Ransom for a Prince. Lisa Childs

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СКАЧАТЬ have already passed the resort.” And if he didn’t pass the van, he might miss the driveway for the ranch. Why the hell would the van not let him by?

      “Turn around,” Antoine commanded. “Knowing that we are all in danger, you should not have gone off alone.”

      “I’m not alone,” Sebastian murmured as he studied the van through eyes narrowed in suspicion.

      “Who’s with you? You left Brenner stranded at the Wind River courthouse.”

      “I’m not alone on the road,” he clarified. Why wasn’t he? If the street was as remote as the sheriff’s report had led him to believe… “There is a van between my vehicle and the witness’s.”

      The road curved again, and Sebastian caught a glimpse of the rusted Suburban and the red-haired woman in the driver’s seat who tightly gripped the steering wheel. Had she seen his vehicle behind the van? Seeing the van was probably enough to frighten her. Who the hell was in it? Reporters? With no windows on the sides, just sliding panels, it looked similar to the many vans that had been parked outside the courthouse.

      He edged closer again, nearly pushing his grill against the back bumper. “Have the sheriff run this plate…” Mud had been smeared across it, concealing the numbers.

      “What is it?” Antoine asked.

      “Can’t read it.” He swerved to the left so quickly that the van didn’t have time to cut him off. But it tried, banging hard against the side of the Hummer. The metal of the van crumpled. There was no station name or number on the side of it, either. “Damn…”

      “What?” Antoine asked.

      “I don’t think they are reporters.” He pushed harder on the gas, surging the Hummer forward until he’d drawn level with the driver’s window of the van. But the glass was so heavily tinted that he could not see through it.

      “Back off,” Antoine advised him.

      Instead of heeding his brother’s advice, Sebastian cranked the steering wheel and slammed the Hummer into the van, just as they had slammed into him. Metal crunched and tires squealed. The seat belt snapped against his neck and chest as the impact jostled him. Both vehicles spun out, gravel spewing as they skidded off the pavement onto the shoulder of the winding road.

      “What the hell’s going on?” Antoine’s shout vibrated in the speaker.

      Reaching beneath the seat for Brenner’s spare weapon, the one he would not have been able to get through the security screeners, Sebastian assured his twin, “I have it under control.”

      “Wait for me,” Antoine implored him. “I can be there shortly with a few of the security detail.”

      “You’ll be too late,” Sebastian replied as he pushed open the driver’s door. Dirt swirled in the wind, stinging his eyes, so he had to squint against it and the sunlight as he approached the van.

      The heavily tinted window lowered just a couple of inches—not enough for Sebastian to see the driver. All he caught was a glimpse—a glint, really—of sunshine off metal.

      He was not the only one who was armed. Perhaps he should have worn a bulletproof vest for the press conference as Antoine and the sheriff had suggested. But if a true marksman had been hired to kill them, Sebastian knew they always went for the head shot.

       Chapter Three

      Gravel spewed as the van slammed into reverse. The tires fishtailed off the shoulder and then back onto the road. The prince stood in the cloud of dust swirling around him, a gun—probably a GLOCK—gripped tightly in his hand.

      Dmitri held on to his own weapon, the barrel of the Ruger revolver trained on the prince as the driver continued backing away from the Hummer. “I should have fired at him,” he grumbled. “I still have a shot.” But only for a few more moments as the distance between them widened.

      “Prince Sebastian is not the intended target,” the driver, Nic, reminded him. “We do not have clearance to kill him.”

      “Not yet.” Dmitri reluctantly holstered his gun. Then he reached for his cell, his hand shaking slightly as anger coursed through him. “But we will…”

      “The son of a bitch ran us off the road,” Nic snapped as his anger erupted.

      “Ran you off the road.” Had Dmitri been driving, that would not have happened. He punched in a speed-dial number and swallowed hard when the boss answered immediately.

      “Is it?” the man asked.

      “We were not able to get close enough to tell,” Dmitri admitted.

      “Why not?”

      “We had interference,” he reluctantly explained, “from one of the royals.”

      “Which one?”

      “The one who held the press conference offering the reward. Prince Sebastian Cavanaugh. I had a shot. Should I have taken it?” Dmitri asked, turning to glare at the driver.

      A deep chuckle emanated from the phone. “The prince is no threat.”

      “He has military experience.” Dmitri recalled learning from the conference. He had posed as one of the reporters and then hung around with them afterward on the off chance that she might come forward for that reward. The prince had done what they had not been able to. He’d drawn her out of hiding.

      “A prince with any real military experience?” The boss snorted. “I’m sure he never left his barracks without his security detail. He is no threat.”

      “But we lost our tail on her because of him,” Dmitri said. Despite his efforts, Nic had been unable to keep the Hummer from passing them. Was it because, as Nic had grumbled, the Hummer was just more powerful than the van? Or was it because the prince was more powerful than Nic or the boss would admit?

      “The plan was to use him to find her,” the boss reminded him. “Follow the plan. Follow the prince. He’ll lead you to her.”

      “And once we have her?”

      A chuckle rattled over the cell phone. “Then you will kill Prince Sebastian Cavanaugh, of course.”

      “Of course…”

      Dmitri stared through the dust-smeared windshield at the Hummer in the distance. As the prince rounded the rear of the vehicle to approach the driver’s side, sunlight glinted off the weapon he held.

      Maybe the boss was right. Maybe the prince’s military experience meant nothing. But the tightening muscles in Dmitri’s gut told him that when the time came, Prince Sebastian Cavanaugh might not be all that easy to kill.

      WITH HANDS TREMBLING, Jessica slid the dead bolt closed. Then she peered through the sheer curtain over the window in the door. Nothing had pulled into the dirt driveway behind the Suburban, but there had been vehicles following her. First the van. Probably the reporters from the sheriff’s office.

      She shuddered at the thought of their cameras catching her on film to be broadcast everywhere…

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