I shoved to my feet.
He clambered after me, knocking into the bench with his hip and cursing. “You’re leaving?”
The question didn’t deserve a response. Why on earth would I do anything but leave? I slipped through the door and sprinted to my horse, splashing my skirts with mud and muck, praying the man didn’t follow.
My bloody boot slipped in the bloody stirrup, and it took three bloody tries to get myself into the bloody saddle. I glanced toward the shed, expecting to see Oisin, only to find a crooked wooden door staring back.
I turned my horse toward the only road leading out of town, urging her to pick up the pace once we passed the town limits.
The mist turned my curls to frizz, growing heavier and more insistent as I finally reached the small forest before our estate.
If only I could tell my sister what had happened without having her romanticize the encounter.She’d be unbearable, asking for all the details, making more of it than it was.
A simple instance of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
That was all.
Nothing to get worked up over.
And certainly not worth dwelling on.
Dampness seeped through my cloak and skirts. A few sheep munching on clover beside a stone fence glanced my way as I flew past. The left turn up ahead would lead to my father’s estate. If only I had it in me to go right. To escape this fate. To leave and never come back.
My mare came to a neck-breaking halt, sending me careening into the saddle horn. Hair slapped over my eyes. I shoved the sopping strands back from my forehead.
The beast’s ears twitched from side to side, then flattened against her brown head. When I tried to nudge her forward, the stubborn brute refused to budge. What was she so afraid of? The trees creaking in the breeze? The steady pitter patter of rain on the puddles?
The booted foot dropping from the branch above my head?
Bloody hell.
I grabbed the horn to keep from toppling headfirst out of the saddle.
Oisin had his long, lean frame draped over a low hanging branch. Black breeches hugged his thighs as he swung his leg back and forth.
“You never told me your name,” he drawled, smoothing his thumb over the shiny buttons on his gold waistcoat. Thick, mahogany hair fell to the tops of his ears, swept to the side by careless fingers. Although it continued raining, he remained dry, like the rain knew better than to dampen his white shirt.
He’d sought me out? For my name? “You never asked.”
A grin played on his full lips. Dimples. Of course. Deep obnoxious ones. “My mouth was otherwise occupied.”
Not what I wanted to think about at present—or ever again. “My name is Lady Aveen Bannon, daughter of Lord Michael Bannon.”
Plucking a tiny bud from the branch, the man traced a finger along its edge. The bud unfurled, growing to a brilliant green beneath his touch.“Radiant beauty.”
He was good. I’d give him that much. Still, a handsome face and a few parlor tricks wouldn’t be enough to impress me. “Do you say that to all the women?” He looked like the type of man who used such silly lines.
“Only the ones called Aveen.” He rolled onto his side, propping his chin on one hand as if he were lying on a bed and not on a thin branch twenty feet in the air. “It’s what your name means.”
“And what does Oisin mean?”Worthless cad?
“Oisin means ‘little deer.’” A wink. “But that’s not my real name.”
As much as I wanted to know his real name, a stranger who sought to have affairs with married women was not the sort I needed to know. It didn’t matter that hearing his voice sent shivers down my spine and made my stomach flutter like leaves in a breeze. He could take his grin and his dimples and jump off a cliff. “It was a pleasure meeting you, not-Oisin.” It wasn’t. “But I’m afraid I must be on my way.” I kicked my horse forward; she took off at a brisk canter.
The stranger appeared on the road, startling my bloody horse and blocking my path with his broad shoulders and lean waist and smarmy smile. “Where are you off to in such a rush?”
My fingers tightened on the reins, and I resisted the urge to groan. Couldn’t he take a bloody hint? “Home. It’s getting late, and I don’t want to miss dinner.”