Lilah took a deep breath. This was a cattle ranch, and Hugh Bradford himself had assured her that there was nothing dangerous here. It would be bad for business to have anything eating the merchandise, so the entire twenty-thousand-acre ranch was circled by an eight-foot fence. This she could verify, since she had just climbed it.
She’d done a poor job of it, though. A sharp wire had caught her on the chest as she swung herself over the top of the rusty steel-mesh fence, and now she had a tear in her shirt and a nasty gash that rubbed painfully against the strap of her backpack. She could mostly ignore the discomfort, but it had been a bad way to start off the night.
It figured, she thought grimly. What hadn’t gone wrong since she arrived in Kenya?
The bilious anxiety she’d been battling all day threatened to rise up again, and she clenched her teeth, willing it away. She couldn’t afford to dissolve into a mess of tears and worry, not now. It was still miles to the excavation site, and she had too much to accomplish before dawn.
Clouds were gathering in the distance, their dark shapes massing on the northern horizon, but the rest of the night sky was clear, with stars sprinkled like diamond dust around the full moon.
She’d spent the afternoon studying the maps Hugh had sent, planning her route through the ranch. But making the transition from printed paper to the vast darkness of this wide-open savanna was more than a little overwhelming.
The air was cooling rapidly around her, and Lilah shivered, trying not to think about how isolated she was out here. She fixed her mind on the road ahead, and reminded herself that every step took her closer to the site.
Her site. It was hers, Ross Bradford and his title deed be damned. What had he done to earn the land, inherit it? Ha. She’d spent three years planning this excavation, and all her life dreaming of it. Ross might own the land, but she had earned it.
She stopped suddenly. There was a new noise coming from somewhere nearby, blending with the raspy trill of the crickets. It had been hovering on the edges of her consciousness for several minutes, getting louder and louder until it had finally caught her attention. It was behind her, and it was...mechanical.
She turned quickly, looking back down the road, and saw with a sudden jolt of anxiety that car headlights had appeared down the road near the fence.
“Oh, great,” she said, freezing in her tracks, staring toward the approaching headlights. The car was still half a mile away, at the bottom of the low hill, but this was the only road around, so it would have to pass her. Who would be up at this hour? What should she do?
The car was coming fast. She had to do something. She looked around quickly, then dashed up the road and dove off into the tall brushy grass behind a clump of scraggly bushes.
The thorny branches caught at her hair, and she jerked free, trying to crouch down as low as possible. She held her breath, peered through the grass and watched the car approach.
It was a brand-new, four-wheel-drive Land Rover, moving smoothly over the pitted road. Lilah huddled even lower as it neared, then stared, her stomach tightening in alarm. It seemed to be slowing down. She watched with an increasing sense of disbelief as it came closer and closer to where she lay hidden in the grass.
Was she hidden? Yes, she was sure of it. Could the driver of the car have seen her walking, silhouetted against the sky, just a few moments earlier? It seemed unlikely for a person without incredibly sharp eyes, but the moon was bright tonight, and it certainly looked as if the driver was searching for something. Or someone.
Me? Not me, oh, please, she prayed, afraid to move, afraid even to breathe. It was too late to try to slink away, now that the car was close enough for the driver to spot any motion in the thigh-high grass.
The Land Rover stopped, barely twenty feet from where she crouched, and the tall, broad-shouldered figure of a man swung out. She couldn’t make out his features or expression with the inner light of the car at his back, but the harsh ring of authority in his voice was unmistakable, as was the long dark shape of the rifle he held.
“Out of the bushes now, or I’ll shoot.”
Lilah’s heart was beating so loudly that she thought it would drown out the sounds of the night. Was he bluffing? Did he know where she was? He couldn’t! No one could see that well in the dark.
She didn’t move, didn’t even breathe.
Go away, she commanded silently, trying to send him a telepathic message. Go away.
