Page 18 of Win Me, My Lord (All’s Fair in Love and Racing #5)

CHAPTER ELEVEN

F or the race, Bran hadn’t stood with the other trainers—or even with his own lads and grooms from the Roost.

He hadn’t been able to.

He’d needed a secluded, unobtrusive shadow in which to slip.

The fact was he wanted Radish’s victory too much.

He needed it too much.

Considering the crowd of thousands, seclusion had been easier to accomplish than he’d expected.

Once he started walking, eyes tended to avert once they realized he had a limp.

Whether they couldn’t watch out of disgust, pity, or embarrassment, he’d long stopped wondering.

Rather than seeking a place near the start and finish line, he’d located a perfect shadow on the backside of the tack house on the opposite side of the racecourse.

Further, he enjoyed a view of not only the track, but the grandstand, too. Artemis would be there. Of course, he couldn’t make her out amongst the indecipherable throng. She’d said she would be here, and he harbored no doubt that she was.

Unbidden, their encounter on the beach two weeks ago came to him, and he saw her as she’d been—sable hair, loose and breeze-tousled, her dark eyes light with joy.

Nay, encounter was the wrong word.

It was a word too without direction or purpose. An encounter could be random and without forethought.

There had been both forethought and purpose in that encounter .

She’d actively sought him out. For what precise reason, he didn’t know. He wasn’t sure she did either. Perhaps it was the magnetic pull that drew them together when they came within range of each other.

There was no helping it.

Ten years ago, there had been many lies—but that wasn’t one of them.

Of those lies spoken ten years ago, he couldn’t help questioning one of them in the wake of their encounter .

She hadn’t married Stoke.

Of course, he’d known that.

Why would I have married your brother?

Her brow had crinkled with utter bewilderment, and her eyes had remained clear. If he hadn’t known differently, he would venture she had no idea that she’d intended to marry his brother.

But that was what Bran had been told.

A lie.

Which put him at a crossroads—to pursue the truth, or let the lie stand and keep moving forward with his life.

A bitter snort escaped him.

Moving forward.

But wasn’t that bitterness a reflex?

Perhaps … perhaps at last, he was making some forward progress.

Really, it came down to today.

Today, he needed a win after a string of losses that seemed to know no end.

As the horses assembled at the starting line, he became a straight line of tensed muscle. Lafferty had his instructions and race plan. Now, all that remained was for him to execute it.

Even from this distance, the duo of horse and jockey were impossible to miss in their garishly colored silks. Bran could grudgingly admire how Sir Abstrupus made his presence felt in the absence of his physical person. It was a remarkable skill.

The starter lifted his gun, and an anticipatory hush descended on the crowd.

The next distinct sound was the crack of the shot, and the horses were off.

Bran’s breath held for the next two seconds, waiting for a second firing of the gun, but no shot sounded.

There would be no false starts today. Good.

Radish was untested in a racing environment, so it wasn’t known how he would handle a series of false starts if the man with the starting gun had been bribed to rattle the horses.

What was painfully obvious as Radish neared the first turn was that he was in a terrible position.

Lafferty was taking an aggressive line and attempting to muscle through from the inside, when the field hadn’t yet strung out and were still all clumped together.

The less risky strategy would’ve been to linger at the back and use Radish’s speed and grit to gain ground on the straights.

In the pocket of the turn, risk became inevitability and it happened—Radish became tangled with two other horses.

Bran’s stomach plummeted to his feet.

This was it.

Another inevitable loss happening before his eyes.

Except, improbably, Radish kept his footing.

Sure, about twenty yards stood between him and the rest of the pack, but he was on all four hooves and that had only been the first turn.

The St. Leger was a long race.

There was time.

It wasn’t belief that took hold within him—life had knocked him down one too many times for him to commit to such a far-fetched notion—but rather will .

With every fiber of his being, he was willing Radish to be just that bit faster than the field and make up ground one powerful stride after another.

And, as if Bran’s will possessed powers beyond those of the natural world, that was exactly what Radish began to do. His grit and determination and will implacable, he set to work.

By the third turn, Radish had caught up to the pack, then by the next straight, he was ready to make his move.

Lafferty didn’t repeat his earlier mistake, but instead directed Radish to the outside.

