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She shook her head and ran trembling fingers through her hair. “Not now . . .”
His smile was sad, but genuine. “Then I think you should get cleaned up and rest. It’s after midnight—”
“Oh.” For the first time that night, Tiffany was aware of her appearance. She looked down at her vest and saw the bloodstains discoloring the delicate gray wool. The sleeves of her pink blouse were rolled over her arms and stained with sweat and blood. She felt the urge to cry all over again when she looked up from her disheveled clothing and noticed the concern in Zane’s gentle gray eyes.
Instead of falling victim to her emotions, she raised her head proudly and managed a stiff smile. “I’ll be fine in the morning. This night has been a shock.”
“Obviously.”
“If you’ll excuse me . . .”
When she rose from the chair, her knees felt unsteady, but she managed to stand with a modicum of dignity despite her disheveled appearance.
Zane picked up her barely touched glass. “I don’t think you should be alone.”
Involuntarily she stiffened. Ellery’s words from long ago, just after her father had died, echoed in her mind. “You shouldn’t be alone, Tiffany,” Ellery had insisted. “You need a man to care for you.” In her grief, Tiffany had been fool enough to believe him.
She lifted her chin fractionally. “I’ll be fine, Mr. Sheridan,” she assured him with a calm smile. “I’ve been alone for over four years. I think I can manage one more night.”
He noticed the slight trembling of her fingers, the doubt in her clear blue eyes, and realized that she was the most damnably intriguing woman he had ever met.
“I’ll stay with you.”
“That won’t be necessary.”
“The mare’s not out of the woods yet.”
Tiffany hesitated only slightly. Zane’s presence did lend a certain security. She remembered his quick, sure movements as he tried to revive Ebony Wine’s dead colt. With a shake of her head, she tried to convince herself that she didn’t need him. “Mac can take care of Ebony Wine.”
“And it wouldn’t hurt to have an extra pair of hands.”
She was about to protest. She raised her hand automatically and then dropped it. “Don’t get me wrong, Zane,” she said softly, her tongue nearly tripping on the familiarity of his first name. “It’s not that I don’t appreciate what you’ve done tonight. I do. But the foal is dead.” She shuddered and hugged her arms around her abdomen. “And Mac will attend to Ebony Wine.” She shook her head at the vision of the dead little colt lying on the thick bed of straw. “I . . . I think it would be best if you would just leave for now. I know that we still have things to discuss, but certainly they’ll wait until morning.”
“I suppose.” Zane glanced at the portrait of Devil’s Gambit hanging proudly over the mantel. He had the eerie feeling that somehow the tense drama he had witnessed earlier in the foaling shed was linked to the disappearance of the proud stallion.Impossible.And yet he had a gut feeling that the two tragic events were connected.
As if Tiffany had read his thoughts, she shuddered. Zane was across the room in an instant. Tiffany wanted to protest when his strong arms enfolded her against him, but she couldn’t. The warmth of his body and the protection of his embrace felt as natural as the gentle rain beating softly against the windowpanes. He plucked a piece of straw from her hair and tenderly let his lips press a soft kiss against her forehead. The gesture was so filled with kindness and empathy that Tiffany felt her knees buckle and her eyes fill with tears.
“I . . . I think you should go,” she whispered hoarsely, afraid of her response to his masculinity. Damn him! She wanted to lean on him. What kind of a fool was she? Hadn’t she learned her lessons about men long ago from Ellery?
“Shh.” He ignored her protests and led her gently out of the den, through the foyer and up the stairs. “Come on, lady,” he whispered into her hair. “Give yourself a break and let me take care of you.”
She felt herself melt inside. “I don’t think, I mean I don’t need—”
“What you need is to soak in a hot tub, wrap yourself in one of those god-awful flannel nightgowns and fall into bed with a glass of brandy.”
It sounded like heaven, but Tiffany couldn’t forget that the tenderness of the man touching her so intimately might be nothing more than a ploy to extract information from her. At this moment she was too tired to really give a damn, but she couldn’t forget her earlier instincts about him. He was engaged in a vendetta of sorts; she could feel it in her bones. Try as she would, Tiffany couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling that Zane Sheridan, whoever the hell he was, would prove to be the enemy.
Zane left Tiffany in the master bedroom. Once she was certain he had gone downstairs, she peeled off her soiled clothes, threw them in a hamper and walked into the adjacent bathroom.
As she settled into the hot water of the marble tub, her mind continued to revolve around the events of the past few weeks. If the first foal’s death had been a shock, the second had been terrifying. Now two more foals by Moon Shadow had died mysteriously. Each foal had been only a few hours old, with the exception of Charlatan, who had survived for a few hope-filled days.
Just wait until Rod Crawford gets hold of this story,she thought as she absently lathered her body. The wire services would print it in a minute and she’d have more reporters crawling all over the place than she could imagine. If that wasn’t enough, Zane Sheridan’s theories about Devil’s Gambit’s fate would stir up the press and get them interested all over again in what was happening at Rhodes Breeding Farm.And the scandal. Lord, think of the scandal!
Tiffany sank deeper into the tub, and didn’t notice that her hair was getting wet.
What about Zane Sheridan? Was he here as friend or foe? She sighed as she considered the roguish man who had helped her upstairs. One minute he seemed intent on some vague, undisclosed revenge, and the next his concern for her and the farm seemed genuine.Don’t trust him, Tiffany,the rational side of her nature insisted.
“Men,” she muttered ungraciously. “I’ll never understand them.” Her frown trembled a little as she thought about Ellery, the husband she had tried to love. Marrying him had probably been the biggest mistake of her life. The moment she had become Mrs. Ellery Rhodes, he seemed to have changed and his interest in her had faded with each passing day. “Dad warned you,” she chided herself.” You were just too bullheaded to listen.”
