Free A Notorious Love by Sabrina Jeffries Page A

task.

    “You can’t mean to…we’re not…where’s the carriage?” she sputtered.
    “We’re not taking the carriage,” Mr. Brennan said matter-of-factly as he climbed back up to her side. “Traveling by coach would slow us down, and you said yourself that this matter requires haste.” He held out his arm to help her descend. When she didn’t take it at once, he added, “Wait a minute, I nearly forgot—you don’t ride, do you?”
    She scowled at him. Nearly forgot, indeed. The devil. Well, his blatant tactics would not work. “Of course I ride.”
    He cocked his head. “That’s not what your father said this summer.”
    “I thought you ‘nearly forgot’ that?” When his lips twitched, she tipped her nose up at him. “As it happens, Papa was mistaken. I can handle any horse you give me.”
    Well-bred Young Ladies do not tell falsehoods, she thought woefully. Though she used to ride every day when the weather was fine, she hadn’t mounted a horse in the eight years since her illness had struck. She’d feared having everyone see her fail at it.
    But as with the other things she’d had to tackle on her mad excursion, she’d do this, too. Because she refused to stay behind, no matter what Mr. Brennan sprang on her.
    He eyed her skeptically. “Your leg won’t give you trouble?”
    Of course it would, but she’d never let him know it. She took the arm he offered. “Not in the least.”
    He said nothing more as they made their slow way to the gelding. Close up, her mount looked impossibly large. She swallowed hard. They would need a mounting block, and perhaps even two on top of each other, sinceshe couldn’t use her weak left leg at all to vault herself onto the horse.
    Would her leg even serve well enough to ride? She tried to remember being in the saddle, how it had felt, how she’d supported her weight, if she’d needed that leg with the sidesaddle.
    But memory was pointless. She’d been a different woman then, sure of her abilities. Her body had done the riding, not her mind, and how did one make the body remember anything? She couldn’t even make her leg remember how to walk properly.
    Mr. Brennan lowered his head. Concern flickered in his eyes. “Are you sure about this, lass? I don’t want to see you hurt yourself.”
    Pride took over then, pride and a bit of the Laverick stubbornness. “I’m perfectly sure. I’ll merely need help mounting.”
    “Of course.” He took the cane from her hand and tucked it into the pack behind the cantle of the saddle. Then before she knew what was happening, he turned her to face him and placed his hands on her waist. “Tell me when you’re ready.”
    “I was speaking of a mounting block!” she cried, seized by sudden fear. “You can’t lift me so high!”
    He chuckled. “Compliments upon compliments, eh? D’you doubt my strength?”
    She stared up into his face uncertainly. He waited, expectant, sure of himself and his power. It wasn’t his strength she doubted, but her own. If he lifted her and she did not maneuver her body into the saddle right, she might come crashing down on him. Or worse yet, fall onto the stone steps.
    He bent close. “Trust me,” he whispered, his breathsurprisingly sweet-scented as it drifted over her cheeks. “I can heft a slender thing like you with one hand. I won’t let you fall, lass, I swear it.”
    Oddly enough, his words reassured her. His hands were heavy on her waist. She could feel their heat through her muslin gown. Their heat and, yes, their strength. She had seen his muscles for herself yesterday. If anyone could lift her into a saddle, he could.
    Besides, the longer she hesitated, the more likely he was to guess she was lying about her ability to ride.
    “All right,” she said, taking a deep breath. “I’m ready.”
    The words had scarcely left her lips when she found herself soaring, held aloft by the sheer might of two brawny arms that set her upon the horse’s back as easily as a swallow