ANNA’S EYES ADJUSTED to the cool dimness the next morning as she wandered down the packed-earth aisle of Ravenhill Abbey’s stables. The building was venerable. It had served the Abbey through several reconstructions and expansions. Stones the size of a man’s head formed the foundation and the lower walls. Six feet from the ground, the walls became sturdy oak that led up to the exposed rafters, vaulting twenty feet overhead. Below, stalls flanked a central aisle.
The Ravenhill stables had room for fifty horses easily, although fewer than ten were currently in residence. The relative paucity of horses saddened her. This must at one time have been a thriving, active place. Now the stables were quiet—like a grizzled, slumbering giant. It smelt of hay, leather, and decades, perhaps centuries, of horse manure. The odor was warm and welcoming.
Lord Swartingham was to meet her here this morning so they could ride out to inspect more fields. Anna’s makeshift riding habit trailed in the dust behind her as she walked. Every now and then, an equine head poked curiously over a stall and nickered a greeting. She spotted the earl farther ahead, deep in conversation with the head groom. He towered over the older man. Both stood in a beam of dusty sunlight at the far end of the stables. As Anna neared, she could hear that they were discussing the problem of a gelding with a chronic limp. Lord Swartingham glanced up and caught sight of her. She paused by Daisy’s stall. He smiled and turned back to the head groom.
Daisy was already saddled and bridled and tied loosely in the aisle. Anna waited, softly talking to the mare. She watched Lord Swartingham lean down to listen to the head groom, his full attention on the older man. The head groom was a wiry, aged specimen. His hands were knotted now with arthritis and healed bones, broken long ago. He carried himself proudly, his head stiffly erect. The old man, like many countrymen, talked slowly and liked to discuss a problem at length. Anna noticed that the earl patiently let him have his say, neither hurrying him nor cutting off his speech, until the head groom felt that the problem has been sufficiently mulled over. Then Lord Swartingham gently clapped the man on the back and watched him walk out of the stable. The earl turned and started for her.
Without any warning, Daisy—gentle, placid Daisy—reared. Iron-shod hooves cleaved the air only inches from Anna’s face. She fell back against the stall door, cowering. A hoof thumped the wood next to her shoulder.
“Anna!” She heard the earl’s shout over the startled neighing of the nearby horses and Daisy’s own frantic whinnying.
A rat scurried underneath the stall door, flicking its naked tail as it disappeared. Lord Swartingham caught the horse’s halter and pulled the mare forcibly away. Anna heard a grunt and the slam of a stall door.
Strong arms wrapped around her. “Dear God, Anna, are you hurt?”
She couldn’t answer. Fear seemed to have clogged her throat. He ran his hands over her shoulders and arms, rapidly feeling and smoothing.
“Anna.” His face lowered toward hers.
She couldn’t help herself; her eyes closed.
He kissed her.
His lips were hot and dry. Soft and firm. They moved across hers lightly, before he angled his head and pressed strongly. Her nostrils flared, and she smelled horses and him. She thought irrelevantly that forever after she would associate the smell of horses with Lord Swartingham.
With Edward.
He skimmed her lips with his tongue, so softly that at first she thought she had imagined it. But he repeated the caress, a touch like suede leather, and she opened her mouth to him. She felt his warmth invading her mouth, filling it, stroking across her tongue. He tasted of the coffee he must have drunk at breakfast.
She clenched her fingers at the back of his neck, and he opened his own mouth wider and drew her closer to lean against him. One of his hands brushed across her cheek. She threaded her hands through the hair at his nape. His queue came undone, and she reveled in the silky feel of his hair between her fingers. He ran his tongue over her bottom lip and drew it between his teeth, gently sucking on it. She heard herself moan. She trembled, her legs hardly able to hold up her weight.
A clatter from the stable yard outside brought Anna abruptly back to her surroundings. Edward raised his head to listen. One of the stable hands was berating a boy for dropping equipment.
He turned his head back to Anna and smoothed his thumb over her cheek. “Anna, I…”
His train of thought seemed to slip away. He shook his head. Then, as if compelled, he brushed a gentle kiss over her mouth and lingered there a moment as the kiss deepened.
But something was wrong; Anna could feel it. He was slipping away. She was losing him. She pressed closer, trying to hold on. He ran his lips across her cheekbones and lightly, softly, over her closed eyelids. She felt his breath sift through her eyelashes.
His arms dropped, and she sensed him step away from her.
She opened her eyes to see him running his hands through his hair. “I’m sorry. That was—God, I’m so sorry.”
“No, please don’t apologize.” She smiled, warmth spreading through her breast as she gathered her courage. Maybe this was the time. “I wanted the kiss just as much as you. As a matter of—”
“I’m engaged.”
“What?” Anna recoiled as if he had struck her.
“I’m engaged to be married.” Edward grimaced as if in self-disgust or possibly pain.
She stood frozen, struggling to comprehend the simple words. A numbness seeped throughout her body, driving out the warmth as if it had never been.
“That’s why I went up to London. To finalize the marital settlements.” Edward paced, his hands agitatedly running through his disheveled hair. “She’s the daughter of a baronet, a very old family. I think they might have come over with the Conqueror, which is more than the de Raafs can say. Her lands—” He stopped suddenly as if she’d interrupted.
She hadn’t.
He met her eyes for an agonizing moment and then looked away. It was as if a cord that had stretched between them had been severed.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Wren.” He cleared his throat. “I never should have behaved so badly with you. You have my word of honor that it won’t happen again.”
“I-I—” She struggled to force words through her swelling throat. “I ought to return to work, my lord.” Her only coherent thought was that she must maintain her composure. Anna moved to go—to flee, really—but his voice stopped her.
“Sam…”
“What?” All she wanted was a hole to curl up in so she could never think again. Never feel again. But something in his face kept her from leaving.