Hunter seemed so sure that someone was coming for them. Her stomach tightened into a hard knot of anxiety. They were no longer in an armored car. Her normal security guards weren’t there to protect her. She didn’t even have so much as a butter knife with which to defend herself.
She suddenly realized that she very much wanted to live. She wanted to watch Dimitri, Nikita and the baby grow to manhood. She wanted to hold the children Nicholas and Ericka would someday have. She wanted to watch Alex fall in love. She wanted to help guide her country through the new millennium, to ensure the passage of new laws to protect their women. She wanted to fall in love, have children and grandchildren. She wanted to travel. She wanted to get to know Hunter better, much better.
Fear seemed to have sharpened the clarity of her thoughts and her senses. In the bright sunlight, their car was such an easy target. A bullet could penetrate the windshield in the blink of an eye, and she would never know what happened. One moment she would be alive. The next she would be gone.
Get a grip.
She couldn’t allow her runaway thoughts to panic her. She had to have faith in Hunter’s abilities. He certainly handled the car with the skill of a race car driver. Even when forced to veer from the pavement to the rock-strewn shoulder to avoid a darting squirrel, Hunter kept the car under control, and last night he’d assured her that he’d lived through much more dangerous missions.
Tashya began to feel calmer and was even beginning to think that all of Hunter’s precautions were for nothing. There had been no reason to climb across the roof and down the tree. No reason to steal a vehicle. At the sight of clear road ahead, she started to relax.
“Oh, God,” Neve shouted from the back seat, and pointed, her hand shaking.
Two cars up ahead waited on either side of the road. As Hunter drove by, the cars pulled onto the road behind them, following them. Tinted windows lowered and gun muzzles pointed in their direction. Several shots pinged off the back window, shattering the glass.
“Get down,” Hunter ordered.
He no longer drove straight ahead. He swerved from side to side, no doubt trying to throw off their pursuers’s aims.
Tashya flung herself sideways. Her head ended up resting on Hunter’s leg, her cheek pressed to his thigh. She clung to the seat, cringing as more shots pinged off the car.
Their car suddenly skidded. Hunter swore, fighting to keep them from going sideways. “Damn. They blew out a tire.”
The tire shredded on the pavement, leaving the stench of burned rubber. Worse, their vehicle bounced and jarred them so badly that she bit her tongue. Only her seat belt prevented her from falling to the floor.
Hunter didn’t release his foot from the gas pedal, but the engine coughed. Tashya lifted her head slightly, but all she could see were trees flashing by, their branches like tentacles sucking at the car, scraping the paint.
Hunter had driven off the road.
“Ladies, when we stop, get out of the car and run. I’ll stay behind and cover you.”
“I smell gasoline,” Neve shouted from the back seat.
“They probably hit the gas tank. Don’t worry, the car won’t explode like in the movies,” Hunter assured them.
As the car slid into a clearing, Tashya unstrapped her seat belt. Through the shattered back window, she saw no sign of their pursuers in the trees behind them. She grabbed her backpack. They’d probably have only seconds to run and hide in the dense brush once the car finally stopped sliding on the damp grass and loose dirt.
Hunter jammed on the brake. Finally the car halted. Hunter yanked out his gun, popped the trunk and reached for his duffel.
“Go. Go. Go.”
Heart leaping up her throat, Tashya dashed after Neve into the woods. Stickers clung to her socks and branches whipped her face, but she kept sprinting. She breathed in huge gasps, not so much from exertion but from fear—and not for herself so much as for the man who had stayed behind.
She glanced back over her shoulder to see one car filled with their pursuers enter the clearing. Hunter swung his arm as if he were pitching a baseball. A second later the car exploded.
He must have thrown a grenade.
She couldn’t see the second car, but she heard the engine roaring as if the driver was determined to run Hunter over. Moments later shots from automatic weapons sliced the air with a savagery that seemed to shake the ground.
