by ANDREA SMITH
“Nice car,” I commented. “Is this your Atlanta car?”
He smiled, “No, baby, this is your Bristol car.”
What? Oh hell no!
“Trey…” I started.
“I won’t argue with you about this Tylar. This is my gift to you for your twenty-first birthday. I want you to have it. I selected it especially for you. The color fits you. It is the color of fun, it’s the color of passion and it’s the color you will make me see if you give me any shit about taking it. Do you understand?”
I leaned over and hugged him.
“Thank you, Trey. I love it.”
I love you I thought. I love everything you have given me over the past twenty-four hours.
He was on the interstate in a matter of minutes.
“So,” I asked, "Is this as fast as your Lamborghini?" Trey laughed good-naturedly.
“I’m afraid not baby. I want you to take things a bit slower. This car gets zero to sixty in 5.4 seconds. I think you can handle that, don’t you?”
Trey drove past the exit to the airport. I looked over at him getting ready to say something.
“We’re driving back to Bristol, Tylar. How else would we get your car to you?”
“Oh, right,” I laughed.
I settled back in my new sports car. Perhaps eventually Trey would let me drive it. He put some music on that was soft classical.
I dozed on and off, dreaming of our night together and the passion that we had shared. I wished that it would always be that way between us. I blushed and smiled thinking about how bold I had been with him. I was comfortable being with him and having him know every inch of my body. I wanted to know every inch of his. I wondered if this was how it was supposed to be when you loved someone. Soon I fell into a deep sleep. The next thing I knew we were pulling into the long, winding drive of the estate up to the manor.
“Wake up, baby girl,” Trey said softly, kissing my hair. “We’re home.”
“Trey, we’re at your home,” I replied.
“You are staying here with me tonight. No argument.”
He got out of the car, popping the trunk, and opening my door for me to get out. As always, Thatcher was coming out the front door, gathering my luggage up and taking it into the manor. Trey put his arm around me, leading me up the winding staircase to his suite. I was exhausted. I wasn’t sure why.
“Do you want something to eat, Tylar?” he asked. I shook my head ‘no.’
“I really just want to brush my teeth; get my pj’s on and go to bed if that’s alright.”
“Of course,” he answered. He got my small cosmetic case and took it into his bathroom.
I went in and brushed my teeth, stripped out of my clothes wearing just my panties and padded back out to his bedroom. I didn’t feel like going through all the clothes in my suitcase so I went into his closet, switched the light on and picked out one of his shirts to wear. I put it on buttoning only a couple of the buttons. I pulled the covers down from his bed, and crawled beneath them. Oh this felt so good.
Trey came back into the room just as I got settled in. He came over to my side of the bed, bending down and kissing my lips gently, smoothing the hair back.
“I’ve got some work to do in my study, okay? I’ll be up in an hour or so.”
I nodded, feeling his lips brush my forehead again before he went to the door, turning out the light before he left.
It was some time later that I felt Trey climb into bed next to me. He smelled freshly showered. He curled up next to me, pulling me in close to him, and wrapping his arm around me. I slept the whole night cradled in the comfort of his strong body.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Trey and I had breakfast together the next morning. I was dressed for my day of dressage training. The trainer that Trey had hired was extremely knowledgeable. Mark Montgomery was trained in classical dressage and had competed both in Europe and the U.S. He worked the first couple of days alone with Derringer. He wanted to get a feel for how much previous training the horse had, as well as his current skill level.
Mark felt that Derringer would be ready to test at Intermediare I as early as one week from now; I wasn’t sure that I would be ready. Mark made it look so easy. I was having an issue with timing that we were trying to work through, particularly in the half halt.
“How’s the dressage training coming along?” Trey asked, almost as if on cue.
“Mark says that Derringer is ready to test to Level One; he wondered how much training he had previously.”
“I bought the horse in England as a one year-old,” Trey answered. “My former fiancée trained him for a little more than a year.”
“I didn’t realize you had been engaged, Trey,” I lied, knowing perfectly well that he had from when Gina spilled the beans.
I wanted more information though.
“Perhaps I will stop by the arena later and observe your progress. I want to make sure this trainer is worth what he’s being paid.”
Trey had successfully changed the subject. I would probably never find out the details of the broken engagement.
“How late will you be working with Derringer?” he asked.
“We usually train for two hours in the morning and two hours in the afternoon."
“What does Mr. Montgomery do between training?”
“Oh, he’s working with another horse over at ‘the Belle. Don’t worry; he’s not on your clock when he works with Figaro,” I teased.
“You didn’t answer my question, Tylar. What time are you finished for the day? I want to go to dinner this evening.” He sure sounded like it was serious.
“Trey, I’m back at my cottage by four o’clock.”
He rolled his eyes when I mentioned my cottage. He seemed to be in a mood today.
“Good, we’ll leave here around six; can you meet me up here then?”
“Of course,” I said.
(Your majesty.)
