The Fake Husband

“I think we need to cut to the chase.”

Folding his arms along the edge of the table, Rhys leaned closer and held Jacquie’s gaze by sheer force of will. “I’m not sure what’s going on, but I am sure I’m tired of playing games. Why are we here, Jacquie? What do you have to say to me?”

She drew a deep breath. “You asked me why I left without saying anything.”

“Yes.”

“Well, there is no husband. I invented him because I couldn’t come home as an unwed mother with an illegitimate child.”

Setting down her coffee, Jacquie looked Rhys straight in the eyes. “Your child, Rhys. My daughter, Erin Elizabeth Archer, is your child. The only proof you’ll need is a single glance at her beautiful face.”

Dear Reader,

I taught myself to ride a horse when I was in junior high school…with a scarf looped around the bedpost, me mounted on the footboard and a volume of the Encyclopedia Britannica open on the mattress for instruction. Yes, I really was that crazy about horses. But in time I grew up, gained a husband and children and let the horse dreams fade.

Then my younger daughter, aged twelve, began pestering me to go riding with her friends. I’m not quite sure how it happened, but now we own four horses and spend most of our time outside school hours “at the barn.”

The Fake Husband is a story about people who love horses. Jacquie Archer and Rhys Lewellyn are brought together the first time by their competitive equestrian careers. And when all-too-human concerns tear them apart, it's the horses—and one very special child—that bring them together again. I think the nobility of the horse draws out the best in us humans, and I thoroughly enjoyed spending time with people who respond to that call. I hope you'll do the same.

Happy reading!

Lynnette Kent

[e-mail]

or PMB 304

Westwood Shopping Center

Fayetteville, NC 28314

The Fake Husband

Lynnette Kent

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To the friends I’ve found “at the barn”

Kelly and C.J., Kim, Beth, Karen and Julie and Kelly K. and Laura, Dr. Garrett and Dr. Brian

Your laughter, your tears and your teaching will always be with me.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER ONE

RHYS LEWELLYN ARRIVED in the “sunny South” on New Year’s Day, just in time for the worst snowstorm to hit North Carolina in eighty years.

“Damn snow wasn’t supposed to reach this far till tomorrow,” he growled, switching the windshield wipers to maximum speed. “And we should have been here two days ago.”

“Two flat tires and five horses make for slow traveling.” Coming from the back seat, Terry O’Neal’s brogue was as thick as the day he left Ireland thirty years ago.

“Tell me something I don’t know.” Rhys shifted his weight from hipbone to hipbone and flicked the switch for the seat heater to high. The escalating ache in his back measured exactly how much effort he’d put into this trip and how much stress he’d undertaken.

“All right, then.” Terry rattled the map. “Your turn’s coming up on the left.”

“Thank God.” A glance toward the passenger side showed his son’s posture unchanged, head turned to look out the window at the white blanket shrouding trees and road alike. No sign of interest, or fatigue, or anything remotely resembling enthusiasm had slipped through Andrew’s guard since leaving New York. He might as well have declared himself a hostage.

Perhaps he was—a hostage to his father’s failure.

For now, though, the struggle was not father against son but man against nature. Rhys eased his foot onto the brake and felt the tires skid.

“There has to be six inches of snow on this road, over a layer of ice. Have these people ever heard of snowplows?” With the weight of the trailer behind him, he needed all the traction he could get—which appeared to be none, as the truck continued to slide despite antilock brakes and four-wheel drive.

Rhys muttered a string of curses. “I can’t stop the damn thing.”

“Just take the corner,” Terry advised, leaning forward between the seats. “Wide as you can.”

Teeth gritted, Rhys didn’t have time for another smart answer. He turned the steering wheel gently to the left, avoiding thoughts of what would happen if the trailer behind him twisted or, worse, capsized. Holding his breath, he glanced at the rearview mirror to see the rig behind him come into line. All he had to do was straighten up a bit and they’d be headed down the lane, none the worse for their little skating adventure.

Then the truck’s front tire jolted into a deep hole on the right side. “Oh, Jesus,” Terry groaned. “What now?”

