatever is missing in your life?"

The man had no right to ask her such personal questions. He had no right to a.s.sume so much about her. And d.a.m.n him, he had

no right to know her better than she knew herself, just as he claimed. This intimacy between them had to stop.

"I wish to return now," she said stiffly. Anne turned to mount her horse. Merrick was at her back in an instant. His hands closed around her waist.

"Not yet," he said. "Not until at least one of us gets something we want."

Chapter Four.