He had the good grace to chuckle. ‘Well, I was rather hoping you’d keep away from matches.’
God that drawl was sexy. She’d always thought that type of accent would come across as affected, but it suited Hugo. Even his name suited him.
She had to stop this; men were off the agenda. Look what had happened with Oli – she’d thought he was arrogant and assertive in a sexy and amusing way and, before she’d known it, he was controlling her life.
‘I may be lighting one later, but I’ll send Mabel round if I need help.’
‘That’s telling me.’ He didn’t seem offended; more amused. Sod him, she could so do this, and he’d just overreacted last night. What was a bit of smoke? ‘I’ll catch you later then.’
Not if she saw him first.
***
She was going to make the most of this man-free, wonderful holiday thought Flo as she pulled on an extra sweater and grabbed the key for the shed that Daisy referred to as her ‘tack room’. The sun was shining now, but the long-term forecast said snow, so if she was going to get her long-awaited horse ride out down the country lanes, then now was as good a time as any.
Barney stood as patiently as a riding-school hack, shooting her the odd quizzical look as she shifted the saddle about on his back. It wasn’t that she’d never put a saddle on before (though it was a long time ago, but surely you never forgot?), it was more that he was so broad, and his withers were so low, it was hard to be sure if it was actually in the right place. And every time she tried to do the girth up he gave such a big sigh she couldn’t get the leather strap through the buckle. Which convinced her she’d got something wrong. But this had to be his saddle, and his girth, as they were the only ones she could find.
There was at least a two-inch gap between her and victory when Mabel heard a noise and barked. Barney stuck his head up to see what the fuss was about, and he miraculously slimmed down.
‘Ha!’ Flo pulled the leather strap through the metal buckle quickly and did up the girth triumphantly. ‘You naughty thing, blowing your stomach out like that.’ Barney looked at her indignantly and pulled at his hay net.
Using the fence to mount off might not have been her brightest idea, thought Flo, as it creaked alarmingly, leaving her scrambling up and onto Barney before the whole thing collapsed. But at least nobody had seen her, she hoped. She glanced around from her new vantage point on the back of the cob, even standing up as high as she could in the stirrups to peer over the fence, and luckily there was no sight of Hugo.
Not that she was bothered about what Hugo thought.
Hugo was a man, and a very opinionated, arrogant, posh man at that. Who thought she was a comedy act. He’d be crap in the relationship stakes; she’d never know what he was thinking, not that she wanted another relationship.
The lane from the cottage was as traffic-free this morning as it had been when she’d arrived. In the spring there would, no doubt, be farm traffic and tractors, but a winter morning just had to be the most perfect time to go out. Barney ambled along happily on a long rein as she settled into the saddle, wondering if her hips would ever recover from being stretched this wide apart. Crumbs, she might not ever be able to walk again properly if she was out for too long.
Barney came to a stop and tugged on the reins, and Flo stopped thinking about the state of her inner thighs. There was a weird buzz, and she glanced to the right to see a large pylon and then up to see heavy electricity cables overhead, crossing the road from side to side. She guessed that the cold, damp air was probably partly responsible for them making that much noise, not that she was any kind of expert. She had as much knowledge about electricity cables as she did about men.
The horse snorted, so Flo nudged with her heels. ‘Oh come on, I know you’ve been this way lots of times before. Daisy said so.’ Barney wasn’t impressed, he took a step backwards. Flo kicked gently. Daisy had made it quite clear that her horse was a typical cob, easy-going when it suited him, but lazy and obstinate. ‘You really need to show him you mean it or he’ll be awful’ she’d said, then added ‘but if you’re too bossy he’ll take offence and try and show you who’s in charge.’ Very helpful.
Barney turned as though to head back the way they’d come, so she pushed him on and they ended up doing a circle and facing the same way. He wasn’t impressed. He stamped a foot and snorted again.
‘Look, I don’t like them either, but it’s only a couple of strides and we’ll be under.’ Maybe she should turn him round and take a run at it, as it were?
