The Country Escape (22 page)

Dougie Everett’s name might have been on more spectators’ lips at the point-to-point than Bill Hedges’ increasingly potent cider cup, but his arrival was so low key that nobody noticed him. Dark glasses covering the still yellow bruising
around his eyes, baseball cap crammed low over his nose, he was dressed in the buff country livery of caramel moleskins and checked shirt, with his official pass on his dashboard. Having parked his ancient and very muddy Land Rover in the shadow of his trainer’s horsebox, the first sight to greet him was a wide-shouldered deer hurrying towards the course leading an alpaca and the weird-eared
skewbald horse he recognised as the same one he’d seen Kat Mason riding, a distinctive Indian breed whose name he couldn’t remember.

His phone rang. It was Dollar. ‘Where are you? I’m in the public car park.’

‘Just arrived.’ He watched a curvaceous fox passing, trailed by a goat. ‘Don’t think much of the runners for the first. I’ll come and find you.’

Jumping out of his car,
Dougie spotted a man dressed as a badger waving his arms behind a nearby Hilux. His day was getting more surreal by the minute.

The badger was squaring up to a shaven-haired terrier-man, with British Defence League tattoos, who was selling Patterdale puppies out of the back of a pick-up. Only one was left, yapping furiously from the back of the box at the badger, who had claws fashioned
from curls of brown plastic cider bottles and was loudly demanding to know the justification for removing the puppies’ tails. ‘Docking is cruel, unnecessary butchery!’

The dog breeder lit a cigarette and watched through a plume of smoke as Dougie approached with a polite nod to admire the remaining Patterdale puppy, trying to scrabble its way out of the box, tiny tail gyrating while Badger
Man ranted about the cruelty of terrier work and tail docking. ‘It’s illegal and barbaric!’

Dougie had missed having a dog enormously while in LA. He liked Patterdales, the Jack Russell’s lesser-known northern cousin, a friendly, black-coated exhibitionist. His uncle had once had one small enough to take anywhere in a poacher’s pocket.

‘Can I have ten per cent off for the missing
tail?’ Pulling out a wad of notes, he handed it to the Hilux owner, who winked and gave him the puppy, slammed his back box shut and headed off to lay a bet on the first race, leaving Badger Man shouting furiously at nobody.

Dougie found Dollar parked in her white Porsche at the front of the public car park, which afforded her a good view of the course. A group of young hoorays
were admiring the car and its driver from the tailgate of a nearby Range Rover, drinking Peroni and comparing ski tans. With their casually unbuttoned checked shirts, bright trousers plunged into unzipped Chameaus – the luxury Range Rover of gumboots – and sun-streaked hair pegged down with flat caps, colourful laughing country dandies, they reminded Dougie of himself a decade earlier, and he had
a sudden unpleasant sensation of having come full circle. He rapped on the Porsche window.

Dollar unlocked the door and recoiled as she spotted the puppy. ‘I don’t want that thing in my car.’

‘Come and watch the first race.’ He crouched, nuzzling the puppy. ‘It’s the members’ cavalry charge so always good value. You look sensational in that suit. Wear no knickers for the rest of
the day and I’ll find an extra length for you.’ He could never resist cheesy Bond lines with Dollar, which he delivered with ever-more twinkling panache and she studiously ignored.

‘Kat Mason is here,’ she said, in her most serious automaton voice. ‘You will not flirt with me today. We are working.’

Dougie found Dollar impossible to read, but her body captivated him, and the more
access she granted him to it, the more he wanted. In the past few days, it had been constantly available and delightfully insatiable, her detachment a terrific novelty and turn-on. She’d made it clear from the start that she wasn’t interested in sleeping with him, and they hadn’t once shared a bed, even in coitus. Nor could their activities possibly be described as making love. All they’d shared
was pure sex, and it was sensationally athletic, with little or no affection, but a lot of mutual pleasure and carb-burning action. Dougie found her thrilling company when she was naked, less so when she was bossing him about fully dressed and when she was carrying a gun. The gun bothered him enormously. Disarming Dollar was a tough challenge in every sense.

‘Here’s the deal,’ he suggested
breezily. ‘If I win my race, I want you to give me something. I can’t think straight when I know you’ve still got them on you.’

‘I am not removing my panties.’

