Horses hooves thundered toward them from behind them.
“Never mind. I see her.” The cowboy walked around behind them and whistled shrilly. “Tally ho!”
“I’m so confused. Now the cowboy is calling out the fox hunt?” Violet got to her feet. “Are you sure I’m not hallucinating?”
“We’re sharing the same vision.” Maggie got to her feet.
They both turned just as a white horse skidded to a halt, practically landing on her haunches and sending a wave of sand toward Violet and Maggie.
The cowboy didn’t move a muscle other than to hold out an apple slice. “Good girl, Tally. Easy now.”
The mare’s white nostrils flared. Refusing the treat, she jerked her head to look at Vi and Maggie.
“You want a slice of apple, don’t you, girl,” the cowboy said in a sultry voice that tugged at something deep in Violet’s chest. “You want it more than you want to trample me or these pretty ladies.”
Violet gasped. Unlike Maggie, who was a large animal veterinarian, Vi wasn’t used to being around anything larger than a golden retriever.
“I’m just kidding.” The cowboy gave Vi a look over his shoulder that made her pulse pound like crazy. “Tally’s as gentle as a kitten, aren’t you, honey?” His voice was deep and rich with a slight Texas twang.
The mare took a step closer to him, then another.
Violet had definitely had too much to drink because that voice called to her the same way it called to that horse of his. She took a step closer. And then another.
In one smooth movement, the cowboy leapt onto the mare’s back–no saddle, no reins, no halter.
“Oh.” He was hot, hotter than Lily’s fiancé actor Judson Hambly. “Oh,” Vi said again but dreamily this time because it seemed required.
“Thanks for your help, ma’ams.” The cowboy extended a hand toward Vi, as if for a shake.
Violet eyed that hand. Handshakes were rarer now that the world had been through a pandemic. “I didn’t do anything.”
“You didn’t run screaming, which would have made Tally bolt to Sag Harbor.” His hand was still extended.
Vi took it, momentarily losing herself in his large clasp and the heat of his skin.
Oh, yeah. Fantasy time.
“To properly thank you, let’s go for a ride.” Without warning, the cowboy swung her up behind him, let out one of those cowboy cries, and the horse galloped across the beach leaving Violet’s wine and sister behind them.
