Before he lost the nerve, he surged forward again.

Slid urgent fingers into her thick black hair.

Bent to her for a too-necessary kiss.

Arden….

With a little sigh she parted her glossy lips to him, warm and receptive and increasingly, gloriously less poised. She was everything female, milk and magnolias and softness and beauty, and she’d once been his. For a long, blissful moment, life felt like it had before. Back when he’d had a prosperous future to offer and a heritage to be proud of, and what he’d foolishly thought was honor….

Dear Reader,

It’s great to be back at Silhouette! One of the more intriguing parts of THE GRAIL KEEPERS books I wrote for the Silhouette Bombshell line was the modern secret society of powerful men. Now in THE BLADE KEEPERS, I get to explore a few of those men.

THE BLADE KEEPERS truly would not be possible without the encouragement and support from several important people. First and foremost, I have to thank the ladies of the Texas Read ’Ems group, who strongly encouraged me to pursue the idea of writing about exiled Comitatus members—and who regularly invite me out of my cave and into the world of book lovers and good food. Then there are my faithful critiquers, including Juliet Burns, Kayli and Toni, and my creative writing students at Tarrant County College, who help remind me every day to write for the love of writing. Finally, to my agent, Paige Wheeler of Folio, and my beloved editor Natashya Wilson, as well as Patience Smith and Mary Theresa Hussey, also of Silhouette Books; you have more faith in me than I sometimes do, and I have no words to convey my gratitude. But I’ll try “thank you.”

Evelyn Vaughn

Knight in Blue Jeans
Evelyn Vaughn

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

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EVELYN VAUGHN

believes in many magicks, particularly the magic of storytelling. She has written fiction since she could print words, first publishing a ghost story in a newspaper contest at the age of twelve. Since then, along with her books for Silhouette, she has written four historical romances and a handful of fantasy short stories, some under the name Yvonne Jocks. She loves movies and videos, and is an unapologetic TV addict, still trying to figure out both how to time travel and how to meet up with some of her favorite characters. Even as an English teacher at Tarrant County College SE, in Fort Worth, Texas, Evelyn believes in the magic of stories, movies, books and dreams. Luckily, her imaginary friends and her cats seem to get along.

Evelyn loves to talk about stories and characters, especially her own. Please write her at Yvaughn@aol.com, or at P.O. Box 6, Euless, TX 76039. Or check out her Web site at www.evelynvaughn.homestead.com.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Prologue

One year ago

A voice broke the candlelit hush of the secret society’s underground lair. “Nope. I’m sticking with bite me.”

The six suits across the ebony table from Smith Donnell tensed with outrage. His three friends, behind him, tensed with more familiar dismay.

“Just speaking for myself,” Smith added for their sake.

“And hardly even that,” noted his blond buddy, Mitch. “He’s kidding—Right, Smith? Ha, ha! Ha. Apologize to the nice society elders and we’ll just—”

“But bite me,” Smith continued. “This is beneath the Comitatus.”

“—commit social and financial suicide,” Mitch edited with resignation.

“How dare you?” began Phil Stuart, their overlord. Comitatus leaders were always Stuarts. The Bluetooth headset on one ear made the thirtysomething billionaire look out of place in this stone-lined vault beneath Mount Vernon.

Yeah. That Mount Vernon.

“Dare?” Smith challenged now. “We’re an ancient secret society! We should be as daring as the knights we descended from, not make war on women.”

“Not all women,” clarified some guy with a French accent. “Only those who prove…problematic.”

Smith’s friend Trace said, “Oh. That makes it okay, then.”

Smith couldn’t tell if that was sarcasm or not. Trace was big, not witty.

“Since when do we worry about feminine empowerment?” Smith liked his women saucy—one special woman in particular. But he was understandably biased. “It doesn’t hurt us. To start acting like bullies, hiding cowardice behind—”

“Enough!” Stuart slammed his fist on the table, his face flushing to match his red hair. An unnamed society elder behind him—they didn’t wear name tags—growled.

“It won’t be enough, will it?” whispered Mitch mournfully.

“It never is,” Quinn, their fourth, whispered back. The men of Donnell Security had known each other since college. They understood Smith’s temper.

Smith folded his arms, scowling. “Didn’t the Comitatus once defend the weak and the righteous? You act like we’re just another old boys’ network protecting our exclusivity. Our racial, financial and sexual…I mean…”

He shifted his weight, annoyed. “Our…” Way to ruin a good tirade.

“Chauvinistic?” suggested Quinn quietly, behind him. None of them were stupid—with the possible exception of Trace. But Quinn was the most intelligent.

“Yeah,” agreed Smith with a finger jab. “Chauvinistic exclusivity.”

“You pledged loyalty to your overlord,” warned Stuart. “I, not you, decide the proper course for the Comitatus. Your job is to obey me.”

Obey? Smith could hear Mitch whispering, “Let it go, let it go, for the love of all things precious…”

“My job is to defend the society that brought honor into my life. I won’t watch fearmongers destroy the greatness we once had. Allegedly had.”

“You pledged your life to me,” insisted Stuart, leaning across the table into Smith’s space. “Your fortune, your sacred honor.” Like their fathers before them, and their fathers’ fathers, blah blah blah.

“Nope.” Smith didn’t flinch. “I pledged myself to your uncle. He made a much better leader than you have. You? Kind of suck.”

The moment stretched, pregnant with oh-no-you-didn’t. By challenging the succession, Smith had just finished himself with the society. That imagined rumbling noise was probably his fathers’ fathers spinning in their graves.

Was heresy really a killing offense in the Comitatus? Smith tensed, just in case. But he ran a booming business judging threats, and sure enough—

“Get out,” commanded Phil Stuart through his teeth.

