She blinked quickly and winced immediately as the coloured contacts scratched her eyes. Perfect! First the itchy wig, then the lack of a jumper, and now the scratchy contacts. What next? In what other ways could she be ill-prepared for this endeavor?
He stopped in front of her, and her nose twitched at the familiar smells of horse and hay and a new, unfamiliar one of sandalwood. Him. It must be. She couldn’t account for it any other way. The problem was, why was she still inhaling it?
Cool air nipped at her elbows, and she wrapped her hands around her tighter and pulled the long T-shirt sleeves over her arms.
“You’re cold.” His voice was gruff, and Really? jumped to her lips before she swallowed it back. That was not polite and definitely not the way a princess should behave.
But . . . she was not supposed to be a princess.
“Excuse me for saying it, but the words ‘You think?’ spring to mind.” Lightness filled her. It was not correct, and she could already see her father’s frowning face, but boy, did it feel good to just let loose from the strict confines of palace formalities. If she weren’t careful, she could get used to this and show her father yet another way she could modernize the royal family.
His dark eyebrows shot up at her sharp words, reminding her of a flock of birds she had once seen on the beach. That had been a good evening spent with her brothers.
“I am guessing that like the phone, a jumper somewhere in that car also doesn’t exist so you should just . . . here, wear this.”
His speech jumbled together quickly, and the words “no, thank you” to whatever he was offering were on the tip of her tongue before they got stuck in her throat as he reached down to the hem of his jumper and pulled it up.
Her stomach lurched at the sight of the well-honed chest, any coldness forgotten about as a new heat raced through her. Even in this light, she could make out the ripple of muscles under the skin, and her toes curled into the soles of her boots.
She flung up her hand as his head disappeared into the jumper. “Mr. Anastos, Damon. Please! There is no need for that. Please keep your clothes on!”
His head emerged quickly, and her nerves danced like balloons on the wind as his lips twitched up. “Don’t worry. This is as undressed as I get.” He waved the jumper in the space between them, like a peace flag, and she reached out and grabbed it to her, holding it in front of her like a shield.
Not that it could give any protection, especially not as it smelled exactly like him. No, she should just give it back. Like right now even though the soft material was warming her cold fingers.
“The idea is that you put it on, princess.”
Ice set in her nerves, and Tia pulled the jumper closer, holding it higher. He couldn’t suspect . . . He would have said something sooner, wouldn’t he? She forced out a bark of laughter. “Princess? Who said anything about being a princess? Because I didn’t!” God, she sounded hysterical, but at least that should knock him off her trail—if he was even on it.
His lashes lowered a fraction, and he folded his arms in front of him. “It’s called a phrase.”
“Oh yes, of course it is.” She flopped back against the car and lowered her hands. At least there was no need for this shield anymore. Which means she would have to hand the incredibly warm item back. Darn it! “Here. Please take this.” She waved the jumper between them again as his head shook from side to side.
“No. Annoyingly my mother did not raise me to leave a woman stranded and freezing in the middle of a field with night coming. Even if said woman did ‘accidentally’ intrude on my farm.” He flicked his fingers into air quotes. “So I suggest, as much as it goes against the very core of my being, you may come back with me and we can call you a tow truck from my house. Then you need to be gone. Deal?”
Did she have any other choice? “Deal. And really, thank you so much.” She pulled the jumper over her head and pushed the wig back into place as discretely as possible. Her nose wrinkled at the bizarrely enticing smell. When had it become enticing? All the more reason she should probably give it back . . . “So, Mr. Anastos, is your farm far from here?”
“A twenty-minute ride away.”
He pushed his thumb and forefinger into his mouth, and Tia slapped her hands over her ears as he let out a short, sharp whistle. What was he summoning? Cerberus, the hound of Hades?
Would it be too much to hope that his ride would be the car from the TV show Knight Rider that her brother used to watch as a child?