What seemed like hours but was probably only half a minute after the initial shots, the gunfire behind them lessened in intensity. Neve collapsed, her face red, her breath coming in huge pants, and Tashya didn’t urge her to go on. They were far enough from the battle to be safe—if Hunter had taken out the occupants of the second car. If he’d failed, all the running in the world would do them no good.
Tashya longed to go back to Hunter’s side to try to help him. Leaving him alone to face the enemy while she and Neve ran away seemed the ultimate act of cowardice. She desperately wanted to return and fight. Yet her presence would distract Hunter. If he stopped to worry about her, he could make a mistake and get killed.
The overpowering scent of burned flesh infiltrated the wooded area, settling around them like a pall of gloom. Tashya wished she could see what was happening, but smoke blocked her view. Suddenly the gunfire ceased.
Neve grabbed her hand. “Come on. We should keep going.”
Tashya yanked her to a halt. “I’m not leaving.”
“Highness, your brother told us to—”
“I don’t care what he said. He could be injured.” Tashya hadn’t wanted to disturb Hunter’s fighting mindset. She understood well how important sharply focused concentration was. When she jumped her horses in competitions, she never even noticed the crowds who watched. She never heard the announcer, blocking everything out except her rhythm and the stride of her horse beneath her. So she understood the necessity of not disturbing Hunter during his fighting mode, but with the cessation of shooting, the battle appeared to be over.
With the outcome unclear, Hunter might need help, and she wasn’t about to go off and leave him. She released Neve, and cautiously started to retrace their mad flight. “You go on if you want.”
Tashya didn’t wait to see what the nanny would decide. After the ear-splitting gunfire, the silence had her nerves on edge, her ears straining to pick up clues as to who might still be out there. Something had to be wrong, or surely Hunter would have caught up to them by now.
Although determined, Tashya was careful. She used the natural cover of the dense woods to keep her hidden. She tried to walk silently and to avoid stepping on branches that could crack beneath her feet. She found herself holding her breath, listening for the slightest sound. There was nothing. Not a bird, a frog or a cricket.
Neve came up beside her and whispered, “It’s creepy. Maybe we should head for the road and flag down a car, or call the police.”
Tashya shook her head. “Alex thinks that the kidnappers are listening to the police radios. We need to be careful.” Stooping, she picked up a stout branch. Tentatively she swung it through the air to test how long it would take to connect and how much force she might need to use.
Neve tugged Tashya’s sleeve. “Did you hear that?”
“What?”
The hair on the back of Tashya’s neck stood on end. An object in the trees appeared much too straight to be part of nature. She squinted and decided she was looking at the barrel of a gun.
Where was the shooter? Hidden behind the trunk of an oak?
Tashya picked up a rock and tossed it toward the gun. Nothing moved.
Now what?
Maybe the direct approach wasn’t such a good idea. Circling around might take longer, but be smarter and safer. No way could she become lost. The stench of the burning car would lead her to the clearing.
“This way.”
Tashya hurried to her right, arbitrarily picking a direction. If they angled toward the battle scene and emerged from a new direction, perhaps they might figur
e out what had happened to Hunter before anyone else spotted them. From there, she’d have to wing it, depending on what she found.
She prayed Hunter was still alive, but had to thrust her worry from her mind. Instead she focused on hiding herself, edging forward slowly, making as little noise as possible. Next to her, Neve copied her movements.
Tashya had no idea how much time had passed or how far they’d run. The journey back seemed to take forever. Despite the shade from the trees, the morning sun beat down on her head. Perspiration broke out on her forehead, and she yearned for a cool shower.
Neve stepped on the back of Tashya’s shoe. “Sorry, Highness.”
“Can we dispense with my title?” Tashya pulled her shoe back on, accidentally hooking her broken nail. Pain shot up her hand.
She raised her hand toward her mouth, intending to suck on her bleeding finger when a man stepped out from behind a tree. Forgetting her bloody finger, she gripped the branch and started to swing.