“Gladly.” Smith turned and walked, trusting his friends to watch his back.

“Don’t take your knife,” warned their overlord as Smith approached the rack where all Comitatus members left their traditional weapons—showy, long-bladed knives—upon entering any ritual meeting place. The two men guarding it squared their shoulders in preparation for a fight. It might be fun, but…

“We used to use swords, you know,” Smith called over his shoulder as he passed, just to be contrary. “Back when our honor meant something!”

Assuming it ever really had.

The last thing he heard before the heavy doors shut behind him was a deep growl—and Phil Stuart asking his partners, “And where do you stand?”

Hell. No matter what Mitch, Trace and Quinn chose, this had the makings of an awkward ride home. Smith jogged angrily up worn stone steps once trod by George Washington, freemasons and other Comitatus. High-tech security—a system Smith had updated himself—presented a stark contrast to the ancient setting, like the society itself. The modern Comitatus had infiltrated all levels of business and politics. It was a powerful and long-lived organization. Legend held that it had once been great.

Smith had believed in that greatness. But now…

He had barely reached the hidden garden exit behind the ornate tomb before Mitch caught up to him. Trace followed like an oversized shadow. Neither friend carried a ceremonial knife. They’d abdicated their positions, too.

Smith hated like hell to apologize, but…“I’m sorry.”

“About our fortunes?” demanded Trace as they walked, putting distance between themselves and any guards. They’d all just made some deadly enemies, after all, which explained Trace’s sneer. “Or just our lives and sacred honors?”

Smith looked from one friend to the other—and realized Quinn wouldn’t be following them. Hell. “Your honor’s alive and kicking. You didn’t have to fall on your swords to prove it.”

“You mean, fall on our knives.” Mitch’s grin was even brighter than his hair. “Oh, well. Belonging to a secret cabal of ultimate power just isn’t what it used to be. I mean, even Trace would have drawn the line at hunting down women.”

Trace nodded in big, sullen agreement. Then he frowned. “Hey!”

And there they stood, waiting for Smith, suddenly their leader, to say what happened next. As if he had any idea, beyond…bad. Bad, bad things. They’d been born into this society. They’d taken oaths at the age of fifteen. And now…

“What say we get drunk?” he suggested, to their certain approval.

Drunk was the only way he would manage what he had to do next.

It was the only way to say goodbye to Arden Leigh.

Chapter 1

“Beauty is power; a smile is its sword.” —John Ray, English naturalist

Arden was so busy with her hostess duties that she didn’t notice the small exodus until her guest of honor pointed it out.

“I can always tell I’m back in the South,” drawled gubernatorial candidate Molly Johannes, “when certain menfolk head off to talk on their own.”

Then Arden saw it and silently cursed herself. True, she’d had to monitor the needs of her guests, the caterers and the string quartet. That was why she hadn’t bothered with an escort tonight. Her late stepmother had done such an excellent job with such functions, Arden didn’t want to disappoint her memory. And true, men often drifted away to private conversation in their social circle—a common holdover from the days of brandy and cigars. But Arden expected better than “common,” especially from her father.

Her first thought was, Well, sugar. Sugar meaning something nastier.

But she simply smiled her Miss Dallas smile, complete with dimples, and covered for the men. “As long as they’re talking about how to make you governor, Comptroller Johannes, I wouldn’t hold their little rituals against them.”

“Call me Molly, please! State Comptroller is a mouthful even for the state comptroller.” The stocky, middle-aged woman shook her head with amusement. “I’m still not sure why an old boys’ club like your daddy’s is willing to support me, though I suspect you had something to do with it. But as long as they believe in my message, I’m willing to grant them as much time in their clubhouse as they want.”

Arden laughed with her. But as soon as she got Molly talking to another guest, she took a moment to slip out back, into the shadowy August heat of her father’s gardens. The clink of wineglasses and murmur of conversation faded like the brightly lit rooms as she let the French door swing shut behind her—and glimpsed, just for a moment, a twinkling of light across the darkness.

She blinked. It had been years since Dallas County had seen many fireflies outside the botanical gardens. Highland Park—a small, exclusive city surrounded by the larger sprawl of Dallas—had plenty of landscaping and parks, and yet…

The air-conditioned chill of indoors faded off her bare arms as Arden scanned the stone paths, the swimming pool, the magnolia and live-oak trees, all the way back to the estate’s old well. The light didn’t repeat.

She noted the steady glow from what had once been a guest-house but now was her father’s detached study. Shadows moved behind the shades—the usual deserters from her soiree, no doubt. So she headed toward the detached den to sweetly bully her father and his friends back into their public responsibilities.

Which is when a dark-haired, dark-suited young man emerged from behind the trunk of the nearest oak. That alone startled her, even before she registered the huge hunting knife in his hands.

Really. A hunting knife paired with a Ralph Lauren suit.

Only the unreality of it explained how easily she folded her bare arms, cocked her head and narrowed her eyes. “So much for Daddy’s top-notch security,” she drawled in accusation. “Whatever do you think you’re doing?”

The extra long serrated blade made her stomach go all knotty and sick. But breeding, and her former experience in pageants, gave her skill at hiding her feelings, especially around a man younger than her twenty-five years.

Also? Fear had nothing on her annoyance.

“You need to go back inside the house now,” ordered the young man. He wore a small goatee and a had Yankee accent. Massachusetts, she recognized with an even greater flare of surprise. Unless she was mistaken, and roving bands of Bostonians had migrated down to the Lone Star State for a surprisingly well-dressed crime spree, this was one of her guests! But how had she not caught his name?

Now she did speak her mind. “You come to my party, drink my champagne, eat my hors d’oeuvres and now you threaten me? Why, that’s just…tacky.”

“You think I’m joking?”

