A rumble sounded. Not a white steed, but a truck, rumbled up the street. It nearly passed her, until, with a quick brake, it came to an abrupt halt right in front of her.
Her heart leaped into her throat, but she reminded herself she had nothing left for someone to steal.
Except herself, came the dismal, unhelpful thought. Fear bloomed again, and she might have started running regardless of her combat boots, until the window rolled down and a man leaned across the seat. Beneath his hat, piercing green eyes landed right on her.
Her Clint Eastwood look-alike from the plane.
“Problem?” he asked in that slow, Southern drawl that somehow sent a warm shiver down her spine, when just a moment ago she’d been chilled from her fight with her thief.
“Problem?” she repeated as casually as she could, cocking a hip and trying to look like the badass princess she was known to be. “What makes you think I have a problem?”
“Because you’re standing out here in a downpour looking like a drowned rat.”
A drowned rat! “The bus hasn’t come yet.” But even if it did, her ticket was sitting all nice and cozy in her purse. The purse that was right this second gracing the neck of a thief. But she couldn’t tell this man that, not when her pride was sticking like crow in her throat.
He put his truck in Park and rested a forearm on his steering wheel. “So what’s a princess doing riding a bus?”
With her self-esteem at her feet, there was no way she could tell him.
“Ah, hell,” she thought she heard him mutter. And then he’d turned off his truck and got out in the rain, moving with the easy grace of a man who wasn’t in a hurry to be anywhere other than where he happened to be.
Standing in front of her, he seemed bigger than he’d been on the airplane, bigger than life. He was over six feet, all broad shoulders, hard muscle and about zero body fat. Certainly bigger than any man she was used to standing so close to her, so she took a little step back. But she left her chin thrust high into the air, because she’d choke on all that pride before admitting defeat to anyone.
“Here.” He shrugged out of his jacket to set it on her shoulders. She didn’t know if his caring enough to want her warm helped or made it worse. “So what happened to your stuff?” he asked.
“It was just stolen. And before that, my second flight was canceled. Having a hell of a day here.”
He had a way of looking at people, of tilting his head back and gazing at her with deep green eyes that made her stomach flutter. “Are you hurt?”
I’m fine, she almost said. But she wasn’t. There was a strange, slow, unfurling in the pit of her belly, and it didn’t come from the horrid day or the rain or the theft. Or even from the way her makeup was starting to run down her face.
It came from his hands on her shoulders. From his easy grace and confidence.
“Princess?”
She gazed up at the man towering over her, at his unfathomable gaze and the lock of brown hair falling over his forehead. It was streaked with light gold from what she imagined were long days in the sun. On his horse. Being a cowboy. The unfurling in her belly ignited. “Do you really believe I’m a princess?” she whispered.
He frowned, then bent down a little to look into her eyes. “Maybe you hit your head? Is that it?”
He thought she was crazy. And she was.
Because he was a stranger, a one-hundred-percent-male stranger who made her want to drool, made her want to stand straighter with her breasts thrust out and check her makeup all at the same time. She felt as if she’d known him all her life even as she wanted to know him even better.
How stupid is that, Amelia?
TIM SCOOPED the woman’s tangled, soggy hair back from her forehead, frowning as he looked her creamy skin over for a bump. Somehow the black smudged eyeliner beneath her eyes made them look ever bigger. More vulnerable.
“I didn’t hit my head,” she said quite clearly, stepping back from his touch. “And I really am a princess. Your Serene Highness Natalia Faye Wolfe Brunner of Grunberg, to be exact.”
Stepping back, he scratched his jaw and studied her, but she didn’t crack a smile. “That’s a mouthful,” he said.
“Which is why I go by just Your Serene Highness Natalia Faye.”
“Still a mouthful.”
“My things have been stolen, or I’d show you identification.”
“Want to go to the police and make a report?”
She frowned. “No. The thief is long gone, and my family would just insist I come home. All I need is a ride to Taos, New Mexico. I’m going to a wedding.”
This was said in a hoity-toity voice, her chin thrust high in the sky and eyes flashing, as if he were her servant. So he stared at her for one more beat, then tossed his head back and laughed.
“I’m not finding the humor in this situation,” she said, crossing her arms across her chest.
Oh, boy. Nutcase alert. Despite her superior airs, he could tell she was cold, all covered in goose bumps. Suddenly she looked twelve to him again. Or she would if she didn’t have the most mouthwatering, curvy body he’d ever seen. Damn it, she was the prettiest nutcase he’d ever seen, and any bastard could come along and take advantage of her. Tim wasn’t into pretty nutcases himself, but he couldn’t just leave her here.
He wished he could. He had enough to deal with, but he knew this woman and her expressive eyes would haunt him tonight if he didn’t try to do something for her. “Look, you’re obviously a little down on your luck.”
“A little today, yeah.”
It made his gut clench. “So let me call someone for you-”
“No!”
“But-”
“No,” she said so firmly, he almost believed she could really be royalty. She ran a hand down her wet, clingy leather and thrust her shoulders back. “As I’ve said, I’m fine.”
Terrific. She was fine and he was…delayed. And yet he couldn’t just drive away. Maybe it was his save-the-wounded-bird heart. Hell, it was definitely his save-the-wounded-bird heart. “Where are you off to, then?”
“Nowhere at the moment.”
“I could take you with me to my ranch.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Why?”
Why? Because he was an idiot. Because clearly he didn’t have enough to worry about with his grandmother refusing his help and his sister sleeping with his new ranch hand. “You’d…be safe there.”
“At your ranch.”
“Yes.” Where he already had a corral full of rescued animals he couldn’t bring himself to get rid of. Not that he’d put this woman in the corral, but the rescue efforts weren’t much different.
Which was exactly what his grandma had told him when he’d tried to convince her to come back with him this weekend.
You’re just trying to save me from old age, Timothy. But I like old age. And I like it here. Now I love you, but go home and save a cow or something.
He sighed. Instead of a cow, he supposed he’d rescue this drowned-looking woman. “So…is it a go?” He shielded his eyes from the now even heavier rain soaking them. “Are you coming with me?”
A gold eyebrow vanished into her hair as she regarded him with mistrust.
“Not for whatever you’re thinking,” he added quickly.
Another sharp jag of lightning lit the sky, with thunder too quick on its heel for comfort. “You can clean yourself up,” he said, wanting out of the damn rain. “Get some food and sleep. Then maybe…I don’t know…look for work.”
“Work,” she repeated, as if the idea had never occurred to her. “Hmm. Interesting. Do you have a job opening?”
“I’m hiring right now for a cook and a ranch hand.” To replace the ranch hand he planned on firing if he-Josh-was still boinking his baby sister.
Which reminded him to wonder if Sally was still mad at him. Actually, that particular worry was just a waste of time.