‘Not your knickers, your bullets.’

‘You must introduce yourself to Kat Mason today,’ she demanded, ignoring the challenge. ‘She and her closest allies are here dressed as animals.’

‘I think I’ve just met the
boyfriend. Very hirsute.’ He straightened up and looked across to the course, which he’d walked the night before and where three riders in red coats were now leading the field to post for the opening race, which was restricted to members of the hosting hunt. A rangy chestnut was being ridden by a girl with a deliciously round backside. He eyed it appreciatively, revelling in the loveliness of British
hunting buttocks. ‘Now that’s one I wouldn’t mind laying each way.’

Dollar snapped, ‘Keep your mind on the job.’

‘I’m just talking about a bet,’ he said cheerfully, and wandered off to find a bookie.

Watching him go, Dollar snarled under her breath, knowing she’d have to keep very close tabs on him. She didn’t entirely trust Dougie and found him difficult to control
despite gaining rapid sexual leverage, an unexpectedly enjoyable tactic that more than rewarded all the fantasies she’d entertained while watching his movies. She still firmly believed he was the right man for the job: he was charming and cool-headed, a gifted lover, and he seemed totally unflappable. But his inability to take the bonus seriously made him dangerous. Nor was Seth reacting as jealously
as she’d hoped to the heavy hints she’d been dropping that Dougie was her new plaything. Currently in Mumbai, increasingly agitated because he wanted her back there to run his life and protect him from the rest of his staff while he converted the Brides List data into bar charts, pie charts and flow charts, he remained frustratingly disengaged with Eardisford and her quest.

She sent him
another message, telling him everything was going perfectly to plan. As always, the response was almost instant.
Kwl! U R gr8 $. IMY.
Dollar pressed the phone to her lips to shield a rare smile, knowing that only Seth’s most trusted inner circle received his incomprehensible teen texts. To turn
IMY
into
ILY
would take nerves of steel and a watertight back-up plan, but she had those covered.

Ignoring the calls from a nearby tailgate to join them for a drink, she donned her dark glasses and slipped after Dougie, wishing she’d worn something more practical than a white linen suit. Her research was normally impeccable, but this time she’d been let down by the vain misassumption that this muddy Herefordshire hillside would be akin to Ascot.

At the sanctuary stand, the bizarre costumes were drawing almost as much interest as the real animals. Posing for a photo between the local farrier’s young sons, Kat felt like Minnie Mouse in Disneyland. ‘Yes, it is quite hot, but
all in a good cause!’

Overhead, the sun was staging scorching appearances between muggy, dark clouds, and the inside of Kat’s deer head was pumping out stale nicotine and Brylcreem fumes, with a faint undertone of cheese and onion crisps.

Pru and Cyn, looking far more comfortable in their Constance Mytton-Gough Animal Sanctuary T-shirts, rattled collecting tins and offered passing
families the opportunity to meet Sri and the Shetlands. Their progress was hampered, however, by Russ, who was prowling around in a wider orbit with his STEWS flyers, frightening off all but the bravest pony-mad child. ‘Otters, deer and hares caught in snares suffer unbearable pain!’

‘We must do something about him,’ Pru muttered to Cyn. ‘It’s bad for business.’

‘Along with the toxic
fox,’ Cyn agreed.

‘Actually, she’s our best money-raiser.’ Pru watched Mags circulating amid the crowd in her sexy fox attire, roll-up smouldering between her lips, selling raffle tickets, crying‒ ‘Give us yer money, you bastards!’ ‒ in such a threatening, piratical tone, she was outselling the official hunt raffle threefold.

On the public-address system, the commentator was doing
sterling work encouraging race-goers to visit the stand and support the charity race later, although he’d long since tired of the sanctuary’s full title and was referring to it as ‘the Hon Con’s Zoo’ between plugging the local game fair and an upcoming Brom and Lem Hunt supporters’ ball.

‘We should have a ball to raise money,’ Cyn said dreamily. ‘Constance loved balls. She was always throwing
them.’

‘Comes from having lots of dogs,’ laughed Kat, heading past with a group of children to introduce them to the animals.

As soon as she was out of earshot, Pru and Cyn moved in on Russ. ‘We think you’d be better off targeting the bar,’ Pru said firmly.

