Zara Stoneley - Stable Mates

Driving her grandmother the handful of miles to her friend’s house was the normal ordeal. Lottie honestly didn’t know anyone who made her quite so nervous. She was more than capable of handling a horsebox, and had been driving her father’s tractor since her legs had been long enough for her feet to reach the pedals, but with Elizabeth in the passenger seat her nerves were shot to bits. It was always the same, she started with a routine inspection of the interior, then she moved onto comments about speed (‘doesn’t this car go any faster?’), cornering (‘do you really need to brake every time?’), overtaking (‘just because the stupid man wants to go at that speed doesn’t mean we all need to dear, in my day he’d have been run off the road’) and ended with parking (where she just opened the door and stared pointedly at the kerb, ‘shall I call a cab dear?’ being the normal comment, if she bothered with one).

‘Maybe your father needs to get you a better car. That might help,’ was always her parting comment before she slammed the door hard enough to check for rust damage, and after dusting herself down, she headed off.

It took most of the drive back, with the window down and the radio turned up full blast, sending the echoes of a defiant Pink into the countryside, before Lottie had relaxed her jaw enough to stop her teeth aching. By the time she drew up outside Rory’s cottage, she could almost, almost see the funny side.

***

Lottie walked on to Rory’s yard just as a man she’d never seen before stripped his t-shirt over his head and displayed a very attractive six-pack. She counted. It was definitely a six-pack. And she was pretty sure that if she had seen it before she would have remembered. Bodies like that tended to make a lasting impression.

Driving back from Tipping House, she’d had two things on her mind. One, what was her grandmother up to? Because she was definitely up to something as far as Tom and Uncle Dom went. And two, why was Tom here, in Tippermere? Why here exactly? There was something he wasn’t saying, and she had a horrible feeling there was something Elizabeth knew. Or why would she have been so interested?

Both thoughts were swiftly delegated to the back of her mind though as the beautiful naked torso, or was that naked beautiful torso, grabbed every inch of her attention. As he had his top fixed firmly over his head, and so couldn’t see, there didn’t seem to be a problem in taking advantage and staring. So she did. Until she realised he’d thrown the clothing to one side and she was staring open-mouthed at a guy who was staring straight back at her. He wasn’t open-mouthed though, he looked slightly concerned, like she might be a deranged mad woman escaped from the nearest loony bin. She shut her mouth.

‘Sorry.’ And went red. ‘I, er, have you seen Rory, or er Pip?’

‘You must be Lottie.’ Now that was the type of deep, dark, sexy voice she thought only existed in her imagination. She’d always had a thing for a nice accent, and Irish just shot straight to the top of the hit parade. Lottie resisted the fleeting urge to shut her eyes and ask him to keep talking. Then it registered that he knew her name. And she didn’t know his; she really would have remembered if she’d met him before. With or without clothes. Definitely.

Rory had a lot of friends, no one she would have ever called close, but lots of drinking buddies, eventing buddies, hunting buddies. Ever since they’d fallen into dating, he’d been surrounded by people, and at every party you could find the entertaining Rory in the thick of things. Which at times could be bloody annoying, like most of the times when she’d had a few drinks and was starting to feel either mildly randy and in need of attention, or well-oiled enough for her chatterbox mode to have kicked in and she just needed to talk. To him. But, even though they’d spent a lot of drunken evenings together (and drunken nights), she was pretty sure she would have spotted this guy, even if she did only have eyes for Rory.

‘Are you okay?’

‘Fine.’ Lottie squeaked, cleared her throat and tried again. She had been quite happy ogling him, now the tables were turned she felt more than a little bit uncomfortable. Like an eavesdropper who’d been caught out with a glass to the wall, not that she’d stoop to that kind of thing.

Mick O’Neal repressed the smile, put his hands on his hips and took the time to drink in the vision that had materialised before his eyes. She wasn’t at all how he’d expected her from the sketchy descriptions Rory had laced into their conversations. For one, he’d translated the ‘plenty to grab hold of’ as fat, whereas Charlotte was as shapely as she was toned.

‘Are they in?’

‘They are indeed. Last I heard, Rory was trying to blame Pip for not entering his horse in some event, and she was giving him a bollocking back. She threw his phone at him, along with a few other things from the sound of it. I’m Mick by the way.’

He held out a hand and she stared at it with suspicion. Then regretted it when he placed it back on his hip. And then decided that the safest place to be was as far away from him as possible. Contact might be a mistake.

‘Great, thanks, so you are.’ Feeling mildly stupid, which was nothing new, Lottie made a dash for the safety of the kitchen and Rory, only to find a battlefield. The small kitchen table was normally piled high with entry forms, schedules, directions, vets bills and every other conceivable bit of information that an eventer might ever need. Today they’d been scattered in all directions. She teased one out of the corner of a terrier’s mouth and then gave it back to the dog when she realised it was only a phone bill. A second terrier lay forlornly in her small basket, sheets of paper still slowly floating down, her chin on her paws and her eyes darting anxiously between her master and the arm-flailing Pip.

‘I pay you to send in the fucking entries on time.’

‘You don’t bloody pay me, and even if you did, what am I supposed to be? A bloody mind reader?’

‘I do pay you.’

‘Not to be your bloody cleaner, housemaid or secretary. I,’ she waved her arms towards the still open door, ‘work out there, you moron. You said you wanted a bloody groom, not a nanny.’

Rory, who was sat on one of the chairs at the kitchen table, dumped his muddy boots on the chair opposite and crossed his arms rebelliously. Which Lottie was sure was because he just knew his attitude would wind Pip up even more.

‘What are you two arguing about now?’ She pulled out a spare chair and sank back onto it, a dog landing on her lap for reassurance almost before her bum was settled on the seat. When Lottie had suggested Pip come and work for Rory, it had never occurred to her how the sparks might fly. Lottie and Rory thought along the same lines, they were both slightly disorganised, both more interested in play than work and neither of them took much seriously, apart from, of course, horses. Pip was different. Pip took everything seriously and ran her life with military precision when she was on duty. And when she was at the yard, it was business not pleasure. And Rory drove her round the bend. Neither of them would give an inch, one because of his male pride, the other because she was never, ever wrong and wasn’t prepared to pretend she was. The fact that she was quite happy to throw things if it got her point across made life interesting. She’d only been here a matter of months, but already Rory had found out that if he was wrong he was damned well going to be told. Repeatedly. Until he admitted it. The only problem was, Rory was never, in his eyes, wrong.

‘He’s lost his entry for next weekend.’ Pip glanced at her briefly, then fixed an accusing glare back on Rory.