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Laura deliberately didn’t wait to hear more. “We’ll fly home on Monday,” she told Trey.
There was an instant of silence. “Are you serious?”
“Of course.”
“Is something wrong, Sis?” Trey asked, and Laura knew that sixth sense they shared was at work again.
She managed a convincing laugh. “Don’t be silly. I wouldn’t miss this party for the world. It’ll be the highlight of the year at the Triple C.”
When she finally rang off, Tara stared at her in disbelief. “You don’t really intend to fly home on Monday, do you?”
“Why not?” Laura countered.
“We left half our clothes at the hotel in London. Do you realize how much packing we’ll have to do before we leave?”
“Then we’d better get at it, hadn’t we?” Laura said as Max wheeled his chair into the room.
“Get at what?” he demanded, splitting his attention between the two of them.
“Tara will explain,” Laura told him. “I’m going up and start packing.”
Chapter Eight
The plane’s shadow raced across the limitless expanse of grass that marked the plains of eastern Montana. From the cabin’s porthole window, Laura looked down on the landscape below, devoid of any signs of human habitation. The plane’s altitude increased the land’s appearance of flatness. But Laura knew the way it rolled and dipped, sometimes smoothly like a calm grass sea and at other times roughly like an angry one.
She hadn’t needed a visible boundary to know the minute the private jet had entered the skies above the Calder range. She had known it instinctively, without the need for an obvious landmark. Laura decided it was something that came from being born a Calder.
It was that same instinct that caused her to scan the stretch of land to the southwest. Her search was rewarded with the sighting of a large collection of buildings that seemed to spring out of nowhere. A stranger would have mistaken it for a town, but Laura knew she was looking at the headquarters of the Triple C Ranch
In many respects the headquarters resembled a small town, complete with housing for the hired help and their families; a commissary stocked with food staples, hardware, work clothes, video rentals, and other sundry items; a central mail pick-up and drop-off; a gas station; a fire station; and a fully equipped first-aid station. There was even a cook-shack that could be loosely considered a restaurant.
The Triple C was more than forty miles from the nearest town and nearly two hundred miles from anything that resembled a city. Which made it essential for the ranch to be as self-sufficient as possible. It had become such a part of her life that Laura took it for granted, even as she identified each individual building.
But her gaze fastened on the massive, two-story house that towered over all the others, the white of its exterior walls making it stand out against the spring green of the grass. It had long ago been dubbed The Homestead, a name that conjured up images of something rustic and old. The Homestead might be old, but there was nothing rustic about it. It stood tall and proud, a gleaming white jewel atop the knoll.
The door to the cockpit opened, pulling Laura’s attention away from the window. The copilot stepped into the opening, flicked a glance at the dozing, jet-legged Tara and directed his gaze at Laura.
“Let Mrs. Calder know that we’ll be landing shortly.”
“Of course,” Laura replied.
When he disappeared back inside the cockpit, Laura reached across the aisle of the private jet and nudged Tara’s arm. She stirred, then sent a slightly groggy look at Laura. “Are we there?”
“Almost.”
Tara sat up and gently pressed her fingers to her eyes as if to force the sleep from them. But she didn’t do anything so indelicate as to rub them and risk smearing her makeup. Lowering her hands, she lifted her head and automatically gave her seat belt a tightening tug.
“What a shame we didn’t spend a few days in New York to break up this long flight,” Tara declared on a sigh.
“If we had, I wouldn’t have made it back in time for Quint’s party,” Laura reminded her as she listened with half an ear to the grinding whirr of the landing gear being lowered.
“Quint’s party is the reason you cut our trip short, isn’t it?” Tara’s questioning look held concern and uncertainty.
“Of course.” There was the thud of the landing gear locking into position.
“I wondered,” Tara admitted. “I thought your sudden decision might have had something to do with the information Max found out about Sebastian.”
Looking amused, Laura eyed her askance. “You aren’t really suggesting that I ran from the scene with a broken heart, are you? Honestly, Tara, can you imagine me doing that?”
