30. Georgina #3
The trot feels good, feels right, the rhythm of it settling into my bones.
I’ve been riding steadily for weeks now, building back the partnership Sovrano and I had before everything fell apart.
His ears turn toward me as we curve across the meadow.
I know this movement, the little lift before he lengthens his stride, and I let myself enjoy answering it.
After a few minutes, I bring him back to walk and let him stretch his neck. Max does the same with the gray, and we amble side by side toward the far edge of the meadow.
“Leave it on my bedside table,” I tell him. “The book. I want to decide for myself.”
“Even after that recommendation?”
“Especially after that recommendation.” I look at him. “You’ve made me curious.”
“Then I’ll leave it there.” His eyes are warm. “I’ll try to wait for your verdict before telling you why it’s wrong.”
“You won’t manage it.” I glance at him before returning my attention to the path. “But I’ll enjoy watching you try.”
We turn back toward the stable, taking the longer route through the lower pasture. The sun is getting low, the light turning amber, and I can smell something cooking from the direction of the house. Rosa, preparing dinner. The ordinary rhythm of an ordinary evening.
“There’s a market in the village next week,” Max says. “Saturday morning.”
“I know. Rosa mentioned it.”
“Would you want to go?” He keeps his eyes on the path. “With me. We could walk around, look at things we don’t need, argue about whether to buy them.”
“That sounds like a terrible use of a morning.”
“It does, doesn’t it?”
“I would love to.” I smile at him. “I’ll wear something that makes the vendors overcharge us.”
“You always wear something that makes the vendors overcharge us.”
“It’s a gift.”
At the stable, the groom is waiting. We dismount and hand over the horses, and I unfasten my helmet and hang it on the hook by the door. Max does the same, running a hand through his hair where the helmet has flattened it.
“You have a mark,” I tell him, touching his forehead where the padding has left a faint line.
“So do you.” He touches the same spot on my face. “We match.”
“Charming.”
“I thought so.”
I catch his hand before he can pull it away, and he steps closer, his other hand coming to rest on my waist. The stable is quiet around us, the horses settled, the groom disappeared to check on Luce.
“You look happy,” I tell him.
“I am.” He brushes his thumb over the mark my helmet left. “My mother spent lunch laughing at me, my wife has volunteered to defend the worst book I’ve read all year, and nobody has asked me about my ranking.”
“Would you like me to?”
“Not particularly.”
“Good. I was hoping we could kiss instead.”
His smile reaches his eyes before he bends his head. “An excellent suggestion.”
I lean into the kiss, feeling the warmth of his mouth, the steadiness of his hands. When we separate, I’m smiling.
“Walk with me,” I say. “Before dinner. I want to sit under the oak tree and do nothing for ten minutes.”
“Ten whole minutes?”
“I’m ambitious.”
We stop at the kitchen door for two glasses of wine, then walk through the garden, past the roses and the herb beds, to the old oak beyond the lawn.
There’s a weathered bench beneath it, wide enough for both of us. We sit together, close enough that our shoulders touch, and look out at the hills.
“I used to sit here with my father,” I tell Max. “When I was young. He’d tell me about the horses he wanted to buy, the plans he had for the property. I used to offer improvements until he threatened to hand the whole thing over to me.”
“Did you stop?”
“Of course not.” I lean into him. “I was sure I could do better.”
“That sounds familiar.” He puts his arm around me. “I like that about you.”
“You like winning arguments.”
“I like you.” He kisses the top of my head. “The arguments are a bonus.”
We sit there as the light fades, not talking, not needing to. The hills turn purple, then gray, and the first stars appear over the mountains. Rosa will call us for dinner soon. There will be food and wine and the comfortable ritual of an evening at home.
Max has set his glass on the bench beside him. I hold mine loosely, listening to him hum a few notes of something I don’t recognize. He gets them wrong, starts again, then notices me smiling.
“What?”
“Nothing. Keep going.”
He looks skeptical, and I laugh before I can help it. I don’t need to preserve this evening, hold it so carefully that it stops being ours. I can tease him, finish my wine, decide I’m hungry, and take him inside with me. I can want tomorrow without wishing the rest of today away.
Max reaches for his glass.
“To nothing in particular,” he says, raising his glass.
“To Saturday markets and bad endings and arguments about buildings.”
“To all of it.” He drinks, then sets his glass aside.
I set mine down too, and for a moment we just look at each other in the fading light.
There is still a trace of laughter at the corner of his mouth.
I know how to bring it back. I know what I want to say to him over dinner, and which parts of the afternoon I’ll remember when I wake beside him tomorrow.
Loving him fills the space between us, warm and welcome, with room left for everything I am.
I reach for Max’s hand, and he’s already reaching back.