“My father and half of Texas society are just a scream away.”

Menace twisted his mouth. “Like they’d hear you through closed doors.”

“Oh…” Arden smiled, deliberately showing dimples as she bared her perfect teeth at him. “They’ll hear me.”

He stepped even nearer, so close that she could smell his aftershave—Armani Black—and count the teeth on his knife’s serrated blade. Now would be an excellent time to scream, but he said, “Your research and prying have caused enough trouble already.”

Which distracted her. Her research? That could mean only one thing, and Arden’s lips parted in amazement. Suddenly this strange intercession made weird sense. “You mean, it’s true? There really is a secret society of powerful—”

The knife, cold against her throat, confirmed her guess.

Yay?

“If you’re smart, you will never refer to such a thing again,” Boston warned, making sure Arden could feel the toothy knife above her triple strand of evening diamonds. She tried very hard not to swallow. She could barely breathe. “You will go on behaving yourself, and hosting your little parties, and doing your little charity works. And if you’re a good girl, and stay out of matters that don’t involve you, perhaps—”

Then he dropped.

That would be from the arc of an unexpected tree branch, ending in a sick crack against his head.

The knife landed beside Arden’s perfectly pedicured foot. A brown-haired man sank to one knee, strangely like a courtier about to propose, to check Boston’s pulse with one hand. Unconscious like that, Arden’s attacker looked increasingly young.

Her rescuer kept the tree branch. He looked up, met her gaze—and recognition stabbed through her. Arden knew that angle of brows over mischievous brown eyes, and the sullen-cowboy set to his jaw. She knew the toffee-brown hair by touch, as well as sight. She knew that easy, athletic body, although he’d once dressed far better than his current jeans and dark, long-sleeved tee—a suspicious fashion choice for August in Texas.

But it wasn’t just recognition that made her feel even more unsteady than she had with a knife to her throat.

“Smith.” The name of the man who’d broken her heart by dumping her without explanation. The man who’d simply vanished from her world.

The man she’d once thought she would marry.

No, what cut the deepest was her recognition, from how her pulse sped up and her breath caught—that she wasn’t nearly as over the bastard as she’d hoped.

Oh…sugar.

Smith Donnell grinned as he rose to stand taller than her despite her heels, branch in one hand and Boston’s knife safe in the other. “Hey, Arden,” he greeted cheerfully, as if they’d just run into each other at the club. As if a stranger hadn’t just threatened her. As if he had any right to be cordial! “How’ve you been?”

For a minute, Smith feared that Arden might faint. Or maybe she would attack him with balled fists and harder words. She’d always been a lot more of a firecracker than her poised, beauty-queen looks let on—and she was gorgeous, especially in a green gown that matched her wide eyes, with that thick, Irish-black hair drawn off her slender neck, showing all that peaches-and-cream skin….

Smith forced himself to keep breathing. If he were a lesser man, he might have gone a little wobbly himself. And he’d known there was a possibility of seeing her tonight, although he hadn’t intended to be seen.

She’d had no idea.

Instead of fainting or fists, Arden smiled that adorable, dimpled smile that had always put him on guard. She extended both hands, saw that his hands were busy with weaponry, and made do with an air kiss. “Smith Donnell, as I live and breathe! How long has it been, three years?”

Smith felt his own grin waver at her overestimation, as well as the hauntingly familiar magnolia scent of her. “Barely a year, to tell the truth.”

She waved the idea away. “Time flies, doesn’t it? I’ve been right as rain, thank you for asking. Likely you heard that my stepmother passed. That’s been even harder on Daddy and Jeff—you remember my little brother?—than on me. But what about you? You’re looking…”

Smith waited for her to put a polite-yet-pointed spin on that one. His life since the big defection at Mount Vernon had been embarrassingly hand-to-mouth. Not every powerful businessman in the world belonged to the Comitatus, of course. Just enough of them to keep the occasional “traitors” from getting references, credit or clean background checks.

Go figure. Secret societies sucked when it came to severance packages.

“Fit,” she decided brightly, a euphemism if ever he’d heard one. “So whatever brought you into my daddy’s backyard, where you ought not to be, just in time to play knight in shining armor against…?”

As if in an afterthought, she nudged the suited shoulder of her attacker with her strappy dress shoe. Her full lips pulled into an adorable pout of annoyance. He could spend all night just watching her pout. He used to deliberately provoke it.

“I believe his name’s Lowell,” Smith admitted. No wonder the Comitatus had wanted Donnell Security for their special crusade a year ago, with incompetents like this running around. Lowell had been just plain stupid, going straight for the threats…but then again, the threatening and the posturing illustrated Smith’s problem with the whole organization. “Though we haven’t been formally introduced.”

“And yet here you are. Maybe chivalry isn’t dead.” Her eyes danced at him. “Other than the you-hitting-him-from-behind part.”

He shouldn’t feel deflated at that. Their split should’ve cleared up any delusions she had about his never-steadfast honor. But Arden’s easy poise still brought out his contrary side. “I would’ve challenged him to a duel, but I left my fencing foil with my tuxedo.”

“Ah, but you still have that sharp wit of yours, don’t you?” Her composure was starting to worry him, and he’d already been worried. Worried enough to come out of hiding when he saw her threatened. Worried enough to risk his entire erased existence and everything he was accomplishing with that invisibility.

“So, uh…what did Lowell here mean about you doing research into secret societies?” He prayed his betrayal hadn’t somehow involved her in this.

Rather than reassure him, she wrinkled her pixie nose in that teasing way that used to make his stomach flip. Still did. “Now if I told, it wouldn’t be secret, would it? But look at me, chatting away. I really should call security and get back to my invited guests.” Still, she couldn’t be quite that rude; it all but went against her religion. “Why don’t you come inside and have something to eat? Jeff’s away at camp, but Daddy will be just thrilled to see you again.”

