“Don’t you need to go ride or something?” Anything to get him out of here.
“Farrier’s working on Gordo. Mac’s up next. They need new shoes before the Garden. I’ve got enough time for a coffee break.”
“Oh.” Damn. There went her hope of avoiding a meeting between Steve and Sam. Perhaps Steve wouldn’t remember, anyway. It was probably sheer conceit to assume that just because
she
could remember every second of their long-ago encounter, Steve would.
“You take it black, right? Sugar?”
“Yes, please.” Lord, she must be truly smitten. No other reason for the secret thrill she experienced hearing he knew how she liked her coffee.
Steve carried the mugs toward the table. He had such beautiful hands. Strong and square, they were testimony to years of hard work. Blunt-tipped nails at the end of long, elegant fingers. Clever hands, Ty remembered.
“So, what’ve you been up to?” Steve asked, pulling out the chair next to her. “How’d the morning go?
Make any headway on the list?”
Ty nodded. “And Bubba came by with a wish list.”
“Yeah. Mentioned it when I saw him in the barn. Told me if I had one of those shower and heater jobs, it wouldn’t take him an hour and a half to groom Gordo every time he decided to take a mud bath.”
“What about the other items on the list?” Ty asked, wanting to be sure he agreed before she started placing orders.
“Some of my old stablehands will be returning by the end of the week. I’d already talked to them. We can hire more as the barn fills up. The rest is cosmetic, right? I’ll leave that up to you,” Steve finished with an enigmatic smile.
And what precisely did he mean by that?
That she had good taste or, rather, that he still wasn’t going to let her make any decisions of real importance? Ty thought of her idea for the clinic. That certainly didn’t fall under the category of cosmetic. Well, no time like the present to clarify the situation.
“I also came up with another idea for Southwind.”
Steve took a slow sip of coffee, his blue eyes watching Ty steadily over the brim, all too conscious of the number of times he’d brushed her off in the past few days. His pop would have blistered his ears if he’d witnessed Steve’s recent behavior. And pop would have been right. “Go ahead, I’m listening.”
Ty blinked in surprise. “Right. I was trying to come up with something different to build up Southwind’s clientele. It occurred to me that we need to give them a sampling, whet their appetite.”
“And how do you plan to do that?”
“A clinic.”
“A clinic?”
“Yes.” Ty nodded eagerly. “Just one weekend, so it doesn’t interfere with your show calendar. We could schedule it for some time in December. That’ll give us enough time to get the word out, get everything prepared. We’d offer three days of riding: instruction over the flat, over fences, videotaped with your comments dubbed in a voice-over so that the riders could refer back to problems you pointed out. The horses could all be boarded here, giving the owners an opportunity to see what a beautiful place this is.”
He was silent. Silent long enough that Ty had to fight the urge to fidget. Then, “A busy mind you have, Ty. It’d be interesting to clock. My guess is it’s been racing at about seven thousand rpm.”
“And you prefer your women dumb and blond?” Dear Lord, why had that slipped out? She must have awakened this morning with a mental image of Steve’s date, Cynthia, emblazoned on her brain. Steve grinned. “Not particularly. These days, frighteningly intelligent brunettes seem awfully appealing.”
His grin widened when Ty’s eyes darted away to peer into the bottom of her cup, as though fascinated by the dregs. “And you think a clinic would attract riders who want to train with me?”
His words had Ty’s gray eyes meeting his, comfortable once more, now that they’d left the subject of Steve’s taste in women. “Of course,” she said with a nod. “I’m willing to bet money on it.”
“That so? How much?”
With what could only be described as a cocky smile, Ty named a sum that had Steve shaking his head in laughter. “Sorry, no can do. Even though I’d love to take you up on it, I never bet more than I can afford to lose.”
Ty extended her slim hand across the table. “A gentleman’s bet, then. But you’re still going to lose,” she promised, clasping Steve’s warm hand firmly. “ Remember, I’ve got firsthand experience. I’m the one who got a private lesson from you.”
Did she have any idea how willing he’d be to give her private lessons in any number of subjects? He’d be a real diligent and thorough teacher, no area left uncovered, no subject he wasn’t willing to explore in depth. He wondered what it would take to convince her.