The rear wheel followed. Before Rhys could brake, the trailer’s double wheel, loaded with two and a half tons of horse, dropped into the pit and stuck fast. Their forward progress skidded to a shuddering, lurching stop.

Swearing, Rhys released his seat belt and jumped down into the snow, wincing as the impact jarred his back. His first glance at the trailer showed him the worst—a forty-foot conveyance tilted to the side of the road at a steep angle, containing five animals known for their tendency to panic at the bite of a fly.

Terry charged past him. “Got to get them out,” he muttered through the fog of his breath, “’fore they go hurting themselves.”

“And how are we going to tie up horses in an empty field in the middle of a snowstorm?” Rhys joined the older man in letting down the back ramp and opening the double doors.

“God knows.”

“And we’re waiting for divine revelation?”

“Better revelation than a broken leg.”

Three horses were loaded side by side at this end, facing forward and trying to keep their balance on the sloping floor. An ominous thumping came from one of the berths at the other end of the trailer.

Rhys put a hand on Terry’s shoulder. “You unload here. I’ll start at the front end.”

“You can’t bring that stallion out by yourself.”

“I’ll get Andrew to help.”

“That’ll be a trick.”

Contrary to Terry’s pessimism, Andrew had sized up the situation and solved one of their problems already. As Rhys headed to the center door of the trailer, he saw that his son had found a pair of trees off to the left and was stringing a line between them to which the horses could be tied.

“Good idea,” Rhys called across the snowy ground. Andrew didn’t hear, or chose not to. Either way, he didn’t react.

But within the trailer, Imperator had heard his master’s voice. His shrill whinny ratcheted the anxiety of the other horses up several notches. Rhys got the ramp down and the door open just in time to see the big Thoroughbred hunch, elevating his hindquarters. With the sound of a cannon shot, both hooves impacted the wall of his stall.

“Jesus, Mary and Joseph.” Beside the trailer, Terry hung on to a lead rope as the bay gelding on the other end, taking exception to Imperator’s display, attempted to rear. By the sound of it, the horses still in the trailer with Imperator were on the verge of outright revolt. “Down, Abner. Down.”

Rhys climbed into the trailer to stand spread legged in front of his stallion. “Okay, big boy, we got the message. You want out. Can you be halfway cool about this?”

Eyes wide, nostrils flaring, Imperator was anything but cool. His winter coat of thick black hair was streaked with sweat. He didn’t travel well at the best of times, and this morning’s tranquilizer had worn off a couple of hours ago—the scheduled time of their arrival before the intervention of the storm.

“Settle down, son.” Rhys stroked a hand along the arch of Imperator’s neck. “Just a little uneven ground, here. You’re the best there is over hills.”

The horse pawed the floor with an impatient hoof, barely missing the toe of Rhys’s boot.

“Get you out, is what you’re saying. Right. Just don’t kill me in the process.” He untied the lead rope from the ring on the wall and stepped back as Imperator lunged against the padded breast bar keeping him in the stall.

“No.” Snapping the rope taut, Rhys put steel into his voice. “Back up. Back up,” he ordered, pressing his fist into the stallion’s chest. “You heard me. Back.” Imperator brought his own stern will to the argument, refusing to retreat. Snow blew into the trailer, along with a cold wind that froze Rhys’s rear end and stiffened the tense muscles in his back.

Giving in, however, would destroy what control he might possess over this powerful animal. He jerked the lead rope once more, pulling the horse’s head down until they met eye to eye. “Imperator. Back. Now.”

After a moment, Imperator conceded and shuffled back a step, then another. Rhys let him stand there for a few moments, submissive, to reinforce the lesson. “Okay. Now we’ll try again.” He released the breast bar. “Slowly. Walk on, Imperator. Walk.”

The horse stepped to the door of the tilted trailer and hesitated at the top of the ramp, staring out at the white world swirling around him. Snowflakes matted his mane and eyelashes immediately. Imperator snorted and shook his head.

“Yes, we were leaving this weather behind, weren’t we? The point of coming south was to get warm, right?” Rhys felt for his footing in the soft snow. “Among other things. Walk on.”

