The Bride Price (7 page)

Caroline opened her mouth to tell her to go ahead, but Sarah’s pleading gaze stopped her. Reluctantly, she nodded. It was way too late for recriminations. Way too late to avoid her fate.

As soon as they emerged from the grove, Lady Tevon’s face cleared and she beckoned them over. “Lady Sarah, where have you been?”

“I was walking with Caroline while the grooms readied the horses.”

Lady Tevon shot her a look of disapproval. “Mrs. Martin, I thought we had come to a thorough understanding of how best to improve Sarah’s chances.”

Chances for unhappiness?
she wanted to respond. “Yes, Lady Tevon,” she said instead, her voice sounding thoroughly chastened, even if it was because of another event entirely.

“We were here before the game began,” Sarah said in her quiet way.

“Fashionably walking in at just the right moment,” Caroline added with as much spark and innocence as she could muster.

Lady Tevon frowned, nodded, then switched her gaze back to Sarah. “Well then, I suppose that is good. But be careful in the future. You don’t want the competitors to think you are hiding from them, do you?”

Caroline had the distinct impression as they patted their horses, made ribald jokes, and eyed the available women that most of the competitors didn’t even notice Sarah’s presence, nor did they care—more fools they. Sarah was a prize far greater than these men deserved.

Her eyes collided with a whirlpool of aquamarine, and suddenly she could hear nothing above the hammering of her heart, the beat of her bell tolling, the promise of a painful death as she looked into Sebastien Deville’s eyes. A slow smirk curved his mouth as one hand absently played with his horse’s reins.

Sweat broke along her brow. She gathered every last reserve and purposefully turned away.

“Well, Lady Sarah, at least you show a little more spirit with Mrs. Martin around.” Lady Tevon pinned Caroline with a glance. “See to it that she chats with the competitors. Nothing like adding a little incentive to the proceedings.”

Lady Tevon tried to inject some excitement into the statements, but unfortunately, she didn’t even look like she believed her own words.

Why no one could see the kind, beautiful girl beneath Sarah’s calm demeanor, Caroline didn’t know. It seemed obvious to her, but then people rarely looked beneath that which they wanted to see.

Caroline nodded to Lady Tevon, smoothing her hands over her dress in an effort to calm her body. “The party should prove a perfect venue to do so.” Should she survive the week,
the day
, with her already spotty reputation intact, the party would be a perfect venue to see which competitors she would allow to continue, and which ones she would seek to crush. There was one man already firmly on the latter list.

“Quite so.” Lady Tevon definitively agreed. “The men will be strutting after the game this afternoon.”

“Line up,” a voice shouted.

The fifteen riders trotted into place at the starting line. She tried to catalog each of their expressions, but her eyes continued to wander to Deville sitting on his horse, perfectly still, waiting.

A crack sounded and sixty hooves beat down on the earth. The riders galloped over the flat expanse, leaning forward, the best horseflesh and most skilled riders breaking away from the pack as they rode harder. Deville was in the front with three others—the golden Sloane, Lord Benedict, and the hook-nosed man Sarah had identified as Timothy Timtree. Deville’s horse took a tight turn and he held out a gloved hand to a branch. He must have caught the ring, because a few of the riders behind veered off to the other side.

Caroline had walked the course earlier looking for opportunities—the circuits of the wide expanse were useless, but the forays through the forest paths had held promise. Rings were placed throughout, so that more than one participant could gather them. Two riders riding together could each grab one from a different side and break even. The men who had set the course would be baffled if they could see the rings now, however. Some were hanging in
slightly
different homes.

She had heard the excited stable hands talking about a complicated calculation between the time one finished the race and the number of rings collected. The calculations hadn’t interested her, but the stable hands’ undivided attention on one another, and
off
the stalls, had. Her helpmates had encountered no trouble completing their tasks.

“What are they doing?” Lady Tevon peered through a pair of opera glasses.

“I believe they are looking for their second rings. They seem to be encountering difficulty doing so.” Caroline tried to rein in her self-satisfied smirk, she really did.

