by Kay Hooper
—
“The Ghost,” as Resolute was called, gave racing fans a thrill on Saturday, setting a blistering pace and leaving the remainder of the field to choke on his dust. He galloped home with the conscious pride of a racehorse who knows he’s something special, accepting the applause as his due.
“Arrogant bastard, isn’t he?” Shane noted dryly much later while Addie, still in colorful green and silver silks, was grooming her horse. Shane had his heart under control now, although the race had been, for him, an ordeal he could still feel.
She laughed. “Of course. He knows he can run. And you know as well as I do that some horses really love applause.”
Leaning on the door, Shane easily accepted Sebastian’s sudden climb onto his back. He scratched a foreleg that was around his neck, gazing at Addie and her horse. “Funny. I just remembered something. I saw a young gray stallion near Canberra that’s his image. A year or two older, though.”
Addie came out of the stall and looked at him, amusement in her dark eyes. “I thought he held on like a vise.”
Shane blinked, then turned his head to find Sebastian’s chin on his shoulder. “Well…he did, last time. I wonder why he climbed on my back?” Only half his mind was on the question; he was thinking of that other gray horse—and wondering.
“Maybe he likes you. Is he going to dinner with us?”
“Heaven forbid.” Shane shifted the reluctant koala back to the door. “But I’m glad to see you’re beginning to look forward to meals.”
“I’ll have a salad.”
“The hell you will.”
They were still arguing when they waved to Bevan and left the barn, heading for the changing rooms so Addie could get out of her silks.
—
“Addie…about that other gray horse.” Shane was gazing out the train window at scenery he didn’t see as they returned to Melbourne on Monday, trying to make himself think, because looking at her roused a temptation he’d been fighting for days now. He had—just barely—won the battle with his urges, but it was no thanks to Addie that he had.
Clear in her own mind about her feelings, Addie responded to his touch eagerly and instantly, holding nothing back. Born with a loving nature, she was quick to touch him, and her eyes glowed with a feeling that both warmed his heart and knotted his belly with desire. But Shane still held back.
“You know, I did concentrate—easily—on yesterday,” she said thoughtfully.
“Because you were on Resolute, probably.”
“More likely because I love you. Once I knew that, I didn’t have to agonize over it anymore.”
Shane cleared his throat and risked a glance at her. She was sitting comfortably with her feet propped on the padded bench across from her. He cleared his throat again and determinedly stared at passing New South Wales scenery. “About that other gray horse.”
“What about it?”
He concentrated, pursuing a fleeting idea. “Well, suppose we were to rent that horse. Until the Cup.”
“Why would you want to rent a horse, Shane?”
“A gray horse. A horse that looks identical to Resolute. Call it bait for a trap. We’d take precautions, of course, so that the horse was safe. But if it came down to it, better to risk a horse other than Resolute. And if anything happened to it, I’d pay the owner.”
“I couldn’t let you do that,” she said, but she was thoughtful.
“It’s my idea, and I’d pay,” Shane said firmly, then turned away from the window, sighed, and sat beside her. “But I don’t think I’ll get the chance. Resolute’s the only gray horse on the Flemington track; it’d be noticed if we brought in another one. There’s just too damn much going on around the track, too many people moving around. And he’s got such a noticeable kind of personality.” Shane shook his head. “Well, it was a thought.”
He turned his head to find Addie nibbling on a thumbnail, and promptly forgot what he’d been saying. He found himself struggling for breath, the craving he felt for her slicing through him like a hot knife. He watched her lips moving, shaping themselves around the oval nail, and a hard throbbing warned him that watching her was as dangerous as touching her.
Shane yanked his gaze away to stare straight in front of him, asking himself if he was out of his mind. Thinking that any pain—any pain at all—could be borne if he could just lose himself in her, if he could just feel her slender body cradling his in passion.
That had to be worth whatever it cost.
