Turning, Kady looked up at him in the growing darkness. He was asking her to spend the night alone with him? Share a sleeping bag maybe?
“You don’t have to look at me like that. Despite the bad opinion you have of me, I’m not a rapist. Besides, Leonie’d have my hide if I touched another woman.”
“The blonde?” Kady asked. Of course, she had nothing against the woman except for a few unkind remarks she’d made about Kady’s life work. But if that shapeless, bag of bones was what he liked, who was she to object?
“Yes, the blonde,” he said with a little smile that made her feel as though he could see right through her.
When Kady didn’t answer, his face changed. “Look, I’m not after your body, no matter how enticing it is. I have a business deal to work out with you.”
“Such as?” Kady said, eyes narrowed in distrust.
“Look, it’s growing dark and Uncle Hannibal’s eyesight isn’t great at best, so maybe he wouldn’t recognize me and might start shooting again. So could we continue this at my camp?”
Kady knew she didn’t really have any other choice. She couldn’t very well climb down a mountain in the dark, and besides, she was very tired and very hungry. In spite of her discomfort, she hesitated. “What business?”
Tarik glanced over his shoulder into the darkening woods as though he expected someone to jump out at any moment. “Ol’ Ruthless Ruth left a codicil to her will.”
“Stop calling her that!” Kady said sharply. “She was a very nice person, and I want to help her.”
“Oh, yes, I keep forgetting that you met her, that you’re a hundred years old and—”
“What do you have to eat?” She was not going to be lectured by him again.
“Trout. I’ll cook it myself.”
Like Cole, was her inadvertent thought.
“Unless you would like to cook it. My reports are that you’re a fair cook.” He was laughing at her again!
“No, not me,” she said, standing and starting to walk away. “I can only make soufflés, not real food like fried fish. And my soufflés are so heavy that if I threw one it would probably break bones.” When she stopped walking and turned back toward him, his eyes were twinkling more than the stars above them.
His horse was not far away, and this time Kady mounted behind him with reluctance, and now that no one was shooting at her, she leaned away instead of clutching him to her. A short time later they were at his camp, which was complete with a tent, a Jeep, and a horse trailer. Before a fire that was nearly out was a table and chairs.
“You travel light, I see,” she said with all the derision she could muster as she dismounted. “I almost expect to see a butler and a couple of maids.”
“Even Jordans have to rough it sometimes.”
Kady had to bite her tongue to keep from saying anything else, as he seemed to be amused by anything she said. Part of her said that she should be thanking him for saving her life, for coming to her rescue, but somehow the words would not cross her lips. Maybe it had to do with having seen this man so many times during her life. As she sat down on one of the chairs and watched him prepare the fish, she thought how even the movement of his hands was familiar to her.
He poured her a glass of wine—an excellent vintage, of course—and as she began to get warm as the wine seeped into her system, she was very aware of the growing darkness, and even more aware of his dark good looks.
“So what did the codicil say?” she asked, and even to her, her voice sounded nervous.
He dished up the trout, two to each of them, and some roast potatoes flecked with bits of charred wood, flavored with smoke, and took a seat across from her. “It didn’t make any sense really. It said that if Cole Jordan, born in 1864, died when he was nine years old, then no Jordan could accept the return of the money from you for three years after nineteen ninety-six.”
As he looked up at Kady, the firelight playing on his features, he seemed to be waiting for her to say something, but she concentrated on eating.
“I’ve done a bit of research into my family history, and there was a Cole Jordan, born in eighteen sixty-four, who did indeed die when he was nine years old.”
Kady kept her head down. What had she hoped for? That he’d come to save her because he’d fallen madly in love with her? Couldn’t stay away from her? That he’d say he’d been dreaming about her all his life?
“What do you know about this?” he asked impatiently when she remained silent.
“I’m sure that my stories wouldn’t interest a businessman like you. What was it you said, that I pop through time like a rabbit in and out of holes, so how could an idiot like me say anything that would interest someone like you?”
“You’re going to make me work for this, aren’t you?”
Kady took another sip of wine and smiled at him. “Is there any reason I should be nice to you? Did it cost you a lot to bring a lawsuit against me? Did you have it all prepared for months before I showed up?”