I headed down to the stables, thankful to be about my business today. Something was going on with Trey. He seemed agitated for some reason. I couldn’t fathom what could have happened between last night and this morning. He had been in his study, catching up on emails it appeared. I noticed that Trey had parked my new red car in one of the five garages. I was glad. I wasn’t sure how my having an extravagant car was going to go over with the rest of the group. Jenna was already making catty remarks about my ‘special assignment’ referring to the dressage training.
That was one of the downsides with the dressage training; the arena was located over at ‘the Belle. It was hard to avoid Jenna. She did her share of running into Mark it seemed. It was fairly obvious she had her hooks out for him. Mark didn’t seem to notice or perhaps he was used to it.
He had a slender but muscular build. He was probably only 5’10” at the most, not nearly as tall as Trey. He had blondish-brown hair, and green eyes. I estimated that Mark was close to the same age as Trey, though he didn’t act as formal.
Mark had lived a life of hard work. He talked about it sometimes. He was born and raised in Wyoming. His family had a horse ranch so he got started riding at a very young age. They bred warm bloods for just these types of competitions.
He was extremely intense as a trainer. I knew that Derringer was more advanced than me from the way he responded to Mark’s aids versus mine. I certainly didn’t want to take Derringer backwards, and it was a worry of mine. Mark said my job was to bring the horse around, not the horse’s job to bring me around.
When Derringer and I arrived at the arena, Jenna was perched on the gate, talking to Mark. She was laughing, and flipping her hair. Shouldn’t she have had her hair in a bun by now? The tours of the mansion started at 10 a.m. each day; the workers were supposed to be in full period costume by 9:30 a.m. It was close to that now.
As soon as I approached, Jenna’s smile faded.
“Well, I see your star pupil is back, Mark. Good luck with that.”
She gave me a smirk as she walked awa
y.
“Hi Mark,” I said, grinning. “I’m so glad that I give Jenna something to be catty about. What would she do without me?”
Mark grinned, shaking his head.
"Women are brutal," he commented.
I thought Mark was just a bit smitten with Jenna, but didn’t want to admit it. I had filled him in on our brief but acrimonious history.
I wasn’t sure if Jenna was continuing with her “Twinkie” campaign. Nothing had been mentioned to me lately, but most everyone else here had far too much class to repeat the venomous things she liked to spread around.
Derringer and I had a pretty good morning session with Mark. Mark’s style with dressage was traditional. He placed significant importance on the communication and rapport that must be established between the horse and the rider prior to training. He recognized that existed with Derringer and me. He said that was one of the reasons he agreed to train me.
Mark was very direct in his approach with me. He made it clear that his expectation was that successful dressage was dependent upon my abilities to get to the skill level that Derringer had already reached. It had to be a partnership of sorts, which benefited the horse as much as the rider.
Mark and I reviewed videos taken at the morning session. We did this daily; it was a good tool for me to view weaknesses in the routine. Mark would point out areas that needed more work, and take me through what movements and aids should have been executed at that time to keep the regularity of the gait pristine.
Later in the afternoon I brought Derringer back out into the arena. We had pretty much conquered the rhythm, gait, and tempo Mark wanted to work on the regularity of the gaits; the evenness and levelness of the stride. He wanted me to start working on the half halt to improve the horse’s cadence. Derringer was sensitive to both the leg and rein aids, he was reaching for the bit. He was more than ready.
I mounted Derringer and put him through the beginning paces; we worked into a trot, circling the outer perimeter of the arena, several times.
At the third round, second turn, I could feel Derringer’s sideways gait; I had given too much leg in my execution. I over-corrected trying to align his hind legs to follow the path of his front legs.
Mark came on out to where we were.
“I’ve got an idea,” he said, “Dismount for a moment.” I did as instructed, dismounting from Derringer and stood beside Mark. He mounted the horse and then held his hand down to me, pulling me up in back of him.
Sharing the dressage saddle was extremely intimate as it was made for just one rider.
“It might be easier if I show you how the half halt is properly executed, Tylar. To the naked eye, it looks as if the rider applies all three aids at the same time. However, if we could freeze frame it you would actually see that the aids are applied separately in sequence. We’ll go through this a few times so you can feel what your body is supposed to do in conjunction with what the horse is doing okay?”
“Sure,” I agreed.
“Okay, for the first attempt, I want you to rest each of your hands on the outside of each of my thighs, as close to the back of my knees as possible.”
I did as instructed.
“Okay, now remember what we talked about earlier, there is no ‘halt’ in the half halt. That is a misnomer. Every half halt should contain what?” he quizzed me.
“The surge,” I answered.
“Correct,” he said. “It will contain the surge, the drive, and the energy from Derringer’s hind legs, just as if you were asking for a medium gait or a lengthening, right?”
“Right,” I responded, “But we don’t want him breaking into the medium gait, until after the surge, correct?”
“Yes,” Mark responded, “Because we know that we always ride the horse from back to front, which is what the surge guarantees.”
Mark started Derringer into the routine, my hands placed on the outside of each of his muscular thighs.
“If we’re lucky, you will be able to feel my calves close first. It will be a steady squeeze for three seconds, just before the surge. Here we go.”
