Page 18 of My Queendom for a Horse

I shake my head and blink rapidly, expecting him to disappear.

Being in a coma isn’t ideal, but surely Dad will come looking for me. Or John. Or both of them, right? The last time something felt this surreal, the last time. . .was when I thought a horse intentionally threw a race for me. “Umm,” I ask. “Are you. . .?” I can’t quite bring myself to say it.

“Am I?” He quirks one eyebrow, and I swear, he could be posing for some kind of strange print ad in a magazine. He’s that beautiful. Even though he looks a little dazed.

I clear my throat. “Are you. . . Obsidian Devil?” I wince as I say the words, because I could not possibly sound crazier.

“Of course not. My name’s Aleksandr.”

I breathe a heavy sigh of relief. So it really is some kind of delusion, or else I blacked out when Obsidian bolted and left me here, and this naked man. . .showed up and crawled under the saddle and. . .What is going on? “Why are you naked?”

He frowns. “I didn’t have clothing on before I changed, obviously.” He says it so matter-of-factly, like I’m the idiot for asking.

I swallow. “Right. Obviously.”

“You’re looking at me as if I’m insane, but you’re the one who asked if I’m Obsidian Devil. That was never my name. It’s just what those people kept calling me.”

Those people.

As in.

It feels like my brain is swelling inside of my head. “You’re saying that you’re a horse.”

“Well, not right now, clearly.” He frowns.

His enormous, well-muscled shoulders shift, and my eyes track downward, ogling his beautifully sculpted chest. His unbelievable six pack. And then I find myself wondering what’s beneath the saddle.

“How did you break the curse?” he asks. “Who are you that you can? And what took you so long?”

“The curse? What curse?” I’m not sure if I’m more concerned that I’m starting to engage with my hallucination, or that he seems to be talking about magic and shape-shifting.

“I helped you with your race because I thought you were different. I thought you might release me, so I could go home. I never even considered you might be able to free me.”

“Free you? Home?” I scramble to my feet. “You can’t leave. I just spent a fortune on you.” I swallow. “I need you to be a horse. I need to win races. A lot of races.” I’ve lost my mind. This horse wants me to release him, like he’s a captured slave or something.

“I’m from Russia,” he says. “My friends and I refused to help the Yurovsky and Kurakin families during the drought, and they cursed us. I only woke a year ago.”

“You woke?”

“I was buried alive—in horse form—sometime in 1917.” His brow furrows. “I believe someone mentioned the year as being twenty-something, now?”

“I. . .” I have no idea what to say to that.

“You needed money, and you got it in that race. Is that not so?”

“Well, yes and no,” I say. “I risked some of my money to win more money, but then I spent almost all the money I made when I bought you.”

His frown deepens. “So because of me, you’re still in trouble.”

I nod.

“That’s frustrating.” He stands up. And Oh. My. Word.

That phrase “hung like a horse” takes on an entirely new meaning.

5

I stare for too long, but finally my brain engages, and I cover my own eyes with my hand.

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