“It’s one reason medical causes are so important to us,” Ashley added. “She’s seen firsthand the difference donations in certain areas and fields can make.”
He tried to think of something to say that would make up for him blowing their agreement to drop the assumptions. “That’s admirable. She must be happy to be in a position to do that.”
“It’s a calling, for her.”
He studied her for a moment. Tried not to notice how lovely she was, and focused on those eyes, and the intelligence gleaming there so obviously once you knew what to look for. “And for you?”
“Absolutely. There are many things I support, but spreading good medical care and practices is chief among them.”
So she wasn’t solely some environmental crusader, what some would likely call a tree hugger. He was always wary of people so sucked up into a single cause that they were incapable of seeing anything else and put everything into that basket, as his mother said.
They were passing the city limits when she asked with a frown, “Where is this safe house?”
She said it with a bit too much emphasis on the last two words, and he knew she was still none too pleased about this. He was glad he’d cleared this with the family earlier. It was easier to present it as a done deal than having to explain he was spiriting her off to a place he, in part, owned.
“It’s actually a fishing cabin.” He gave her a sideways look as he got on I-135 and headed north. They’d actually be within spitting distance of Braxville when they got off and headed west. “And the exact location you’ll keep to yourself. Please.” He only added the last because he’d seen her stiffen at the order.
She didn’t speak again, but her jaw was set. Ashley Hart clearly wasn’t used to being ordered around. And why would she be? She’d inherited billions upon millions from her grandparents and was the only child of her equally wealthy parents. Nobody told that kind of money what to do, unless she let them.
He thought about trying a softer sell, convincing her to just let him do his job, since the goal was to keep her safe. But at the moment, he didn’t think she was in any mood to listen. At the same time, he didn’t want her sitting there stewing, maybe thinking of ways to make this more difficult than it was already going to be. Because he had a feeling when she discovered one particular aspect of the Colton family fishing cabin, she was very much not going to be happy.
They were off the interstate, almost halfway there, and it had been done in silence. He glanced at her again. “Tell me something. If Sanderson had been going to build, say, affordable housing instead of luxury homes, would your reaction be different?”
“Making assumptions yet again?”
“No. Asking an honest question.”
She didn’t speak for a moment, but he’d swear he could feel her eyes on him as he drove. Then she said, “In the same place? No. The type of housing doesn’t matter, the destruction of habitat does.” His peripheral vision caught her tapping a slender finger on her knee. “Looking for hypocrisy, are you?”
“Just trying to understand.”
“What’s hard to understand?”
He shrugged. “Since most of your efforts in this kind of situation seems to be toward making people stop doing things, I can’t help wondering...who, exactly, are you saving the world for?”
“Everyone,” she said, sounding puzzled.
He could risk a glance on this smaller road and looked at her. “But you don’t want them to do anything with it? Kind of like having a beautiful piece of jewelry and never wearing it, isn’t it?”
Her brow furrowed. It seemed she was considering it, at least. “I gather you’re not an environmentalist,” she said, her mouth quirking.
He looked back at the road, traffic lessening the farther they got from the interstate. “Not an answer to my question, but I’ll bite. I think we should protect what we have on this planet, but not worship it.”
He’d probably really ticked her off now. But at least she wasn’t stewing about the safe house.
To his surprise, after a moment she said, “I understand that. There are many who cross that line into thinking humans should be removed altogether.”
“Excluding themselves, of course,” he said dryly.
“I’m not sure some I know wouldn’t include themselves.”
“Now that’s scary.”
“On that, we agree.”
“Hey, miracles happen,” he quipped. And when he heard her laugh, it was much more gratifying than it should have been. And he couldn’t help smiling.
* * *
Mr. Tyler Colton was... Ashley wasn’t sure what he was. All she was sure of was that, aside from being armed—she’d caught a glimpse of a handgun on his belt beneath the jacket—he wasn’t what she had expected. She’d seen flashes of the kind of authoritative demeanor she’d never liked in her family’s personal security people, although there she had long ago resigned herself to the necessity. Her family was prominent and wealthy enough to be targets for all kinds of unsavory people.
She’d had to accept it there, so she supposed she might as well accept it here. Besides, this man was a lot more intriguing than brusque and rather crusty Mr. Patrick who led the home team, as it were.
Not to mention gorgeous.
Yeah, that, too.
But he’d surprised her with the jewelry comment. In one sentence, he’d presented his viewpoint in a way that made more sense than most of the arguments she heard. And she couldn’t deny there was validity to it. She wasn’t one of those rabid sorts who placed people at the bottom of the hierarchy of things to care about. She just happened to believe people should be more careful, that they could be more careful and do a lot less damage.
She studied him while he was focused on driving. She told herself it was because she needed the distraction from being a passenger, and almost believed it. But he really was very smooth, as smooth as their driver back home. And from what he’d said, he’d obviously been well trained.