“Shane…” Addie turned dark eyes brimming with a whimsical humor to focus on his face. “I think I know how we can do it.”
“Do what?” He met her gaze obliquely, his own skittering away as he fought the urge to lunge.
“I think I know how we can set a trap.” She blinked at him, and her own gaze suddenly became aware. “You weren’t thinking of that. You were thinking of—”
“Tell me how we can set the trap,” he ordered hastily.
“Stubborn,” she chided softly.
He half-closed his eyes and blocked a wistful sound in the back of his throat. “Just tell me, dammit.”
So she did.
—
By late Monday Shane was rather amusedly aware that Addie had taken his initial vague idea and run away with it. She had started with two calls at the crack of dawn to summon her sisters, following those with more calls showing a masterly ability to plan.
“Why do you need a big truck that’s painted like an ambulance?” he asked in bewilderment.
“For a diversion.” Addie was biting a pencil and staring down at a diagram of the Flemington racecourse. “I really don’t know what—well, Manda’ll think of something. She always does. We have the horse, don’t we?”
“We have the horse. Waiting just outside Melbourne.” And that had been a race, Shane remembered, to make arrangements and bring the horse from Canberra.
“Good. Where can I send Bevan until the Cup?”
They were seated in the hotel lounge since Addie’s races for the day were over, and Shane had stopped shaking inside. He was grateful to Addie that she made no fuss over his obvious anxiety, but simply accepted what neither of them could change and got on with her racing.
With concentration. She had won two out of three races today.
She was coping better than he was, Shane thought, and cleared his throat to respond to her question. “You don’t trust him, then?”
“Not to fail to recognize a ringer. And not to tell the wrong person about it. He wouldn’t hurt Resolute, but—well, I just don’t want to take a chance. So I’ll have to send him away. But where?”
“Tell him to go walkabout?” Shane ventured.
She grinned. “He wouldn’t. In case you haven’t noticed, Bevan is more Welsh than Aussie.”
“I had noticed. Well, then where can you send him that’ll keep him away almost three weeks?”
“I was asking you.”
“Why don’t you send him up to Darwin? That’s a good long distance.”
“You don’t say. Why should I send him there?”
“Do I have to think of everything?”
Addie sighed and brooded for a few moments. Then, slowly, she said, “I suppose I could send him to Killaroo. Tell him I was worried about Dad—which is true—and ask him to stay there until the Cup. He and Dad get along, and I could swear him to secrecy about the racing.”
“Your father doesn’t know you’re racing?”
Addie looked a little self-conscious. “Well, not exactly. I promised him I’d ride only Resolute; he doesn’t know about the others. I didn’t want to break the promise, but—oh, hell. I had to.”
Shane nodded slowly. “I see. Well, could you trust Bevan to keep quiet—and stay put?”
“Yes, I think so. And Dad won’t mind having him stay. I’ll just tell Bevan you and I are going to watch Resolute.” She was quiet for a moment, then added, “He’ll think I suspect him, of course, but there’s no help for that.”
“True.” Shane thought of her other calls. “I know you’ve hired someone to help watch the barn at Flemington, and someone else to stay with Resolute—but isn’t she on vacation or something?”
Addie smiled. “I told you Storm’s my valet. It’d look a little strange if she just disappeared while I go on racing here, so I asked her to announce she was on vacation, and to leave Melbourne. She’ll be back to watch Resolute Tuesday morning.”
“What about Wednesday night?”
“Well, if I know anything about it, Jacto will come with Manda; he’ll watch Resolute for us.”
“Jacto?”
“He’s an old Aborigine who’s sometimes Manda’s watchdog, traveling companion, and helper. They’re an odd couple, but I must say I’ve gotten used to seeing them together. And if anybody comes near Resolute with Jacto on watch,” she added dryly, “I only hope he’s made his peace with his Maker.”
Whimsically, Shane asked, “And what deadly assassin will your other sister bring along?”
