Appointment At The Altar. Jessica Hart

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СКАЧАТЬ horseman.’ Lucy had never, in fact, seen Kevin on a horse. As Guy had pointed out, she was usually in the kitchen when the stockmen were at work, but she had heard them talking about how good Kevin was often enough.

      ‘I can ride.’

      ‘I don’t mean English riding.’

      ‘English riding?’ Guy raised his brows, a smile hovering around his mouth, and she gestured irritably.

      ‘You know what I mean. Just sitting on the back of the horse and pottering along a country lane. I’m talking about real horsemanship—working with the horse, being able to control it absolutely the way Kevin can. Taming a wild horse, or bringing down a cow without hurting it…all the things he does every day.’

      ‘I admit I don’t spend a lot of time on horseback in the bank, but that doesn’t mean I couldn’t be a stockman if I wanted. Could Kevin run an investment bank, do you think?’

      Lucy looked at him suspiciously. ‘Are you really telling me that you can ride like Kevin?’

      ‘I’m not saying I’m any good, I’m just saying that I could be a real man if I wanted to.’

      As usual, his face was poker straight, but his voice held that undercurrent of amusement that so riled Lucy. She didn’t believe a word of it. He was just teasing her, probably miffed because she thought that Kevin was more of a man.

      Lucy’s chin went up. She had had enough of being teased by Guy over the last few days. ‘Prove it,’ she said.

      ‘Prove that I can ride?’ Guy rubbed his jaw, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. ‘Short of throwing myself on to a spare horse, I’m not sure how I can do that.’

      ‘We’re at a rodeo,’ she pointed out sweetly. ‘There are plenty of horses back there.’ She nodded in the direction of the holding pens behind the makeshift arena. ‘You could take part in one of the competitions.’

      ‘Have you seen those horses?’ Guy made a comic face. ‘Half of them are completely wild!’

      Lucy shrugged. ‘You said you could ride,’ she reminded him.

      ‘Well, there’s riding and riding, if you know what I mean.’

      ‘You’re the one who said you could ride like Kevin. I don’t think it would be easy, but a real man would like a challenge. You obviously don’t,’ she finished dismissively, and then regretted it because Guy had straightened and suddenly he seemed very solid and very close.

      For one frozen moment she thought she might have gone too far, but then he smiled. Taking off his sunglasses, he looked directly into Lucy’s hostile eyes. ‘I wouldn’t say that, Cinderella,’ he said softly.

      Lucy had the strangest impression that the noise and smells of the rodeo had faded around them while blue eyes locked with blue. Hers were the blue of a summer sky, while Guy’s were darker, a deep ocean blue where laughter lurked like sunlight glinting on the water and, as she stared up at him, held against her will by their gleaming depths, she was suddenly acutely aware of him.

      Ever since he had arrived, she had dismissed Guy as a playboy, too handsome for his own good, too charming to be real, but now, all at once, she saw him as a man. A man with warm brown skin and a hint of golden stubble, with a strong jaw and a slightly crooked nose and laughter lines creasing those blue, blue eyes, and something turned over inside her at the realisation that he was not only a very real man but that he was very close.

      ‘In fact,’ Guy went on, and his voice held that disturbing undercurrent of amusement and something else that sent a tiny shiver down Lucy’s spine, ‘I’d say that I enjoy a challenge just as much as the next man, if not more.’

      Swallowing, Lucy succeeded in wrenching her gaze away from his at last and she took a step back. ‘You’ll do it, then?’ she said a little unsteadily. She felt odd, as if the ground had been cut away beneath her feet somehow.

      Guy grinned again and, in spite of herself, her pulse gave a little kick. ‘You know it would be much easier if you would just believe me.’

      ‘I’ll believe you when you take part in the next round. It’s calf roping next, so they’ll give you a proper horse.’

      ‘Calf-roping? You couldn’t pick something a bit harder?’ said Guy humorously. ‘That means I’ve not only got to stay on the horse but catch a calf with a lasso.’

      ‘It’ll be a challenge,’ Lucy agreed. ‘And according to you, you like one of those!’

      ‘Ah, well, if that’s what it takes to convince you, I suppose I’d better—’He broke off as an ‘ooooh’ came from the crowd standing around the ring. ‘Isn’t that Kevin?’

      ‘Kevin?’ Lucy turned sharply to see Kevin rolling free of the horses’ hooves in a little cloud of dust, but he was smiling broadly as he stood up and helped the men catch the horse that was still bucking furiously around the edge of the ring. People were clapping too, so presumably he had stayed on the horse’s back for longer than the others.

      She had missed his moment of glory. Lucy was mortified, and furious with Guy for distracting her. When Kevin dodged his way across the ring towards her, she gave him a dazzling smile that pointedly excluded Guy.

      ‘You did brilliantly,’ she said, trusting that he had been too busy clinging on to the horse to notice that she’d been talking to Guy instead of watching him.

      ‘Wasn’t bad,’ said Kevin laconically.

      ‘Congratulations,’ said Guy, muscling in where he wasn’t wanted, as usual. Anyone with any sensitivity would have murmured an excuse and slipped away to leave her alone with Kevin, but not Guy! No, he was right there, shaking Kevin’s hand, being friendly and interested and asking him about the skills he needed to stay in the saddle so long, until Kevin was getting positively loquacious.

      ‘Isn’t it time you went and got ready for the calf-roping, Guy?’ Lucy interrupted as a megaphone crackled into life with an announcement about the next competition. ‘You don’t want to miss your chance to have a go, do you?’

      ‘You going in for that, Guy?’ asked Kevin and she couldn’t help noticing that he seemed more interested in that than in anything she had had to say.

      ‘So it seems,’ he said, smiling. ‘Lucy’s issued a challenge that I can’t refuse, although I’m not sure that I’ll be able to take part. I wouldn’t blame the organisers if they didn’t want amateurs messing up their competition.’

      Lucy wasn’t going to let him weasel out of it that easily. ‘At least you can go and see.’

      Kevin looked puzzled as Guy strolled off. ‘I didn’t know he could use a rope,’ he said.

      ‘He can’t,’ she said scornfully. ‘He’s just calling my bluff. You wait, he’ll be back in a minute with some excuse about why he can’t do it.’

      But Guy didn’t come back. Lucy should have been perfectly happy now that she was alone with Kevin, but her attention kept being distracted by the laughter from where all the contestants were gathered. Whenever she glanced over, she could see Guy, clowning around, pretending to get on a horse the wrong way round, borrowing СКАЧАТЬ