My horse danced around Sebastian’s. The animal was happy to be outside and wanted to run.
“You know what else I claim to be good at?”
“Is it something R-rated?” he asked, a smile playing around his mouth.
“X-rated,” I assured him. “And you saw the preview already.”
He leaned over, grabbed the front of my shirt, and crushed our mouths together.
I kissed him back, then broke away and spurred my horse into a gallop before he decided to start running on his own.
There was an equestrian trail that ran parallel to the art trail for a few miles. It was located on an old train spur that was about five feet down from the art trail. I turned the horse, and he took the jump easily.
Behind me, Sebastian cursed. “You’re going to break your neck.”
“No, I’m not! This is a great horse.” I patted the rust-colored mare on the neck, then trotted down the trail and easily took the next jump a few paces away.
God, this is perfect!Riding a horse out in the country, pursued by a smoking-hot guy—it was all of my teenage-girl fantasies come to life.
“Did you do horse shows when you were younger?” Sebastian asked when he caught up to me.
“In high school,” I told him. “Even though this is the country, people teased me for liking horses so much. They called me the crazy horse girl. But horses were better than boys because they didn’t pull my hair or try to steal my homework.” I stroked my fingers through the horse’s silky mane.
“You’re not a crazy horse girl,” Sebastian said with a frown, bringing his horse alongside mine.
“Oh, I totally am!” I said cheerfully. “I wear the label as a badge of honor! I so need a setup like yours one day—with all the stables and the riding rings. I’d basically just live there full-time as a recluse, have all my meals delivered, and take in all the stray horses people abandon.”
Sebastian grimaced. “That is a real problem here. Every month or so, someone leaves their horse tied up at the end of my driveway. When I called animal control about it the first time it happened, they told me they could take the horses, but wouldn’t give me a straight answer about what would happen to the animals after. So, I take them in.” He gave a helpless shrug. “Some of them, I’ve been able to find homes for, but a lot of them are old. They just want pets and snacks.”
“Don’t we all?” I said lightly, though inside, my heart was busy building an extra-creepy shrine in Sebastian’s honor.
Between Sebastian’s taking care of his little brother and adopting abandoned horses, I was horribly close to making the ultimate bad decision of falling in love with him.
No love. Only sex!
But the horses!my inner romantic shrieked.
“I’m surprised you don’t have every eligible bachelorette in Harrogate lined up outside of your door with a goopy, soppy story like that,” I teased.
He frowned. “I don’t really have time for dating. I have to take care of my brother. I don’t want to be like my father, where his latest wife or girlfriend takes precedence over his kids. I don’t want Alfie to feel uncomfortable in his own home or feel like he’s second best or that he doesn’t have a hundred percent of my attention.”
Oh. Right.
“Plus,” Sebastian added, “the few women I have dated didn’t understand my priorities. They always tried to put themselves first and push Alfie off to the side. They constantly texted or called me and wanted me to spend all of my free time with them. It greatly impacted my productivity.”
So much for dating.
I poured gasoline on the shrine and lit a match.
“I totally feel you,” I said, trying to salvage things. “I work so much that I really don’t have time for dating either. Only the occasional bouts of casual sex. Not that much of that has been happening lately.”
He shot me a sly smile, and the dappled light filtering through the tree canopy turned him into a forest prince riding through his domain. My heart skipped a beat.
Maybe I shouldn’t sleep with him. When I fell in love, I fell hard.
Heard a new song? I listened to it on repeat for the next twelve hours. Found a new dish at a pop-up restaurant? I ate it twice a day and then cried like someone had died when the pop-up restaurant closed.
If I slept with Sebastian, who knew what would happen?