‘Kat needs me here.’ He pointed to the deer, who was trying to control a pygmy goat, two Shetlands, an alpaca and an
overexcited Sri as they all posed for photographs beneath their flapping charity banner. The sisters closed in further.

‘The charity committee can offer you expenses.’ Cyn produced a twenty-pound note.

‘If you don’t go, I’ll tell Kat exactly what I see going on in Mags’s car when it’s parked up by my silage clamps late at night,’ Pru said darkly.

‘Maybe you’re right.’ His
attention was distracted by a call for final bets on the first race, in which one of his comely cousins was riding. ‘Must place a small charity wager.’

In the roped-off animal enclosure, Mags had stepped in to help Kat control the marauding menagerie, not noticing the little goat helping itself to fivers from her raffle bucket. Kat let out wail of frustration as the smallest, greediest
Shetland made a break for freedom and the refreshment tent. While she raced after him, antlers rattling, the goat prised the bucket from Mags’s grip and upended it.

‘Oi, give that back!’

‘I’ve heard of drinking the profits, but eating them is a new one,’ laughed a gorgeously husky voice, as a figure stooped down to remove several banknotes from the goat’s mouth and drop them back
into the bucket before pausing to admire Mags’s thigh boots.

Dougie was struggling to admire much beyond the boots, but he knew that it was in his job description to make a flirtatious introduction. Straightening slowly, he smiled wolfishly as he handed the bucket back. ‘Hello there.’

Behind his dark glasses, Dougie’s blue eyes were assessing the crotch-length, white-bibbed
orange velvet dress and fur-trimmed thigh-high boots amid increasing alarm. With the matching fur hood, she still seemed the obvious redhead, but she was a lot older and bulkier than he’d imagined. ‘You must be the gorgeous ginger Kat everyone’s been telling me about,’ he battled on, with his biggest, sexiest smile in place.

Fishing through the cash bucket to check if it was all still there,
Mags muttered distractedly, ‘It’s a bloody fox costume, mate. I’m a fox.’

‘Aren’t you just?’ He held out his hand gamely. ‘Dougie Everett. I hear we’re neighbours?’

‘That’ll be Kat you’re after.’ She waved at a small stampede taking place near the tea tent.

‘I am!’ He beamed with relief, then balked at the sight of a huge, pot-bellied deer tripping over guy ropes as it chased
an alpaca and two Shetlands.

‘Fucking Nora.’ The fox shot off in their direction, brush twirling.

About to follow and help, Dougie realized he’d been left in sole charge of a money-munching goat and the unusual skewbald mare with the wall eyes and curled ears who was extremely agitated, desperate to follow the two runaway members of her herd and round them up. Circling, snorting
and pawing the ground, she eyed the enclosure ropes, ready to take a run up.

Dougie grabbed her head collar, listening as the commentator announced that there now appeared to be a loose alpaca on the course. His phone was chiming with an urgent message. As he grappled for it, two elderly ladies strode in to take the horse and goat from him.

‘Thank you, young man. So kind!’ The taller
one eyed him beadily. ‘Are you the new Eardisford huntsman?’

Having introduced himself with a warm handshake, he listened with a stiff smile as the sisters skittishly described meeting his father as a young man at a house party where he’d behaved ‘very naughtily indeed’. Dougie knew that there were few country houses in which Vaughan Everett had not behaved very naughtily indeed. He discreetly
checked his phone screen. Dollar’s name was attached to two words:
DEBRIEF NOW!

Thinking excitedly of his no-knickers demand, he wished the ladies a polite farewell and hurried towards the car park.

Lurking behind a stall selling expensive shooting coats, Dollar huffed impatiently: she had seen Dougie target the wrong charity worker. They needed better tactical planning.
She had yet to spot Kat Mason, and casing the point-to-point incognito was proving impossible: she was attracting far too much attention in her white linen suit, a rare exception to the ruddy-cheeked tweed masses. People all around were staring, and there were dogs everywhere. Her young admirers from the car park had now been replaced by a band of aged ones trying on hats, one of whom stepped forward
in a Panama with the label dangling over his nose and proffered a hand. ‘Frank Bingham-Ince.’ He affected a deep, honeyed drawl. ‘Are you connected with Eardisford?’

