The Lady Tamed by Boyd, Heather (urban books to read TXT) 📗

foot free of the stirrup, throw your leg backward and dismount over the left side of your mount.”

Jeremy executed what he thought was an adequate dismount, struggling because his left foot was still stuck in the stirrup, forgotten. Milo and Samuel did it with much more grace and speed. Jeremy gave the reins over to the groom with all possible haste and the horses were led away, much to his relief.

“Not bad for a first ride. Not bad at all. Just like a marriage really.” Samuel grinned. “Exciting at first and not without highs and lows.”

“Lots of lows,” Milo grunted. “Marriage is not for everyone. I was in love. But I was alone in that,” he warned quietly.

Samuel sighed. “Perhaps the next woman you court won’t pretend to be what she is not.”

“I’d never marry a woman who claims to love me, now.” Milo shook his head and then suddenly remembered Jeremy was listening. “Keep that to yourself.”

Who could he tell that would care? “Of course.”

He walked around the stable yard a bit, stretched his legs that seemed to have turned to jelly. He was supposed to find something to do with himself now until dinner that evening, he’d been told.

Fanny and the duchess were playing croquet on the lawn. It looked like great fun and he assumed she might be good at it, given the way she concentrated on every shot. He couldn’t loiter, but he wished he could have a game.

“Are we boring you, Dawes?” Samuel asked quietly, coming up to stand beside him.

“Not at all.”

The lord noticed the game underway. “We all used to play together when we were younger. Fanny would always win, having the cooler head, Rebecca would pout, and Jessica would sit herself down in the middle of play to stop the games from continuing if she wasn’t winning, which was all the time.”

“And if we were around,” Milo said, coming up to Jeremy’s other side, “I’d beat Fanny, Samuel would annoy Becca so she missed, and Anna and Jessica would sit down to make us play around them.”

Jeremy looked at Samuel and then at Milo. “Anna?”

The earl turned away and it was Samuel who answered. “Anna, our sister, was lost in childhood,” he whispered.

“I’m sorry to hear that. My condolences.”

The earl suddenly excused himself, leaving Jeremy and Samuel behind. “I didn’t mean to upset him.”

“He’s never gotten over the loss. She was special. His favorite.”

“Fanny has never mentioned she had another sister.”

“It’s a subject we never talk about very often, because then we lost mother too.” Come let’s find some shade and drink to forget life’s disappointments.”

“Mr. Dawes. Brother!”

Jeremy spun about at the sound of Fanny calling to them. She was rushing in their direction, skirts lifted over her ankles, hand holding down a hat on her head.

Samuel moved toward her. “Is something wrong?”

“Where are you going?”

“Dawes wanted a drink.”

Fanny came to a stop. “I doubt drinking was his suggestion, but it would be yours. I want to have a word with him. Do you mind excusing yourself?”

A sly smile crossed Samuel’s lips as he looked between them. “Give him back in one piece.”

Fanny wet her lips and then met Jeremy’s gaze. “Might we stroll the garden together, sir?”

Jeremy shrugged, as if her request didn’t bother him at all. But it did a little. “If you want.”

They strolled off together, Fanny walking very slowly at his side. When they made a series of turns through the dense trees, at Fanny’s behest, Jeremy heard her sigh. “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.”

“It’s never nothing when you sigh like that,” he noted.

She frowned. “I do not sigh in any particular way.”

He laughed softly at her indignation. “Yes, you do. There’s one sort of sigh when you see a friend, another when you’ve a letter from your father,” he leaned closer still, “and quite another when I put my lips to the back of your neck and kiss your skin.”

Jeremy wrenched himself away from her and buttoned his lips, annoyed he’d fallen back into old habits so easily. Flirting with her had become second nature…but that was before she’d offered to pay him for making love to her.

“I’ve ruined our friendship, haven’t I? I truly didn’t mean to insult you.”

“I didn’t know what I’d signed,” he admitted.

“But you did read it.”

“No, I listened to you read it to me,” he corrected. “I got lost in the sound of your voice and stopped paying attention long before you must have reached the end.”

“I’ll make sure you read every word in the future.”

“The future?”

“If there’s to be one,” she said, then worried her lip. “Can you forgive me?”

“It probably was a mistake to hire me in the first place.”

“No, it wasn’t.” She drew close. “We had a miscommunication, but the air is cleared now, isn’t it?”

“You were bound to grow tired of my acting sooner or later,” he admitted. “You should hire someone else for your next play.”

“There isn’t a good enough reason to pretend anymore,” Fanny murmured. “No more acting for me.”

They continued to walk and found themselves beside a field where a dozen workers toiled. Fanny waved at them and they waved back.

Jeremy smiled. “That’s what I remember most about you on the day we met at the theater. You were kind to everyone, no matter their position.”

“I remember you flirting with me until my sides ached from the laughter you inspired.”

“Well, you were the prettiest lass in the room,” he admitted. “I wanted to impress you, even before I knew who you really were.”

“I was impressed. I still am.” She looked down at her hands. “I see you’ve made friends with my brothers.”

He smiled. “Does it look that way? I thought them more like conspirators to your father’s torture.”

“What torture?”

“Shooting at dawn. Riding. Living as a gentleman is hard work indeed when you have to worry about what everyone thinks and might say. How does anyone bear the scrutiny?”

“I don’t always.” When she turned, there was an uncertainty in her gaze he’d not seen before. “Most of the