Before she even realized what was happening, the gun cracked and a shot whizzed over her head only a few feet to the left, buzzing like an angry bee.
Lilah gasped, and threw herself chest-down on the ground, trembling all over. He had a close enough idea of where she was, and he was going to kill her! What was she supposed to do? If she stood up now, would he shoot her? If she didn’t, would he start shooting into the bushes? This wasn’t fair! She might be trespassing, but killing her for it was overreacting, damn it!
“Out here, right now!”
He cocked the rifle again, and Lilah shrieked, jumping up. “Don’t shoot! I’m coming out!” She sucked in a sharp, hot breath and stormed out onto the road.
“Are you crazy?” she yelled, seizing belligerence as the way to keep herself from dissolving into a quaking mass of fear and shock. “You could have killed me! You can’t just shoot people!”
She faced the man, her hands clenched into fists to keep them from shaking, and stared at him as the white haze of panic began to clear from her eyes.
He was tall, standing inches over her, but in the sharp shadows of the moonlight he seemed even larger. There was a power about him above and beyond the gun he held, coming more from the intensity of him, the strength of his body poised there, his attention focused on her with a force that seemed physical. Lilah had never been easily intimidated, but facing off with this man made her fight for her bravado.
His eyes, shadowed by suspicion, bored into her as he lowered the rifle. “Who the hell are you?” he said coldly. “This is private property, so you’d better have a damn good explanation for why you’re here.”
Lilah stared at him, her heart pounding and her body icy-hot with adrenaline, trying to think fast and not succeeding. Who was he? If this wasn’t the infamous Ross Bradford himself, she had a chance of bluffing her way out of this.
The voice on the phone hadn’t been so refined, or so deep, had it? Could her ear have been tricked by the noise of the airport and the static on the line?
There was no way to be sure, so she took a deep breath and prayed for luck. “Of course it’s private property,” she said haughtily. “I happen to be a guest here. Who are you?”
“A guest?” he said incredulously. “Whose guest?”
He had a guarded face that disclosed nothing, but looked squarely and coldly down an aquiline nose at her as if she were a bug on a specimen tray. He reminded Lilah of a Roman emperor, powerful and remote on his arena balcony, and she had a sinking feeling that she was the one about to be thrown to the lions.
She braced herself. “Ross Bradford’s guest,” she said.
“Really.”
“Yes, really. And I don’t think he’ll appreciate hearing about this incident,” she said sternly, encouraged by the fact that he was now watching her thoughtfully. “However, if you go away and let me get on with my walk, I promise I won’t mention this to him.”
“I’m Ross Bradford.”
Lilah gulped. “You are?”
“That’s right,” he said coolly. “I own this property, and I don’t recall inviting anyone for the weekend. You’re going to have to come up with a better story than that.”
Lilah managed a weak smile. “Okay, I—”
“You can think in the car. Get in.”
“What? I don’t want to—”
“I don’t care what you want. You’re in no position to argue.” Ross Bradford stepped over to open the passenger-side door and waited, not taking his eyes off her. Lilah didn’t budge, and he raised his eyebrows slowly
, ominously.
“Get in.”
Chapter 2
Ross Bradford didn’t like being wrong, especially when it happened because he hadn’t paid enough attention to his instincts.
His instincts had warned him earlier that day that this archaeologist might turn out to be a problem, but at the time he had dismissed the feeling, assuming that his message had been clear enough about where she and her excavation stood.
Or, rather, didn’t stand. He had been direct to the point of being rude, but he simply didn’t have time to let her down gently.
Thinking back, Ross realized that there had been clues in the grim determination, maybe even desperation, that he’d heard in her voice. And now here she was in the flesh, glaring at him like a cornered alley cat.
What the hell was he supposed to do now? It had been a long day, and it apparently wasn’t over yet.
He waited, watching her as he stood with his hand on the open passenger-side door, and something about her stance, suddenly light and edgy, warned him that she was thinking about making a run for it.