Letting Barney turn round was a mistake though, he’d already taken advantage and trotted a few hundred metres up the road, with his nose in the air, before she managed to stop and turn him back again. This time she was determined. She’d been pushed around enough over the last few years, and she really wasn’t going to let a woolly gelding do it.
‘You boys are just all the same, give you half a chance and you take advantage.’ Taking a deep breath she kicked on and set off at a spanking trot. It was easy. This was going to work. It was SO going to work. Three yards short of the cables she realised it wasn’t.
It was amazing how agile a horse that bulky could be.
Barney wasn’t daft. He didn’t just put the brakes on this time; he slid to a halt, spun round and ducked his head all in one impressive motion and Flo found herself in a very damp ditch. With wet knickers for the second time in two days.
Barney peered down at her, and she could have sworn he winked, then off he trotted – straight up the road under the flaming electricity cables!
Flo closed her eyes and swore. Then she heard the welcome clip-clop of horseshoes on tarmac. Brilliant. He’d come back, obviously realising he was heading in the wrong direction and away from his precious hay net.
But it wasn’t Barney.
It was a very elegant and well-groomed thoroughbred. With a very upright, elegant rider, who had slowed so he could look down his nose at her.
He grinned. It was Hugo.
Was he the only person that lived within five miles of her? Talk about a ghost town, or village.
She scrambled out of the ditch (which luckily wasn’t too deep), staggered to her feet, and gave him a glare that dared him to say a word.
The grin broadened and he laughed, his horse standing motionless, as a well-trained animal should.
‘Problem?’
‘Can you bloody well stop taking the piss for once, and help?’
He looked her up and down, his eyes crinkling at the corners. ‘Makes a change from smoking the place out, I suppose.’ He rested a hand on the pommel of the saddle. ‘What would you like me to do? Swing you onto my horse and take you home fair maiden?’ He raised an eyebrow, and looked decidedly cheeky from where she was standing. Roguish her gran would call it.
But no, she definitely did not want to be pressed groin to groin with him on a horse.
‘Very kind, but I think I’ll pass. Maybe you could go and catch Barney?’
‘Not quite as appealing as catching you.’
Flo stared; she was going pink again. A very bad habit. ‘I need to get out of these.’ She pointed down at her jodhpurs and the look he gave her made the blushing state worse.
‘I could help.’
‘You can help, Hugo,’ she paused, ‘by catching Barney. Please?’
‘Some girls are no fun at all.’ He sighed.
***
He was as good as his word. By the time she’d got back to her cottage, stripped off her sopping clothes and soaked in a warm bath for half an hour, the feeling had returned to her bum. And Barney, it appeared, when she glanced out of the window, had been returned to his field.
Mabel had flopped on the floor in front of the Aga, and for a moment she felt like joining her. Coping with a broken heart at Christmas surely should be enough for anybody, but sharing it with six scraggy old chickens, a solitary neighbour who thought she was a comedy act, a wilful horse, and a dog the size of a donkey? You had to be kidding.
‘Thanks for catching Barney.’
‘No problem, I’m a dab hand at it. He has a habit of wandering.’
After doing a bit of wandering herself she’d tracked Hugo down to a small outdoor school adjacent to Mere End Farm, where he was riding a large bay horse in fluid, effortless circles. He pulled up a few feet from where she was standing.
‘And dumping people?’
‘Well Daisy is used to his ways, it’s his habit of getting out of the field which is normally the problem. Hence the padlock and chain.’
‘Ahh, so you’re saying I’m just a terrible rider?’
‘I didn’t say that.’
‘It was in your eyes.’
He laughed and swung out of the saddle, landing far too close for comfort. ‘I can give you a few lessons if you like, to brush up?’ The smile reached his eyes, devilish as well as amused.
Flo took a deep, calming breath and tried not to let him fluster her. ‘Kind offer, but I don’t know if my bum or my pride is up to it.’
‘Nothing wrong with admitting you need help. Even I have lessons.’ He paused. ‘And you weren’t too bad when you were at Billy’s, from what I remember.’ Faint praise. ‘But my memory isn’t that good.’