It was Hunter. Alive and looking very unprincely. His clothes were dark with soot and possibly blood, and also torn in several places. His hair had lost its I’m-the-most-desirable-bachelor-in-the-country look, and the gleam in his eye was anything but fraternal. Even Neve seemed to be eyeing him strangely.
Tashya retracted the swinging branch awkwardly and tried to deflect any doubts Neve might be suddenly having about the prince’s identity. “Alex, I’ve never seen you so rumpled in your life.”
Hunter paid no attention to the threat of her branch, instead, he stared at the blood trickling down her hand and hurried to her.
“Are you okay?” Tashya and Hunter both asked one another at the same time.
Neve nervously giggled.
Hunter frowned and reached for Tashya’s wrist. “You’re bleeding.”
“I told you I broke a nail.”
“You didn’t tell me you ripped half of it off.” He slung the duffel from his shoulder, reached inside and pulled out a first-aid kit.
Neve looked from Hunter toward the burning car. “Are we safe? What happened to those men that were chasing us?”
“They won’t bother anyone ever again.” Hunter opened the kit, took out a bottle of alcohol and uncapped the top. “This is going to sting.” He poured the clear liquid over her wound.
“Ouch.” Tashya tried to jerk her hand back.
Hunter held her still, his fingers a manacle around her wrist. “Sorry. Almost done.”
But he wasn’t almost done. He’d found a tube of antiseptic and squeezed ointment onto her raw nail. Then he wrapped her finger in gauze. “The ointment has a numbing agent in it and the bandage should help protect you from reopening the wound.”
Tashya pulled her hand away from his the moment he finished his ministrations. “Thanks.”
The sudden sound of a helicopter’s whirring rotors overhead had Hunter urging them under the canopy of a thick shade tree where they wouldn’t be spotted. She suspected that the chopper was simply delivering supplies to a nearby town and its occupants had no idea of the death and horrible destruction in the woods. But Hunter wouldn’t take any unnecessary chances. When it came to survival, Tashya trusted Hunter’s judgment and didn’t even try to guess what he’d do next.
Hunter looked from Tashya to Neve. “If the cops find the tracks we left driving off the road, they’ll search the woods and find our pursuers’s cars and their bodies. They’ll block the road and seal the obvious exits. Maybe bring in dogs to track us.”
Neve looked at him skeptically. “Highness, can’t you call in the military to get us out of here?”
“I could—if I was sure that General Vladimir or his aide wasn’t behind my little brothers’s kidnapping.”
Tashya couldn’t help agreeing with the nanny’s obvious doubts. “It seems as if the military is going to extraordinary lengths just to keep women out of their ranks.”
Neve gasped. “You think that’s why they took the boys? To keep you quiet during the voting?”
Tashya’s views were well known among the educated palace women. While not all of them openly agreed with her, many had offered private encouragements.
Hunter shouldered his duffel. “Right now, we need to set a false trail. Are you both up for a little hike?”
“How little?” Tashya asked. Still, she picked up her backpack and followed Hunter. “May I remind you that we have no food or water?”
“My military training included survival courses,” Hunter offered.
“It did?” Neve muttered under her breath.
Tashya said nothing more. While Hunter knew how to survive in the woods, Alex didn’t. While Neve didn’t say another word, she clearly had doubts. Tashya supposed if the nanny guessed that Hunter was impersonating Alex, it wouldn’t be so bad—as long as she wasn’t in league with the kidnappers. But if she was part of the group, and she was suspicious of Alex, wouldn’t she keep those doubts to herself?
This circular spy logic made her head ache. As Hunter led them away from the road and the burning cars and the dead men, Tashya wondered about their chances of success. They’d started in an armored car, traded it for a stolen one and were now reduced to walking. Yet, on the positive side, Neve believed she could find Dimitri and Nikita. Tashya hoped the police wouldn’t find the cars they’d left behind until tomorrow. At least she couldn’t yet hear dogs barking on their trail.