Mark was right; we went through the motions about three times. Like clockwork, Mark would close his calves with a steady squeeze; I counted to three in my head and the pressure released. Mark then had me put my hand on his hand holding the outside rein; my other hand on his hand holding the inside rein.
Through this, I was able to understand that each of these aids happened separately, though very close in time. It was a steady squeeze of the calves for three seconds, outside hand captured reins to contain the horse’s power back to the hind legs; inside rein held loosely to keep Derringer flexed and straight.
“Okay,” Mark said, dismounting, handing me the reins.
"Scoot up, my turn.”
He remounted Derringer, this time behind me, putting his hands on the outside of each of my thighs and we went through the routine several times. We continued with the reining as well until I was executing the half halt nearly as well as Mark. I was proud of myself.
When we brought Derringer back to the gate. I noticed that Trey was sitting in the grandstand. I wasn’t sure how long he had been watching. But he didn’t appear pleased.
Holy Moses, now what is wrong?
Mark set the video camera up and had me take Derringer back out so that he could video tape how a proper half halt should look to an observer. Once finished we called it a day. Mark told me to take the video camera with me to review everything that we had gone over today.
I dismounted, walking Derringer over near to where Trey was sitting.
“Well?” I asked. “What did you think?”
I was smiling, hoping to be praised for the progress we’d made.
“I think I’m confused as to why Mr. Montgomery needs to have his hands all over you while training you in dressage? I’ve never seen that style of training utilized.”
“Trey, I was having some problems getting the feel of the surge. Mark thought this would help and it did.”
“I felt the surge” Trey replied, “The surge of my blood pressure.”
He was still ticked off.
“You are being ridiculous, Trey.”
“Oh am I? You seemed to be enjoying yourself trotting around that track with him all over your backside. I was worried Mr. Montgomery might be in need of a hosing off had the training not stopped when it did.”
“Stop it,” I couldn’t help from laughing. “You are being silly and you know it.”
“I’m serious when it comes to you, Tylar. You do understand that, don’t you?”
Oh God, when he looked at me with those piercing blue eyes, so serious, so sexy, I wanted to mount him right then and there. I could see that beneath the sarcastic humor, Trey had been bothered by Mark’s being close to me. I didn’t want him getting in a worse mood than he already seemed to be in.
I went over to him, stood on my tip-toes and kissed him sweetly and longingly. He wrapped his arm around me, tightly, brushing my hair from my face.
“You have nothing to worry about, Mr. Sinclair,” I told him, snuggling into his chest.
“Just see that I don’t, Tylar. I don’t share. I will see you at the main house at six.”
I got back on Derringer, riding him back to the stables. I told him what a good job he did today. Once back I got him situated in his stall, removing all of the dressage tack.
I brushed him down thoroughly, cleaned his hooves, and brought him his treat for a fine day’s work. He loved the cut-up carrots I brought him, eating them from my hand.
I put my face next to his large one as he chewed the last one and kissed his nose. Derringer was born to compete. He was perfection.
Having concluded my duties in the stables, I started up the path leading to my cottage. Ray’s was the first cottage on the left from the stables. I saw Denise on his porch, shaking throw rugs outside.
“Denise!” I yelled running over toward his porch.
I hadn’t seen her since the ho
spital and I was ashamed for not calling her before now.
“Hey girl,” she hollered back, waving. “How in the hell are you?”
“I’m great,” I said. “I’ve been meaning to call you, I really have. . .”
“Hey, I know how it is; I’ve been swamped down at the salon. All kinds of weddings this summer. I was thinking maybe we would be adding yours to it?”
“What?”
“Ray says you and Trey are really close. He says he’s never seen Trey like this with any other girl, the way he is with you.”
“Did Ray know his former fiancée, Tess?”
“Well I’m not sure about that. I don’t know how often Trey got home when he was engaged to her. You want me to ask him?”
“No, no,” I replied quickly. “Maybe it’s better not knowing what she was like.”
“So what are you doing?” I asked, “Cleaning Ray’s cottage for him? Now that is definitely a woman in love.”
“I’m just finishing getting him packed up.”
“Why, where is Ray going?”
“Sweetie, he’s finally moving in with me. Hell, he’s there practically every night anyway. He was worried Trey might have a problem with it wanting him to be close by if needed. Trey was fine with it. Trey is a good man, Ty. You make sure you treat him right, you hear?”
“You do the same with your man, Denise.”
“Hey, Ray and I will have you and Trey over for a cookout or something soon. How’s that sound?”
“I would love it,” I said, starting back up the path. “See you later, Neecie!”
“Take care baby girl,” she called after me.
I showered at my cottage. It was not creeping me out as much as it had before. I was starting to feel a bit more safe and secure.
I had changed into a tight little white jean skirt, and dark purple tank top. I blew dry my hair wearing it down perfectly straight. Being in the sun had really brought the blonde highlights out. I applied some light blush, a little bit of purple eye shadow just around the bottom lashes and top lid, and some mascara.