Her ability to spout social lies the size of the Watergate cover-up still amazed him. “Haven’t you got a hot date to get back to?”

“Three,” she assured him, not missing a beat. He half believed her. “But you won’t be in our way.”

“Actually, sweetness,” he said, satisfied at her almost-wince over the endearment, “you’d be doing me a favor if you didn’t mention me being here at all.” He pressed the branch into her hands. “Or, at least, don’t tell anyone my name. I can’t say why, just now, but…”

She arched a perfect brow. “But I owe you?” They both knew that, with the way he’d dumped her, he would have to save her life several times before they were even. Still, she had the grace to pretend. “I never could say no to you, could I?”

“Actually, you could.” He’d never worked so hard to catch a woman in his life—and then he’d had to go and throw her back, right before he’d meant to seal the deal. Her perfection had been her only flaw. Of all the things he’d lost that night at Mount Vernon…“You really do look fine, Arden Leigh. Always did.”

For a moment, her facade faltered. Could that be lingering pain in her big, lash-shadowed eyes? Did she want to kiss him as badly as he did her? Could she be human for him, just once more? But the moment passed, and he suspected it was mere wishful thinking on his part.

Not to mention…secrecy and all. Big society plans. Vengeance to be wrought and inner-circle VIPs to betray.

“Give me a count of twenty-five?” he asked, backing away a step. On what should not have been an afterthought, he wiped his prints off the ceremonial knife and flipped it sharply into the manicured lawn, well away from Lowell. When Arden hesitated, eyebrows lifted in challenge, he added, “Please?”

“One,” Arden drawled obligingly. “Two…”

Hell. Before he lost his nerve, he surged forward again.

Slid urgent fingers into her thick black hair.

Bent to her for a too-necessary kiss.

Arden…

With a little sigh, she parted her glossy lips to him, warm and receptive and increasingly, gloriously, less poised. She was everything female, milk and magnolias and softness and beauty, and she’d once been his. For a long, blissful moment, life felt like it had before. Back when he’d had a prosperous future to offer, and a heritage to be proud of, and what he’d foolishly thought was honor.

Back when, amazingly enough, he’d had her. After a year without her, to have her so close, so his, felt—

Oof! With a sharp jab of the branch into his ribs, Arden put an end to the kiss. Smith felt both relieved and shattered. She stared dazedly up at him, her gaze as raw and resentful as his felt, and he feared the coming accusations, didn’t know how he could ever explain himself.

Instead, after regaining her composure with a single, shaky breath despite her hair now falling in messy loops to her bare shoulders, Arden said, “Eleven. Twelve.”

Smith ran. It was a big yard. He’d barely vaulted the stone wall before he heard Arden’s voice split the night. “Daddy!”

In the excitement that followed, Smith had no trouble meeting with Mitch and Trace, whom he’d been signaling with his penlight before Arden’s attacker distracted him. As the local Comitatus leadership poured into the garden to Arden’s cries, Smith and Mitch stole into the office they’d vacated.

“Niiice.” Trace grinned from his position as guard outside. “She’s still hot.”

“Shut up.” Smith punched a code into the security pad with the end of his penlight. The society’s new security was top notch, but Smith was better. Mitch was already moving around Donaldson Leigh’s dark, heavily furnished den, collecting the surveillance equipment that they’d hidden that afternoon under the cover of all the florists and caterers who’d swarmed the property in preparation for Arden’s big night.

“Weird though these words feel leaving my mouth, Trace is right,” Mitch admitted, even as he unscrewed a nearly invisible, key logger from Leigh’s keyboard cable. “The whole thing had a kind of old-romance, Robin-Hood-and-Maid-Marian look to it.”

“Except that this isn’t a movie,” Smith reminded him, still mulling over the guard’s accusation. Your research and prying have caused enough trouble already. Arden should have been safe. What had he gotten her into? “Are you done?”

“Almost.” Humming a happy little ditty, Mitch stretched to retrieve another tiny, voice-activated microrecorder from a hanging planter. “We’re in luck! Nobody watered.”

“They won’t leave this place empty for—”

“Got it!” Mitch pocketed the recorder and made for the door. “Here’s hoping they got to the best plotting and self-implication before Arden interrupted things. Good job stalling her, by the way.”

Yeah. That’s what Smith had been doing. Stalling her.

“Shut up.” But instead of running, Smith paused beside what looked like an antique gun safe just inside the door. It wouldn’t hold guns. Inside would be at least five long, toothy, ceremonial knives—and suddenly he wanted them.

Rather, he didn’t want Donaldson Leigh and the others to have them. The knives represented the society. He itched to challenge that.

Especially when his own father stood with them.

“What happened to low profile?” demanded Mitch, hovering at the closed door. “What happened to nobody knowing we were ever here? Or is Arden going to talk anyway?”

If Arden talked, they might as well add insult to injury and take the knives. It’s not like she owed Smith that kind of trust. And yet…

Trace drummed his fingers on the doorjamb. “Guys! Some suits are headed back this way. As long as we’re hitting people with sticks tonight…?”

“She won’t talk,” Smith decided. Hoped. “Not right off, anyway. Let’s go before Trace starts a brawl.”

Mitch opened the door and Smith tapped in the code to again disable the alarm, careful to leave no fingerprints. The knives, though…Those, he left.

It wasn’t like they were swords. It wasn’t like they held real value.

Then the three exiles from the most powerful secret society in the world escaped from Donaldson Leigh’s property—with what might be the Comitatus’s plans to secretly destroy the female gubernatorial candidate inside.