Hunter led them in one direction for a hour. Then he made them walk through a creek. Several times they left the creek only to backtrack again. “We’re laying a false trail for dogs and trackers.”
“You sure you haven’t been watching too many Western movies?” Tashya asked.
“They use this ploy often because it works.” Hunter led them back downstream and over a rocky area before heading in a new direction. “There’s another road that parallels the one we came in on. We’ll head out of the woods there.”
They’d left the creek hours ago, and Tashya tried to think positively, but as the hours wore on without either food or water, her spirits began to sink. She didn’t dare ask Hunter if he knew where they were—fearing his answer. Instead she concentrated on Hunter’s back, placing one foot in front of one the other, taking just one more step.
That’s what her life consisted of now—taking just one more step. Then another.
HUNTER PRESSED the women harder than he would have liked. However, if the bullet-strewn cars and bodies behind them were found, he expected an extensive investigation to be launched immediately. He’d searched the pockets of the men he’d killed and had learned very little. He suspected that their cars were stolen, their weapons bought on the black market. None of the men had carried identification. So these were professionals—not particularly well trained, but one step up the ladder from the thugs he’d left in police custody.
He didn’t waste time thinking that he would have preferred to take one alive to question him. He cut his losses and moved on. Although his stomach rumbled with hunger, finding water was much more important. Under ideal conditions, a human body could fend off starvation for upward of two months by living off its tissues, but it could not last nearly as long without water.
Finding water was one problem. Making sure it was fit for human consumption was another. Luckily, he had chemical purification tablets in his duffel.
He’d hoped to cross the woods before nightfall or to come across a deserted cabin with a working well, but he had seen no signs of civilization since they’d left the road, no water since they’d abandoned the creek earlier in the day. Hunter had no doubt he could keep the women alive in these woods, but the nanny was already suspicions of him. The more skills he exhibited, the more suspicious she would become. However, he wouldn’t let them go to sleep thirsty tonight.
Hunter knew that water tended to be found near the bases of hills and that game trails often led to water holes. He’d been following a deer trail for the past two hours. Finally it paid off with what he’d been looking for: a creek tumbling down from t
he hills.
“Water.” Neve licked her lips. “You found us water.” She hurried to the creek bank and scooped up a handful.
“Don’t drink it.” Hunter opened his duffel and found his water purification tablets and his canteen. He handed the items to Tashya. “Fill the canteen. Add two tablets and wait a full ten minutes to make sure they dissolve before you drink.”
He pulled several other items from his duffel. “You both rest, and I’ll try to find us some dinner.”
He could read a thousand questions in Tashya’s eyes. But she didn’t ask them, no doubt unwilling to risk increasing Neve’s suspicions. He placed a sealed container of matches in her hand. “After you rest, why don’t you build a fire?”
Tashya frowned at him. “You plan to be gone long?”
“I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
Clearly she didn’t feel comfortable in the woods. However, Hunter felt safer in the wild than he had at any time since he’d entered the country. With the false trails he had laid, he was reasonably sure they wouldn’t be found for hours. Out here, the most dangerous animal they might come across was a bear, and if it attacked, his weapons would protect them. In the palace, recognizing one’s enemies wasn’t so easy. Neither was dispensing with them.
So he welcomed the respite from danger, even if it would only last for a short while. He didn’t think it would rain. There was no reason they couldn’t eat a meal and catch a few hours’ sleep.
Ever since he’d seen Tashya’s bloody hand, he’d promised himself to take better care of her. When he was afraid a stray bullet had nicked her, the moisture in his mouth had disappeared. When she’d told him that her injury was the broken nail that he’d paid no attention to earlier, he’d winced with guilt. He’d just assumed a manicure would fix her problem. He hadn’t taken the time to find out that she had an extremely painful injury. If the finger became infected due to his careless assumption, he would only have himself to blame. Instead she’d suffered in silence, a trait he hadn’t expected from a pampered princess.
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