Steadily Imperator moved down the ramp. Once on the ground, a combination of fresh air and the prospect of freedom energized the big horse. Head high, eyes wide, he surveyed his new surroundings, shifting his body to take in a three-hundred-sixty-degree view. Though he obviously would have preferred to gallop across the field to the trees where Abner was already tied up, Rhys held him to a walk on the unknown ground and tied him at the other end of the line from the bay. “You two be gentlemen. We don’t need any other complications this afternoon.”

When he turned back to the trailer, he saw Andrew trudging through the snow leading the two mares, Daisy and Lucretia, followed by Terry with Felix, the black-and-white pinto yearling.

“So,” he said as they came close, “we’ve got five horses to move down this lane in the snow. Any reason we can’t ride three and lead the other two?”

Terry shrugged. “Whatever we’re going to do, let’s be quick about it. I’m freezing my cheeks off out here.”

Rhys nodded. “I’ll take Abner and lead Imperator. Andrew can mount Daisy.” He gave the gelding a pat. Daisy and Abner were brother and sister, though a year apart in age, and shared the same even temperament. Riding either horse was like relaxing in a favorite armchair.

But Terry stopped him with a hand on his arm. “I’d advise against riding her after all the upset. You can never tell what will cause a mare to drop her foal too early.”

“Damn.” Daisy was pregnant, and Terry was exactly right. But Felix was far too young to carry a rider. “That leaves us a mount short.”

Andrew looked around, his eyes bright. “I’ll ride Imperator.”

Rhys shook his head. “No.”

“I can. He—”

Keeping a firm grip on his temper, Rhys explained the obvious. “All we need is an Olympic champion running wild with you on his back, through a snowstorm, over unfamiliar, unseen ground. The way things are going today, both of you would end up with broken bones.”

An insolent—even contemptuous—sneer curled Andrew’s mouth. “I’m not the one who fell off him last.”

“That’s enough of that,” Terry said sharply. “Keep a civil tongue in your head, boy.”

Rhys swallowed against a surge of emotion he didn’t want to classify. “I have more weight to use and twenty years of experience to my advantage. That makes me a safer bet.” Avoiding the sullen outrage on Andrew’s face, he turned toward the truck. “I’ll lock up the rig.”

First he tried to pull the trailer wheels out of the hole again, thinking that without the weight of the horses, he might actually succeed. But the traction just wasn’t there. Even in low gear, the truck’s wheels spun uselessly against the weight behind it.

In the tack room of the trailer, he slung Imperator’s bridle over his shoulder and pulled saddle pads off the racks. He’d seldom ridden this horse bareback—Imperator needed the discipline of a saddle to keep him focused.

Then again, the last time he had been on Imp’s back, a saddle hadn’t kept either of them from disaster. For a moment, Rhys stood with his eyes closed, fighting back the memory of that last fall, his own sense of helplessness as the world literally spun around his head.

But that was the past. Today, he was making a start on his future. Their future, his and his son’s.

When he rejoined Terry and Andrew, they’d fashioned their horses’ halters into bridles without bits. Rhys gave them blankets and turned toward the stallion. Again Terry grabbed his sleeve. “I’ll ride him, if you want,” the Irishman said in a low voice. “You’ve no need to take such a risk, with your back still tender.”

“I’ll be okay,” Rhys assured the trainer, and himself. “Give me a leg up.” As they walked to open ground for mounting, Imp tossed his head and capered, obviously wanting a brisk run.

“Are you sure?” Terry asked once more.

“What do you think?” Rhys brushed the snow from Imp’s back before slinging the saddle pad across.

“That you’re a damn lunatic, just as I have said since you were five years old.”

“Well, at least I’m consistent. Ready?” He closed the reins inside his left fist.

Terry bent his back and held out his clasped hands for Rhys to put his knee into. “If you say so.”

Then, with three bounces on his right foot and a toss up from Terry, Rhys found himself, for the first time in two months, astride the great Imperator.

“All right?” Terry said, as Imp sidled and shied.

What other choice did he have? He could either admit he was all but puking with fear…or else sit here and ride the damn horse.

Rhys drew a deep, shaking breath. “All right.”

The Irishman retained Daisy’s lead rope as he ploughed through the deepening snow—at least eight inches by now—to Lucretia, a gray Thoroughbred named for the wicked glint in her eye. Andrew, again wearing his mask of indifference, had already mounted Abner.