Addie chuckled. “Her own still composure. Sydney’s the calm eye of whatever storm happens to be raging around her. She has the face of a madonna and the brain of a mathematician.”
“Good Lord. I wonder if I’ll be able to cope with all of you.”
She was studying her diagram again, and responded absently. “One doesn’t cope with Delaneys. We simply are, and everybody’d better get the hell out of our way.”
“Even me?” Shane asked meekly.
Addie looked at him, her eyes kindling. But when she spoke, it was with extremely polite words. “You,” she said, “had better be glad there’s only one Delaney woman trying to get you into her bed.”
Shane blinked and coped frantically with the pulsing sensation she could always spark with that special rich darkness in her voice.
“Because if I enlisted the aid of my sisters, you’d be delivered to me bound and gagged, Yank.”
“Pushy ladies,” he managed.
“You bet your—”
“Addie!”
“—ego we are.”
“Why don’t you go call your father and tell him Bevan’s coming?”
—
The sisters hadn’t arrived by the time Shane left Addie at her door, but she assured him they’d be in her room when he came for them in the morning; they were both traveling quite a distance, she explained vaguely. And they were, certainly, there when Addie opened her door early to greet him with a yawn.
“It’s perfect!” The warm, cheerful voice belonged to a striking young woman with cinnamon-gold hair and bright amber eyes, and she was sitting cross-legged on one of the two rumpled beds, gesturing enthusiastically to her listener.
The listener, a serene beauty with wine-colored hair and deep gold eyes, was clearly doubtful. “Manda, you could get arrested for that,” she said in a slow, musical voice.
“We’re discussing strategy,” Addie told Shane, leading him into the room and sitting down beside him on the second bed. “Or, rather, we’re picking up where we left off at three this morning.” Almost as an afterthought, she told her sisters, “This is Shane.” She introduced the other two Delaneys, although Shane had already decided who was who.
And Shane also decided that the room was rather small to contain three Delaney women and one bewildered American. He could, quite literally, feel their energy. But the pulse of that energy was different from each. From Addie came, of course, the magic of voice and presence that was a caress. From the ebullient Manda came a sparkling, multicolored rainbow of animation that left one rather breathless. And from Sydney came a quiet, still force that was like the swell of the ocean—deceptively calm with no more than a whispered hint of latent power.
And they studied him, the two sisters, with equal interest and reactions that varied according to temperament. Manda sent a gleeful look to Addie that spoke volumes, and Sydney glanced between her sister and the stranger rather thoughtfully.
It was, predictably, Manda who spoke first. “Emus,” she said to Shane brightly. “What d’you think?”
“About emus?” Shane knew he had lost track of something somewhere, and felt rudderless.
She nodded with enthusiasm. “They’re fast, you know, and very curious. Nobody’ll be able to catch them, so you’ll have plenty of time for the switch.”
In answer to Shane’s rather desperate glance, Addie whispered, “I told you Manda’d think of something.”
“We’ll need brown dye,” Sydney said, scribbling on a piece of paper.
“Cases of it,” Addie agreed.
“Sydney and I can get all that while you go get rid of Bevan,” Manda said. “And then I’ll have to get the emus and make sure the truck has a cross on it—”
“Spray paint,” Sydney murmured, and made a note of it.
“Remember,” Addie told her younger sister firmly, “it has to be between the fifth and sixth races, before the horses go out onto the track. We don’t want anyone getting hurt. And you make damned sure no one sees you park the truck or open the doors.”
“Of course I will!” Manda said indignantly.
“Bail money for Manda,” Sydney murmured, making a note.
Shane laughed in spite of himself, and earned a disgusted glance from the sister who was apparently a lightning rod for trouble.
“Look,” she said to Addie, “why don’t you and Shane go have breakfast or something and get to the track? We’ll take care of everything on this end. You’ll find Jacto somewhere near Resolute, and you can ask him about tonight.”
“All right.”
—
A short time later, as they sat eating breakfast in the hotel dining room, Shane spoke a bit uneasily.