Donaldson Leigh hungered to crack his fist across young Prescott Lowell’s jaw. But, no. The Comitatus could not claim to be the apex of civilization while behaving like the unwashed masses.

Instead, he pointed at the boy with his ceremonial knife. “Down.”

“But I had to threaten her. I was guarding—”

“DOWN!” Civilization also depended on knowing one’s place.

The boy—he couldn’t be more than twenty-three—dropped to his knees, defeated. At Leigh’s glare, he laid his ceremonial knife on the marble floor in front of him. Whether or not he got it back…

“You were to guard us against our enemies, you fool. Not against wandering family members!”

“But…she knows about us!” Apparently not content to spout these lies, Lowell actually dared to glare up at his elder.

Leigh used a knee to push the youth onto all fours, then facedown onto the floor. At least the boy knew better than to protest that!

“Leigh.” Will Donnell drew his friend back with a restraining hand on his shoulder. “I think he understands that he made a mistake.”

“But I didn’t blow it!” protested Lowell. “I intercepted her—”

“With a knife!” At least some of the other elders, behind Leigh, were murmuring agreement at Leigh’s complaint.

“She’s of the blood. Should I have used a gun?”

Only Donnell’s hand on Leigh’s shoulder kept him from reacting to such blasphemy as the boy babbled on: “I had to stop her, didn’t I? So I did. I told her to go back to her party, mind her own business, and she said that there really was a secret society!”

Leigh’s restraint on his Irish temper cracked. The hell with civilization!

Donnell held him back from kicking the boy’s teeth in. “Do you think our families have never had suspicions?” Leigh’s friend asked, more calmly. “We have ways to divert them. By confirming them for her, you’ve caused far more trouble than you prevented.”

That, brooded Donaldson Leigh, was an understatement. Certainly more trouble for young Lowell.

And, worse—more undeserved trouble for his beloved daughter, Arden.

Chapter 2

“So he kissed me, and then he just…left.”

“And you didn’t call the police,” noted Arden’s friend Valeria Diaz as the women walked through midday heat from a sleekly modern light-rail station into a questionable, once-glamorous Victorian neighborhood. Tall and dusky skinned, her coils of brown hair drawn into a practical ponytail, Val didn’t stand out in South Dallas’s run-down Oak Cliff neighborhood nearly as much as Arden did.

“The kiss wasn’t that bad,” joked Arden, before giving in and answering what her friend really meant. “There was no need for the authorities. Daddy said—” She deliberately ignored her friend’s roll of the eyes. Especially here in the South, “Daddy” was a perfectly respectable title for one’s father…just like it was acceptable to give a boy his mother’s maiden name for his first name, as with Smith. “Apparently, Lowell is an intern of my father’s. I assumed they would handle the incident internally.”

Val’s dusky face had all the expression of a stone idol—an idol with intense, topaz eyes. “Someone puts a knife to your throat, he deserves jail time, not a demotion.”

Arden’s friend and partner never had excelled at girl talk. Val had once, briefly, been a cop. She’d surely been a tomboy. “Daddy has it under control. He’s a good man.”

“Unlike his daughter, the slut.” Val’s eyes sparkled with sudden teasing, despite her mask of solemnity. “So you kissed this knight in shining timeliness?”

“Smith kissed me,” Arden clarified with assumed dignity. Then she admitted, “But I didn’t exactly bite his tongue.” No, instead she’d opened herself to him. His warm touch. His scent of heat and earth. When she should have been skewering his foot with one of her dress heels, she’d instead closed her eyes and pretended—just for a minute—that they’d never broken up. All her foolish, inappropriate longing had gone into that one stolen kiss.

Smith…

Like some desperate fool, she’d started to lift her arms around him, to draw him to her for the first time in too long….

Just as well she’d forgotten the big stick in her hand.

“There was tongue?” Val glanced over her shoulder as they walked.

“Smith always did have a peculiar kind of charm.” That roguish grin. That cocky indifference. Even during those years when they’d known and disliked each other—or thought they had—she’d sometimes wanted to kiss him just to shut him up.

“Charming as pie, ’til he dumped you.”

“Exactly.” They turned down a cracked, uneven sidewalk onto a street boasting large trees and more Victorian homes. Several had been renovated to their original elegance, but most sat in graffitied disrepair, with abandoned cars in the front yards and rusting burglar bars on the windows. Historic Oak Cliff, once a jewel among Dallas society neighborhoods, had fallen victim to postwar white flight and urban decay generations before.

Arden liked to think the recreation center for girls she and Val had started nearby could reverse some of that.

“Dumped you over the phone.” Again, Val glanced behind them. Satisfied, she turned her stern stare back to Arden. “With no warning.”

“Yes, he did.”

“Drunk off his butt.”

“I was there, Val. I’m the one who told you.”

“Boy deserved biting.” Val slid her topaz gaze disapprovingly toward Arden. “And not in any good way.”

“Well…I did hit him with a branch.”

“Good.” But Val knew her too well. “Accident, was it?”

“And I doubt I’ll see him again.” Which was a good thing, of course.

“Make sure of it, girlfriend.”

“Why, look,” said Arden brightly, to change the subject. “We’re at Miz Greta’s.”

Miss Greta Kaiser taught piano at the rec center. Her tall stone home, like the neighborhood, had forgotten its elegance beneath decades of neglect. It boasted a mansard roof with uneven iron cresting, dormer windows along the top story, and a high bay window of Second Empire style. Roman arches over its windows and doorway added an Italianate touch. But several of the cracked panes in its higher windows had been patched with cardboard or taped plastic, despite Arden’s repeated offers to help with repairs. Lost roof tiles gave the appearance of missing teeth. What must once have been a glorious garden had withered to a brown, dirt-spotted lawn, deprived of sunlight by a single, glorious oak tree and of water by the Texas heat.