“Don’t do it,” he said, and saw her jump guiltily. She covered her surprise with a scowl, and folded her arms.
“I’m not going anywhere with you,” she said. “Even if you do own this ranch, it doesn’t give you the right to try to shoot anyone you see. And if you think I’m getting into your car, you’re crazy.”
“Actually,” Ross said dryly, “I didn’t try to shoot you.”
“Oh, yes, you did. I was there, remember?”
“If I had tried to shoot you,” he said, “you wouldn’t be here talking to me. I never miss. Now, get in the car, or I’ll radio the police and have them come out here and arrest you for trespassing.”
“Arrest me!” she stared at him, horror on her face. “You can’t! This is all a big mistake. M-my car broke down, and I thought I could find a house back here to call for help—”
“Your car broke down?”
“Yes,” she said vigorously. “The fan belt broke.”
“The fan belt,” he said. “I see. What a shame. What were you doing here in the first place?”
She blinked, barely missing a beat. “Hiking.”
“At midnight?”
“I got lost.”
Ross gazed at her, not sure whether he was impressed or appalled by her brazen attempts to save herself. Whatever the case, he definitely wasn’t flattered by her apparent belief that he was too stupid to connect her with the woman on the phone that afternoon. Did she think he had mysterious trespassers popping out of his bushes on a regular basis? It had taken him less than a minute to figure out who she was, even discounting the fact that the car headlights had briefly illuminated a Wisconsin decal on her bag. How dumb did this woman think he was?
She stared back, chin lifted slightly, the bravado of her expression not completely hiding the anxiety in her eyes. Looking at her, Ross had to admit that if he hadn’t recognized that smooth, slightly low voice of hers, he actually might have written her off as some renegade student of Dr. Evans’s.
Her hair was tied up in a messy ponytail, with escaped tendrils waving down to her chin. She wore blue jeans and a dark plaid button-down shirt that made her hair and skin look pale in the icy moonlight. With her scuffed sneakers and that backpack slung over her arm, she didn’t look old enough to drink, much less to have a Ph.D.
“Have you ever seen the inside of a Kenyan jail?” he asked coolly. “It’s not pleasant. And the American embassy isn’t going to like having to deal with the police on your behalf. That kind of thing involves a lot of trouble and money, and it could be days before they get you out. Is that really what you want?”
“You wouldn’t do that,” she said, but her voice had lost much of its certainty, and she looked paler than ever. Her eyes flicked to the car and back to him again.
“Wouldn’t I?” Ross said, and waited. She was probably right, but having her discover that wouldn’t hurry this encounter along. His head ached from the hassles of the day, and he was damned if some stubborn archaeologist was going to cost him more sleep than he’d already lost.
“Are you sure you want to gamble on that? You don’t know me at all. Get in the car.”
The dangerous quiet in his voice was enough to convince her. She clenched her jaw and climbed silently into the passenger seat, where she sat, watching him warily as he shut her door and walked around the car to the driver’s seat. As he started the car again and drove up the road, he glanced over to find her staring at him.
“You’re not going back toward the gate,” she said.
“That’s right. I’m going home.”
“But... what about me?”
He didn’t answer. The truth was, he didn’t know what to do with her, but it certainly wasn’t going to involve leaving her alone out on the savanna. One of the herders had just killed a five-foot cobra by the side of the road that morning, and here was the professor, making swan dives into the shrubbery without thinking twice. She might be a nuisance, but she deserved to live through the night.
“I don’t want to go home with you,” she insisted. “Like I told you, this has all been a mistake. Let me go and I’ll leave, I swear it.”
“Sorry.”
“Why not? Just stop the car and let me out! I’ll walk right back to the gate and—”
Ross had had enough. “Walk back to the gate?” he repeated. She really was clueless, and lucky that she’d made it this far. “Do you know how dangerous it is out here? Are you aware that we’ve started taking down the divider fence between this ranch and the wildlife reserve? The whole northeast side of this property is open. We have lions hunting here at night, and you’re walking around like it’s upper Manhattan.”
