Nacho Figueras Presents (3 page)

A
lejandro impatiently raked back his hair, tilted his jaw to the mirror, and rasped the razor over his soaped face. A few silver strands had appeared above his ears in the last year. To his eye, he was aging rapidly. It might help, he thought wryly, if he could get more than two hours' sleep at a stretch.

The day's match had failed to go his way. His team had been all over the place—harmony and strategy conspicuous by their absence and the opposition had taken full advantage. The humiliation was grim, and after the game, all he'd wanted to do was come home and be left in peace, but there could be no sitting out the evening's dinner.

Social life in Wellington was a performance sport every bit as exacting as the competitive riding to which the town played host. The remainder of the season stretched ahead of Alejandro like an unending road—only one month in and the prospect of all the glad-handing and interminable dinners left to go already seemed exhausting. Alejandro splashed the last soap from his face, looked himself in the eye, and told himself to buck the fuck up.

Despite the previous night's ill-considered ride, MacKenzie had played like a dream, and Alejandro's own performance hadn't been criminal. In many ways, he knew he was a better and more fearless player than he'd ever been. All his energy these last years had gone into riding, and grief seemed to have diminished his sense of risk.

But one daredevil player didn't win a match, and Alejandro knew very well that he was not the leader his father Carlos had been. He would never have the hold over his little brother Sebastian that their father once had, and today his brilliant but dissolute
hermano
had been, at best, dialing it in. Plus Rory had seemed distracted by a pretty blonde in the stands, and though Lord Henderson had done his best, his best could not make up for the others.

Still La Victoria weren't yet out of the running for the Carlos Del Campo Cup, and if he was going to redeem the season, what Alejandro really needed to bring to the team was inspiration, discipline, and a deft and unexpected unifying strategy. Shave done, he slapped some Polo Red on his cheeks and pulled on a fresh shirt.

A rancher at heart, Alejandro always slightly resented the effort of dressing for dinner. He'd rather have his team around the kitchen table in Argentina, legs stretched under the long, scrubbed pine table, than meet under what felt like stage lighting in a Florida club. Still, dinner at the Player's Club had been his mother's initiative and canceling on Pilar was not an option. Certainly she had lost as much as he had over the years, if not even more, and she had never let her own grief be an excuse to dodge a single commitment, so he could hardly hold up one rather pathetic game as justification to check out. Buffeted by tragedy the last few years, the Del Campos would never welcome pity. He must show the world that the family were not just surviving, but thriving.

He left his dressing room and took the stairs two at a time to his daughter, Valentina's room. She was lying on her bed, swathed in a velour sweatsuit, her glossy black hair covered up in huge headphones. She gave him only a cursory glance.

“Fifteen minutes, V,” he said. “Go ahead and change. We don't want to keep your
abuela
waiting.”

In fact, Pilar was already waiting in the huge front hall of their home, a long-suffering look on her face. She thumbed a magazine, sapphires flashing at her wrist and ears.

He kissed his mother's cheek. “
Cinco minutos, Mamá
,” he said. “I just have to check the barn.”

He had a good loyal team that traveled with him from Argentina, and stable hands converged from all over North America in Florida each year. The relocation of his team and family and thirty ponies was a huge undertaking and needed almost as much of his time as playing did.

He took a quick tour of the barn to see that the tuck—the last check of the evening—was under way without event. Conversation ended abruptly as he entered. The atmosphere was muted, as it always was after a lost game.

In front of so many of his staff, Alejandro was acutely aware of their disappointment, and he knew he should offer his crew some apology. He realized what a boost it would have been for every one of his people had he managed to win today.

And yet, he suddenly felt himself tongue-tied, unable to make one more apology after a solid year of apologies. So he merely left his staff with a brisk good night and drove the car round to the front of the house for his mother and daughter.

B
efore Alejandro could take the ticket from the club's valet parking guy, Valentina, wearing a dress so short that Alejandro had to quell his urge to take off his jacket and wrap it around her waist, stalked ahead to the restaurant entrance.