It broke Arden’s heart to see it. And yet, had the home joined the ranks of the restored historic houses brightening the area here and there, Miz Greta couldn’t possibly have managed its upkeep. The divorcee had macular degeneration, a central blindness that limited her ability to manage certain tasks…which was why she’d asked for Arden’s help looking into a suspected secret society. Greta could play piano with her eyes closed. But she could no longer read without a huge magnifying glass.

Today, Arden had brought a new audio book, wrapped in crinkly tissue, for their visit. “It’s a hostess gift,” she explained to a curious Val after knocking on Miz Greta’s recessed door. The expected barking erupted from the other side. Both women took off their sunglasses, and Arden her wide sun hat.

“And I don’t get a bodyguard gift because…?”

“Sweetie, you’re not my—” But the opening door cut off the rest of her answer. Both women stood a little straighter for their elder. Despite their significantly different backgrounds, both Arden and Val had been raised with Southern manners.

“Please do come in,” insisted the small, white-haired woman, braids wrapped around the crown of her head, giving her barely enough height to reach five feet. She peered down at the barking dog through Coke-bottle lenses. “Hush, Dido!” Then—presumably to the women and not Dido—“I’ve made strudel.”

On mere hours’ notice? The delicious smell filled the warm house, a testament to Greta’s cooking abilities despite her failing eyesight.

“You shouldn’t have,” demurred Arden as they made their way through the crowded vestibule and into the parlor, because that’s what one said. Once she’d presented the gift, she crouched to let the cocker spaniel lick her hand and remember her. Dido wiggled harder at the sheer joy of having company.

“Sure she should,” insisted Val, of the strudel.

“I love cooking for guests,” agreed the older woman.

In minutes, her visitors had china plates of strudel and tall glasses of sweetened iced tea. Because Greta’s old house had no central air—only cheap window units and an assortment of fans that had been running since June—the iced tea was especially welcome, despite Arden’s awkwardness at being waited on by someone she’d rather be serving.

Arden felt even worse recounting her adventure of the previous night—but it had to be said, no matter how much it troubled her old friend.

“My God.” Miz Greta shook her head, paling at even Arden’s most gentle version. “I never dreamed that you…You could have been killed!”

“I’m sure I was in no danger.” Arden gently squeezed Greta’s thin hand. “The Lowell boy was just posturing.”

“And apparently Arden’s loser ex-boyfriend has miraculous timing,” added Val darkly. When the dog barked in the kitchen, she stood.

“Heavens, child! You’ll have me jumping at shadows. Dido?” The dog trotted back in and sat, nose pointed at the strudel. “She barks at squirrels.”

Val sank back into her chair, but now Arden felt alert, as well. Being recently held at knifepoint had that effect, but it was no excuse for frightening old ladies.

“Dido certainly enjoys company,” she noted, a deliberate feint.

“She’s very affectionate.” The older woman relaxed as she petted her dog. “Hence the name. I’ve always been partial to Virgil’s Aeneid. In Roman literature, Dido is the heroine who falls completely in love, then kills herself after her lover deserts her to pursue his destiny.”

“Imagine that,” murmured Val, no big fan of classic literature—but in the meantime, Miz Greta’s cheeks had regained some color from the distraction.

“I wouldn’t have mentioned last night,” noted Arden carefully, “except that Lowell validated your suspicions. Why would anybody care about our research otherwise? I believe there really may be some kind of secret society out there!”

“A dangerous society.” Greta shook her head. “Of course you must do as he said and leave the matter be—no need to pursue this further.”

“And let them think they’ve frightened me away?”

“Wait a minute,” protested Val. “I came into this late. What kind of secret society are we talking about, and just what kind of research did you do?”

“Not very much,” Arden said. “Miz Greta had a…a personal curiosity and asked for my help with some reading. I found a few books about secret societies in general, but this one—they’re called the Comi…?”

“Comitatus,” provided Greta softly.

“The Comitatus were hardly ever mentioned. I went online to some conspiracy Web sites and posted questions, but almost everyone denied ever hearing of them. Except of course for the teenagers who pretend to know everything but can’t tell you anything. Then I found a conspiracy buff who seems to be local—he calls himself Vox07. He offered to meet me with the names of some area members of the society if I would trade information, who knows what kind…That’s as far as I got before last night. Why do you keep looking out the window?”

“Never hurts to be careful,” said Val. “Especially when—assuming there really is a Comitatus—anyone from a bookstore clerk to this Vox person could have let on that you were asking questions. Way to be stealthy there, Leigh.”

Arden resisted the urge to make a face. Val wasn’t usually paranoid. She was just…careful.

Arden hated thinking she might have cause.

And why was the dog spending so much time in the kitchen, with company here? Smith had once told her something about dogs and security…. “Where’s Dido?”

Neither Greta nor Val understood her non sequitur at first, but Miz Greta called, “Dido! Come!”

The cocker spaniel scrambled happily into the parlor, wiggling her pleasure at being called…But she also cocked her head back toward the kitchen, as if torn. Why?

Dido loved company!

“Check her breath,” suggested Arden, standing suddenly.

Val was on her feet even before Greta—barely able to hold her exited dog still long enough to open her mouth—exclaimed, “Strudel? Bad dog! How did you get into the—?”

By then, Arden and Val were heading down the narrow, wood-floored hallway past the staircase and library, toward the kitchen—aiming for stealth, which is why Arden had left her pumps back in the parlor. She dropped back a pace only when she saw Val draw a gun from a small-of-the-back holster. Texas had a carry law—and Southern girls were well versed in gun safety, too.

