“I don’t need luck, just opportunity.”
“Oh, incidentally, could you please just leave me at the Saxtons’ house? I promised Chauncey I’d come by.”
“No chance. Didn’t you know that the stallion always herds his mares, keeps them under his watchful eye?”
“Is that so? Well, perhaps the stallion had best come to the realization that there is the occasional mare who refuses to share him. Maybe you know of such a stallion, Brent?”
That did it, he thought. “If the mare were more of a mare,” he said brutally, “perhaps she could keep the stallion content.”
“Or,” Byrony said, manifestly amused, “if the stallion were more of a stallion, he could be content in his own pasture. I venture to say that there are some mares who are just as possessive as their stallions. Have you ever heard of a mare nipping her stallion’s neck?”
“All right,” he roared, scaring the horse, “that does it. Enough of this ridiculous imagery. If you ever raise that whip to me, Byrony, I will make you very sorry.”
“How, if you don’t mind my asking?” she said with great seriousness. “We mares like specificity, you know.”
He ground his teeth. “I don’t know,” he said finally, “but you can be certain I will come up with something.”
“Until you do, then I shall keep to my present course.”
“Which is?”
“Keeping my stallion to myself,” she said, “using whatever means are necessary.”
“We stallions also appreciate specificity.”
“Do you now?” she said, and very lightly trailed her fingers up his thigh. She felt his muscles tense, heard his sharp intake of breath.
“Perhaps,” she said, “this stallion will shortly be too exhausted to leave his pasture.”
“I will do just as I please, Byrony.”
“So shall I, Brent. So shall I.”
“You’d best remove your hand, else I’ll take you right here.”
She laughed, and with great concentration straightened her bonnet. He gave her a black look as she began to hum, as if she hadn’t a care in the whole damned world.
Brent fully intended to make love to her until she was utterly exhausted when they returned, but it was not to be.
Caesar met him outside. “It looks important, Brent,” he said.
Brent took the wrinkled envelope and stared down at it. “Oh no,” he said.
“What is it, Brent?” Byrony asked.
“A letter, and not from my brother, Drew. It’s from my father’s lawyer in Natchez.” His hand was trembling; he couldn’t seem to control it. He ripped open the envelope and pulled out the neatly scripted two pages.
Byrony watched his hands clench, watched the myriad expressions on his expressive face. She heard him curse very explicitly and very quietly.
He turned to walk away fro
m her, but she grabbed his arm. “What is it, Brent?”
“My father’s dead, and of all the insane things, he’s made me his heir.”
TWENTY-THREE
“Why shouldn’t you be your father’s heir?”