Sometimes it was hard for him not to watch her with worry. Three years on and he could see that she was still in the teeth of the tragedy. He occasionally wondered whether she would ever be okay again, whether the damage was permanent. Thirteen was such a hard age to lose a mother. Just when she was turning into a woman, she had lost her most trusted guide. Now, at sixteen, she had grown into a tempestuous beauty who looked, and sometimes acted, much older than her age. She could easily pass for twenty. Alejandro could see the eyes of every man she passed appraise his gorgeous daughter, and he struggled to bite back his temper. They thought they were looking at a woman, but she was just a little girl.

Alejandro glanced at his mother. Her wide green eyes never missed a thing, and though her lips almost imperceptibly pursed at Valentina's rudeness, she didn't say a word.

Alejandro knew that Pilar adored her sons and granddaughter. She was careful always to let him lead, to make way for him as the new head of the family. But for all her tact, Alejandro had the constant feeling she was biting her tongue, restraining herself from saying something that might rock the already shaky foundations of the Del Campo clan.

They walked along the path of floodlit palms and were greeted by Rocky, the club's longtime doorman. He gave Alejandro a hint of a bow and held the door for Pilar. Inside, the place was packed with air-kissing, glass-clinking people who, Alejandro knew for a fact, loathed each other.

He smiled wryly. The Wellington scene made him think of wars past when combatants would dine together at the end of a day's battle.

As he passed the packed tables, heads turned and voices dropped. He thought he knew what they'd be saying.
Not the man his father was. Lost his nerve. Burned out. Peaked too soon. He'll never win in the wake of all that tragedy.
Alejandro kept his eyes straight ahead, jaw set.

They were shown to the central table, where Alejandro could see from his brother's flushed cheeks and predatory smile that he and Rory were well into a bottle of good Scotch already.

Lord Henderson stood to greet Alejandro warmly. Hendy, as they called him, was a rock. He came from a family as old as England and saw the world in strong and simple terms. He'd been a solid and loyal consigliere to Carlos Del Campo and offered not only his own fortune but a continuity and an affable stability to the team since.

Rory was busy ordering another drink, and Sebastian‘s eyes were unashamedly undressing the prettiest of the waitresses. And she wasn't making much secret of her appetite for him in turn.

Alejandro accepted a cranberry and soda and the menu. He loved his brother and sometimes envied the easy way he seemed to walk through life. Wellington was his element. Outside of polo, the majority of the men in the equestrian set were gay, so the heterosexual women outnumbered the straight men in Wellington by nearly two to one. The polo players could pretty much take their pick of willing sexual partners.

There was an undeniable draw about a man on a horse, and for polo players, “stick chick” opportunities were endless. Everywhere the brothers went, there were women angling for an invitation, and Sebastian had been taking full advantage since the age of fifteen.

Alejandro had always been content to let his brother claim that territory. Ever since Alejandro was a kid, polo had been his obsession, and any girl who was interested in him had to be willing to play second fiddle to the game. There had been a few women who were willing to tolerate his split affection, and they had all been perfectly lovely, bright young girls—but none of them had really managed to turn his head away from the ponies for long. And then, from the moment he'd been introduced to Olivia, his own path had been made clear.

The waiter arrived at the table to take their drink order. Valentina looked up from under long lashes and asked for a glass of champagne. The waiter looked like he was going to give it to her, too, until Alejandro growled, “She's sixteen. She'll have lemonade.”

Ignoring his pretty daughter's protests and wondering when he got cast in the role of brooding, gloomy patriarch, Alejandro reflected that Olivia had only been two years older than Valentina was now when they'd first met.

He pulled himself up. His late wife was like a groove to which his mind kept returning.
Let it go.
He was here at the start of a fresh new season. Today's result notwithstanding, anything was possible. He took a moment to enjoy his mother's imperious charm as she ordered. And smiled at his daughter bantering back and forth with Sebastian and Rory. For all the eyeliner and attitude, Valentina was still his little girl.