When she looked back at him coolly, one eyebrow aloft, he ventured ‘Do… you… speak… English?’

‘Mr Bingham-Ince, I speak perfect English. I’m afraid I’m very busy right now, if you’ll excuse me.’ Eager for full camouflage,
she grabbed a floor-length waxed coat and shooting cap and thrust a wad of fifties at the salesman before retreating to the Porsche to round up Dougie.

Having reclaimed the sanctuary’s pony and alpaca deserters in time to catch the closing moments of the hunt members’ race, Kat watched one of the Brom and Lem’s young thrusters grasp victory on her chestnut by a neck. Witnessing
the mud-splattered hands-and-heels final furlong, she felt even more apprehensive at the prospect of riding the same boggy turf later.

‘Ground’s bottomless,’ the victor reported cheerfully, as she rode up to the winner’s enclosure at the far end of the paddock.

Kat was grateful for the cup of steaming spiced cider that was thrust into her hand and Russ gave her a badgery hug. ‘I
just won a ton! I’m going to add it to my wager on you in the charity race.’

‘Please don’t.’

‘Have faith. You’re going to win, Kat. Trust me.’ He high-fived her antler horns and loped heroically back to the beer tent.

She hurried back to the sanctuary stand to find Mags in a state of high agitation, fox hood dragged back to reveal pink hair on end, black mask thrust up into
her fringe as she puffed on a roll-up. ‘Dougie Everett was looking for you, Kat. Do not trust him, my love. I know his sort. Arrogant twat. Thank you for this.’ She grabbed the spiced cider and downed it, then rattled her raffle collection bucket. ‘Pay up!’ she yelled at a passing gaggle of young farmers, who reached for their wallets in terror.

Kat tried to look insouciant beneath her
deer mask, adopt a Mae West face and flick up an eyebrow, but it was wasted on the ponies, and on her elderly helpers, who reported that Dougie Everett was ‘absolutely charming’ and a ‘hero of the hour’ but ‘not as dishy as he was on screen’.

‘I gather he’s quite the horseman,’ Pru sighed.

‘Puts the “neigh” into “neighbour” then,’ Kat said brightly, wondering if it would be terribly
vain to change back into her jeans.

Deciding that the ponies needed a break, she towed them back to the lorry to chill out with Donald, who had fallen asleep, snoring contentedly against his haynet. Bunking them all up together with more hay and mint bribes, she paused by a far glossier horsebox parked nearby and listened worriedly to the thumping and howling coming from inside.

Dollar had concluded that the best way to focus Dougie on the task in hand was more sexual leverage. Her Porsche was far too exposed and his Land Rover too grotty, but their trainer’s horsebox proved a perfect debriefing retreat. Part stable, part Winnebago, it had a luxurious beechwood-and-leather living area with discreet blacked-out windows.

‘You must concentrate on Kat Mason,’
she panted, as they slammed against a cupboard, fittings rattling. She gripped an overhead shelf as her hips gyrated against his.

Dougie had been quite looking forward to watching a few more races and assessing the way the course was riding, but he could hardly complain about the distraction when it was so physically all-consuming. Added to which, he reminded himself, she was armed.

‘My mind is definitely on Kat Mason,’ he lied, vaguely aware that the puppy – which had been fast asleep – was now howling for attention. ‘Kat Mason all the way!’

Astonished to hear her name, Kat crept towards the thumping, howling horsebox then started back in alarm as two distinctive crescents appeared against the darkened windows. Even with the thick privacy glass, she recognized
the impression of male buttocks, followed by a fossil stripe of backbone. The horsebox was positively rocking. The shrill howling fell silent. Moments later, the crescents and fossil peeled away from the window and more thudding ensued deeper within the box.

Ducking down and tiptoeing away, her face burning, she pulled off her antler head, shook out her hair, then crammed it back on before
rushing to the stand to rattle collecting tins and watch the racing.

Dollar was staring fixedly at the tinted window. ‘I am telling you, a huge creature with horns was standing right there.’

‘You’re imagining it,’ Dougie said easily, laying her back against a leather bench and angling her to perfection. ‘England really isn’t crawling with wolves, tigers and mythical beasts.
I’m the only horny thing around here.’

She gazed up at him, the dark eyes glowing. ‘That’s why I hired you.’