Three. Noelle MackЧитать онлайн книгу.
matrimony by late spring. The season was well underway and the bachelors of the ton would soon be departing for their country estates, to spend the languorous months of summer in pursuit of trout and the more willing servant girls of the household.
Yet the married women seemed as eager to catch the eye of the men who strolled by, sometimes alone and sometimes in groups of two or three. Some men rode, putting on a display of muscular buttocks in breeches that were almost indecently tight, their thighs gripping the saddle leather in a most provocative way as they trotted by on the finest horseflesh in London. From behind she could glimpse something even more delicious: the balls of the well-endowed men, compressed slightly by the supple buckskin that contained them, but very much there. Fiona never tired of that sight.
She would not have minded being swept away by such a man for a wild ride over a moonlit moor, if a convenient moor could be found that was not too cold or too desolate, she thought with an inward smile. He would clasp her to his chest with one strong arm during their desperate ride…his stiff cock pressing into her bouncing behind while she clung to the saddle horn and rode astride, just as he did.
Fiona let her mind drift and elaborated upon her fantasy of ravishment. He would know that her soft cunny smacked the saddle with each bounce and that would make him grit his teeth and groan with hot longing…until, wild with desire, her faceless lover would make the horse rear and scream, then dismount to lay her down upon the heather…well no, that was scratchy stuff. Anyway, he would make her come again and again.
The very thought made her feel randy. It was rather at odds with the decorous scene through which she was driving at the moment, certainly, but the fleeting fantasy was quite diverting.
Fiona did not see the piece of paper that the breeze tossed under her horse’s nose, but she felt a hard jerk as the animal shied and the reins went flying. Both her hands clung to the side of the carriage when the horse launched into an all-out gallop that sent the strolling fashionables scurrying to safety on every side.
Fiona had not the breath to scream. The horse swung away and headed over the greensward as the shouts receded. She heard only the dull thud of pounding hooves and the rattle of the light carriage. It was likely to lose a wheel at this breakneck pace over open ground or shake itself to bits with her in it. But there was nothing she could do besides hang on.
Another sound came to her ears, of faster hooves overtaking them. One of the horsemen upon the Hyde Park paths had come to her rescue, an excellent rider who brought his mount near as he dared to her panicked animal and made a swift grab for the loose reins.
He missed. He grabbed again and missed again. Then, whether from the closeness of the other horse or simply because hers had grown tired, the hooves slowed to a trot, and then, blessedly, a walk. The winded gelding finally stopped…and hung his weary head.
“As well you might,” the man said softly. His voice was deep and soothing. He reached for the reins as he halted his mount and got them at last.
“Th-thank you,” Fiona stammered when she found the strength to speak. She put a hand to her forehead, shielding her eyes from the strong sun. Her bonnet had been lost in the pell-mell gallop and her hair had come unpinned, tumbling down over her neck and shoulders in waves of glossy honey. “That was a trick worthy of the Roman arena. Do you race chariots, sir?”
Her rescuer kept both sets of reins in his hands as he dismounted. “No. But I was a cavalry officer, and I and my horse are veterans of the Peninsula battles. You might say that we learned that trick together.”
He made soothing noises to her gelding and stroked the animal’s sweating neck with fine, strong hands turned a deep color by a foreign sun. Despite that, they were a gentleman’s hands, she thought, wishing that he would stroke away her trembling as well.
He dropped the reins, moving to her carriage to help her down. She alighted upon the grass, almost too weak to stand, but she stiffened her spine and took several deep breaths, then felt a little better. They were not far from the shade of the trees, where she might sit and rest. Then Fiona realized that she would have been thrown instantly from the carriage had her runaway horse swerved to avoid the trees, and began to tremble again.
The man noticed. He slipped off his light riding coat and put it over her shoulders, saying only, “Wear this. And do not argue.”
She looked up at him with astonishment. “Why would I argue?”
He smiled slightly. “A riding coat does not go with an elegant gown, milady.”
“I don’t care. It is comforting. And it smells very nicely of bay rum, and—” And you, she wanted to say, but didn’t. A powerful, virile man who had ridden hard and risked his neck to save her. “What is your name, sir?”
“Edward Finch, Lord Delamar, at your service.”
“I am—”
“Ah, but I already know who you are. The Incomparable Fiona. The Belle of Mayfair. Also known as Lady Gilberte. The young widow of that filthy old scoundrel who died under mysterious circumstances. You are as lovely as the scandal sheets say. But did you poison him, as they also say?”
“Wh-what?” she sputtered.
He was opening a small compartment at the back of her carriage and seemed not to notice her consternation. “Do you have a lead rope? Ah, here is one. We can tie the horses while you rest and tell me everything.”
She felt inclined to fling his coat to the ground and tread upon it. Yet he did not seem to be the sort of man who would be intimidated by a fit of womanly pique. “There is nothing to tell,” she said at last.
“Of course not. I was speaking in jest, but I apologize. You are still upset, understandably so.”
Fiona looked back at the distant path to the point where her horse had bolted; the crowd that had fled before her had resumed their peaceful promenade. Then she looked back at him.
He offered no more explanation of his remarks about the scandal that had sullied her reputation—what little remained of it, she thought—and was busying himself with the horses and leading them a little distance away once he had freed hers from the tangled harness.
He returned. “Since you have not asked for my forgiveness, Lord Delamar, I shall not give it. But I accept your apology.” There was a noticeable edge in her voice.
He nodded, giving her the slightest of smiles. “Rest assured that I never believe what appears in print. The scandal sheets provide coarse entertainment for the rabble, nothing more.”
“Ah, yes. They were out in force upon the path. Did some low fellow notice me and mention my name?”
“No.” He smiled. “I was riding close behind you with a friend. A very respectable friend. But he knew who you were.”
“I see. And when my horse shied, did he tell you to come after me?”
Lord Delamar shook his head. “When I saw the danger you were in, I spurred my horse and came on straightaway. I don’t suppose that my friend or the others thought you had lost the reins; only that you had decided to amuse yourself with a mad dash. You have a reputation for being rather wild, you know.”
“This conversation seems to be going in circles. You have returned to the subject of my reputation, such as it is.”
“So we have,” he said genially. “Well, if it is any comfort, we are two of a kind. I am not received in the very best drawing rooms myself.”
Lady Fiona favored that unexpected response with a slight smile of her own. “Is that why your friend did not follow you? I suppose that being seen with you is bad enough, but adding a scandalous female like me is far worse.”
He snorted. “I have very little use for propriety, milady.”
Fiona pondered that interesting statement as she walked up and down. “Then I am glad that we met, even under these circumstances.”
“Yes. Wild horses brought us together. It