Horatio laughed. “I’m a premium property adviser, actually. But it’s an easy mistake to make. I think you’ll be interested in what I’ve got to say.”
“You’re emigrating?”
“I’ve got an offer for you. One that could make all your money worries disappear.”
A pulse of anger rippled through my body. Of course this arsehole knew I had “money worries.” People in high places talk, and Horatio’s father was very well connected. He probably knew more about my financial situation than I did. But then, that wouldn’t be hard. I shook my head, put my foot in the stirrup, and launched myself up into the saddle.
“If you’re going to make another offer to buy the village, the answer is still no. It will always be no.”
Horatio and his property developer father had been trying to buy Newton Bardon and the land around it back from the Buckford Estate for years. Ownership of the village had bounced back and forth between our two families for centuries. Most recently, my grandfather had snapped it up for a song in the early 1990s, when the Blunts’ original property development empire went bust during the recession. The family had been forced to abandon horrendous plans to build a two-thousand-home housing estate on the village common. They had to liquidate their assets. They lost everything. Horatio’s grandfather had gone to prison.
I let Achilles feel the squeeze of my legs, and we walked towards the gate into Home Field.
“I’m not interested in the village,” Horatio said. He waved a plastic pocket of documents in the air. “I’ve got a client who wants to buy Buckford Hall.”
I pulled on Achilles’s reins and we stopped, dead still. I kept looking straight ahead, feeling my blood slowly begin to boil at the impertinence. I refused to make eye contact with the silly little man.
“It’s not for sale,” I said, through gritted teeth.
“Are you sure?” Horatio stepped in front of us. “It’s a very generous offer.”
“The answer is no.”
Achilles walked on, forcing Horatio to stand aside.
“Sensible opening negotiating strategy, Dub-Dub. Of all people, I can appreciate that.” He was trotting along beside us now. “My client is very serious. They’re a cash buyer. A reputable international hotel chain.”
The idea turned my stomach.
“Buckford is not for sale. It never will be.” It was time to put the boot in. “And if your father thinks sending you to do his dirty work, just because we went to school together, is going to make me sell, then he’s an even bigger idiot than you are.”
Horatio winced. A point to me.
“Oh, come on, Dub-Dub, everyone knows how hard up you are,” he said. “I mean, I saw the TV crews as I was driving in. You must be getting desperate. It can’t be long now, surely?”
The words tightened around my chest like a corset. The scoreline was even. It takes a lot to get me angry. I was raised on a diet of yoga and meditation by a pair of carefree well-heeled hippies, after all. But Horatio Blunt knew how to press my buttons. He’d been doing it since school. I was now absolutely raging. I eyeballed him.
“Look, Horatio. We’re friends, aren’t we?” (This was a lie. We absolutely were not friends.)
“Of course, Dub-Dub! Oldest chums.”
Achilles and I negotiated the gate.
“Then as an old chum, I know you won’t be offended when I say this, but the only person I want to see coming down my drivewaylessthan you is the village undertaker. And next time I see you coming down my driveway—and mark me, this is a promise—the very next person coming down the driveway after you will, in fact,bethe village undertaker. Do we understand each other?”
I let the gate slam shut.
Horatio blinked. “I can see you need time to think about it. Perfectly understandable. It’s a big decision. I’ll leave this folder in the tack room for you, shall I?”
I could barely breathe. I leant forward in the saddle, dug my heels in, and clicked my tongue. Achilles took off at a trot.
“All you have to do is sign and all your money worries will be gone,” Horatio called after us.
I clicked again and Achilles broke into a canter, then a gallop. I rode him hard, the white stallion’s hooves thundering across Home Field and up the winding trails of the ancient oak woods to the top of Buckford Hill. It was only once we reached the stone circle which crowned the estate that I could rip off Horatio’s corset. I dismounted, let Achilles’s reins fall, and sucked the fresh spring air deep into my lungs. As I stared out over the green expanse of everything my family had achieved in five hundred and forty years, I knew Buckford wasn’t mine to sell. It was mine to save. Horatio believed selling up would solve all my problems, but he misunderstood something fundamental—something he, of all people, really should have known. Selling wasn’t the easy answer. It was the hardest answer of all.
Chapter 5
Petey