‘You just had to spoil it, didn’t you?’ Flo pursed her lips and shook her head. ‘And for a moment there you were almost being nice.’
‘Treat ‘em mean, keep ‘em—’
She held her hand up. ‘Now you sound like a dinosaur. What have you been reading the 1950’s guide to being a scoundrel and rotter?’
He laughed. ‘Sorry, old habits.’ He didn’t look at all sorry.
‘I won’t be here long, I mean if the weather turns like it said on the forecast I might not even get chance to go out riding again.’ So much for the romantic notion of ambling down the lanes on a gentle hack – scrub that one off the list.
‘Well the offer is there.’ He paused. ‘I can always escort you if you like, happy to help you back in the saddle any time.’ His gaze had drifted down to her bum, which she had a strong urge to wiggle, just to see his reaction. But if she knew anything about Hugo at all, then she knew that was just playing with fire.
Oh why did everything he said sound like some kind of innuendo? Or was that just her? She was pretty sure it wasn’t though, the grin was never far from his eyes, even if it wasn’t playing around his full lips.
‘I’ll bear it in mind, thanks.’ She could just imagine a lesson with Hugo – now that really would give him something to laugh about. Anyway, moving on. ‘I came because I had another kind of offer.’
He raised an eyebrow.
‘Dinner.’ Did she detect a hint of disappointment? ‘I can cook, honest! To say thank you for rescuing me. Catching Barney. And the smoke thing, I suppose.’
‘I hardly…’
‘Just be British, keep it simple and say thank you.’
‘Thank you.’ He grinned. ‘Thank you doesn’t always come that easy to us Brits.’
‘I’ll see you at seven then? At mine.’
‘We could do it here, I have slightly more room than you do.’
I bet you do. More room downstairs, more room upstairs… where, no doubt, he had a four-poster bed and no head-banging beams.
‘My place.’ Safer. ‘Nothing fancy, but you can bring wine if you like.’
‘You’re early.’ Flo spun round in mild panic as Hugo appeared at the back door, clad in jeans, white shirt and the type of jumper that would have made some men look like a grandad. Since when did a pullover look sexy? She gulped. ‘It’s not quite…’
He raised an eyebrow. ‘Everything okay?’
‘Sure.’ She was squeaking. This was looking like a bad idea.
‘I can pour the wine.’
She caught sight of the clock: he was bang on time. Typical. Here she was trying to impress for once, and prove that her life wasn’t one disaster after another and she’d failed again. She was normally a very together person. She planned, worked to strict timetables, she had spreadsheets. But whenever Hugo was about it didn’t seem to work out.
‘Smells good.’ He popped the cork and started hunting in the cupboards for glasses.
‘I was just going to—’ Flo waved towards the stairs.
‘Sure, you get changed, although you look fine to me.’
Hugo being nice was harder to cope with than Hugo making fun of her.
‘I’ll wait in the lounge,’ he winked, ‘make sure you’re not about to set the house on fire.’
Ahh that was better. ‘Sod off, Hugo.’
Mistake number one (well for this evening, at least): leaving clothes on the bed. Her very nice, but only vaguely sexy (you had to play safe with Hugo around), tailored trousers now had the unmistakeable mark of a very big dog on them. She picked them up with a sigh. Crumpled was not the word. Okay, so it was jeans then, and a cashmere jumper, which she’d wisely put away.
How on earth did a dog that size manage to sneak around without her knowing?
Hugo was standing in front of the fire, glass of red wine in his hand, looking very lord of the manor-ish, when she went down.
‘Dinner is served, my lord.’
He grinned and took his place at the table, then transformed into the most charming dinner guest she’d ever known.
It wasn’t just his impeccable manners, the way he appeared to actually listen to her, or his compliments to the chef – he was actually relaxed and easy company. He made her laugh with his story about the day Barney broke into his food store, made her giggle at his slightly naughty comments about Jimmy, and seemed intent on wiping every sarcastic, mocking, and arrogant comment he’d ever made straight out of her head.
