usually flies in about seven.” The man glanced at his watch. “Another three hours from now. No sense in waiting around. Can’t let you past the gate unless I get the word.”
Jack had got the message. His father’s home was forbidden territory to him as far as Lady Ellen was concerned. Probably always had been. Bitch, guarding her own interests tooth and nail. Though his father hadn’t bucked them. How much power did she wield over her much-older husband? Whose choice was it to keep the son in exile?
There was so much Jack wanted to know.
Was determined to know.
“I’ll be back,” he said.
“I’m stationed in the cottage,” the guard warned, nodding to the small ranch house overlooking the entrance to the property.
He was making it clear that no one slipped past him. The guy was probably in his early fifties but his big, burly frame was still all muscle—a formidable opponent in a fight. Not that Jack was looking for one, not with this man, who was just doing his job. He returned to the rental car he’d hired at the airport, thinking the view from the ranch house did not take in the whole perimeter of this estate.
Half an hour later he’d parked the car on the verge of a side road, raided his luggage for jeans, a dark-blue T-shirt, and Nikes, changed out of his visiting clothes and hiked cross-country to the white fence that marked the territory he wanted to scout.
He leaned on the top railing for a while, taking in the view of horses grazing in lush pastures, what was undoubtedly state-of-the-art stables, and a rider—a girl with a mass of red-gold curls streaming out from the tight constriction of her riding hat—putting her horse through a series of pony club jumps.
Was she the elder of the two adopted daughters?
Or a stable hand, employed to train the horse to jumping?
The slender figure looked shapely enough to be a young woman, though that factor certainly didn’t rule out a girl of fourteen. She rode well, handling the horse with confident authority, but then he had, too, at fourteen, having learnt the hard way on his stepfather’s ranch.
He scaled the fence and strolled towards the exercise enclosure, wanting his curiosity satisfied. It was a matter of supreme indifference to him that he was trespassing. To his mind he had more natural right to be here than anyone else on this property.
Sally didn’t see the man’s approach. Blaze hadn’t been completely set right for the triple jump and she wanted to take him through it again. The big gelding had been too eager. She had to rein him in a bit, make the timing perfect. Her concentration on the task was total. Only when Blaze had sailed beautifully over the third hurdle did the sound of clapping alert her to the presence of a spectator.
Flushed and exhilarated by her success, she turned to smile at the person who had admired her skill enough to applaud it, expecting to see Tim Fogarty, the stable hand who always helped her groom Blaze for showjumping. It startled her to see a stranger, especially a stranger who was alone. That didn’t happen here. A visitor was always accompanied by someone.
He was very handsome, outstandingly so compared to the young men of her acquaintance—thick black hair, a face that instantly drew fascinated interest, and his tall and strong physique was definitely ten out of ten. His forearms, resting on the top railing of the enclosure, were tanned and muscular, suggesting he lived an outdoors life. Maybe he was a new employee.
Sally nudged Blaze into walking over to where the man stood, aware that the flutter in her stomach was caused more by a sense of excitement than curiosity. His eyes were examining her in a very detailed fashion—vivid blue eyes—making her extremely conscious of how she looked and raising a silly hope that he found her attractive.
It was silly because it was obvious he was too old for her. In his twenties, she judged. At fourteen she had the height and the figure of a young woman but not the years to match this man. There was something in his eyes—a knowingness that came from a lot of hard learnt experience.
“Who are you?” she asked, feeling a compulsion to learn everything she could about him.
His mouth quirked into a dryly amused little smile, making her wonder how it would feel to have such beautifully sculptured lips kissing hers. Would they be gentle and sensitive to her response or hard and ravishing? He was the kind of man who could have stepped out of one of the romance books she’d read, making her wish for things that weren’t yet part of her life.
“Who are you?” he countered, surprising her with his American accent. Nice voice, though, deep and manly.
“I’m Sally Maguire,” she answered with a touch of pride, wanting to impress him with her status as daughter to a man who was virtually an Australian legend.
“Ah…” he said, but it wasn’t an admiring Ah, more a mocking one that told her he wasn’t impressed at all.
Had she seemed snobby about who she was?
“Fine horse,” he remarked. “You handle him well. Have you been riding long?”
She nodded, suddenly feeling ill at ease with him. “Dad gave me a pony when I was five.”
“No doubt he bought this one for you, too.”
The mocking tone was more pronounced this time.
“Who are you?” she repeated more sharply. “What are you doing here?”
He shrugged. “Just looking around.”
“This is private property. If you have no business here, you’re trespassing.”
“Oh, I have business to be done. Very personal business.” His eyes stabbed into hers like blue lasers, scouring her soul. “I’m waiting for my father to come home.”
None of the employees had a son like him. She was sure of it. “Who’s your father?”
“The same as yours.”
Shock rendered her speechless for a moment. Was it true? A bastard son who’d never been publicly acknowledged? He didn’t look like her father, though he did have blue eyes, a much sharper blue though.
“I know nothing about you,” she blurted out, seized by the fear that whoever he was, he’d come to make trouble.
“Not surprising,” he drawled derisively. “I’m sure Lady Ellen prefers to pretend I don’t exist.”
He hated her mother. She could see it, hear it, feel it.
“She probably doesn’t know about you, either,” Sally threw at him defensively, fretting over his attitude.
He shook his head. “What a protected little cocoon you live in, Sally Maguire!” There was a wicked challenge in his eyes as he added, “Why don’t you ask Lady Ellen about the marriage she busted up and the boy she wanted no part of?”
“What marriage?”
“Leonard Maguire’s marriage to my mother,” he tossed at her, obviously confident that he was dealing with irrefutable fact.
Sally