He was also the first man in a very long time to spark this kind—or almost any kind—of interest in her. She was all too aware that in her position, as the only child of very wealthy parents, and the heiress to her grandparents’ vast fortune, she was an obvious target for fortune-hunting males. Because of this, she very rarely let anyone past the gates, as it were. So rarely that it startled her that the thought had even formed. Then again, looking at that profile—those chiseled features, that jaw, the slightly tousled hair that somehow made her fingers itch—it was no surprise. Obviously, they would be spending some time in close proximity, so she supposed she’d be better off admitting his appeal so she could steal herself against it.
“Is this what you usually do?” she asked in a very impersonal tone.
He didn’t look at her, but he did answer. “Personal protection? It’s a lot of what we do. But not all.”
We, she thought. She didn’t guess he was short on ego—how could he be, all six feet two of him, broad shouldered and solid muscle, with that hair and those amazing dark blue eyes?—so he clearly felt a part of a team, not a solo act. That was telling. “What else?”
“Risk assessment. Corporate security. Event security. On occasion, we work a support role for a bigger operation, coordinating with government agents for an official visit.”
“You sound like a sales brochure.” She made sure it didn’t sound like a dig.
“We’re good at what we do. My boss has built a good thing. We’re not as big as Pinkerton, but we’re as good.”
She shouldn’t, she supposed, be surprised he knew who handled their security at home. Her father had gone with the storied company not solely because of their long and famous history, but because he knew several of their people and trusted them.
“Speaking of that, Pinkerton’s got offices in Omaha, St. Louis and Oklahoma City. So why us?”
&
nbsp; “If you’re laboring under the misapprehension that my parents discussed this with me, I’m sorry. They didn’t bother.”
He gave her a sideways glance. “They probably didn’t want the fight.”
She drew up straight. “Are you saying I’m stubborn again?”
“Are you saying you’re not?”
“No. I happen to think stubborn is just a facet of persistence, which is a very useful quality.”
One corner of his mouth—he really did have a rather lovely mouth—twitched. “Well, that’s a nice way to pretty it up. Doesn’t make it any easier to deal with, though.” She started to say something about that being his job but before she could, he added, very quietly, “Especially when it’s someone you love and you’re afraid for them.”
Her parents. He’d been talking about—and apparently thinking about—her parents. The instant he put it that way, the moment he planted the image of her parents afraid for her, her retort died unspoken. And the stubborn faded away.
“I’ll try to remember that.”
“I thought you said you always remember.”
“I do.” It only gets foggy when emotion gets in the way.
She was feeling emotions—and other things—around this man that she would do well to ignore.
Chapter 8
Ty saw her looking around the inside of the SUV as if she were only now noticing some things that were out of the ordinary. The extra mirrors that gave him a wide visual range. The two fire extinguishers, one on each side. She reached up and rapped a knuckle lightly against the window beside her. Then she looked at him.
“Bulletproof?” she asked.
He didn’t bother to deny it. He already knew she was too smart to fool. Besides, maybe it would stir her to taking this more seriously.
“We prefer the term ballistic glass,” he said easily. “This is level five. Will stop handgun fire and many rifle rounds. My boss had to pull some strings to get it, military has first call.” She barely winced. Points for cool.
“What else?” she asked.
“Body is lightly armored. Special gas tank. Run flat tires.”
She looked over her shoulder toward the back of the big SUV. “Do I even want to know what you’ve no doubt got stored back there?”
He gave her a sideways glance. Thought of running down the list of weaponry in the equipment lockers that took up about half the wayback of the vehicle. Decided that would be both unwise and unprofessional—something he was not used to feeling but had been poking at him ever since he’d spotted her across the hotel lobby. Instead, he just lifted a brow at her. “I don’t know. Do you?”
She sighed audibly. “No. Probably not.”
“Just let me do what I’m trained to do, Ms. Hart.”
“Two weeks suddenly seems like a very long time,” she muttered.
He wondered what she thought would happen if the threat hadn’t been rounded up by her self-selected two-week deadline. Did she really think her parents would simply go along, let her go back to her regular life and pretend there was no danger? From what he’d picked up in his brief video call with them, that wasn’t just unlikely, it was guaranteed not to happen.
But he’d deal with that if and when it happened. Right now, he just wanted as little hassle as possible. Sure. You’re only dealing with one of the three richest heiresses in the country, if not the world. No hassle at all.
He kept his eyes on the road, but one of his assets was excellent peripheral vision so he saw more than she probably realized. And he saw her tugging at her bag, the big brown leather satchel-type thing he’d noticed before if only for the lack of some blatant designer label. She wasn’t looking at it, just reaching with long slender fingers into a side pocket. Then in rapid succession, she stopped, frowned, then let out an exasperated breath.
“I’d like my phone back now.”