She dropped her gaze as the small pebbles next to her boots danced around them, and she lifted her head up quickly at the sound of metal clunking on metal.
Fear swarmed through her like angry wasps, and black spots danced before her eyes at the sight of the large horse before her.
God, no! Anything but this!
Chapter 2
“Did you say something?”
Tia dragged her eyes away from the prancing beast in front of her and back to its owner-slash-her-unlikely-rescuer, forcing the foggy cloud in her brain to move.
Had she said something? Oh God, she couldn’t remember. The hair from the wig fluttered in front of her face as she shook her head.
“In that case, let’s go.” He turned sharply away from her as the horse trotted closer, and she saw Damon’s lips lift into a wide smile as the horse greeted him in soft whinnies as if it couldn’t believe its luck that they were reunited once again.
Tia’s heart squeezed tightly at the gentle interplay between owner and beast, and unbidden memories of her own mare, Calypso, came flooding back. If only she had lived. If only her father had let her.
Tears stung her eyes, and Tia pushed her finger gently beneath them, forcing the tears back. The soft material of Damon’s jumper scraped her cheek, and she sniffed loudly, pushing the material up to her elbows. She did not have time for memories. She had used all that time up while she had been in hospital. Now was the time for the present, not the past, and currently her present was staring her in the face, holding on to a stirrup. Oh dear.
Tia coughed loudly. “Mr. Anastos . . . ” What could she say? Sorry, Damon, but I can’t ride that horse. I haven’t ridden in ten years, and the last time I rode, my older brother died and I was left unable to walk for months. Like she could tell him that. Like she could ever tell anyone that. Even the press had received the abbreviated version. She shook her head and pressed her lips together.
“Tia?”
Goose bumps shimmied up and down her arms at her name on his lips. She had never heard it sound that way before, and she must have heard it a thousand times. It was as hard as toffee and as soft as caramel. Both her favorite sweets. Darn it!
“Mr. Anastos, isn’t there another mode of transport?” She swallowed back the tremble. If she was lucky, he was still too absorbed in his horse to hear it.
“Sadly, I left my helicopter at home.” Sarcasm dripped from him like honey from a beehive.
Well! That was just charming. “There is no need for unhelpful comments like that. I was merely asking a question. But I must tell you that I cannot, I mean will not, ride on a horse to your farm. I am sorry, but there must be another way.”
There, that didn’t sound panicked did it? It didn’t betray the fact that a large shot of cortisol was now working its way around her body at lightning speed as she tried to figure out the best way to fight or fly from this situation.
“There is.”
“I thought there had to be, so what—”
“Walk.”
“I beg your pardon?” Tia blinked slowly. Had he just said . . . ?
“Walk. You know, what they used to do before cars were invented. That is the other option.”
No, she hadn’t been mistaken. Or delusional. Or both.
“Yes, I know what walk means but . . . but.” She stopped, forcing her mind into some sort of coherence and sucked in a breath. Okay, time to start over. “What about simply calling someone for help?”
His hands stilled on the stirru
p, and Tia narrowed her eyes. He hadn’t suggested calling for help earlier, and he did not appear to be reaching for his phone even though she pointed it out. That could only mean . . . “You do not have your mobile either do you?” Why, the hypocritical—!
“Unlike you, who obviously planned your journey without a phone, I had not planned to find someone on my farm who would need help that required me to carry my phone!”
“But you said you were here to sort something out, and suppose something had gone wrong. Then what? How would you have gotten help yourself?” Aha, that got him! She pushed back the urge to fist pump the air and pushed her hands against her sides as he glanced over his shoulder toward her.
“Kronos would have gone back to the stables, and a horse without a rider, especially one that had had a rider on him, would arouse enough suspicion that someone would have come looking for me,” he said slowly, as if explaining something trivial to a child. “But I’m curious. What did you mean when you said you cannot go on Kronos?” His voice was suddenly soft, his hands carrying on their motion up and down the stirrups. It was the same soothing tone he had used on Kronos when the horse first appeared. It was calming, yes, but almost a “lull and relax her into a sense of false security” kind of way.