He even cleared the dishes off the table and then led her un-protesting to the sofa.
‘It’s quite warm in here, you’ve done an excellent job with the fire.’ Was he laughing at her or with her now? ‘Think I need to strip off.’
Shit. She was in trouble here. Mistake number two: efficiently building a fire.
The pullover went straight over his head, and the shirt underneath rose up, displaying a rather toned set of abs. And a long scar down his rib cage.
‘That looks nasty.’ Gawd it was hot in here, she’d be fanning herself soon. Could you get hot flushes at her age? She stared at the scar, which wasn’t good for her, as it meant she was taking in the rest of his surprisingly tanned torso.
He pulled the shirt down unselfconsciously and threw his jumper over the back of the chair. Then he ran long, slender fingers through his mop of hair, leaned back and looked at her through heavy-lidded eyes. ‘Offering to do your Florence Nightingale bit and kiss it better?’
A ‘red for danger’ signal flashed in front of Flo’s eyes. You couldn’t make it up. He was coming on to her. Seriously. The strip was part of the act. And even though the glimpse of his body had made her question her ability to become a nun (that really had been a stupid idea) did he honestly think a couple of hours of good behaviour and half a bottle of smooth red wine was going to oil the route into her knickers?
‘Hugo stop being a wanker. It will take more than a bit of sweet-talking over a trifle to get me in bed.’
‘Sorry.’ Why did ‘sorry’ in that posh, languid drawl sound anything but? He raised an eyebrow. ‘Your language has got worse.’
‘So has your behaviour. No, sorry, scrub that. You always were like this.’
‘Call it attention-seeking.’ He looked slightly, but not very, apologetic. There was a long silence, disturbed only by Mabel’s snuffles as she chased an imaginary intruder. ‘I was rather hoping—’
‘What? That you could just add me to your list of conquests? I remember what you were like.’ Yeah, she’d watched the girls clamour for his attention, and vowed that however attractive he was she wasn’t going to join them. He was too selfish, too temperamental, too damned arrogant. She’d always felt like tipping a bucket of water over his head. She had to admit he was sexy, and when he turned the charm on
full-force, wow, she’d almost forgotten who she was dealing with.
He didn’t smile as she expected, just carried on looking. Which left an uncomfortable hole she had to fill.
‘I thought you called me Nightingale because of the singing, not my nursing ability.’
His eyes narrowed and he studied her for a moment. ‘Both. It seemed to fit. You always looked after the little people.’
‘I was just nice to everybody, that’s all.’ Unlike you, she could have added.
He shrugged, as though he knew. Held his hands up in surrender. ‘Sorry. Uncalled for. I got the scar when a horse I was on went down with me, caught me with a hoof when it was thrashing about trying to get up.’
‘Oh, it looks bad.’
‘Worse for the horse.’ He didn’t elaborate, just poured the remainder of the wine into their glasses. ‘That was when I bashed my nose as well, not that it was ever one of my best features.’ He twisted the stem of his glass in long, elegant fingers and Flo shifted in her seat. Why did he have to make everything look like some, some, well sexual gesture?
‘It goes down rather a long way if you ever feel the need to check it out. The scar.’
She rolled her eyes and hoped he hadn’t noticed the way her gaze was drawn back to his waistband.
‘Don’t you ever stop, Hugo?’
‘Not when I really want something.’ The corner of his mouth twitched. ‘Patience never was my strong point.’
‘Well go after an easier prey, I’m sure there are plenty of girls willing to humour you and,’ she willed herself not to look down, ‘check out the full extent of your scar.’ Would opening a window, or fanning herself look too obvious?
‘I’m sure there are.’ One of his arms had somehow sneaked its way along the back of the sofa, and his hand was uncomfortably close to her shoulder, his fingers beating a gentle tattoo that seemed to be reverberating straight through her.
‘I seem to remember you working your way through them on the yard.’ If she perched any more on the edge of the seat she’d be falling off.
The Holiday Swap Page 13