“You haven’t enlisted the aid of your sisters, have you?”
“Afraid for your virtue?” Addie asked with gentle innocence.
“My virtue bit the dust years ago. It’s my hide I’m worried about. I know damned well Manda would throw herself into the project with enthusiasm, and Sydney reminds me irresistibly of a volcano on the point of erupting.”
“What a perceptive man you are.”
“Addie.”
She smiled slowly. “I didn’t enlist their help, Shane. I intend to get you all by myself.”
Shane was, he knew, fighting a losing battle. It was difficult enough to struggle against his own powerful feelings, but when Addie could inflame him with a smile or a look and turn him to jelly with a touch…what on earth could he do?
“Stop fighting,” she murmured.
He was a little startled to find her just there, but it was becoming a familiar surprise; she had the uncanny knack of reaching into his mind when he least expected it.
“Stop trying to seduce me over the breakfast table,” he said. “We have a busy day ahead. You’ve got two races to run and we have a shell game planned.”
Addie accepted the change of subject, but the fey smile played over her lips and her eyes gleamed with velvety dark promise. Shane was vaguely surprised that he hadn’t stabbed himself with a fork or tipped coffee into his lap, and thought ruefully of his first impression of this woman.
Fragile? Delicate? Timid? God, he must have been out of his mind.
It wasn’t only horseshoes she could bend with a knowing touch.
—
They found Bevan at the track, and Addie talked persuasively to him. He was clearly reluctant to leave, and also seemed to feel, as she had predicted, that he was suspected of attempting to harm Resolute. He was passionate in his denials, and Addie was soothing. She was worried about her father, that was all; she and Shane could watch Resolute. Bevan went, finally, a little stiff but resigned and apparently reassured.
“You could charm the devil out of his horns,” Shane observed with some feeling.
Addie stood on tiptoe to put her arms around his neck. “How am I doing with stubborn Yanks?”
“Top honors.” He would have said more, but a movement in the shadows of the barn drew his attention, and he ha
d an impression that was more tactile than visual of an impassive dark face and veiled eyes; it was the eyes he felt.
Addie seemed to feel it at the same moment, and withdrew her arms without hurrying. She turned to peer into the shadows, then stepped toward them. “Jacto. It’s good to see you.”
The Aborigine seemed to flow from the darkness. “Addie. No one has disturbed the horse.” His voice was low and quiet and filled with restrained power.
She nodded her thanks. “Manda said you were on watch. Could you again tonight?”
“Of course.”
“Thank you, Jacto.” She half turned, introducing the two men briefly. Jacto responded with a slight inclination of his head and murmured words, then seemed to vanish again.
Shane gazed rather blankly at the spot where the old man had stood. “Where did he go?”
“He’s around,” Addie said vaguely. “He’ll be here when we need him.”
She got to work caring for her horse and Shane, bemused, helped her.
—
Addie rode in the first two races of the afternoon, and neither of her sisters had yet arrived. Shane stood at the end of the barn hall to listen as the first race was run, keeping an eye on Resolute’s stable and unable to see the track because of the angle of the buildings. He listened tensely, relaxing only a bit when she was announced as the winner.
He couldn’t stop the images. A brightly colored figure lying in a graceless sprawl on churned-up earth and the wail of sirens. It was a frozen picture in his mind.
But there was another picture, this one a jumble of images and sensations. Dark eyes that were bottomless pools of enchantment. Soft lips beneath his own and a slender body of silk-sheathed tempered steel locked in his arms. A voice as rich as honey and deep as night, laced with magical promises. Fiery red hair and flaming passion.
Shane could no longer separate the pain. The pain of fear and the pain of wanting her. Both ached inside him. He could deal with both marginally. Push them away in a moment of laughter or the bustle of activity. But he had been balanced on a high wire too long, swaying between two aching wounds.
She had to race, she said. She had to love him, she said.