‘What, are you completely mad, Greppi? Now you listen to me and you listen carefully, boy.’ The older man leaned over his wife and enunciated his words very slowly, as if addressing someone whose grasp of English was faulty. ‘Neither Lizzie nor myself approved of your involvement with Laura, but she’s a big girl and there has not been much we could do about it. However, the only way you will marry our daughter is over my dead body! Do you read me loud and clear, boy? She is our jewel and there is no way on the face of this green earth that we will give our blessing to any marriage between the two of you.’
‘She’s only a child, Gabriel.’ Elizabeth Jackson’s voice was quiet but firm. ‘Nineteen years old. And you’re only a child as well.’
‘Why don’t we cut through the child argument and get to the heart of the matter?’ Gabriel said with rigid self-control. ‘You see me as an inferior citizen because I am not British.’
‘That’s not true, young man!’ But Elizabeth Jackson’s protest was as empty as a shell. The truth was stamped on her husband’s face and Gabriel turned his head to one side in anger.
‘You’re not what we have in mind for a son-in-law, Greppi. I have no doubt that you’ll make something of yourself, and good luck to you, but Laura deserves…’
‘Better?’ Gabriel’s voice was spiked with acidity.
‘Call it what you will. And I warn you, Greppi, you leave our daughter alone. We haven’t wanted to interfere, but you are no longer welcome at these stables. You can find somewhere else to do your riding and earn your extra money.’
And that was the end of the discussion. Gabriel could see it in the way the old man turned towards the window, offering him the dismissive view of his back.
‘Very well.’ Jet-black eyes smouldered as he looked at the two of them who would both breathe a sigh of heartfelt relief when he disappeared out of their line of vision.
But this was not over. He had appealed to them for their blessing and they had turned him down. Laura would not. He would have preferred to have married the woman he loved with her parents fully on his side, but if that was not to be the case, then so be it.
He turned on his heel and walked out of the room, letting himself out of the front door. The meeting, which he had imagined would have lasted at least an hour, an hour of persuading them that, whatever their prejudices, he would devote his entire life to making their beloved daughter happy, had lasted a scant ten minutes.
The stables were set away from the house. Gabriel made sure to exit along the drive, knowing that her father would probably have leapt to the window just to make sure that he was leaving the premises, and, after a few minutes of walking through the cutting night air, he abruptly turned to his right and ploughed his way back towards the extensive stables.
He had arranged to meet her there and she would be waiting for him. The thought of that quelled some of the fire burning in his soul and he relaxed his pace, filling his head with images of her.
The stables stretched around a huge courtyard, which was occasionally used for lessons for beginners. A long, sheltered corridor bordered the sprawling sweep of the individual horses’ quarters and Gabriel swiftly and assuredly made his way towards Barnabus’s stall.
The light was on and she was grooming him, her long fingers stroking the mane, running along the proud length of his head.
Gabriel felt the familiar hot stirring in his loins and drew his breath in sharply, and both Laura and horse turned to look at him.
‘I didn’t expect you so early,’ she murmured, leaving the horse and wiping her hands along her jeans. She smiled and lifted her face to his, giving a soft purr of contentment as his mouth brushed hers.
‘Disappointed?’
‘Hardly!’
‘Do you want me to give you a hand here?’
‘Oh, no. There’s nothing to be done. I was just chatting to Barnabus.’
‘About me, I hope,’ Gabriel murmured softly, pulling her towards him and keeping her there, with his hands on her rear, so that she could feel exactly what she did to him.
She was the perfect combination of her parents. She had the height of her father and the blonde beauty of her mother. When she tilted her head back, as she was doing now, her waist-length hair rippled over his hands like strands of silk. White silk.
‘But of course,’ she agreed with a small laugh of delight. ‘Who else? What have you been doing since I last saw you? Have you missed me?’
I’ve been slaving at an incompetently run engineering company. I’ve been poring over books so that I don’t completely lose track of my Economics degree. I’ve been putting aside every sweat-earned penny so that I can afford to eat when I return to university. Oh, yes, and I’ve asked your father for your hand in marriage and it was bitten off.
That little titbit, he decided, he would keep to himself. Now, he would lose himself in her and then he would propose. Her parents would simply have to accept him because they would have no choice.
‘If you’re finished with Barnabus…’ he murmured, tucking her hair behind her ear and nibbling it with his teeth until she squirmed.
‘The office…?’
‘Out here, if you’d prefer, although I cannot truthfully say that I would welcome dealing with the frostbite afterwards…’
The office comprised three rooms attached to the far end of the stables. One small sitting area for clients, a room in which the books were kept and a bathroom, all furnished with exquisite taste. Soon, Gabriel thought, they would no longer need to scurry and hide and make love like thieves in the night. He imagined her face as she heard him ask her to marry him and he felt a fierce quiver of possessiveness.
‘What’s the matter?’
He turned to see that she was staring up at him, all wide-eyed and concerned, and he smiled.
‘Do you ever dream of us making love in a proper bed?’ he asked softly, unlocking the door to the office with the key that, unimaginatively, was hidden under one of the plant pots outside. He pushed open the door and then closed it behind them, capturing her against the back of the door and kissing the nape of her neck. ‘A proper, king-sized bed complete with satin sheets and a feather duvet?’
‘A cramped single bed would do,’ Laura murmured, sighing as his tongue trailed along her neck. ‘Anywhere but here. I have nightmares about Dad bursting in when we’re in the middle of…of…’
‘Making love…?’ he finished smoothly for her and she coiled against him with a smile. His voice always did this to her, turned her legs to water. His dark, deep voice with the lingering traces of his Argentinian background, and his smoky, sexy eyes that could stroke her body even when he wasn’t touching her.
He had turned up out of the blue one wintry morning a year ago. One minute she had been bending over, grooming one of the horses, her long hair roughly braided back away from her face, and she had stood up to find him staring at her from the stable door, his hands in his pockets, his body leaning against the rough doorframe. He had heard about their stables and he had come to see whether he could earn some money helping out because he loved horses and was a natural at handling them. He had only just come up there to live. His father had been made redundant from his post as a teacher and, whilst he could cope until he located another job, there simply was no longer enough to cover his son’s university fees. Gabriel needed to work for a year and had taken a job nearby at a small company, interrupting his university career until he could accumulate sufficient money to put himself through the remainder of his course. He had explained all of this without taking his eyes off her and without moving from his indolent stance by the door. Laura had listened and had hardly heard a word he had been saying. She had been too overwhelmed by his sheer animal beauty.
‘Are you suggesting