“Before you go any further with this clinic idea, you’d better make sure Bubba’s agreeable. This bird ain’t gonna fly otherwise,” he cautioned. “It’ll require a lot of extra work.” Extra work for Bubba. And for himself, too. That was why it surprised Steve to realize how good, how right, it felt to have Ty sitting there, a huge, happy smile on her face, her eyes shining bright, a kid at Christmas.
“I’ll go talk to him right now,” she was saying, already rising from her chair. She couldn’t believe it! Steve was willing to do it, hold a clinic. If her sore muscles had permitted, she would have performed a tap dance on the table. “Maybe if I offer to groom Gordo for him, he’ll be so grateful he’ll say yes. Then I can flesh out the details, advertising and the like, while you’re riding.”
“Speaking of which, can I interest you in hopping on Mac’s back again today?”
Those incredible eyes of hers grew round as saucers. “You’re joking, right?”
“Nope,” Steve replied calmly, shaking his head. “Best thing for you. ’Course, riding bareback on the beach might be a little much.” His strong white teeth flashed in a smile at Ty’s loud and decidedly inelegant snort. “ Seriously, I guarantee you’ll feel loads better if you ride Mac for a while—think of it as the hair of the dog that bit you. But if your muscles are still ouchy . . .” The timbre of his voice dropped, reaching out to her like a caress. “I’ll be more than happy to walk on you again.”
For starters,
he added silently.
“Sounds like a win-win situation, Ty,” Lizzie said with a broad smile, unabashedly eavesdropping as she entered the kitchen and made a beeline for the coffee pot. “Go for it.”
“What do you say, Ty? Yes?” Steve’s voice husky and low.
Ty stilled as his question echoed inside her. What could she say but yes?
She was in love with him. A basic, fundamental, and terrifying truth. A fact she’d been refusing to acknowledge, perhaps not even recognizing it. Since, in all probability, she had loved Steve from the moment she laid eyes on him.
It was useless to pretend love had blossomed only yesterday, or the day before, or even at the meeting with the lawyers. Some bizarre, incomprehensible twist of fate decreed that at the impossibly tender age of fourteen, Ty Stannard would have a golden kernel planted deep in her heart by none other than Steve Sheppard. Unacknowledged, untended, her love for Steve had been growing inside her these past ten years, its roots now deep and strong.
Helplessly, Ty looked across the table. Steve was waiting, balancing the wooden ladderback chair on two legs. His tanned fingers wrapped around an apple he was absently polishing against his sweater, the sweater’s hue making Steve’s eyes as brilliant and compelling as a sun-kissed ocean. He smiled. And her heart did a little flip. How could a moment be so casual on one level and yet so perilous?
She opened her mouth to speak. But then the fearsome wonder of this discovery, the complexity of emotions it engendered, seemed so overwhelming that when her mouth parted, with the word
yes
right there on the tip of her tongue, only needing her voice give it life, Ty hesitated. In that split second, Ty saw the danger that lay before her: her yearning heart might reveal far too much in that simple
yes.
And all that Steve would learn from it. And reject.
That moment’s hesitation cost her.
In the game of “If only . . . ,” Ty supposed that if only she’d had the courage to say yes directly, braving whatever ever sudden insight flashed in those perceptive blue eyes, if only she’d said yes, then she and Steve would have already been out the door, heading toward the barn, neatly skirting the disastrous quicksand of discovery Ty had feared.
But no. Into the kitchen walked Sam Brody, a vibrantly happy Emma perched high on his broad shoulders. Avolubly happy Emma, too. The toddler launched into giggles of pure ecstasy when Sam was forced to duck in order to avoid cracking Emma’s curly head against the lintel. At the sound, three pairs of eyes—two shocked, one resigned—swiveled and locked on Ty’s exbodyguard and her goddaughter. For several seconds, which to Ty stretched into hours, one could have heard a pin drop. Then, as had happened ten years ago on a swelteringly hot summer day, all hell broke loose. A quieter hell yet unmistakable nonetheless.
A gifted director would have made good use of it, the sheer awfulness of the situation, zooming in on Steve and Lizzie’s expressions, capturing the emotions that raced over them, delighting the audience. Lizzie standing, stunned and dismayed to find her baby girl getting a taste of the high life on the shoulders of a dangerous-looking, roughhewn man.
Sam staring back at her, his lips a straight line. Aman who’d always excelled at masking his own emotions, whose golden eyes missed very little. Not Lizzie’s shock, as it segued into fear, anger, then something else, as Lizzie finally recognized exactly who it was supporting her child. Sam Brody, looking nothing like Lizzie’s memories of him. So solid, yet leaner too, his powerful muscles well defined beneath the light knit shirt he wore, a mountain on which her daughter Emma presided as queen.
