“You’re not an ax murderer, right?” she asked.

Unnerved, he decided. Definitely, he was unnerved. “No.”

“I’ve never hitchhiked before.” She looked around inside his truck, probably searching for something obvious. Like body parts. “Contrary to what you must think of me, I don’t take this lightly.”

“You’re safe.”

“I bet that’s what all the bad guys say.”

“But I’m like Clint Eastwood, remember?”

She actually laughed. Laughed. A sweet, bubble of a laugh, that in return made him grin like an idiot.

She carefully settled in as if she was indeed a little princess, and hooked up her seat belt, dripping water everywhere. “You wouldn’t, by any chance, just take me to Taos?”

“Sorry, princess. Do you know how far away that is? I’ve got a ranch that needs my attention. I’ve been gone for a few days myself.” God only knew how his sister had fared in his absence. Forget Sally. How had everyone else fared? “But say the word, and I’ll call someone for you. Anyone, anywhere.”

“No, thank you. I’ll be your cook, at least for a few days.”

“Not just my cook,” he corrected. “But for all the ranch employees as well.”

She put a confident smile on her face he wasn’t sure was real or forced. “So…how many people is that?”

Forced, he decided. Great. “Depends on how many people quit while my sister was in charge,” he said grimly, and drove.


FOR SEVERAL YEARS Natalia had been having dreams. Dreams wondering what the real world was like. Dreams about being a woman first and a princess second.

She was quite certain Timothy Banning didn’t believe a word she’d said about herself or her heritage, but that was fine. She didn’t need him to believe.

In fact, his disbelief worked in her favor, because for the first time ever, her dream could come true, if only for a few days.

She could be a woman first.

And a princess a very distant second.

“How much farther is your ranch?” she asked, avidly soaking up the landscape. She appeared to be stranded in a desert of grass, grass and more grass. North-central Texas was, without a doubt, one of the flattest places she’d ever seen. So different from her home, which was nestled high in the mountains, between Austria and Switzerland, surrounded by incredible vistas and wild forests.

She thought she’d miss home, but this land was beautiful, too, in a stark sort of way. The terrain was broken up by a few trees here and there, pecan and oak, it appeared. Very different.

She liked it.

“About forty-five more miles.” They’d already made the requested stop at the store, and he’d been right. No leather. But she’d borrowed against her wages and on top of the jeans and T-shirts, had managed to find some interesting wild-apple-green lip gloss, so the whole thing hadn’t been a waste. Now her cowboy looked suddenly tense, as if he regretted taking her with him.

“I’m not crazy or dangerous or anything,” she said. “Just so you know. I wouldn’t hurt anyone on your ranch.”

That made him grin, and oh, my, it was a very appealing one. Slow and easy. Sure and sexy. His teeth were white and straight, except for a crooked eyetooth, which somehow made him look mischievous when he showed it. His face, lean and angular, looked tanned and rugged. He had laugh lines fanning out from his eyes, assuring her he shot that grin of his often. Then there was his body, all long and muscular, and she’d bet it wasn’t any sort of a gym-made body either, but one finely honed from hard physical labor.

And let’s not forget his hands, which were big and sure of themselves on the wheel, tanned and work roughened. Tough. Oddly enough, the most wicked thoughts ran through her head at the sight of those hands.

No doubt, Amelia Grundy would shake her finger and warn her about a man like this. And yet Amelia wasn’t around. For once it was just Natalia.

A woman first, princess second.

Dangerous thoughts. Dangerous but fun. She wondered if he knew how to use those long fingers on a woman, wondered if-

“You’re looking a little flushed there, princess.” He flicked her a glance. “You okay?”

“Of course.”

But she wasn’t okay. She was as crazy as he suspected if she was really daydreaming about this man. She didn’t know what she expected from her Clint Eastwood, she’d never taken the fantasy that far. But behind those green eyes and easy smile was an obvious intelligence that went beyond cow-wrangling abilities.

She sat and wondered about him for a good long while. Until he pulled off the highway onto a road with a sign that said Banning Ranch, 1898.

“Your family has been here a long time.” She liked that. In her life, traditions and family pride meant something. Apparently, it meant something to this man, too.

