Read Online Marrying the Marquis by Patricia Grasso - Free Book Online

and her sisters had been sheltered as befitted a duke’s daughters.
    At the end of the private lane, Ross steered the phaeton onto Bury Road. He turned onto Fordham Road before reaching Newmarket proper.
    Blaze peeked at the marquis and caught him smiling at her. She averted her gaze and concentrated on the passing scenery. Various wildflowers were blooming along the roadside, and lilacs scented the air. An occasional robin darted past, carrying grass for its nest.
    “Pleasant small talk makes a coach ride more enjoyable,” Ross said, “like when yer waltzin’.”
    Blaze looked at him. “I never engage in pleasant small talk.”
    “Ye had plenty to say this mornin’,” he teased her.
    “How far is the MacArthur estate from my father’s?” she asked. “Is that talk small enough for you?”
    Ross laughed out loud, making her smile. “I do believe the only thin’ smaller would be aboot the weather. To answer yer question, MacArthur House lies two miles or so from yers, shorter as the crow flies.”
    “Your house is beyond the woods on the far side of my father’s track?” Blaze asked.
    “Ye’ve a keen sense of direction,” Ross said, steering the phaeton onto a private lane. “We’ll visit the stables and then stop at the house for refreshment.”
    Blaze noted several enclosures. Foals frolicked beneath their mother’s supervision in the pens closest to the stables. In the distance, a lone horse grazed in its own enclosure.
    “Why is that horse alone?” She pointed toward the enclosure.
    “We keep the barrens separated from the others,” he told her.
    “What do you mean?”
    “A mare that hasna delivered a foal in three years is considered barren,” he answered. “We’ll be sellin’ her.”
    His cool detachment surprised Blaze. “Who will purchase a barren mare?”
    Ross shrugged. “The knackers will give us the best offer, most likely.”
    “You mean to slaughter her?” Her surprise became horror. “That’s cruel and unfair.”
    God’s balls , Ross thought, honesty is overrated . He’d really stepped in dung this time and should have known better. A woman who held funerals for furs was bound to object to selling a horse to the knackers.
    “Drive to that pasture,” Blaze said.
    Was she ordering him again? Ross managed a conciliatory smile. “We’ll stop to visit her another day.”
    She arched a copper brow at him. “I won’t forget.”
    “I know ye willna forget.” The lass had a mind like a steel trap.
    “I can never marry a man who sells a horse to the slaughterhouse.”
    “I dinna recall askin’ to marry ye.”
    Blaze blushed, her gaze skittering away. She’d walked into that. Would she never learn to keep her thoughts to herself? On the other hand, why would he waste his time if he wasn’t intending an offer of marriage? She resolved to keep her mouth shut until Pegasus won the Triple Crown. If the marquis sent the mare to the slaughterhouse, his offer of marriage would go the same way.
    Ross halted the phaeton in the stableyard and stepped down. By the time he circled the phaeton to assist her, Blaze had already climbed down.
    “Ladies always wait for a gentleman’s assistance,” Ross told her.
    “A true gentleman does not send horses to the slaughter,” Blaze countered.
    Ross ignored her comment and gestured to the stables. “I want to show ye Hercules, my best hope for winnin’ this year’s Crown.”
    The MacArthur stables resembled her father’s stables. The lighting was dim but sufficient, and the straw-covered floorboards muffled the sounds of their boots. The scents of hay and musky horses hung in the air along with a faint dung odor.
    Hercules, a powerfully-built chestnut colt, stood proudly in his stall as if he’d already won the Triple Crown. He snorted a greeting at his owner and then turned doleful eyes on his owner’s companion.
    Blaze touched the colt’s face and gazed for a long moment into his eyes. “Juno is the barren mare and Hercules is