“You’re keeping an eye on that hock?” Mick asked.
“Doc Harmon’s comin’ here first thing tomorrow when he does his daily rounds.”
“Good. Get the farrier in, too. He needs to reset Casbah’s rear shoe.”
“Already taken care of.”
Mick nodded. “See you in the morning, Tommy.”
“’Evening, sir. Good evening, Miss Montgomery.”
We walked back to the house holding hands. “Casbah’s racing on Saturday at the Point-to-Point,” Mick said. “Along with another of my maidens. I’d like you to come. Amanda’s having her usual tailgate. We could meet there.”
I knew—though he didn’t say it—that he expected his horses to win at the Point-to-Point and he wanted me to see that.
“I’ll bring my grandfather,” I said. “He’s visiting from Paris. I think you’d like him.”
We had reached the terrace by Mick’s swimming pool. When I’d been here last spring, he and I had spent many evenings watching the animals’ beautiful silhouettes from this spot until the sun set behind the Blue Ridge and everything faded to black. When a horse is a champion he shows it. Even from a distance I had seen that regal elegance in Mick’s horses. They knew their destiny and what they were meant to do. With the weather cooling off, he and Tommy had swapped the horses’ routines so they now spent days outside and nights inside. Tonight I missed seeing them.
His housekeeper had already prepared dinner—steaks, baby vegetables, and a salad for two. All he had to do was throw everything together.
I looked over at the plates and cutlery already stacked on a silver tray. “When am I supposed to be dazzled by your culinary skills?” I said. “Is it when you set the table, or when you take the wrapping off that gorgeous salad?”
He grinned. “It’s when I open the wine. Come on. I’ve got something I want you to try. Shane got me a couple of cases.”
A bottle of Gevrey-Chambertin and two Biot wineglasses sat on another tray on the drawing room sideboard. A Burgundy, this one from a grand cru vineyard in a part of France known as the Côte d’Or—the Gold Coast. It would be like drinking silk and velvet together.
I watched him uncork the wine. “Your drawing room looks lovely. Sunny did a wonderful job.”
“She knows what I like,” he said. “You’ll have to see what she’s doing to the guest suite upstairs. It’ll be ready in a few weeks when Selena moves in.”
One of his sisters? A cousin? “Who’s Selena?”
“My goddaughter. Youngest child of an old family friend from the U.K.”
“Why is she moving in?” I didn’t like it that I sounded like a jealous girlfriend.
He didn’t seem to notice. “She’s been winning a lot of prizes in Europe riding show jumpers.” He handed me a pale blue wineglass and touched his glass against mine. “Her father, Lord Tanner, thought perhaps she should get some experience in the States. I offered to let her stay here, though she’ll probably also spend time in Kentucky. She just finished up at Cambridge and planned on taking a year off before working, anyway.”
So she was about Mia’s age—twenty-one.
“It sounds like a great opportunity for her.” I drank some of my wine.
He took my glass. “You are so transparent,” he said, and kissed me on the mouth. “I think of her as a daughter.”
“I hate being transparent,” I said, kissing him back. “And it’s nice you’re doing this for her. I mean it.”
“Come on,” he said. “There’s something else I want to do.”
He brought me to his bedroom and we were rough undressing each other. No tenderness or caresses or words. Our lovemaking was primal and intense, perhaps because it had been months since the last time. I could not tell what drove him, but my own fierce need came from an ache that had burrowed so deep inside me I’d almost managed to forget it existed. The need to be loved—no, to be in love—flared up like a dull pain each time he entered me, because I knew he didn’t want to make any promises. Maybe didn’t even need to.
What he gave in the moment was as good as it got. Sincere but not constant. Passionate but not besotted. In lust, not love. In the end, it was about flesh and comfort and nothing more.
When we finished for the last time he lay next to me, leaning on his elbow, trailing a finger from my forehead down my nose, my lips, my neck, between my breasts, then lower, hovering just before he brushed my sweet spot. Like he was dividing me in half. I shivered. He stopped. “What?”
“Nothing. That was wonderful,” I said. “It always is with you.”
“Stay tonight and it will be wonderful again.”
“I wish I could, but I need to sleep at home. My grandfather.”
“You need to sleep at home because of your grandfather?” He looked incredulous. “Can’t he take care of himself?”
I pulled him down and kissed him. “Of course he can. But he’s eighty-two and he just got here yesterday. I feel like I should be with him.”
“You mean you’d rather be with him than me—”
“That’s not true and you know it.”
“Come on.” All of a sudden he sounded all-business. “Let’s eat. I’m starved.”
He got up and put on his clothes. I picked up my things where he’d flung them and retrieved my cane.
“Give me a few minutes to pull myself together.”
“Of course,” he said. “Come outside on the terrace when you’re ready. I’m going to start the grill.”
We ate in his splendid dining room at a table that seated twenty-four. He moved two silver candelabras so they were at one end of the table and we sat across from each other. His dining room chairs reminded me of thrones. The paintings on the walls seemed to recede and the moss green curtains were drawn across the windows so the room was dark except for the flickering candles, which danced in an occasional current of air. We sat in a golden pool of light and talked quietly.
“I’ll get another bottle of wine,” he said.
“I’ve got to drive,” I said. “That’s enough for me.”
“Your grandfather will be fine. Stay the night.”
He opened the second bottle and I let him fill my glass. “If you’re not careful we’ll drink your entire cave.”
“I rather doubt it.”
“Buying that much, are you?”
He grinned. “And enjoying it. I’ve started buying futures, too. From Shane.”
“When did Shane get into futures?”
“It’s been a while. He told me he’d spent the last few years cultivating relationships with négociants in Bordeaux and a few of the boutique vineyards in California,” Mick said. “He went to France last March for the ‘en Primeur’ tastings. Raved about what he drank so I bought a few contracts in July.”
Wine futures—like futures for any other product traded on the market—lock in a price of a vintage while it’s still in the barrels. The purchaser bets the wine will be worth more down the road, after it’s aged and bottled. If things go the other way, at least with wine there’s always Plan B—drinking it. But while futures, especially Bordeaux futures, had been around for a while, it was an unregulated practice. Gambling with no one to police what went on.
“Futures are risky,” I said. “You can lose a bundle.”
“I like taking risks. And I can afford to lose.” He looked me in the eyes and I was glad I never had to stare him down across a conference room table. In business, I bet he’d been merciless when he wanted something. He, too, had pockets that went all the way to China. He could match any price to get what he wanted.
“You sure Shane knows what he’s doing?” I asked.
“Why wouldn’t I be?” he said. “He’s got great contacts. He introduced me to a wine buyer he’s been working with. I’m thinking of hiring her.”
I moved my wineglass to the side and leaned across the table. “You’re going to hire Nicole Martin?”
“You know her? Yes, I think so. Why?”