How in God’s name could he be so young?
was the errant and wholly unwelcome thought that crossed Lizzie’s mind. She scowled in irritation. And, for perhaps the first time in her life, found that the use of her tongue had deserted her. Her feet, too, oddly frozen.
The same, however, could not be said for Steve.
Click, click, click.
The tumblers slid into place, the lock on that ten-year-old memory finally releasing. Now that last, tantalizing piece of the puzzle stared back at him, the picture complete. Oh, yes, Steve was remembering everything. And feeling a hundred times a fool for not having recognized Ty Stannard before. A fool these three people just loved to ridicule. For the second time in the space of twenty minutes, Steve gripped Ty’s elbow. Now, however, it was more like a steel manacle closing around a prisoner.
“Excuse us, won’t you?” Steve snarled, raking both Sam and Lizzie with a contemptuous glance before dragging an unwilling Ty out the front door.
She tried digging the heels of her paddock boots into the ground, but Steve was walking too fast for her to find purchase. “Where are we going?” she demanded, jerking her arm in the slim hope that it might free her from his hold.
He ignored her efforts as he would a dust mote. “Somewhere far enough away so that I can throttle you in peace.” He didn’t want those “good friends” of hers running to her rescue. Steve’s stride ate up the ground, taking them past the barn, past the pasture where Fancy Free’s grave was located, to the far outdoor ring. He came to an abrupt halt near a jump, a rustic wooden gate, painted white with two tall yew bushes planted on either side. “Okay, this is good enough,” he said, jerking her around to face him. They stared at each other, eyes clashing. Steve took a step back, and Ty’s chin lifted in defiance as his gaze raked up and down her body.
He let out a mirthless laugh. “All grown up now, are we?” His Kentucky drawl cut like a whip. “You must’ve been having yourself a real good laugh, what with my being too dumb to recognize you.” With lips curled in an insolent smile, his eyes took in her breasts, the gentle curve of her hips, and he laughed again. The sound had Ty flinching. “ ’Course, you have changed a great deal. My compliments, Junior.”
He sketched a mocking salute.
The temper Ty had been valiantly holding in check these past days erupted. She stepped forward, her fists clenched at her sides. “Listen, you overgrown creep. So you didn’t remember me. So what? Was I supposed to go running up and ask for your autograph again? Bat my eyelashes and remind you of how we met long ago?” Her voice took on a simpering note. “Oh, Mr. Sheppard, I’ve always been such a fan of yours. Do you remember Lake Placid, 1989, when I . . .”
“Cut the bullshit, Junior. You know exactly what I’m really talking about. I’d begun to think you were different. But no. When you get right down to it, you’re the same as those other spoiled, wealthy women after all. You get off playing games with people.”
“That’s not true! I’ve done everything I can to help you out of a stinking mess!”
“Oh, you’ve done more than that. Don’t tell me you need your memory refreshed? No worry, mine’s back in working order. Let’s see. This makes the
second
time that you’ve intentionally misled me. I don’t work real well with partners who are liars. I should know, having had one before.”
“Oh, that’s rich, Steve, coming from you. Well, I’ll tell you what
I
don’t like in a partner. I don’t like partners who are overbearing, stubborn, manipulative clods. Since coming to Southwind, you’ve been doing your utmost to see how far you could push me. Hoping I’d break and give up. I’ve been working my butt off to help you save this farm.”
“Lying your butt off, you mean.”
God, how she wanted to sock him. “Bull. You know damn well you’d never have agreed to make a deal with me if you hadn’t believed I was my father. Want to know why, Sheppard? I’ll tell you. Because you’re prejudiced. Not every rich woman is like Allegra Palmer and her friends. And so what if I didn’t tell you that I was some girl you met ten years ago? Big deal. You call that dishonesty? I call it survival.”
“What in hell are you talking about?”
“You want honesty, Steve? Why don’t
you
show some for a change? Answer me this: How would you have treated me if you’d known I’d offered to save your sorry self because one day, long ago, when I was a gawky, infatuated fourteen-year-old, you were kind to me for about fifteen minutes. The first person who’d ever been kind without expecting something in return.” Her gray eyes sliced through him.