Val practically rolled around the kitchen doorway, weapon first, like the cop she’d once been. She scanned, then crossed the large room with Arden following, past its yawning fireplace and shelves, toward one of three doors. She pushed open one, revealing a second set of stairs blocked with boxes and storage, and shook her head before closing the door to glance back at Arden. “Stairs?” she mouthed in surprise.

“Servants’ stairway,” Arden whispered back, moving to the 1950s stove to check the pan of strudel. Too much pastry was gone, and it looked like someone had been serving with their fingers.

Dogs make the best security systems. That’s what Smith had once told her. Except for the bribing-with-food part. He might have driven her crazy sometimes—more often than not, truth be told—but he’d always made her feel safe.

“Someone was here,” she said softly.

“What’s wrong?” called Miz Greta from the hallway, her voice quavering in a way that hurt Arden’s heart. “Did you find someone?”

“Not that we can see,” Arden reassured her brightly. “You just keep hold of Dido and let us make sure, all right?” Careful not to cross Val’s line of fire, she stepped to the middle door, this one obviously leading onto the covered porch. Its hook-and-eye latch hung open…Was Greta that lax about security? Around here?

Crouching, Arden pushed the door open. Gun first, Val swept the porch.

Again—nobody.

The friends exchanged pregnant glances, torn between amusement at their Charlie’s Angels routine and the fact that there was one…last…hiding place.

In her stockinged feet, breath shallow from the risk, Arden crossed to the third doorway. Probably the pantry or the larder.

Val held up one finger, to create a count. Then two.

At three, Arden pulled the door open. From behind the shelter it made, she saw Val feint back and shout, “Freeze!”

Dido began to bark wildly—

And a second gun poked past the door as a too-familiar voice, both pleasant and deadly, said, “It’s August. This place isn’t air-conditioned. I couldn’t freeze if I wanted to.”

Smith? Arden leaned past the door to peek at the man she’d immediately recognized, both from his voice and from his truly inappropriate sense of humor. His eyes didn’t look that mischievous just now, but his jaw was set even more stubbornly than usual—and his aim on her best friend didn’t waver.

Val aimed right back.

Over a year with no word, and now Smith had shown up twice in less than twenty-four hours? As ever, Arden took refuge in hard-won composure.

“Hey, Smith,” she drawled coolly at the gunman, deliberately imitating his cocky greeting of the night before. “How’ve you been?”

Chapter 3

Well.

This wasn’t how Smith would’ve preferred to kick off his next meeting with Arden. Not that he’d actually meant her to see him again. Despite following her here. But…still.

He kept her Latina friend in his sights—mainly because she still had him in hers—but said, “Arden Leigh, as I live and breathe. Seems like forever, huh?” What with them replaying last night and all. Since he didn’t want to take his gaze off the lady looking to shoot him, he didn’t put a hand to Arden’s pretty cheek. Instead, he made do with an air smooch. “Kiss, kiss.”

“And here I thought you didn’t like guns.” How could she put such thick disapproval into such a sweetly phrased statement? She was right, of course. He didn’t. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t hit what he aimed at, or that—after seeing a Comitatus flunky holding her at knifepoint the previous night, and after listening to Mitch’s partial recording of the Comitatus agenda—he wouldn’t carry one until he knew she was safe.

Which she wasn’t, here.

The old lady in the hallway said, “Blades are more honorable than guns, don’t you think?”

That surprised the hell out of him, so much that he glanced away from the muzzle of the Latina’s Saturday Night Special to the older woman’s pale gaze, which seemed to look not just at him but through him. More honorable. Those were almost the exact words the Comitatus leaders used when giving a teenaged boy his ceremonial knife upon entry into the society. Blades were personal. Blades were honorable. Guns might be more practical, but if ever someone of Comitatus blood outright betrayed his brethren, he would be shown the honor of dying by blade.

How could she know?

Only when she smiled down at the dog, wizened and wise, did Smith grasp his rookie mistake. The old woman hadn’t known—not about his own involvement with the Comitatus, anyway—until he’d reacted.

Blades. “Honor’s a luxury some of us can’t afford,” he said carefully.

“Obviously.” Arden glanced pointedly between the two guns. “Will you two please put those nasty things away?”

“Her first,” said Smith at the same time Arden’s friend said, “Him first.”

“At the count of three.” Arden made it a velvet-gloved order. “One.”

The tall, dark woman narrowed her eyes in challenge.

“Two.”

Smith wished he was staring at Arden instead of a gunwoman. The blue-jeaned Amazon was handsome, in her way. But Arden was pure beauty, and not just because she wore such a pretty sundress, her black hair in a curly ponytail.

Or because her toenails were painted the exact same color as her fingernails and her lips.

Or…

“Three,” finished Arden—but the weapons didn’t move. She put her hands on her hips, as if she meant business. “Oh, for mercy’s sake!”

Smith almost hoped to see her lose her temper—he’d loved catching sight of the real Arden behind the composure since long before they’d started dating.

He wasn’t ready for her to step right into the line of fire.

Where the slip of a finger could kill her!

“Hey!” Immediately he turned his weapon to the ceiling and thumbed on the safety. His voice cracked. “Arden!”

“Are you insane?” demanded the other woman, doing the same thing.

“Did I teach you nothing about personal safety?” demanded Smith, struggling to catch his breath. “Never, never—”

“NEVER!” insisted her friend.

“I,” noted Arden icily to Smith, dismissing the deadly weapons with a roll of her eyes, “am not the one breaking into houses—”

“The door was unlocked, no breaking required.”

“—and pointing guns at people. Shame on you!”

The strange thing was, instead of laughing at her, he did feel a touch shamed…which made him petulant. “I was just making sure you weren’t into something over your head.” Justified, he jabbed a finger in her direction. “Which apparently you are. Secret societies and all that…that crazy talk….”

