Page 19 of Lady Like

A chance run-in with Alexander Bolton will look too calculated should it occur only two days after the Majorbanks’s ball, so Emily waits a sennight before she and Violet take the baby walking through Regent’s Park, along the path that goes by the stables.

She uses the time in between to read more about horses, though everything she learns only confirms what she already knows, which is that they are large, unpredictable, and untrustworthy.

Violet keeps up a stream of conversation as they cross nearly the whole heath to reach the paddock where the horses are exercised, mostly about how little the baby slept and when the baby last ate, and Emily does her best to pay attention to her cousin instead of her own anxiety at the thought of seeing Alexander again.

They pick a bench near the stables, from which they can see the jockeys taking their horses through the jumps at a distance. Overhead, the sky is a woolly gray, rain threatening to break from the coffered clouds.

Violet hoists the baby from his carriage and begins to thump his back. “Which one is he, then?”

The riders are too far away to make out their faces, but Emily recognizes the dual coloring of Alexander’s stallion Harry had mentioned. She points. “That one.”

Violet nods—or perhaps she is simply bouncing herself along with the baby. “He looks to be an exceptional horseman.”

“Indeed.” Emily watches, breath bated, as Rochester steers the horse to the fence, adjusts his stance, then digs his heels into the horse’s flank. The stallion takes off at a gallop toward the assembled stiles, which, with the duke’s steady hand, he clears easily.

Perspiration breaks out upon Emily’s neck. At the ball, she had taken note of Alexander’s handsomeness in the way of hearing an opera sung—though not to her taste, she could appreciate the skill required to produce it.

But now, she is captivated by the sight of him on that horse.

The lines of his body, highlighted in the gray light from the sky, are elegant as strokes of calligraphy.

The dip in his back as he leans into the neck of his mount, the curve of his ass in his tight riding breeches.

The muscled girth of his thighs, too far away to be seen clearly, but her mind fills in the gaps as she watches him rise off the saddle and balance in the stirrups.

She should look away. No, she can’t bear to.

She must. Her throat is suddenly dry, and she feels a pulse in her legs that ripples all the way to the bottom of her feet.

She thinks of marble nudes by great Italian artists, and suddenly sees the appeal in dedicating one’s life to the depiction of the human form.

If it took the creation of a statue to justify this level of study, she would have learned to carve.

She would eat the form of man from rock with her teeth if she had to.

Eventually, the riders finish their circuit and set course for the stables.

When they reach the paddock, Alexander, lit from behind by the overcast light, swings himself from the saddle.

Emily’s breathing quickens. God, his calves!

The cocky angle of his shoulders! The dip of his neck, the strong profile!

The short dark hair curling around his ears—

But Alexander is a blond. She remembers noting how similar in color his hair was to her own.

The rider turns, removing their cap, and—

“No.” Emily speaks aloud without meaning to.

“What?” Violet sits up. “What is it?”

Emily leaps to her feet. “We have to go.”

“What?” Violet stands, confused. “What about your duke? You came all this way to speak to him.”

“We have to go—now.”

“Give me a moment.” Violet begins to bundle the baby back into his buggy and good lord, infants come with so many parts, why can they not be moved swiftly from one location to the next?

Emily keeps her back to the stables, as though that might make her invisible. “Make haste, please!”

“Just give me a moment—”

“Catch up with me, then.” Emily starts to walk, even as Violet is still bundling the baby.

“What has gotten into you? Emily, wait for me!” Violet calls, but Emily has already started across the lawn, as quickly as one can in a skirt that tightens around the knees and with feet that still throb at the memory of the Majorbanks’s ball.

But then another voice calls from the direction of the stables, “Miss Sergeant!”

And, out of either deeply ingrained politeness or outright stupidity, Emily turns.

Across the paddock, striding toward her, is Harriet Lockhart, all calves and cocky shoulders and that stupid, smug grin as though she knows Emily had been staring.

Bastard, Emily thinks, wondering if she can plausibly pretend she has not seen Harry, even though their eyes are locked.

Harry hops the paddock fence and jogs to Emily, and God, those riding leathers are obscenely tight, though of course Emily had only admired them when thinking it was Alexander’s firm rump to which they clung.

Harry pulls off her gloves, pushing her sleeves up to her elbows, and Emily feels beads of sweat trickle down her spine.

“Miss Lockhart,” Emily says, inclining her head. She can feel herself going red as she thinks of the way she ogled Harry on that horse— thinking her Alexander, of course!

“What a strange chance we should meet here,” Harry says.

Emily presses the tips of her gloved fingers to her forehead, wondering how much moisture they can possibly soak up. “Almost like you told me to come.”

“Ah yes, I did mention Rochester would be riding, didn’t I?”

“Another ruse, I see.”

“It is not!” Harry laughs. “He’s with the mare—just there.” She points to where Alexander—Emily sees him now—is leading a small bay into the stable. “He had me on Matthew this morning since I’ll be riding him in the Milton Derby.”

“A lie by omission, then.”

“No lie at all!” Harry replies. “I did not expect you to wait a fortnight before you made an appearance.”

“It has been seven days at most.”

“You counted the days?” Harry presses a hand to her heart. “You’re a romantic.”

They are interrupted when Violet pushes the buggy in between them, looking from Emily to Harry. “Good morning. Have we met?”

“Yes.” Harry offers her a hand. “Though I believe you were asleep.”

“Oh yes.” Violet squints. “Was there a bear with you, or was that a dream?”

“You’re thinking of my brother, I expect.”

Violet adjusts her grip on the carriage. “Emily, we should go.”

“I want to see the horses,” Emily says quickly.

Violet squints at her. “First you talk all week of coming here, then you want to run away like you’re being chased, and now you want to stay again?”

Emily swallows hard, staring determinedly away from Harry, who she’s sure is grinning and making assumptions, all of which are probably true. “Well, now I want to stay.”

“I’m happy to take Miss Sergeant home when she’s finished here,” Harry says.

“Oh, that isn’t—” Emily says, but Violet interrupts.

“Wonderful, thank you.” She leans in to kiss Emily quickly upon the cheek. “Good luck, darling. Have a good time with your duke.”

“He’s not my—”

But Violet is already pushing the carriage away, wheels clacking on the uneven path, leaving Harry and Emily alone.

“Lovely woman,” Harry remarks.

Emily is certain if she goes any redder she’ll catch fire.“Where’s Rochester? I best get this over with.”

Harry claps her hands together and gives them a victorious shake over her shoulder.

“That’s the spirit. Now—steady on.” Emily has started toward the paddock gate, but Harry catches her arm.

“Would you like me to make an introduction? I might pretend I don’t know that the two of you are already acquainted.

We can play off this meeting as a fated coincidence. ”

“Release me,” Emily says. “I do not require any help from you.”

Harry lets go, then looks down at her palm, like she’s worried something on Emily’s dress might have stained her, though the opposite is far more likely.

Emily takes a few steps toward the stables, then stops. The truth is, she hasn’t considered what exactly she will say to Rochester when she sees him, her arrival unannounced and uninvited.

Emily turns back to Harry, who is now leaning upon the fence at an aggravatingly jaunty angle. “Fine,” Emily says, her voice tight. “Will you walk me?”

Harry presses a hand to her chest in feigned surprise. “Me?”

“Since you are so in Rochester’s favor.”

“Am I?”

“And since my association with you might cause him to reconsider his preconceptions about me.”

“Very well. Would you like an arm?”

“Piss off.”

“There she is.”

Emily scowls, then takes off at a trot toward the stable, her shoes squelching in the swampy turf.