As he had for the past week, Rhys ignored his son’s attitude and his own inability to make a connection with the boy. “Let’s get this parade underway.”

Heading Imperator toward the lane, he kept a firm hand on the reins, restraining the stallion’s desire for speed. The asphalt road surface was solid under the snow, but treacherous nonetheless, thanks to that layer of ice.

“How far do we have to go?” he called back to Terry.

“Five miles, or there abouts.”

“Terrific.”

Five frozen miles to a cold house and barn he’d leased without seeing them, on a horse he had failed the last time they rode together. Imperator didn’t trust him any more than he trusted himself. Not exactly the perfect start to a new life.

“Happy New Year.” Rhys blew out a frustrated breath. “Happy New Year, indeed.”

COVERED WITH SNOW and laughing with no breath left to do so, Jacquie Archer staggered into the warmth of her kitchen and leaned back against the door to prevent her daughter from coming inside.

“Let me in!” Erin pretended to pound on the window. “Little pig, little pig, let me come in.”

Jacquie grinned at the recollection of childhood stories. “Not by the hair of my chinny chin chin.”

“Then I’ll huff—” Erin pushed at the door “—and I’ll puff—” she pushed again “—and I’ll blow your house in.” She gave one more push, just as Jacquie stepped away from the door and allowed it to swing open. With a cry of surprise, Erin stumbled across the threshold and into her mother’s arms.

They collapsed against each other, still laughing. Hurry, their Australian shepherd, came in behind Erin and danced around their feet in exuberant canine fashion, panting and jumping up at them in an effort to join the game.

“Now I remember why we named her Hurricane,” Jacquie said, rubbing the perky ears. “We’d all better get dried off before we end up standing in a puddle of melted snow.”

Minutes later, their ski jackets and bibs hung from the shower curtain rod in the back bathroom. The snow caked on their boots melted into the tub. Erin toweled Hurry’s long, black-and-white coat to a reasonably dry state and gave her a snack of dog food mixed with warm water while Jacquie heated water for tea.

“Orange spice, lemon, or English breakfast?” She turned off the heat under the whistling kettle. “Honey or sugar?”

“Lemon and honey,” her daughter decided. “And gingersnaps. Yum. What movie should we watch?” She set out the tin containing their remaining Christmas cookies.

“You decide. I need to look at my schedule for next week and check the machine before I sit down. After spending the morning outside, I figure I’ll be asleep in seconds.”

“’Kay.” Erin took a plate of ginger cookies and her mug into the living room. Jacquie sipped at her orange spice tea and finished off a couple of cream-cheese cookies before turning to the answering machine. Sure enough, the light was blinking. She gathered her pen and appointment book, then pressed the button.

“Hi, Jacquie, honey.” Her mother’s sweet Southern accent always made her smile. “We enjoyed having y’all over yesterday to watch the games and share our New Year’s Day. Looks like the snow won’t last too long—the weather channel says the temperatures will be in the fifties the first of next week. You be careful driving around, though. We’ll look to see you at church on Sunday. Let me know if you want to come here for lunch.”

Message two was from her friend Phoebe Moss, who lived down the road. “Happy New Year, Jacquie. How about this snow? You should see my horses kicking up their heels out there. Speaking of which, we’re due for a trim. Give me a call and we’ll set up an appointment.”

Jacquie was still writing a note to call Phoebe when message three started. “Ladysmith Farrier Service? This is Rhys Lewellyn. I’m leasing Fairfield Farm…”

She heard nothing else. A black cloud swirled in front of her eyes and the room tilted under her feet. For the second time in her life, Jacquie thought she might actually faint.

Holding her mug in two shaking hands, she went to the kitchen table and sat down with her back to the answering machine. What she couldn’t see wasn’t there, right? Rhys Lewellyn didn’t exist. Keeping her mind deliberately blank, she reached the bottom of her mug and the little pile of sugar that hadn’t dissolved.

Erin padded into the kitchen in her socks. “Hey, you’re eating all the cookies. No fair.” She rummaged through the tin and pulled out another gingersnap. “Last one. I’m watching the last half of the asteroid movie. Are you coming?”

