The Black Sheep And the Princess. Donna Kauffman
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of boots. The ones he’d been wearing when he left the city the day before yesterday smelled like that harbor Dumpster. Unfortunately, the little general store he’d stopped in on the drive up hadn’t exactly sported a huge variety of men’s clothing. He could have gone on ahead to Ralston, the town closest to the camp, but it had been hard enough just coming here.
He shuttered any thoughts of the past away, just as he’d done from the moment he’d crossed the county line. He was here to do a job. Kate Sutherland was just another client. Even if she didn’t know that yet. Rubbing a hand along the back of his neck, he turned away from the cabin and began tracing the trail of evidence back through the woods, past two of the cabins, doing whatever it took to keep his thoughts focused exclusively on the situation here. Trying like hell not to care about how pathetic and rundown the place had gotten. Like it mattered. He hadn’t given Winnimocca a single thought since he’d peeled out of here on the old FXS Low Rider he’d spent two long summers rebuilding.
And yet, the swiftness with which he moved through the trees and up the side of the mountain belied his own past there. He’d been gone half his own lifetime, yet easily traversed the grounds as if he still did it every day. It shouldn’t have surprised him, shouldn’t have bothered him. It was just a place. But as he dug his way up the last rise to the side of the main road, he admitted to himself that it did.
He pulled out the new slim satellite phone Finn had gotten for them each to carry and made some notes, used the camera function to snap a few more shots, then added a few more things to the list of equipment he was going to need Finn to ship up to him. The property was expansive and mostly wooded, which would make it a bitch to secure. It wasn’t going to be easy, and it wasn’t going to be cheap, but it could be done. Fortunately for Trinity, money was never the issue.
What he really wanted to do, though, was dig a little more, find out who the hell was watching her, track those fuckers down, and make the whole problem go away without installing so much as a single surveillance camera. That would also take care of having to talk to Kate again. He wasn’t sure which was the more daunting task, and didn’t want to know.
Whoever was bothering her wasn’t putting much muscle behind it. Yet. They were using grade school scare tactics designed to discourage rather than harm. Zap Kate’s will by hitting her in the checkbook, forcing her to spend money cleaning up the vandalized property, and slowing down the progress on restoration work.
If they knew Kate, they’d know this wasn’t going to work. He paused, then chuckled ruefully. Like he knew Kate, or knew what the hell had really motivated her to take on this camp. He’d done some digging on her, too, had to if he was going to understand his client’s needs. Which was mostly a bunch of bullshit, even if true in any other case. Kate wasn’t any other case, and he’d probably be better off admitting that to himself right now. The ten minutes he’d spent with her on her porch last night should have made that blisteringly clear.
At fifteen, hell, seventeen, he’d lusted for her in every possible way a boy could lust for a girl. She’d kept him so jacked up he didn’t know if he was coming or going. Though he’d spent an inordinate amount of time coming on those few times each summer she’d swing through camp. Not once had she ever actually been present, however. No, he’d jerk off, or head down to Benny’s and pick up someone willing. Someone more suitable for him. Someone who wasn’t Kate Sutherland. But someone he’d pretended was Kate as he’d pounded himself relentlessly into her.
He’d taken Kate every which way a man could take a woman. And he’d never once so much as laid a finger on her. Back then he’d prided himself on his control, on not letting her push him into doing anything rash. Anything that would ever actually give her the chance to outright reject or humiliate him. Like it was some big fucking contest. Only he was the only one playing.
Last night, standing on her porch, a grown man who had moved far, far past his angry, rebellious youth, and even farther from any fantasies he’d held for one long-ago unattainable princess…he’d been so razor hard for wanting her he could have cut diamonds. It had taken every last ounce of his restraint not to touch her. Not to push, poke, prod, or do whatever it took to see exactly where the boundaries might lie between them now.
He knew she’d watched him when they were teenagers. Knew he could have taken her. Just as he knew she’d never have asked him to, much less begged, as he’d fantasized about. God only knew what she’d have accused him of if he ever had.
But they were adults now. And he didn’t know if he wanted her as a way to settle some past score that had existed only in his frustrated, confused mind…or if he wanted her because she was still the finest damn thing he’d ever laid eyes on.
She hadn’t looked like the adult version of the unattainable, rich princess teenager last night. Cool, poised, and decked to the hilt in designer everything. She’d looked tired, worried, rumpled. He’d heard the strain in her voice…and wanted her so badly it made his teeth ache. Just thinking about the way she’d said his name, his given name, which he hadn’t heard in years, made his body twitch to life all over again.
He jammed the phone back in his pocket. Time to hike to his car and make the trek down into town, contact Finn, set up the shipment, then buy whatever real supplies he could to settle in here for the duration. After that, he planned on heading back up here and camping out, literally, on her doorstep, until she heard him out and agreed to his help. Then he’d move into whichever cabin was in the best shape and get to work.
He had it all planned out.
If he could just figure out a way to do all that and not want to take her up against the nearest wall, he might actually survive this.
He started hiking back down the paved road toward the camp entrance. On second thought, maybe he owed her a thank-you. The more distracted he was by fighting his constant hard-on, the less time he spent having to fight the avalanche of childhood memories that threatened to bury him every time he let his guard down for half a second.
The sound of an engine slowed his steps. A moment later Kate rounded the bend in her little pickup. He made a mental note to look that up, too. He could understand the need for a truck over a sports car, but this one was not only undersized for the task, but had seen far better days. From his look around the camp, it also seemed to be the only vehicle she had on the premises. He recalled her first car had been a gleaming midnight blue Porsche 911 that he’d wanted to get his hands on almost as badly as he wanted his hands on her. The Kate Sutherland he knew was not a pickup truck kind of woman, and definitely not a used-vehicle-of-any-kind type.
Which did absolutely nothing to explain why his pulse kicked up a notch and his body tightened in immediate response when she braked to a stop next to him and rolled down the window. Her mouth was pinched at the corners. Clearly she was not happy to see him. Perversely, that made him want to smile.
“Car break down?” she asked.
He debated on whether to get into it here, or wait until he had more of an advantage. Any advantage would be nice. So far, Kate had unknowingly robbed him of it, and quite easily, too. “No,” he said, opting for blunt honesty. After all, it had gotten him pretty far in the world. “I was doing a perimeter check on the property.”
Her eyes widened and her throat worked, but when she spoke, her tone gave no indication of how she felt about his unwanted incursion. Still the cool princess. Even with her trademark shoulder-length blond hair pulled back in a loose ponytail, not so much as a dab of makeup enhancing her smooth as silk skin, and sporting a faded blue sweater, she was every inch the debutante.
He curled his fingers inward and propped his fists on his hips. It was that or reach for her, see if he could muss up that too perfect control a little to match the rest of her look.
“A perimeter check,” she repeated. “Funny, I don’t remember hiring you on as a security guard.”
“Yet,” he responded, giving in to the grin that threatened out of nowhere. She frustrated him to the extreme in ways he didn’t begin to try and understand. She sure as hell couldn’t know. So why the almost giddy response his body had to even a hint of banter, he hadn’t