Tia balled her hands into fists. Well, she was not prepared to be lulled or relaxed in any way, shape, or form, thank you very much. She was on a mission and she had only two weeks before her “get out of the palace free” pass was up. Otherwise known as, her parents discovering she was not on the skiing trip she led them to believe she was on. “I said will not.”
“Not initially. You said cannot. And if I am to help you, then I would like to know why.” The soothing tone was gone. Instead, his voice was low and determined. It was a tone no one would dream to argue with. Sadly for him, she wasn’t no one, and that was a horse, and this just could not happen. “Kronos is a gentle, reliable gelding. Don’t be scared off riding him by his appearance.” He carried on at her silence.
“Scared? Who said anything about being scared to ride?” Scared was too mild to describe the jellylike feeling in her legs and the racing of her heart. The question was, how had he seen that? Even now, if she closed her eyes, she could still feel the bones in her pelvis crunch when her favorite horse, Calypso, landed on her. She could hear the screams of her brother as he called for help, as he called to her, and Calypso’s whinnies as she tried to scramble off her. And then the sight of her older brother, unmoving only a few feet away. Not that she was scared off horses: she loved seeing her brother’s racers in action. Only riding them proved a problem.
“Good, because we need Kronos to get back. And FYI, you still haven’t answered my question.” His matter-of-fact tone made her want to scream. She hadn’t been on a horse in more than ten years. Maybe her irrational fear of them was gone, but that didn’t stop her heart from hammering every time she thought of getting back on one. And she had tried; God knows she had tried.
“I just do not ride horses.” Tia folded her arms in front of her as he turned toward her, the reins from the horse’s bridle hanging loosely in his hands. “If you want to ride, then be my guest and I will”—she blew out a steadying breath—“follow you and walk.”
• • •
Crickets chirped loudly around them, highlighting the deafening silence, and Damon forced his gaze back to Kronos and ran his hand across his smooth coat. She just didn’t ride? That didn’t make any sense. Why would Phillipe send someone to be a honey trap if she didn’t share any of his interests?
He flicked a quick glance back to her. Okay, so she looked kind of cute in his oversized jumper. But just because that made his blood pulse around his body at a faster rate than normal and the hairs on his body stand on end as if he had rubbed them with a balloon, it didn’t mean his brain had to follow. Thee mou, he was acting like some kind of teenager.
There was something strange about Tia Liakos, and he was going to find out what it was. If Phillipe thought he was going to have the upper hand in this play, he had another thing coming. Tia may be—hell, was definitely—lying to him about something. His father had lied to his mother about coming back to her, and his mother had lied—okay, not lied but omitted the truth—to him about who his real father was. Omitted the truth at the age an angry teenage boy needed to know who he was and where he belonged. Had he known then what he knew now, he wasn’t so sure he would have wanted to know. That he was nothing more than a royal bastard sat like a bitter pill in his mouth, one he couldn’t spit out or even swallow.
Kronos’s soft whinny dragged him back from his dark thoughts about his father, and Damon scraped his teeth over his tongue. Even thinking the word “father” in association with that man left a bitter taste in his mouth. He did not have time for liars. However . . . what was that phrase his grandfather used to say? “Keep your friends close but your enemies closer” or something like that.
“Whatever the lady wants, Miss Liakos. Walk it is.” He twisted the lead rein around his hand and turned back to his “guest.” “It’s this way.” He flicked his free hand in front of him into the gathering dark and pressed his back against Kronos as she marched past, the sound of a small huff escaping her lips. His nose twitched at the delicate smell of roses, and his brows drew together. There were no roses in this field. That could only mean it was her.
