Her pulse fluttered.
He hadn’t tried to touch her. Was he going to?
Would she stop him?
She wasn’t certain she was breathing. She’d become a marble statue of herself. Frozen, waiting, wondering what might happen. Dying for him to touch her and terrified that she might let him.
Olive didn’t allow others close for a reason. She didn’t allowWestonclose for an even better reason. To let her guard down now was to allow him within hurting distance.
Again.
“Go inside,” she said while she still had control over herself. “I have work to do, and don’t need you underfoot.”
At first, he didn’t move. She feared him about to call her bluff by proving how much a damnably large part of her wanted him to stay.
Wanted this to bereal.
But they both knew it wasn’t.
“Very well.” He made a gorgeous leg. Such elegant manners should have been incongruent with the sight and the smell of the stables. Instead, it felt courtly. “You’ll know where to find me.”
That was it.
No argument; no pressure. She stated a wish and he complied.
Olive was suddenly certain that if her wish had been to feel his lips on hers once more, he would have complied with that as well.
She wasnotthat foolish. Not anymore. She’d kissed him once, and the experience was more than enough for one lifetime.
The thought of doing it again... She lifted her fingertips to her lips as he walked away.
Weston had hurt her.
He was uniquely capable of doing it again and having it hurt worse because this time, Olive should know better.
She’d been innocent before. Falling into the same trap twice would feel like her fault. As though she’d invited him to destroy her all over again.
It had been a stable just like this one.
Ten years ago, on a trip to London, she’d experienced a moment that had defined who she was to this day.
Summer. Children’s steeplechases. Shiny medallions for the best girl and the best boy of each age group. Olive had been fourteen then, and as excited as if it were Christmas.
She and Papa had arrived too late to watch the boys race. Weston hadn’t won. Some other lad did. Papa said Weston’s father must be frothing at the mouth. Losing was what he deserved for all of the evil Milbotham had wrought.
Olive took his word for it. She’d never met the marquess or his heir. This was her first competition. Her first time around other children who loved horses as much as she did.
It didn’t go well, even before the girls’ steeplechases began.
She was strange and different and awkward. Too tall, too gangly. Ugly, they told her. Worst of all was her smile, with her too-big teeth. It was a wonder she didn’t frighten the horses away.
When her turn to race came, she did what she always had done: closed her mouth tight and flew like the wind.
Shewon. Handily. She could barely think from the cacophony of shouts. Papa was out there. He’d watched her win.
By the time the medallion was pressed into her hand, she was giddy. It was proof she was talented, worthy, of value. She couldn’t wait to show her father.
With a smile she couldn’t suppress and legs barely strong enough to hold her, she passed behind the stables on her way to circle back to where the spectators awaited.
