Sylvester frowned and the warm light died in his eyes. "Why didn't you tell me about this? I am quite capable of conducting such business with the farrier."

"Oh, I can't remember to tell you every last detail," she said. "It's a relatively trivial matter… and anyway, you haven't met the farrier yet."

"And I assume you were going to rectify that this afternoon?" His eyebrows lifted in an ironic question mark.

Theo's flush was answer enough. "You're not yet familiar with the ledgers," she said stiffly.

"That is no excuse. Stand still," he snapped as she moved to jump off the stool despite his hold. He took a step closer to her, and his riding boot crushed a white lace flounce. The seamstress gave a little cry of distress, and he glanced down impatiently. With exaggerated caution he moved his boot, glaring at Theo.

Clarissa flinched unconsciously, her eyes fixed on the earl's large hands at her sister's waist. He seemed to fill the sewing room with his anger and his physical presence. She cleared her throat and said awkwardly, "I'm sure it just slipped Theo's mind, sir. But you'll be able to accompany her and meet Mr. Row this afternoon."

"I fully intend to meet Mr. Row this afternoon," the earl stated. "And I shall dispense with an introduction. My absentminded cousin will be far too busy making wedding preparations with her mother to perform it."

Clarissa could think of no more oil to pour on these troubled waters. The seamstress, apparently oblivious of the stinging atmosphere, knelt back with a sigh of satisfaction.

"There, Lady Theo. That's all pinned. If you'd like to slip out of the gown now, I'll have the stitching done in a trice."

The earl released Theo's waist. "I'll tell you the results of my discussion with the farrier later this afternoon, cousin." He turned to the door.

"No, wait!" Theo jumped off the stool, tripping over the yards of train in her haste. She seized his arm. "He's such a tricky son of a bitch that -"

"What did you say?" The earl interrupted this impassioned beginning in genuine shock.

"I don't know. What did I say?" She looked startled.

With astonishment he realized his blunt and unconventional fiancee genuinely didn't know what he was objecting to. " 'Son of a bitch,' my dear girl, is not appropriate language for the granddaughter of the Earl of Stoneridge, let alone for his wife."

Theo dismissed this objection with an impatient gesture. "Yes, but you don't understand. You're a newcomer and Johnny will think he can fool you. You don't know what a tricky bastard -"

"Theo!"

"Your pardon, sir." She tried to look contrite, but her eyes were now alight with mischief. "It keeps slipping out."

There was something wonderfully absurd about the contrast between the impish grin on Theo's brown face, the energy coursing through the slender frame, and the demure white lace and flounces of a gown that looked as if it had found its way onto the wrong back.

Sylvester tried and failed to look stern. "Try to put a curb on your tongue in future."

Theo merely shrugged and said, "Just give me a minute, and I'll be ready to come with you." Immediately, she began to pull her wedding dress over her head.

"Theo!" Clarissa squawked, staring at the earl, who still stood in the room. The seamstress, whose priorities were very straightforward, ignored the earl's presence and rushed to help before Theo's rough treatment tore the flimsy silk.

Sylvester chuckled. It was so typical of Theo. "I'll give you five minutes to join me in the stables," he said through his laughter, striding out of the sewing room before Clarissa's sense of the proprieties could be further outraged.

"Damnation!" Theo muttered through the yards of filmy gauze train as it was edged over her head. "Be quick, Biddy."

At last she was free of the confining material. She scrambled back into her riding habit, grabbed her whip, hat, and gloves from the table, and ran from the room.

"Always in a hurry, Lady Theo is," the seamstress observed comfortably, gathering up the gown and carrying it to the long sewing table.

Sylvester had his fob watch in his hand as Theo reached the stables, panting, cramming her hat on her head. Dulcie had been saddled and stood placidly beside the earl's black. The massive gelding was shifting on the cobbles, tossing his head and snorting. It was unusual behavior for the well-behaved Zeus, she thought, before her eye was caught by something much more important.

"Seven minutes," Sylvester observed. "Not too bad, considering."

Theo ignored this. She was staring at the sidesaddle on Dulcie's back. "What's that?" she demanded. "Where's my proper saddle?"

"Ah," Sylvester said. "Cousin, it's time you started riding like a lady. The Countess of Stoneridge can't go racketing around the countryside like an itinerant gypsy."

Theo glanced around the stableyard. Two grooms were busy soaping saddles in the shade of an oak tree. "You have no right to make such a decision for me," she said in a fierce undertone.

"If you won't make it for yourself, Theo, then I do have the right," he said as softly. "In two days you'll be my wife, and it doesn't suit my pride to wed a hoydenish romp."

" Your pride!" she exclaimed in a whisper. "If it didn't trouble my grandfather, and it doesn't bother my mother, what the hell right have you to complain? I don't give a fig for your pride." Even as she said it, she knew it was a silly challenge, and it was one that Sylvester ignored.

He simply caught her round the waist and lifted her into the saddle. "Let your left knee rest on the -"

"I know how to do it," she broke in crossly.

"That's something, I suppose." He smiled, perfectly happy to conciliate now that he had her where he wanted her. He still held her on the saddle, however, but Theo had no intention of making a spectacle of herself by jumping down again. She had the uncomfortable conviction that Stoneridge would simply put her back in the saddle, and such a jack-in-the-box display in front of the grooms was not to be considered.

"Let go of me, Stoneridge!" She snatched up the reins, glowering at him.

He held her for a second longer, then nodded and released her, turning to mount the restlessly pawing black.

"Easy, now." He stroked the animal's neck as he gathered up the reins and prepared to spring into the saddle. "Easy, fellow. What's the matter with you?"

"I expect he's objecting to his rider," Theo said, wishing she could have come up with a wittier retort.

Sylvester merely chuckled, and his eyes narrowed as he looked up at her. "Shall you object, gypsy? Somehow I doubt it."

Theo's jaw dropped as a host of unbidden emotions rushed through her at this wickedly suggestive comment. Her eyes darkened in the telltale manner he'd become accustomed to, and Sylvester laughed aloud, swinging himself into the saddle.

He was barely seated before the black raised his head and snorted, his eyes rolling wildly. Before Sylvester had time to grasp the reins securely and get his other foot into the stirrup, Zeus took off at a headlong gallop, crashing over the cobbles, his head up, nostrils flaring.

Sylvester pulled back on the reins, struggling to find his other stirrup as he fought to keep his seat. The horse jumped the railed fence separating the stable from the pasture, his rider clinging on for dear life, and bolted toward the cornfield on the far side.

Theo was so taken aback that she didn't immediately move; then she kicked at Dulcie's flanks and the mare set off in pursuit. Even galloping flat out, there was no way Dulcie could catch the bolting gelding. The black's speed was terrifying as he sailed over the hedge separating the fields. Theo could see that Sylvester had both feet in the stirrups now and was lying low on the animal's neck, gripping the mane as well as the reins, trying to keep his seat.