“Are you ready to order dinner, or waiting for one more?” the waiter asked, nodding at the empty chair.

Pilar met Alejandro's eyes. “I asked Cricket to join us.”

On cue, there was a small commotion at the doorway and three men barked with laughter and parted to reveal Cricket—British show-jumping star and equestrian set pinup—making maximum impact on entrance as she did everywhere she went. Cricket had been given the nickname by her family when she and her first pony cleared parallel bars from a standing start. Since Cricket loathed her given name, Candida, and loved to jump, she'd made it her business to see the nickname stuck.

Rory stood prematurely to pull out a chair, and Cricket made her way slowly toward them, dipping her cheek to be kissed at tables along the way and glancing up coyly at Alejandro whenever her breasts were displayed to best advantage. With her platinum mop of hair and bee-stung lips, she always looked distractingly ready for bed.

She arrived in a soft cloud of some delicious Bond Street scent, waved kisses at them all, and slid into her seat with a quick look at the mirror behind the table. Apparently satisfied that she was perfect, she gave Alejandro a slow, entitled smile, which took in the entirety of their history.

There was an easy elegance about the way Cricket did everything, Alejandro thought as he watched her shake out her napkin and accept an air kiss from a passing publicist. Maybe because her family had been British horse royalty for generations, she made playing the Wellington scene seem like second nature. As Pilar repeatedly and pointedly said, Cricket was going to make some lucky someone a formidable wife.

She raised her champagne to Alejandro in a silent toast and brought the flute to her mouth, a gleam of speculation in her lovely, slanting eyes.

T
he morning of her flight, Georgia was up yawning before dawn to feed and say good-bye to the animals, the barn, the mountains, the land…The old stone cottage looked heart-stoppingly beautiful in the dawn light, the rising sun reflected off the snow in soft shades of rose and gold.

Get a grip
, she thought. She was already nostalgic, and she hadn't even left.

Sam arrived early, and when he pulled up in his dark blue pickup truck, whether it was pre-trip jitters or not, Georgia's heart did skip a little. With his sandy hair and easy smile, there was no denying the guy's appeal. But once it was just the two of them in the truck, the intimacy felt like dangerous territory so Georgia stuck with thanks again for the ride and then gazed determinedly out the window, feigning fascination with the snow-weighted branches.

Sam didn't seem to mind the lack of repartee and comfortably went about filling in the silence. He told her how pleased his neighbor was with the way she'd looked after their dog's luxating patella. He didn't like to think what would have happened if she hadn't spotted the wobble in his walk. “The family thinks you're some kind of dog-whisperer now, Georgia. Kept telling me you saw the problem before it even was a problem.”

Georgia shrugged him off, embarrassed. She did seem to have a knack for sometimes noticing things that other people might not, but she put that down to paying attention and a dose of beginner's luck. Taking it any more seriously might jinx things.

She politely asked about his work, and he chatted happily about tax season. Georgia tried to stay focused, but she couldn't help it—the minute Sam started talking about money, he always lost her.

After a few minutes, he seemed to realize she'd checked out and abruptly changed the course of the conversation by telling her that a space had come up for rent in the building he owned—right under his office—and how he always thought it would make a good place for a clinic.

He's right
, Georgia thought.
It would.
And she was sure the rent would be cheap. She imagined what it would be like to have him just a stairwell away all day long and half smiled. Not a landlord you could complain about. But still, the complications felt infinite so she put him off, saying she was still learning so much at the animal hospital she wasn't ready to branch out on her own just yet.

He offered to park, but Georgia told him she'd be fine so they pulled up to the drop-off lane at the airport. While Georgia scrolled through her phone for her e-ticket, he jumped out and grabbed her bags. She awkwardly gave him a kiss on the cheek as a good-bye and said thanks again, but as she pulled away, he grasped her arm with one hand and produced a small, wrapped parcel in his other. For one breathless and irrational moment, she thought he might actually be about to propose.