“Yeah, ever since my great-great-grandfather won the place in a card game over a century ago.”

She shot him a look of horror, which only made him laugh again. “The Wild, Wild West. The good old days.”

“Your great-great-grandfather should have been ashamed of himself.”

“And he might have been,” Tim agreed. “But since my great-great-grandmother’s father shot him a few years later for cheating on his only daughter, we’ll never know.”

She narrowed her eyes at him but he only smiled guilelessly, that slow, easy smile that tended to leave her feeling like jelly. “You have quite the colorful history.”

“I have the colorful history?” He laughed. “Hey, I’m not the princess.”

She had no idea if he was teasing. “I really am,” she said. “A princess.”

“Like I said. Colorful history.”

He still didn’t believe her, but that he had been so easy about it, so nonjudgmental…she could really fall for that alone.

As if she’d ever really fall for a cowboy.

Or he for a princess.

“Almost there,” he said, then nodded toward a ranch house at the end of the road. “That’s the main house.”

Home was a freshly painted two-story ranch house, with flowers in the flower beds and neat rows of trees lining the driveway. It was bigger than she had imagined, much bigger, and behind the house she could see several more buildings, corrals and a tower of hay.

“What are you thinking about?” he asked as she stared.

“That I’m grateful I didn’t agree to clean for my bed and board.”

He laughed.

Natalia didn’t. She’d taken gourmet classes, foreign gourmet classes, to please herself, and as a result, she was pretty good at froufrou party food-when she kept the ingredients straight and didn’t mix up the measurements. But she’d never cooked regular food, and certainly not for a bunch of hardworking, rough and tough ranch hands.

She really should have thought of this sooner.

But as she’d been doing all her life, she sucked up the fear and put her badass-princess face on. She’d do this. And she’d do it right.

Hopefully.

4

NATALIA GOT OUT of the truck and looked around. She was used to people. Used to being the center of attention, sought out and acknowledged. It came with the whole princess thing. People loved royals.

But out here, with the vast sky and even vaster landscape, she wasn’t the center of attention. There were no crowds to wave to. No movie theaters, no tattoo parlor, no dry cleaners…nothing but space.

She felt as though she’d stepped foot on another planet.

Which brought her to another point. Tim had been nothing but sweet and compassionate, taking in what he seemed to think was a crazy woman, all to get her off the street.

What kind of man did that?

And what kind of woman let him? Was she simply acting on impulse-cruel impulse, in fact-wanting that time to herself at Tim’s expense?

Today was Sunday. The wedding wasn’t until next Saturday. She’d originally figured on an expensive Taos hotel, lots of room service and time alone to enjoy a good book and the pool.

But after today’s fiasco, something else had taken root. The need to do this, to prove herself, both to her family and herself. To be normal. A normal woman.

With all her heart she wanted that, and part of being a woman, she told herself, would certainly include taking care of the people she cared about.

Stupid as it may be, she cared about this man who’d stopped for a perfect stranger. She could help both him and herself.

And still make the wedding.

“Take until tomorrow to acclimate,” Tim said, coming to stand beside her. His arm brushed hers, a simple, uncalculated touch, yet her pulse kicked up a gear. She stood still to be sure, but yep, those were lust hormones racing through her veins faster than the speed of light. Bad, bad princess.

It was also bad how much she enjoyed following him during his tour, watching his very watchable behind and thighs in those jeans nearly worn through in the most interesting of places. He showed her the main house, the bunkhouse where some of his ranch hands lived, and pointed out the two barns; one filled with equipment, one filled with animals. He offered to show her inside those barns, but she hadn’t yet figured out how to mention one little detail she’d forgotten until now.

She was afraid of animals.

So she declined the tour of the barn.

“Why don’t you change out of your wet clothes, then relax until morning?” he suggested when she stood on his porch looking over the vast, open land.

It was quiet here, very quiet. Except for this little eventful trip, there hadn’t been many times in Natalia’s life when she felt as quiet. Alone.

Suddenly all her bravado and swagger deserted her, and she wished she knew this man better, because weak as it sounded, she would have liked to set her head on his very capable-looking shoulder. Let him shield her from the unknown. Curl into his body and be protected.