The Art of Deception

him, it was without her usual arrogance. “I’d been to Europe five times before I was twelve. I spent four years in Paris on my own when I was studying.”
    She looked over his shoulder a moment, at nothing or at everything, he couldn’t be sure. “I slept with a Breton count in a chateau, skied in the Swiss Alps and hiked the moors in Cornwall. I’ve traveled, and I’ll travel again. But…” He knew she looked at the house now, because her lips curved. “I always come home.”
    “What brings you back?”
    “Papa.” She stopped and smiled fully. “Memories, familiarity. Insanity.”
    “You love him very much.” She could make things impossibly complicated or perfectly simple. The job he’d come to do was becoming more and more of a burden.
    “More than anything or anyone.” She spoke quietly, so that her voice seemed a part of the breeze. “He’s given me everything of importance: security, independence, loyalty, friendship, love—and the capability to give them back. I’d like to think someday I’ll find someone who wants that from me. My home would be with him then.”
    How could he resist the sweetness, the simplicity, she could show so unexpectedly? It wasn’t in the script, he reminded himself, but reached a hand to her face, just to touch. When she brought her hand to his, something stirred in him that wasn’t desire, but was just as potent.
    She felt the strength in him, and sensed a confusion that might have been equal to her own. Another time, she thought. Another time, it might have worked. But now, just now, there were too many other things. Deliberately she dropped her hand and turned back to the river. “I don’t know why I tell you these things,” she murmured. “It’s not in character. Do people usually let you in on their personal thoughts?”
    “No. Or maybe I haven’t been listening.”
    She smiled and, in one of her lightning changes of mood, leaped from the rock. “You’re not the type people would confide in.” Casually she linked her arm through his. “Though you seem to have strong, sturdy shoulders. You’re a little aloof,” she decided. “And just a tad pompous.”
    “Pompous?” How could she allure him one instant and infuriate him the next? “What do you mean, pompous?”
    Because he sounded dangerously like her father, she swallowed. “Just a tad,” she reminded him, nearly choking on a laugh. “Don’t be offended, Adam. Pomposity certainly has its place in the world.” When he continued to scowl down at her, she cleared her throat of another laugh. “I like the way your left brow lifts when you’re annoyed.”
    “I’m not pompous.” He spoke very precisely and watched her lips tremble with fresh amusement.
    “Perhaps that was a bad choice of words.”
    “It was a completely incorrect choice.” Just barely, he caught himself before his brow lifted. Damn the woman, he thought, and swore he wouldn’t smile.
    “Conventional.” Kirby patted his cheek. “I’m sure that’s what I meant.”
    “I’m sure those two words mean the same thing to you. I won’t be categorized by either.”
    Tilting her head, she studied him. “Maybe I’m wrong,” she said, to herself as much as him. “I’ve been wrong before. Give me a piggyback ride.”
    “What?”
    “A piggyback ride,” Kirby repeated.
    “You’re crazy.” She might be sharp, she might be talented, he’d already conceded that, but part of her brain was permanently on holiday.
    With a shrug, she started back toward the house. “I knew you wouldn’t. Pompous people never give or receive piggyback rides. It’s the law.”
    “Damn.” She was doing it to him, and he was letting her. For a moment, he stuck his hands in his pockets and stood firm. Let her play her games with her father, Adam told himself. He wasn’t biting. With another oath, he caught up to her. “You’re an exasperating woman.”
    “Why, thank you.”
    They stared at each other, him in frustration, her in amusement, until he turned his back. “Get on.”
    “If you insist.” Nimbly she jumped on his back, blew the hair out of her eyes and looked down. “Wombats, you’re tall.”
    “You’re short,” he corrected, and hitched her to a more comfortable position.
    “I’m going to be five-seven in my next life.”
    “You’d better add pounds as well as inches to your fantasy.” Her hands were light on his shoulders, her thighs firm around his waist. Ridiculous, he thought. Ridiculous to want her