the horse,” Pierce said.
“We will not leave,” the general announced.
“Tell them to go ahead,” Pierce said softly over his shoulder. Analise, on the verge of slipping off the horse and running for the truck, raised a hand instead and called, “It’s okay.”
General Kaare looked furious but the driver sped up and the truck soon pulled ahead.
After a few moments, they traveled back down the rise to the road. The vehicle was a good hundred yards away by then, disappearing around a curve. By now the attack of nerves that had gripped her a few moments before was gone and Analise sagged.
“You okay back there?” Pierce asked.
“Yes. Of course. The horse wasn’t really bothered, was he?”
“No. I was.”
“Me, too.”
This time his profile came with a furrowed brow under the brim of his hat. “How do you live like this, Princess?”
“Like what?”
“Like a beautiful fish in a crystal bowl.”
Had he just called her beautiful? She smiled against his back, unexplainably pleased. She was used to having people fawn over her, accustomed to reading flattering things about her appearance in magazines and newspapers, but it was different coming from him. “I guess a person gets used to whatever it is they’ve known,” she finally said. “Anyway, I went to school in England for several years, so I’m not always guarded so closely.”
He put a hand over hers as it rested against his flat stomach. “I don’t mean to alarm you, but I have to admit your story about what happened in Seattle worries me.”
“It worried the general, too, but he wouldn’t discuss it. Will you?”
“It sounds like a setup.”
“Excuse me?” she said, and this time her gaze darted behind them. She hadn’t realized until that moment how the car had provided a safety net at her back and now that it was gone, she felt naked.
“The missing driver, the sudden offer of a ride, the knot of threatening men, the attack on your bodyguard, a new man hired—it sounds like a setup with one express goal—get rid of Claude. How well do you know this man, Vaughn?”
“Not very well.”
He squeezed her hand with his. She’d felt his strength when he helped her mount the horse; she felt it in his body now when he shifted his weight with the ride. Power. But not the overbearing affectations of the general. No, something more subtle and quiet and substantial.
“I’ll keep an eye on him,” he added. “And on you.”
“Oh, please, not another eye. There are already so many!”
“It’s not just you,” he said.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean for the time being I’m responsible for everything that happens on this ranch. I want to hand it back to Cody and Adam and my dad in one piece and that means no trouble.”
“Then you don’t normally live here?”
“No.”
“Do you have a ranch somewhere else? Is someone taking care of that while you are here? A wife, perhaps?” The pinto picked up his pace as the road ascended and the distant roof of a building came into sight. Just like the horses at home in Chatioux, this one apparently knew when the stable was close by.
“Why, Princess,” Pierce said, flashing a grin over his shoulder, “is that your way of finding out if I’m single?”
She’d been thinking more along the lines of establishing his identity. For some reason, it seemed unlikely an assassin would claim a family.
Wait. Did she really think this was some kind of setup? If she had, wouldn’t she have insisted the car stay behind them? Trust your instincts, Analise, her father had said on more than one occasion. Sometimes that’s all the armor you’ll have…
“You’re wearing gloves,” she said evenly. “A woman likes to know these things.”
“So does a man,” he said without turning.
“I’m about to become engaged.”
“That’s too bad.”
“And you?”
“I’m not engaged or married or involved with anyone at the moment.”
“But you have been?”
“All those things at one time or another,” he said and there was a tone to his voice that added, Once was enough.
“So if you aren’t a rancher, what are you?”
“I’m part owner of a sort of security outfit,” he said, but there’d been a brief pause before his answer.
“Are you like a policeman?”
“Not really. We help businesses track down inner-corporate ne’er-do-wells.”
“I see.”
“You do?”
“Like industrial espionage,” she said.
“Yes. My partner tends to take the computer angle. I get more hands-on.”
Analise looked ahead and caught sight of a huge log house. Shaped like an inverted V with wings, it appeared to rise to three stories in the middle with tall glass windows. Slender, graceful white-barked trees, their branches currently bare, cradled the upper stories. The long walkway leading to the front was built of rock. A partial roof supported by huge peeled logs covered the end closest to the house. Additional structures could be glimpsed fanning out at the back and there appeared to be a small pond, frozen over, that surrounded the patio on the north end.
When they’d flown overhead, she’d seen long barns with red roofs she supposed held feed and others that must house large equipment. The fields had been dotted with hundreds of black cows, so stark against the winter ground. Add rolling hillsides, millions of evergreen trees and miles of fences and the overall impression was of prosperity.
“You must have enjoyed growing up here,” she said, leaning forward to peer over his shoulder and unconsciously inhaling the clean male scent of his skin. Coming from the privileged life she’d led, admiring a lifestyle wasn’t something she had occasion to do often. But there was a sense of freedom and openness about the place that was foreign to her—and appealing.
For a second she wished she was here alone with Pierce. Just the two of them riding this horse. He was a stranger—he’d never even heard of her before today, he had no expectations, no preconceived ideas of what she was supposed to be.
In fact, if she was honest, she would admit the thought of being alone with a strong, attractive man whose only interest in her was fleeting and trivial was a real turn-on. He wasn’t the kind of man she could ever be with and that was exciting, too.
“The house is bigger now than it used to be. Cody did some serious remodeling before he married Cassie.”
“Is she here now or is she away with him?”
“Neither. The marriage didn’t last, she ran off, á la my mother.”
Analise was willing to bet his casual tone covered some pretty intense undercurrents. “And your other brother, Adam?”
“Off hiking. If you mean is he married, the answer is no. He’s waiting for some nice, shy farm girl to wander into his life.” He turned in the saddle as he reined the horse to a halt and added, “I’d like to talk to you about that photo you mentioned.”
“I’d like to talk to you, too,” she said, nerves flaring again. How much should she tell him? She’d been directed to