decided click of the lock.
Well.
Ainsley blew out her breath and leaned against the nearest wall. She shook in every limb, her chest tight, her corset far too binding. She could still feel the weight of Cameron’s long body on hers, the strength of his hand on her wrists, the imprint of his mouth on hers.
She hadn’t forgotten his touch, the heat of his kiss, the strength of him, in six years. What a man he was, a forbidden, out-of-reach man who cared nothing for Ainsley Douglas and her troubles. Cameron still had the letter, and she had to get it back from him before he gave it to Phyllida, or worse, his brother Hart. If Hart Mackenzie knew what a treasure Cameron carried carelessly in his pocket, the ruthless duke wouldn’t hesitate to use it, she was certain.
But at the moment, Ainsley could only think of the long length of Cameron pressing her into the mattress, the heat of his breath on her mouth. What would it be like to be his lover?
Wonderful, wicked, far too powerful for the likes of Ainsley Douglas. He’d called her a mouse, she remembered, when he’d found her tucked into his window seat to hide.
She also remembered, as she finally pried herself from the wall and headed for the back stairs, something she’d seen very clearly when Cameron had pinned Ainsley’s hands above her head.
His loosened sleeve had slipped, revealing scars along the inside of his forearm. The scars had faded with time, but each was perfectly round, each about three quarters of an inch in diameter. Ainsley recognized the shape of them from an accident that had happened to one of her brothers, but Sinclair had suffered only one burn.
Someone, once upon a time, had amused themselves by touching a lighted cigar end repeatedly to Lord Cameron’s flesh.
The morning was fine enough to put Angelo on Night- Blooming Jasmine and let her gallop in the one field that wasn’t too boggy for the horses. Cameron rode behind them on a retired racer as Angelo let Jasmine run full out.
Cameron felt the power of the horse he rode, the air in his face, the rush of speed—all working to pull him out of his groggy, hungover state. He only ever came alive while astride a horse or watching their grace and strength as they ran. Sometimes when he hit the moment of passion with a woman, he’d feel the same surge of life, but at all other times, Cameron Mackenzie was half dead, walking through life and barely feeling it.
The exception: The two times he’d found Ainsley Douglas in his bedroom. Both times he’d come upon her there, he’d felt that rush and roar of excitement, the exhilaration pouring into his body.
Cameron hadn’t slept after Ainsley had left the night before. He’d tried to soothe his lust and his anger with whiskey and cheroots, but nothing had worked. Now here he was too damn early in the morning, his head pounding, his mouth parched, while he tried to train the most challenging horse of his career.
Night-Blooming Jasmine, a three-year-old with incredible speed, had been nearly ruined by being pushed to win the big races before she was ready. Her owner, a fool of an English viscount called Lord Pierson, had already run through a string of trainers, finding fault with each and transferring Jasmine from one to the next in rapid succession. Pierson openly despised Cameron, because Cameron trained his own horses and sometimes horses for other owners. A gentleman hired others to do menial jobs for him, Pierson told him.
Cameron saw no reason to own horses if he couldn’t be among them. He’d learned at a young age that he had a gift with the beasts. Not only could he bring out the best in each, but the horses followed him about the paddocks like dogs and came eagerly alert whenever he walked into a stable yard.
Jasmine was a dark brown filly with a coffee brown mane and tail, long of leg and sound of heart. She had the spirit and the speed, but Pierson had nearly destroyed her. He’d wanted to run her, as a three-year-old,
Laurice Elehwany Molinari