Page 85 of Me and Mr. Darcy

He’s going to seduce me.

Suddenly every bodice-ripper I’ve read comes flashing back to me in all their breathless urgency. He’s brought me here so he can roll around in the hay with me. To have his wicked way. To make mad, passionate love with the stars twinkling through the gaps of the old timbered roof and his warm, muscular body pressed up against mine . . .

I want to feel offended that he thinks I’m going to put out on the first date, but I can’t. I’m way too excited.

Well, I’m hardly an innocent virgin, now, am I? Despite what my mother likes to think. In fact, I can’t think of anything I’d like to do more right now than roll around in the hay with Mr Darcy.

And it has been a while, I think, eyeing him lustfully.

He leads me inside. Only it’s not a barn. It’s a stable. I feel a twinge of uncertainty. Followed by a strong whiff of something that smells suspiciously like—

Horse shit.

I feel a crash of disappointment. Of course. This is Mr Darcy. He’s a gentleman. He would never try and have his wicked way.

Damn. Damn. Damn.

‘Meet Thunder,’ announces Mr Darcy, opening the stall to reveal the back end of a big black horse, who, right at that moment, decides to lift up his tale and dump a huge dollop all over the floor.

Watching it pile up, my sexual fantasies of rolling around in the hay suddenly disappear. Funny that.

‘Um . . . hello,’ I say lamely, quickly stepping backwards before my gold stilettos get sprayed in excrement and getting my spiked heel caught. ‘Whoah,’ I cry, quickly steadying myself. Maybe I overdid it a bit with the champagne-and-marijuana combo.

‘Don’t worry, there’s no need to be afraid, Emily,’ continues Mr Darcy, misinterpreting my stoned lurch with a cry of fear. ‘This isn’t your horse.’

He’s obviously unaware of my inebriation, I realise thankfully. Well, why would he be? I don’t remember any of the ladies getting stoned in Pride and Prejudice. And they were always going to parties.

Hang on a minute. Rewind that again.

Your horse?

I turn to say something, but Mr Darcy is already striding over to a neighbouring stall, flicking open the dead bolt and opening the door to reveal the most beautiful thoroughbred I’ve ever seen.

Pure white, her powerful, muscular flanks seem to be almost glistening in the light. I’m used to the kind of horses you get in Central Park: old piebald faithfuls who dutifully pull the carriages of tourists and pose for photographs. But this is a different breed of animal. Her whole body is quivering with pent-up energy, like a racehorse just before the starting gun, and her ears flick back as she hears us.

Suddenly she smashes her hoof against the ground, the metal horseshoe making a loud noise against the stone flags. I jump slightly. Jesus, talk about frisky. You’d have to be a brave person to ride her, I decide, noticing she’s tacked up with shiny stirrups and a polished leather saddle.

‘You’re riding Lightning,’ says Mr Darcy, as if reading my thoughts.

Me. Riding. Lightning.

The words string out in front of me in little cartoon bubbles, but as yet I seem to be having difficulty in joining them up. He obviously can’t be suggesting what I think he’s suggesting. I’m wearing a balldress and three-inch heels. I look from Mr Darcy to the horse and back again.

Oh, I get it. He’s fooling around. Ha, ha, very funny.

‘Right, yeah, absolutely.’ I grin, playing along with the joke. But his face is serious and then it hits me. Mr Darcy doesn’t joke, remember?

As he takes Lightning’s reins and walks her calmly out of the stall, her ribcage rising and falling, her thick white tail swishing, I can’t help but feel a snap of annoyance. I can’t believe he hasn’t even asked me if I want to go horseriding! I mean, don’t I get a say in this? I’ll freeze to death in this outfit.

‘Never having been to America, I do not know your customs and traditions on such occasions as these,’ he’s saying gravely. ‘However, I have taken the liberty of arranging a moonlight ride for us both.’

Saying that, as Mr Darcy comes to a halt in front of me, in his white shirt and tight breeches and holding the reins of a beautiful thoroughbred horse, I’m suddenly overcome by the vision before me. It’s so absurdly romantic I feel dizzy.

Usually it’s tickets to the movies and a carton of popcorn if I’m lucky, but this. It’s the stuff of fantasies. Of the novels that line the shelves of McKenzie’s bookstore. This kind of stuff doesn’t happen to me: Emily Albright from upstate New York. The only thing I ever get to ride these days is the subway into work.

‘I trust it meets with your approval.’

‘Um . . . yes . . . of course,’ I stammer, brushing any annoyance I may have felt quickly aside. Well, come on, Emily – you can hardly stay mad at him, can you?