were siblings? How long had they known? Was the old duke aware of Daemon as his son? So many questions, but if she blurted them all out now and Daemon told her to mind her own business, how would she respond? She had to work it all out in her own mind and choose carefully what she wanted to know. Daemon was a private man and only released the details of his life that he wanted to be made public. The rest were cards he held very close to his chest.
“Are you ready to eat?” she asked, shifting all her jumbled thoughts to the back of her mind for later. For now, all she wanted was to eat a meal with a man who didn’t insult her at every turn. Or make her head hurt with the effort to decipher him.
Chapter Eighteen
Later that day, Sophie stood by a makeshift corral as yet another fine thoroughbred went under the hammer and more of Daemon’s money spilled into the pocket of a ducal toad. She wasn’t quite sure what was happening, but Daemon had purchased a total of fifteen horses, much to the disgust of the other men who’d traveled for the auction. She wanted to ask him what he would do with them all, but she could only stand and smile prettily as her brain whirled with questions. The barns at his estate were tiny and he wasn’t a horse man at all. And then there were the dozen more questions about his relationship with Blake she longed to have answered. Why hadn’t he ever mentioned even traveling to Blakiston? She also wondered how often the half brothers saw each other. Too many scenarios skated in her mind.
“Are you all right, m’dear?” Daemon asked, looking pointedly at where her hand was supposed to rest lightly on his arm. Instead her grip was tight, his coat bunched beneath her gloved fingers.
Sophie relaxed her hand and smiled. When she peered at the others around her to make sure no one else had noticed her agitation, she met the gaze of Blake who scowled in her direction as if she was the one bidding on all of the flesh.
“I’m perfectly fine, thank you.” If she could have a guinea for every time she had said those particular words in the past week...
“You don’t look fine. Perhaps you need to sit for a moment?”
“No, thank you.” She leaned closer so no one would hear her. “What are you doing?”
“What do you mean? I’m trying to see to your obvious lack of comfort.”
“Why are you buying all of them? That one over there looks as though she is about to fall over. Her ribs are poking out.”
The stiffness under her hand was not imagined and when she looked to his face, Daemon was now the one wearing a scowl. “He has not fed them properly in a month. Wait till you see the foaling mares. He’s lucky this mob haven’t taken matters into their own hands and hung him from his own barn.”
She didn’t want to see the foaling mares. Not if they appeared as pitiful as the last two. She didn’t want to be there at all, but the whole village had turned out and she didn’t want to be left behind at the tavern on her own. And she still had to find a way to confront Blake with what she knew. And soon.
Four pathetic beasts later and finally, a spirited gray gelding was led into the corral. This one was skinny like the others, but intelligence and defiance shone in his stormy eyes. When he whinnied and reared onto his back legs, the shadow he cast over those standing closest made them shuffle back in fear.
“Ten pounds,” Blake called as he stepped from the shadow of the barn.
A laugh was the only answer from her left as Blakiston also stepped into the light. “You’ll need to do better than that, Vale.”
“Only if there is another bidder,” Blake said, looking around at his fellow villagers and friends. There was just enough firmness in his tone to let everyone know this beast was marked as his.
Sophie waited for Daemon to buy this one as well, but his mouth remained closed, his lips drawn in a tight line. Fascinating.
“Thirty pounds,” came from a stranger in a dusty bowler hat and black coat.
“Fifty,” came Blake’s reply.
Her heart sped up a little in anticipation.
“Sixty pounds,” Bowler Hat countered.
“Eighty.”
This went on for several tense minutes until the amount reached