Page 16 of Irish Rebel
“I’ll give you one anyway.”
Keeley moved out of the box, rested a hand on the door. Best, she decided, to deal with this clean and simple. “Brian, you’re working for my family, in a vital and essential role, so I think I should be straight with you.”
“By all means.” The serious tone didn’t match the glint in his eye as she leaned back.
“You bother me,” she told him. “On some level, you just bother me. It’s probably because I just don’t care for cocky, intense men who smirk at me, but that’s neither here nor there.”
“No, that’s here and it’s there. What kind do you care for?”
“You see—that’s just the sort of thing that annoys me.”
“I know. It’s interesting, isn’t it, that I find myself compelled to do just the thing that gets a rise out of you? You bother me as well. Perhaps it’s that I don’t care for regal, cool-eyed women who look down their lovely noses at me. But here we are, so we should try getting on as best we can.”
“I don’t look down my nose at you, or anyone.”
“Depends on your point of view, doesn’t it?”
She turned on her heel and marched away, focusing intensely on measuring out grain.
“Why don’t we talk of something safe?” he suggested. “Like what I think about Royal Meadows. I’ve worked on farms and around tracks since I was ten. Stableboy, exercise boy, groom. Working my way up, hustling my way through. Twenty years means I’ve seen all sides of training, racing and breeding. The bright and the dark. And in twenty years, I’ve never seen brighter than Royal Meadows.”
She paused, and her gaze shifted to his face before she began to add supplements to the grain.
“To my way of thinking, there aren’t many people as worthy as one good horse. Your parents are admirable people. Not just for what they have, but much more for what they’ve done, and what they do with it. I’m honored to work for them. And,” he said when she turned to him again, “they’re lucky to have me.”
She laughed. “Apparently they agree with you.” Shaking her head, she moved by to start the feeding, and as she passed him he breathed in the scent of her hair, of her skin.
“But you’re not sure you do. Though you don’t seem to have much interest in the workings of the farm itself.”
“Don’t I?”
He studied the neatly typed list on the wall that indicated which supplements in what amounts were added for each particular horse for the evening feed. “I see your sisters and your brothers on a daily basis,” he commented as he began to fix Teddy’s meal. “Everyone in your family, down at the shedrow, or at the track, but you.”
She could have told him the time and placement of every horse they’d run that past week. Which were being medicated, which mares were breeding. Pride kept her silent. She preferred thinking of it as pride, and not sheer stubbornness.
“I suppose your little school keeps you busy.”
Her teeth clamped together, wanted to grind, but she spoke through them. “Oh, yes, my little school keeps me busy.”
“You’re a good teacher.” He moved to Teddy’s box.
“Thank you so much.”
“No need to be snotty about it. You are a good teacher. And one of those rich kids might stick it out, rather than getting bored once horse fever’s passed.”
“One of my rich kids,” she murmured.
“It takes skill, endurance, and money, doesn’t it, to compete in horse shows? I don’t follow show jumping myself, though I’ve found it pretty enough to watch. You might be training yourself a champion. The Royal International or Dublin Grand Prix. Maybe the Olympics.”
“So, let’s see if I get this. Rich kids compete in horse shows and win blue ribbons and those who aren’t so privileged do what? Become grooms?”
“That’s how the world works, doesn’t it?”
“That’s how it can work. You’re a snob, Brian.”
He looked up, flabbergasted. “What?”
“You’re a snob, and the worst kind of snob—the kind who thinks he’s broad-minded. Now that I know that, you don’t bother me at all.”