The men moved along the field, jockeying for position as they madly searched the area where the rings should have been prominently displayed.

Sarah gave her a questioning glance, then raised her own glasses. Caroline raised hers too.

It was a mad field. Horses everywhere, men shoving bushes hither and yon. A few clueless ones scratched their ill-used noggins and wandered aimlessly. This was a favor to them really.
As either an early weed-out, or good practice for the hunt that would be held in a few weeks.

She wasn’t surprised when Deville reached up to grab something. Bateman shoved sideways, nearly unseating Deville. Deville’s horse buckled beneath him, but at the last moment he leaned back, the horse righted itself, and they sped off. Sloane’s hand also closed around something shiny, and he too raced forward to the next thicket.

The rest of the pack raced after them. Midway to the next grove, one of the men turned sharply and galloped down the course, following the un-tampered-with markings.

“What is Mr. Timtree doing?”

“Smart man,” Caroline murmured. “He saw the trouble they were having and has decided to forgo the points collected from the rings.”

“What do you mean?” Lady Tevon demanded.

“The winner’s score is a combination of race time and the number of rings collected. If it takes the others too long to collect the rings, Mr. Timtree can win purely by crossing the finish line first.”

Another few men caught on, including Benedict, who raced after Timtree, eager to emulate his strategy.

Caroline saw Deville’s eyes follow Timtree and Benedict. Deville could follow. It had been a rather brilliant move on Timtree’s part. It was even possibly in Deville’s best interests as he appeared to be a better rider. And Deville had two rings, so he’d be ahead of Timtree, and all the others who had followed him, in the standings for sure.

Deville’s type always settled for the easy way out.

He shifted in the direction of the finish line. “I knew it,” she muttered. Then his horse’s head swung toward the next thicket, and horse and rider flung themselves inside.

She stood shocked, her mouth parting. A gambler. Definitely a gambler.

“I told you.”

Caroline kept her glasses up, ignoring Sarah’s low-voiced whisper as she anxiously searched the trees for movement. A few of the other men, including Bateman, blindly followed Deville. Sloane chose his own path.

A few terse minutes later, Deville’s horse burst into the open. Sloane and Bateman pounded after him, the others on their heels.

Eyes intent upon their prey. The race continued, up, down, and around the course. The lesser riders began to lag behind or decided to take the easy way out, cross the finish line, and put themselves in the middle of the standings. The risk takers pushed ahead. When they reached the last two patches, which were near the spectators’ area, Caroline cursed herself for becoming too predictable in where she had placed the rings. Deville seemed to zero in on them faster every time. She tried switching her eyes away from him, but couldn’t.

He smoothly bent down and plucked another ring, shooting one of the other contestants a smirk as he cut in front, leaving the man swearing in his kicked dirt. He charged toward the next flag. Every line of his body at Roseford had shouted
that he was a predator. Every press of his body to hers had proclaimed him a rogue. Every movement now confirmed both.

He leaned out from his horse, one long arm thrust out, and gripped another ring. His head flipped up as he regained his seat, long strands of hair arcing and settling messily across his face. Something hot and wild raced down her spine. He leaned against his horse’s neck, man and horse racing as one. A shake of his head in the wind whipped the strands back into place as he shot toward the finish.

He was the breed of man to which she was most susceptible. She swallowed heavily. That much was obvious.

Arrogant, dark, and dangerous. She needed to remove him from the competition and her life as quickly as possible.

Sebastien rounded the last corner.

Herakles’s hooves beat at the dirt, spraying it to the sides. He leaned right and snatched the last ring from the branches. He’d missed one when Bateman had shoved him for the third time. Bateman would pay for those tactics later. Sebastien heard Sloane’s mount at his side, but he didn’t spare a glance as they raced to the finish line. Everly shot in from the right and Bateman cut across.

Bateman was too far outside to give chase. He’d be third at best, if Timtree hadn’t beaten them all, clever bastard. And Benedict had taken obvious advantage of the strategy, knowing he wasn’t the best rider. If Benedict beat him in the first game…

Sloane and he were neck and neck for the finish. A fine piece of horseflesh there.

