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She pouted Her hair was falling down all over her shoulders He looked back at the road It shiht and clean as an English toll road

"The clouds have bloay for the moment," she pointed out

He hesitated "You’re not drunk," she said acidly "I’m sure you’ll have much steadier hands with your mount than you are accusto his horse next to hers He glanced at her and frowned "Why are you riding like that?"

She was poised above her saddle, botto her horse

"It’s more comfortable," she said cheerfully "I’ where it e of lust such as he hadn’t felt in years He sed Itup liquor

Actually, he couldn’t ree, to put against all the disadvantages of not drinking Even if he did have to recover his desire in the presence of his least desirable ward

"Your choice," he said, shrugging

"The jockeys ride this way," she said, clearly uncon-cerned by the fact he was seeing every curve of her bottohtest cotton A lady she wasn’t "That rowled "We’ll go to that bend On my mark"

He won But only by a hairbreadth, and only in a terrific gallop at the end of the road and a wild screahter from her

"Oh, that was marvelous!" she cried when it was over "Luna, you’re a beauty, a true beauty! We would have had you if you weren’t riding such a rinned back But he noticed how she winced as she sat back on her horse "Perhaps we should walk theested "After all, it’s the ht," she agreed, too quickly So he jumped off his horse and then came to the side of hers and held up his hands

He hadn’t done such a thing in years, and so he bungled it; soht on her bottom rather than her hips And where she should have been covered by layers and layers of cloth, of course there was only fragile French cotton, tied with little bows, he noticed now His hands were sliding down a curve that had him harder than--

Harder than he’d been in years

Perhaps there was so up the tipple He could take a reet him with a smile and a hot look of desire Who would never scold

He saw soround She had felt his hands too And it had quieted her, at least So that was good She didn’t rail at him on the way home That would teach her not to rip off her skirt and throw it in a ditch when there was no one around but a entleuardian, for he still considered himself such, whether she ed or no

They walked their horses back down the en’s hair spilled around her shoulders,her look witchlike

He felt cos war cheerfully in his ear They walked farther, and it occurred to Rafe that he couldn’t re such a vivid experience in years

Oh, he re pleasure of his first drink in the evening And the lullaby sweetness of finishing a glass and feeling cal with desire, if unfortunately directed to absolutely the wrong place But still, it was back His head didn’t hurt He felt alive, every inch of hi that he wouldn’t drink again

Ever

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