Kronos’s lead rein pulled on his hand as the horse jerked forward, only to stop and whinny softly at Damon. It was either a complaint that he was missing out on his evening hell-for-leather gallop, or like his owner, he wanted to be back at the stables ASAP and away from whatever situation this was spiraling into. “Shh now. It’ll be all right. There’s nothing to fear. Calm down,” Damon whispered.
“Thank you, but I am calm.” Her factual, no nonsense tone made his lips curl into a smile.
“I was talking to the horse.”
Her low chuckle sounded devoid of any warmth. “You sound just like . . . someone I used to know who puts horses above everyone else.”
Someone or some man? The words lingered on his tongue like a high diver getting ready to jump. It was none of his business, so why was he even curious? Besides, she was right about one thing. Horses did come first. If he planned to make a success of his business, he needed the money from his racehorses to do it. That is, if his “father” didn’t sabotage him first.
The rays from the moon highlighted Tia as she walked in front of him. It was . . . regal was the only word he could think of. Even in the loose clothing, he got the impression, her back was straight and her shoulders were back. She was tall for a woman. Not as tall as him, but then at six foot four, few people were. His mother told him he had inherited his height from his father. It was not something he could be proud of.
“That makes sense. Horses deserve more time than most people.” The words “They aren’t out for anything” hovered on his lips, and he shut them firmly. Phillipe clearly knew his stables were his Achilles heel. There was no need to give away any more information than he needed to.
“Funny. That’s exactly what they would have said as well.”
A generic “they.” Interesting.
“Mr. Anastos, are you coming?” she carried on, flicking a glance over her shoulder.
Damon curled his hand tighter into the leather reins, ignoring the pain as they cut into his hand. “Certainly, your highness.” Why hadn’t he though to bring a jacket as well as a jumper? God, he hoped she couldn’t hear the tremble in his voice.
A small cough brought his senses back to the here and now, and he sucked in a small breath.
Small talk. He could sense it coming. He hated small talk.
“Why do you say that? And in that tone?”
Huh? “You’ll have to be more specific, princess.”
“That, right there! The princess thing and the highness thing.” She whirled sharply, and he winced as her finger careered into his chest, sending goose pimples rising along his skin from his head to his toes.
/> He hadn’t realized she was so close. “Maybe because you sound like someone who is used to giving orders to the little people such as myself.” Damn. He hadn’t meant it to come out so—sharp. It was a joke. Okay, partly a joke. He had no idea who she really was, and she didn’t look like the pictures of Phillipe’s daughter, his recently discovered half sister, the princess Adelle.
Her small humph accompanied by Kronos’s soft neigh of almost disapproval made the hairs on the back of his neck stand to attention. Whose side was the horse on anyway?
“I never said you were a little person. That is your inferiority complex. And as for royalty talking to anyone like that, well, that is absurd. Have you ever spoken to a member of the royal household? How do you know what they are even like?”
The smell of roses dragged on his senses, pulling him and calling to him like a drug. How come she could make him so riled and yet so—no, he wasn’t turned on. Damon shook his head hard. That would be beyond stupid!
“I haven’t and I don’t. Happy now? Let’s get back to the house. The quicker your car is fixed, the quicker you can get to Arios.”
“Fine by me, but you have not answered my first question.” Her breath puffed lightly from her lips and moved softly over his skin, and he took a few steps back, knocking into Kronos, who, he could tell from the dip of the lead rein, had now given up watching the dueling humans and contented himself with the cool grass.
“There were so many I forgot which one was the first.”
“Why do you talk of them in that tone? What have they ever done to you?”
His ears pricked up. Was that . . . a slight wobble to her voice? He couldn’t be sure thanks to the loud crickets. “Which royal family are we talking about?”
“Um, the House of Helios. The royal family of Kephelai. Which royal family were you talking about?” Her voice had lowered, and the wobble had been replaced by something that sounded eerily familiar: suspicion. He lifted his hand to pinch the bridge of his nose. Why had he let that comment slip? Damn.
The Runaway Queen Page 2