“A late Christmas present,” he said, smiling bashfully. “I've been carrying it around, hoping I'd get the chance to see you, but you've made yourself scarce.”

It was a necklace. A contemporary silver pendant. Sleek and pretty, and so obviously expensive that, for a split second, Georgia could not help but imagine selling it to help with the cost of a new roof for the barn. She chased this ungrateful thought away, but paused before thanking him, not sure she was ready to accept all that this gift implied.

“Sam, I…”

He waved away her equivocation. “Please,” he said as he lifted the chain, “just try it on.” He clasped the necklace at the nape of her neck, and as his knuckles brushed against her skin, Georgia felt an involuntary shiver of pleasure. It had been a long time since any man had touched her—her dad's occasional absentminded pat on the top of her head most definitely did not count—and for a moment, she allowed herself to fantasize about being with Sam again, how easy it would be.

He stepped back. “It looks perfect on you.”

She touched it, hesitant, and then relented. “Thank you. It's lovely.”

Sam gazed at her intently. “Georgia, I know now's not the right time, but I do want to talk with you. When you're back? Can we have dinner?”

Georgia's smile faltered. But he'd been so decent, how could she say no? “Of course. I'd like that.”

She walked away and then glanced back and saw Sam was still standing there, watching her go. He raised his hand and gave a sweet, easy, just slightly beseeching smile. Georgia firmly made herself smile back at him, waving with what she hoped looked like real enthusiasm.

She boarded, filing past the smug first-class passengers and into her seat. The cabin was cramped, she was sitting in the center, and the elderly man sitting next to her smelled distinctly of Bengay cream, but she suddenly realized that she was happier than she'd been in weeks. It was almost alarming, how excited she was to leave.

Checking messages before going into airplane mode, she found she had an e-mail from Billy with the title “Get the picture?”

There was a link to a piece in
Wellington Magazine
called “The Season's Most Sought-After Equestrian Accessories,” flanked by ads for catering, cosmetic surgery, private jets, and multimillion-dollar realty.

Georgia swiped down to the photo of Billy's latest crush, Beau, proudly displaying on his arm one of the “beautiful bespoke saddles he makes for the world's most exacting polo players.” He looked like the perfect Southern gentleman: strawberry blond, chiseled features, well bred, badly behaved. Exactly Billy's type.

The photo had him handing the saddle to a guy in his late twenties who looked like a rock star in polo gear. Brown, shoulder-length hair, caramel-colored skin, rakish eyebrows, and a mischievous smile. But it was the man next to him that really caught Georgia's attention. Has to be the older brother, she thought. Same hair, shorter cut. Tall, broad, maybe late thirties, but with a much wryer and more reluctant smile that didn't quite reach his ice blue eyes.

Georgia enlarged the caption:

Sebastian and Alejandro Del Campo, scions of the legendary polo dynasty.
She looked at them a long beat, a little dazzled by all the beauty and privilege, before turning off her phone and worrying all over again about her wardrobe.

The plane banked as they readied for landing. Back home, the world had been snow white for so long that seeing the glorious colors—the turquoise sea against the white sand—was like some kind of retinal therapy—a color board of bliss.

Traveling was part of what she'd denied herself in what felt like forever. She was a little afraid now to find out how much she liked it. She had a sudden flashback to sitting at the kitchen counter as a little girl. Her mother spun a globe and trailed a long finger over all the places to which she'd already been and then all the places she still counted on seeing. “You'll see them, too, Georgie,” her mother had said.

The plane bounced as it hit the tarmac, jolting her out of the unacceptable swell of emotion. Georgia brushed away a rogue tear. She hadn't counted on the possibility that coming to Florida—to her mother's old haunt—would affect her so deeply. She took a deep breath, determined not to let the old hurt ruin her long weekend.