So you can post exactly where you are? “When we get there.”
Just by the way she moved her head, he sensed her irritation. And he knew he was right. She was going to explode when they arrived and she saw all the facets of the Colton family fishing cabin.
Tough. Live with it. The words went through his mind, but he had to admit he grimaced inwardly at the idea of saying them to her.
It wasn’t five minutes later when she repeated the motion of reaching for her absent phone. Again, she only seemed to remember when it wasn’t there. Another fifteen minutes, when they were getting close to the lake, she did it yet again. And he couldn’t stop himself.
“You’re really addicted to that thing, aren’t you?”
“It connects me to my platform,” she said, sounding irritated.
“Because the world must know what you’re thinking all the time?” He was poking an already aggravated woman, but his guardrails seemed to be out of whack around her.
“I notice you have one,” she pointed out.
“Yes. And it’s good at its function, which is communication.”
“That’s all you use it for? This tiny device that has more power than the computers that helped put men on the moon?”
He didn’t know what was wrong with him, but the inappropriate words were out before he could stop them. Something he rarely did anyway, but never with a client. “Maybe it’s the difference between being an impressionable teenager and an adult when the first smartphone came out.”
That did it. “Are you purposely trying to be offensive?” There was more than just an edge in her voice now. “The people who follow me care about the same things I do, but I sometimes have access to information they do not. And that phone is one of the main tools of my work. As much as whatever you have stored back there—” she gestured toward the back of the SUV “—are the tools of yours.”
The passion in her voice echoed in the confines of the vehicle. He wondered—even more inappropriately—if she was that passionate about other things.
You have lost your mind, Colton.
“You’re right. That was unacceptable. I apologize.”
“Give me back my phone and I’ll accept your apology.”
“I will. We’re almost there.” He lifted a finger from the wheel and pointed to the right. Kanopolis Lake gleamed in the winter sun.
“Oh!” She hadn’t even noticed, he guessed. “It’s pretty.”
She sounded so astounded he couldn’t help saying, “Shocking, isn’t it?”
She had the grace to apologize in turn for her tone. “I’m sorry. I just didn’t realize it was there.” She gave him a sideways look. “I was apparently too obsessed with my missing phone.”
He almost laughed, and finally found his tact. “No comment.”
But he couldn’t help the twitch at one corner of his mouth as he slowed coming into the small community on the west side of the lake. He’d always had a fondness for the place called Yankee Run, if only for the great name. But he liked the peace and the surroundings and the view, and had often thought if he ever left his modern high-tech house in Wichita, he’d move into the cabin for good.
They passed the first couple of small houses. She was looking around with interest now. He wondered if she’d ever spent any time in a place as small as this unincorporated community. He was glad of the status and size, because it meant there wasn’t much to indicate exactly where they were, which he’d still prefer she didn’t know, just in case.
“This is lovely,” she said, surprising him. “The lake, and I’ll bet the trees are beautiful and green when they leaf out.”
“They are. We’ve got one beside the cabin that gives us a great shady spot to hang out in the summer. And the property is on a rise, so it was fun in winter if we got enough snow to sled down to the lake.”
She looked at him as he made the last turn that would take them to the cabin’s driveway. “You spend a lot of time here?”
“Not so m
uch anymore,” he said, “but most of the summer when we were kids.”
“We?”
“Two brothers, three sisters.”
Her eyes widened. “Big family.”
“Wasn’t planned,” he said with a wry smile. “They were just going for number three and were going to stop, but fate apparently misinterpreted and thought they wanted three at once.”
She blinked. “Triplets?”
He nodded. “Two boys and a girl.”
“Wow. Do they run in the family?”
“Not that we could find.”
He slowed, then hit the button on the remote he’d brought and the gate rumbled open. He made the turn onto the long driveway that wound through cottonwood trees to the cabin that was on a small point projecting into the lake. He’d told her they owned nearly fifty acres around the place, and if it weren’t for the fact you could see the lake and the waterfront houses to the south, you’d never know there was anyone else around. If that kind of isolation bothered her, it didn’t show.
He heard the crunch of their tires on gravel, to him a sound both welcoming and welcome. Dad had wanted to pave it but he’d argued him out of it. On the occasions when he had to bring someone here for work, he wanted that sound because it was a warning someone was coming, at least from this direction. That a pro would likely be coming silently through the trees or up from the lake would be dealt with in other ways.
“What about number six?” she asked, still apparently intrigued by the size of his family.
“Baby sister,” he said, with an affectionate smile. “She surprised everybody five years later.”
“Let me guess... You’re the oldest?”
Something in the way she said it made him ask, “Why would you think that?”
“Oh, maybe your authoritarian manner?”
“That’s my job right now. And I prefer to think of it as being a natural born leader.”
“How about the bossy attitude?”
Colton Storm Warning Page 5