Lynne Graham - Emerald Mistress

‘Rafael Flynn caught him,’ Harriet admitted ruefully.

Fergal chuckled. ‘Women and horses. Now, there is a guy with the magic touch. I hear that he can make them do anything for him.’

Her blue eyes gleamed. She was tempted to quip that that was no doubt why Rafael Flynn appeared to have such a good opinion of himself. ‘Is he married?’

‘Are you joking? I hear his latest lady is some famous fashion model.’

Thinking of the woman she had seen, Harriet thought that figured, and she told Fergal to come inside for tea when he had finished in the yard.

‘One of the local farmers has been looking after Kathleen’s animals for you,’ he informed her then, washing his hands at the sink with the ease of someone very much at home with his surroundings. ‘You’d best decide what you want done with them.’

‘Animals?’

‘Kathleen has a soft touch for strays. There’s an old mare called Snowball that she rescued, and she can still be ridden. There’s a pig too…oh, yeah, and chickens, ex-battery farm inmates,’ Fergal explained ruefully. ‘We’re talking pets and charity cases here, not pedigrees. I had them moved before Eugene McNally did his inventory because he would’ve had them put down. Now you can make the tough decisions.’

Harriet was already smiling at the prospect of a readymade family of livestock which would provide a vital link back to the cousin whom she had to thank for her inheritance. ‘If they had a home with Kathleen they’ll have a home with me.’

His tanned face broke into a warm, attractive grin.

‘Right.’ Harriet curved her hands round the mug of tea in front of her and breathed in deep. ‘You’re using the stables here…’

‘I was hoping we could come to an arrangement,’ Fergal admitted.

‘I’d like that if it is possible,’ Harriet told him honestly. ‘But I do need to make a living, and right now I don’t know if the figures will add up with your horses using that amount of space—’

‘I could start work on fixing up the old stables and move the geldings in there instead. That was phase two of Kathleen’s expansion plan. But the new stables were essential to bring in the owners who wanted their mounts to have only the best.’

Talking to Fergal was easy. He was straightforward, and happy to talk about her late cousin’s original plans. Having been priced out of the riding school business by the high costs of insurance and the seasonal aspect of the tourist trade, Kathleen had hoped to build a livery yard that would be upmarket to attract new clients and increase her income.

‘She must have had savings or something, because she really did spend a mint here,’ Fergal advanced. ‘She bought that pick-up brand-new, and the horsebox arrived only the week before she had the first heart attack.’ His cheerfulness visibly ebbed at that sobering recollection. ‘She was sixty-three and seemed as fit as a fiddle. She was waiting for surgery when she died.’

Harriet watched Fergal swallow thickly and knew that he had been genuinely fond of the older woman. He reminded her of a big, blond good-natured bear, slow of speech and thoughtful and kind.

‘You should come to the Point-to-Point races with me tomorrow. It’s the last meeting of the season,’ he told her with enthusiasm. ‘I’m running Tailwind. I can introduce you around. People need to know you’re open for business.’

‘I’d like that.’ Belatedly conscious of the speculative masculine look of appreciation she was receiving, Harriet glanced away and tried not to smile. She was flattered that he appeared to find her attractive. But she suspected that Fergal Gibson might be a wild flirt, and if she responded it would probably wreck any prospect of their establishing a good working relationship. Unless she was reading him wrong, it would be easy come, easy go with Fergal, and that had never been her style. But maybe a silly rebound fling was what she needed right now…after all, she had been extremely sensible and cautious all her life and where had it got her? Luke, she reminded herself squarely, was with Alice now.

* * *

‘What’s your interest in Harriet Carmichael?’ Rafael asked his elderly butler smoothly, while Bianca chatted to a friend on the phone about how sublime Ireland was—with the exceptions of the weather, the absence of large shopping outlets and nightclubs, Rafael’s cold and comfortless ancestral home and the amount of time he spent in the stables.

Tolly gave him a little smile. ‘Now, wouldn’t that be telling?’

Rafael laughed with true appreciation, for only Tolly would dare to tell him to mind his own business. ‘What do you know about her?’

‘That she’ll not be single for long,’ the older man forecast with assurance, his blue eyes twinkling.

Rafael elevated a mocking black brow. ‘On what do you base that belief?’

‘She’s a fine-looking girl with a lovely smile and land and a business. When it comes to a good catch the local lads are neither blind nor stupid. No, that little lady will be snatched up and off the market by the winter.’

‘Maybe she craves something rather more exciting?’ Rafael murmured softly.

Tolly’s weather-beaten features stiffened. ‘I don’t think so, sir.’

Sir? Rafael wondered why the old man should be so thin-skinned about a young woman he had only met that day. Was it because Tolly had once known her family and already considered her part of the community? Or was he simply showing his disapproval of Rafael’s infinitely casual attitude to women and sex? Whatever, Rafael was very much amused by Tolly’s sudden formality. Across the room, Bianca was now dancing, her hips shimmying to the driving beat of the music she had put on. She shed her jacket slowly, provocatively tugged her suede belt free of her tiny mini-skirt and treated herself to a seductive appraisal in the vast gilt mirror. Rafael decided that his next lover would be less vain and more intelligent and switched on the business news.

* * *

Joseph Tolly lived in a small, incredibly neat gate lodge beside the distinctly ruinous rear entrance to the Flynn Court estate. For all his arrogant confidence, Harriet reflected, with a stab of wicked satisfaction that shook her, Rafael Flynn was clearly too poor to adequately maintain his ancestral home. So why the heck had he attempted to buy Kathleen Gallagher’s property from her at such a healthy price?

The old man appeared at the door before Harriet even reached it. ‘Come on in,’ he urged with a broad smile of welcome.

She was touched to see the careful preparations he had made for her visit. A snowy white lace-edged cloth had been laid on a tray that bore old-fashioned floral bone china and a luscious chocolate cake. The simply furnished room was immaculately tidy and every wooden surface gleamed.

‘Will you tell me everything you remember about my mother’s family?’ Harriet urged her host eagerly, and then, rather more self-consciously, her cheeks colouring, she added, ‘You must be wondering why I’m asking a stranger when she’s still alive. My mother isn’t very nostalgic about the past.’

‘Perhaps there wasn’t much for her to be sentimental about,’ Joseph Tolly said gently. ‘In those days this community was struggling to survive. There wasn’t much employment. Even now the tourists need encouragement to travel several miles of twisting road from the nearest town to visit Ballyflynn. Have you been to see the old place where your family used to live?’

‘I don’t know where it is.’

‘Your mother’s family lived a field away from mine, on a smallholding about two miles out of the village. The house is derelict now, but I’ll draw you a little map so that you can go and have a look around.’