A risky move, but necessary. If the race was to swing in Radish’s favor, this was the crucial moment.

The blink of an eye later, Radish was neck and neck with the race’s leaders on the final furlong.

Impelled by forces beyond his control, Bran pushed away from his solitary shadow of wall and stepped to the railing as Radish stretched at precisely the right moment and took the St. Leger Stakes in a win for the ages.

Even as Bran saw the proof of victory with his own eyes, belief refused to take hold. It wasn’t until the stable lads and grooms rushed toward him in a raucous swarm and hoisted him onto their shoulders in jubilation that belief sank in.

Radish had won the St. Leger.

That ￡3,521 purse was his .

This was the first time anything had gone right for him in two years.

This was a win .

Triumph, pure and gold as guineas, took wing inside him as the lads carried him through the frenzied crowd toward the finish line.

He found he hadn’t lost the taste for victory with all its sweetness and buoyancy.

Time became blurred in the jubilant aftermath as, still hoisted on the lad’s shoulders, he was carried onto the track, congratulations pouring in from every angle.

Then it was on to the presentation of the winner’s plate and—most importantly—the winner’s purse.

￡3,521.

How heavy and how sweet.

Gwyneth could have her season in grand style, and even with a small dowry.

Further, Radish was now qualified for the Race of the Century—and the possibility of its ￡10,000 purse, which was a respectable dowry by any standard.

And with today’s victory, there was one thing more—he didn’t have to immediately return to his shambles of a life.

A stay of sentence might be all it was, but he found he was willing to accept it.

Who knew what more this one win might yield, for winning held a secret that few understood—it carried a momentum of its own.

Winning begot winning.

No .

He wouldn’t get ahead of himself.

Today, he would take the win—and leave every other consideration for tomorrow.

A sudden taut feeling slid across his skin—as if he were being watched. Of course, he was being watched—by several thousand merrymakers, in fact. However, it wasn’t thousands of pairs of eyes that he felt—but one.

Hers .

Unerringly, his gaze shifted and locked with Artemis’s.

Instinctively, he took a step forward, then, reflexively, froze, resisting the urge that had felt only natural an instant ago.

To close the distance between them and take her in his arms and whirl her around and around until her skirts flew in the air and they were dizzy with laughter and light and wonder at this improbable victory.

In that instant, there had been no one he’d rather share this feeling with.

Magnets.

How quickly it became a world of two.

The thought should have produced a surge of anger. But this time, it didn’t. The truth was he was tired of that pattern of thinking.

Some new part of him suggested Artemis might not deserve it. The events that had been so set in stone these last ten years felt as if they now rested on shifting sands.

Lies.

As she continued moving forward, toward him, and he remained rooted in place—no whirling embraces for them—his eye caught upon the two figures accompanying her.

The tall, dark-haired man beside her, handsome and confidently imposing in the manner of a lord supremely assured of his place in the world, was her brother, Rakesley, whom he’d met years ago.

The woman at his side, auburn-haired and lanky, whose pregnancy was just showing, would be Rakesley’s wife, his scandalous duchess who had once been his jockey.

In truth, she didn’t have the air of a walking scandal.

Rather, her hazel eyes held kindness and warmth as she smiled her congratulations at him.

Where Artemis hesitated, Rakesley rushed forward and reached for Bran’s hand to shake. “Well done, old chap.”

His congratulation, however, wasn’t without reservation. He was also taking Bran’s measure as a competitor in the Race of the Century. Bran took no offense. He’d always enjoyed a healthy competition.

Enjoyed.

A word that had been absent from his vocabulary for two years.

Now returned.

“It wasn’t a perfect race, by any stretch,” said Bran, threading the needle between self-deprecation and pride.

“Ah,” said the duchess, “but that’s when you see what everyone’s made of.”

Artemis hung back and silently watched, the lift of an eyebrow doing her talking for her.

Remembering his manners, Rakesley made a quick introduction to his wife and an absent, “And you’ve surely met my sister, Lady Artemis,” before launching into a detailed summary of the race, moment by moment.

All the while, Bran kept half an eye on Artemis, though she contributed not a word. Rather, she watched and kept her impressions to herself.