She sat quietly back against the seat, looking shaken, but Ross wasn’t finished yet. “I find it interesting that you call me crazy,” he said. “So tell me, Dr. Evans, what are you? Crazy, brave or just plain stupid?”
She didn’t answer. Her hands were clasped in her lap, and she stared down at them, biting her lip.
Ross felt a flicker of guilt for being so harsh until he reminded himself that her presence here at midnight, carrying a backpack, said very bad things about her intentions. She didn’t deserve sympathy.
“Well?” he said coldly, hardening his heart.
“All of the above,” she said. “You do know who I am, then.”
“You thought I’d believe the lost hiker story?”
She shrugged. “It was the best I could come up with at the moment. I don’t have much to lose by now, in case you haven’t noticed.”
“And you’re supposed to be a respectable professor?”
The mockery in his voice brought a flush to her cheeks, and she stiffened. “Yes, I am. I have a Ph.D. in African Archaeology, five papers published in highly respected scientific journals, and I happen to be the head researcher on the excavation here.”
“I see. And since there isn’t going to be any excavation here, I have to wonder what you’re doing on my property at midnight, dressed like a teenager and carrying a backpack. It’s not too hard to figure out, actually. You decided to trespass on the ranch and excavate without permission. I’ll bet you thought you’d fill that bag of yours with artifacts and make a little money from them. That reads as theft in my book. Not very respectable, Professor.”
Ross watched her with a sideways look, waiting for her reaction to confirm the truth of his words. It angered him to think that even someone who had claimed that her excavation was a “major site in African prehistory” would stoop to looting artifacts for cash. She didn’t look like the type, which simply proved that appearances were deceiving.
Lilah was staring at him, openmouthed. “That is not true,” she said vehemently.
“Oh, come on, Dr. Evans,” Ross said. “Let’s drop the . pretenses and be honest at least once tonight. Why else would you be here, alone, with your bag? I think you finally accepted the fact that you can’t work here, so you
decided to make a profit to cut your losses.”
“A looter?” she said incredulously. “You’re accusing me of being a looter?”
“Perceptive, aren’t you.”
“How dare you! I’m a scientist!”
“Right,” Ross said. This was just the kind of defensive reaction he had expected. How long would it take until she gave up and admitted the truth?
“Let’s return to the question of why you’re here. Are you a guest? No. Are you a hiker? No. If you have another half-baked story for me, let’s get it out of the way, too.”
“Fine,” she said, her voice tight. “I’m here because you hung up on me, which was rude, by the way. I was going to try, tomorrow, to change your mind about the site, and since you were turning out to be...difficult, I thought it would help if I could actually show you some artifacts.”
She sighed. “I thought that if you could touch the tools for yourself, you might realize how special they are, how interesting and it might help me plead my case. The bag is only to hold a map of the ranch, a flashlight and my notebooks.”
“Why should I believe this story when you’ve lied to me since I picked you up?”
“Because it’s the truth.”
That was almost funny, coming from her. “The truth? That seems to be whatever suits your purposes, Dr. Evans. Right now, I’d say it suits you not to be caught stealing artifacts, so it’s certainly a convenient story. I’ll ask again, why should I believe you?”
“That does it,” she burst out suddenly, and thumped a fist on the dashboard. “This is absolutely the last straw, damn it. Being hung up on, I can ignore. Being forced into a car, even being shot at, I can overlook. But if you dare insult my integrity as a scientist, you’d better believe one thing.”
She pointed an accusing finger at him. “If you knew anything, you’d know that money is not the issue here. Having the chance to spend the months or years necessary to excavate a site as important as the one you unfortunately own—that, Ross Bradford, is what matters. Selling your family’s ranch makes it clear that your only concern is your bank balance, but don’t impose your values on me!”
A Hard-Hearted Man Page 2