They crossed.

Cheers went up through the crowd.

Sebastien let Herakles slow and pulled around in an arc. He tossed the rings on the ground—seven. And saw Sloane do the same. Seven. Sloane gave him a grin, which he couldn’t stop himself from returning, fire still running through his veins. Riding was one of the few things that reminded him that he was alive.

The older men all huddled together, fishwives clacking over their daily profits. Tallying times, rings, and scores. Sebastien patted Herakles and dismounted, allowing one of the grooms to take the animal for a cooldown.

The Tipping Seven seemed to arrive at a decision, as Cheevers turned to the waiting crowd.

“The first game, and why not end in a tie,” Cheevers shouted. “Split the first and second place prize money and points. Well done, lads.”

He shook Sloane’s hand. First place, even shared, was perfectly fine. He’d overtake Sloane on some of the later games, of that he had no doubt.

Timtree and the closest finisher behind him, Benedict, took third and fourth. The top three finishers were all bastards—making the unofficial tally heavy to one side. He exchanged smirks with Timtree.

Timtree had almost beaten them all with his strategy. If Sebastien hadn’t discerned the pattern in the way the rings had been placed—the most inaccessible locations that could be had—Timtree
would have won. He knew Sloane had figured out the arrangement too. The others hadn’t been as lucky, it seemed, merely following behind, hoping to catch one.

Everly and Bateman had each collected two rings—moving ahead of them about halfway through the course, before being overtaken again during a further search. They placed fifth and sixth.

“The prankster responsible for the blankets, saddles, and the rings…yes, good show, good show, but I will remind everyone that tampering with the games is an offense punishable by expulsion.” There was a bite of steel beneath the earl’s words. “The same goes for the unfortunate events this morning.”

Harriet Noke’s hand wound around Sebastien’s shoulder and down his arm. “Congratulations.”

“Not going to offer your congratulations to Sloane?”

“Mmm. Maybe later. I’ve always been more interested in dark than light.”

“Yes, I seem to recall.”

“Good. I hope your memory is as
long
as I remember it to be.”

Harriet was a consummate woman of the world—one who knew how to maximize pleasure while taking precautions. And Benedict had fancied her for years—so any dalliance with her served multiple purposes. So why then was he utterly uninterested?

A flit of blonde drew his attention. The beautiful woman from Roseford stood to the side, hands
on her hips, tart and sweet like the deceptively sugary confection she was.

His blood still raced from the ride. From the hunt. Fueled by the promise of more hunting on a different playing field, it was small wonder why the woman hanging on his arm held such little of his interest.

Lady Sarah whispered something to the blonde.

“Darling, don’t pay the little bride any mind. No need to woo anyone in that quarter.” Harriet pulled a long nail down his coat.

He shot her a look, half in amusement, half in irritation. Another woman came over, sizing up the competition. The increasing feeling of apathy crept over his skin.

Then the blonde looked directly at him. Blue eyes piercing him, straight nose sniffing to the side as she looked away. Not making moon eyes at him, not simpering and clinging, instead challenging him to walk over there and wipe that supercilious expression from her face. To make her pant and moan again, beneath him this time instead.

The hunting instinct, deep, fierce, and predatory, overtook him. His apathy pushed aside—no room for it to remain.

Her identity tickled his skin. He scratched the back of his hand as the two women in front of him squabbled over something ridiculous.

There was little to satisfy these days. Revenge, satisfaction, power…

The hunt.

Yes, the delicious hunt.

The tournament is London’s, nay England’s, worst kept secret, and everyone who is anyone is trying to gain entrance to the show. Invitations to Meadowbrook, the Earl Cheevers’s elegant estate just outside London proper, are the most coveted items of the year. We here at the
Times
are of the opinion that if they had chosen to hold the competition during the season instead of in the summer, the ballrooms would have remained empty, the punch bowls dry, the marriage mart disbanded.

Or perhaps the mart would have simply moved to the estate…