A Complicated Affair

The large black gelding's hooves beat rhythmically on the well-traveled forest path as Diablo carried his master beyond the gardens and then into the forest. When they reached the open meadow, the horse tossed his head, impatient for the freedom to run. In answer, Bryce relaxed his hold on the reins, allowing the horse to stretch out. His long legs ate up the distance as he thundered through the dimming late afternoon light, his rider contemplating the conversation with his sister.
She had assumed - reasonably, he supposed given the information available to her - that Miss. Blackwell's state of undress had been the cause of Bryce's discomfort that summer day two years before. In truth, he'd barely been able to tear his gaze away from her twin long enough to note the young woman's charms. He was able to recall only the vaguest hint of a well-proportioned figure with high breasts beneath her soaked chemise and a narrow waist leading to flared hips where her pantaloons began.
Memories of the boy, Nicolaus, on the other hand, taunted him regularly when he closed his eyes; every detail vivid and larger than life. The shaggy dirty blond hair he had tossed, scattering water like a dog come in from the rain. The raspberry pink nipples that had been puckered up tight from the chill. The water streaming down his tight, lean flanks as his drawers had caught on a branch, pulling down in the back just long enough for Bryce to catch a glimpse of his perfectly rounded posterior before it was again covered.
The sound of the boy's breathless chuckle as he'd stumbled from the water, the waistband clutched in his hands as his sister taunted him good-naturedly from the deeper water in the center of the pond. Shrouded from sight by low hanging branches, Bryce had almost felt that he was peeping and the entire experience had been breathtaking and disturbing at the same time. Cecilia's reminder that Nicolaus would have been only sixteen at the time had done nothing to alleviate his guilt at his body's response to the memory.