He’s here. With his sister. She’s nice. I wish you were here.
She fires back a message as if she’s been staring at her phone, waiting for my response.
He said he was taking someone. He didn’t tell me it was his sister! Not that I’m bothered. I have a date.
A date with who?
His name is Alex. Hot.
I laugh to myself, shaking my head. She’s desperate for me to tell Williams.
Have fun then. Let me know how it goes.
Charlotte and I reach the start point just as the hunt is returning. Gregory and Williams are laughing together as they ride back side by side.How can he manage to be so calm when I feel like the world is crashing down around me?The red coat who commenced the hunt calls, ‘Farewell’ to the huntsmen. The other red coats guide the pack of hounds away and the hunters begin to dismount.
Gregory stalks my way on his horse, halting in front of me, his fine self towering. He removes his helmet and pulls a hand through his dark hair, ruffling some life back into it.
‘Get here,’ he says to me in that way he does.
‘Up there? You’ve got to be kidding!’
The horse plods towards me and turns so I’m looking at Gregory’s boot. He shuffles back on the saddle. ‘Turn around.’
With a frown, I do as he instructs and turn my back on the horse. Then I’m hauled up by my arms on a girly squeal. I lift my leg and he places me down between him and the front of the saddle. ‘That wasn’t so bad, was it?’
‘It’s so high!’
‘High is best, Scarlett, I’ve told you this.’ He plants his helmet on my head and turns me to face him. He tightens the strap under my chin and pulls my hair over my shoulders. ‘I didn’t think anyone could look good in one of these. I was mistaken.’
He kisses me chastely on the lips then kicks his heels into the horse and we shoot away from the stares and whispers of the group, into the dusk. Gregory holds the reins around meand presses his chest into my back. The wind bellows in my face as we ride faster, so fast, I feel like I’m flying. I should be terrified. I’ve never ridden a horse, let alone ridden one at this speed. But I couldn’t be more content, I couldn’t feel safer, wrapped in his arms.
‘Whoa, boy.’ Gregory tugs the reins as he speaks to the stallion and our pace falls to a trot. He guides us to a tree where he commands the horse to stop. He turns my chin to him and relieves me of the helmet, reaching for a branch above him and clipping the helmet to it. Moving my hair across one shoulder, he presses his lips to my neck, sucking, nibbling. ‘I want to make you happy, baby. I want to see you smile.’
This is whatIwant. Only him, just us.
I lean back into his chest, giving him easier access to my skin. His mouth glides up my sensitive skin, along my jaw, and meets mine.
‘You do make me happy.’
‘Turn around.’ Guiding me and taking my weight, he helps me manoeuvre until we’re sitting face to face.
He tugs me towards him and kisses me, our tongues indulging in the taste of each other. Holding the branch above us with one hand, steadying himself, he lifts my legs around his waist. I pull back to see his face, stunning in the last fading light of the day, his dark, lust-filled eyes locked on mine.
Yes, this is definitely what I want. These moments when he sees and feels nothing but me. When I’m his, completely. This is the place where everything makes sense.
With balled fists gripping his blazer, I pull him to me. He releases the branch and drops both hands to my back as my hips roll against his.
Kian is waiting by the horse box when we get back, most of the others dispersing or already gone. ‘Good hunt, sir?’
‘Yes, thanks, Kian. You prepared him well.’
I swing a leg so both are on one side of the horse and let Gregory lower me by my underarms to the ground before he jumps down himself. He pats the horse before Kian takes over control. I watch as he strips down to his boxers under the light of the horse box, his toned body making me wanton again. He really has turned me into an insatiable temptress and I enjoy every second of it.
‘Like what you see?’ he says with a smirk as he fastens his belt buckle over his jeans then pulls his Barbour jacket over his jumper.
‘Always,’ I say, returning my teeth to my bottom lip.
Shaking his head, he says, ‘Come on.’ He lifts his arm and I tuck into his side beneath it.