“In a little while.”

“’Kay.” Unaware of looming disaster, her daughter returned to the simplicity of a world threatened merely by destruction from outer space.

Reality presented a much more immediate and complicated menace. Feeling colder than when she’d been playing outside, Jacquie returned to the answering machine and pressed the button to repeat the last message.

“Ladysmith Farrier Service? This is Rhys Lewellyn.” His voice hadn’t changed in fourteen years, the words still crisp and clean, the tone light and yet somehow rich. A voice that horses listened to, obeyed. A voice that a woman might savor like the ripple of silk against her skin.

“I’m leasing Fairfield Farm—we arrived yesterday in the middle of the storm. I’ve got three horses which lost shoes in the snow. If you have time, I need a farrier as soon as possible.” He left his number and hung up. Decisive and direct, just as he had been all those years ago.

“Mom, you’re missing the movie.” Erin leaned around the door frame between kitchen and living room. “They’re already at the space station.” With her black hair cut short and her slight frame, Erin looked like Peter Pan, mischievous, adventurous, untamed. Straight brows slanting over icy blue eyes increased the effect. On horseback, in a helmet that disguised her feminine chin and mouth, she might have been a boy. She rode like one. Or, to be more precise, like a young version of the man she resembled so closely…her father, Rhys Lewellyn.

“Mom?” Erin came to the table, put a hand on Jacquie’s shoulder. “You all right?” Then she glanced down at the appointment pad and gasped. “Rhys Lewellyn? The Olympic rider? He called you?”

Jacquie hadn’t realized she’d written down his name. “I—”

“You’re going to work for Rhys Lewellyn? Awesome.” Erin bounced across the kitchen and back. “Is he gonna be here for a while? Or is he just passing through? He used to winter in Florida. This is kinda out of the way for driving to Florida, though. Isn’t it? Oh, please, say he’s staying here at least till spring.”

“He—he said he’s leasing Fairfield Farm.”

“How cool is that? I could ride across the Allens’ land and the Brentwoods’ and be there for lessons.” She threw herself on her knees at Jacquie’s side. “Mom, you gotta ask him if he’ll give me lessons. I couldn’t stand it if he was this close and I didn’t get to ride with him. He probably charges, like, a hundred dollars, but I’ll earn the money, I promise. Please, please, promise you’ll ask.”

Jacquie pulled herself together. “We don’t know if he’s teaching, Erin. Let’s get the facts first.” Like the fact that you’re his daughter. And he doesn’t know you exist.

“When are you going out there? Can I come? Fairfield has that great stone barn, doesn’t it? And I bet he’s brought Imperator with him. That’s his Olympic ride, you know. They took the gold in eventing at the last games. Oh, man. I gotta go with you.”

“I have to call back to set an appointment, Erin.” And she would make sure to choose a time when her daughter was otherwise occupied. “You’re missing the movie.”

“Who cares, when I can ride with Rhys Lewellyn? So incredibly awesome. I’m gonna go find that magazine with the big article on the Olympics. They spent pages and pages on him and Imperator.”

Erin dashed to her room. Jacquie folded her arms on the table and buried her head in them. She’d never read an article on the man, not so much as a paragraph over all these years. She hadn’t needed pictures to see the resemblance to his daughter, of course. That was as much a reminder of her time with Rhys as Jacquie had been able to bear.

If she failed to return his call, he would find another farrier. She could lie to Erin and tell her that Rhys wasn’t teaching, only training his own horses. Which might be true.

But if Rhys was going to teach, Erin would hear about it from her friends. And he would most likely be riding at the shows and events scheduled in the area, including the prestigious Top Flight HorseTrials coming up in April. Erin planned to compete there. From what she knew of him, Jacquie would be surprised if Rhys did not.

No matter who rode where, chances were good that she and Erin would encounter Rhys Lewellyn somewhere during the next few months. The horse world around the town of New Skye just wasn’t that big. Thinking of running into him, confronting him with a daughter he didn’t know he had in front of her friends, clients, and plain old nosy strangers, churned Jacquie’s stomach worse than any amusement park ride Erin had ever forced her to take.