The old lady was staring through him again and smirking. Somehow she knew he knew better. He didn’t like her seeming omniscience one bit.

Rejecting Comitatus leadership, as he and his friends had done, meant exile. Breaking one’s vow of secrecy, on top of the whole dishonor thing, could be one of those nasty, dying-by-blade offenses, depending on the circumstances.

Yet another reason Smith carried a gun today.

All the old lady said was, “Is nobody going to introduce us?”

“How ill-mannered of me.” Only Arden could fit so much sarcasm into such proper words or so bright a smile. “Miz Greta, Val, please let me introduce the wholly untrustworthy Smith Donnell. Smith and I have known each other’s families since childhood. Once, during a period of temporary insanity on my part, we dated. Smith, these are Miss Greta Kaiser and Ms. Valeria Diaz. Greta teaches piano at my teen recreation center, and Valeria could kill you for fun where you stand.”

“Gladly,” clarified Val.

“How do you do?” Smith tried his most charming smile. He even bowed a little before seating his revolver back into its SOB holster.

Generally, that was meant as a rhetorical question, but Valeria Diaz said, “Personally, I’m pissed that nobody’s dialing nine-one-one yet. And you?”

Torn about what I heard from that Comitatus meeting. Too happy to be in Arden’s presence again. Worried about the dark sedan that followed you here from the rail station. “I’m feeling more than a little silly that I chose to hide in a pantry instead of taking a stairway to the whole of upstairs,” he admitted, and offered his hand in truce.

Val deliberately ignored it.

“Much as I’m sure you would have enjoyed rifling through Miz Greta’s private things.” Arden pushed his hand back down to his side, her own hands soft, her scent sweetly familiar. Thanks for the brush-off, Val. “I’d rather know why it’s your business whether I’m over my head, off my game or out of my mind. There’s a great deal I wouldn’t put past you, Smith. A great deal…” She widened her eyes to think of the enormity of things that included.

“Nice vote of confidence,” Smith muttered, to drag her back on track.

It worked. “But stalking? Why shouldn’t we call the authorities?”

None of them expected Greta to step in. “Because if we call the police, Mr. Donnell will miss the story he risked so much to hear. Let’s all return to the parlor to deal with the larger issue at hand. Mr. Donnell, would you like some iced tea?”

Val’s mouth dropped open in blatant amazement. Arden, being Arden, revealed her surprise with the barest of blinks—but Smith was pretty adept at reading the annoyance of those blinks, and he grinned in pure triumph. Maybe the old lady was crazy, maybe not. But he wasn’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth…especially when he’d seen so few gift horses lately.

“Why, thank you, Miz Greta. I would love some tea…and maybe a slice of that delicious strudel?” As he accompanied his new favorite person and her gamboling, happy dog toward the front of the house, making the most of his status as a welcome guest, Smith caught Arden’s soothing murmur to Val.

“Just take deep breaths, and it will pass. He inspires almost everyone to kill him, sooner or later.”

She had no idea how right she was.

The question was, how could someone as perfect as Arden have inspired similar—and all-too-real—threats?

And why was someone with tinted windows parked just down the street, keeping watch on her?

Greta Kaiser was not crazy. Nor was she completely blind, physically or emotionally. The macular degeneration gave her central blindness. That meant if she looked directly at Smith Donnell, she saw no face at all, barely a head. But she could glimpse, with her remaining peripheral vision, how Arden Leigh snuck peeks at him when she thought nobody was looking. When Greta turned her old eyes on Arden, the beautiful socialite all but vanished—but Greta got a clearer impression of Smith Donnell beside her, a hint of strong profile and brown hair and blatant interest in—almost longing for—someone he had supposedly dumped. He’d managed to sink onto the love seat next to Arden before Val could.

Arden made an amusing show of ignoring his nearness completely.

Greta also noted Smith’s worn jeans and T-shirt, his cheap shoes. Put that together with the unlikelihood of Arden having dated someone from a significantly lower social caste—have known each other’s families since childhood—and Greta found far more truth on the couple’s periphery than anyone might by looking at their relationship straight on.

This man may have lost his chance to be Arden Leigh’s hero…but he might yet prove to be Greta’s.

“My family name,” she said, when everyone had finished their bickering and settled back in the parlor, Dido flopped happily between them, “is Kaiser. Does anyone know what that name implies?”

“It’s German,” offered Arden.

Greta turned expectantly to Smith, even if that meant losing sight of his expression.

“It means ‘emperor,’ right?” he asked. When Arden and Val stared at him, he seemed to square his shoulders. “What, you think I bought my way through college?”

“Yes, ‘emperor’.” Greta settled back in her favorite chair, comforted by Dido’s chin on her foot. “The name derives from the word ‘Caesar,’ because the Hapsburg dynasty professed direct lineage to the Roman emperors, themselves descendents of the epic hero Aeneas. Hence our claim to the Holy Roman Empire.”

“And you’re a Hapsburg?” Arden sat up. “Of the Austrian Hapsburgs?”

In periphery, Greta caught the suspicion that began to darken Smith Donnell’s strong profile. He was starting to figure this out already.

Clever. Arden had exceptionally good taste.

“Let us say we are a significant branch off that family tree. As you might guess, my father was a powerful man, descended from a seemingly unending line of powerful men. I was born in this house, back when Oak Cliff was the garden spot of Dallas society. I fully expected a life of private schools, debutante balls and eventual marriage into wealth. But instead…” She took a deep breath, bracing herself against the memories. “Even before my coming out, shortly after World War II, my father lost everything. Our fortune. Our standing. The house—I did not inherit it, only bought it back decades later, after the falling property values made it available for a fraction of its original cost.

“We were wholly ruined, and I never knew why.”

Arden leaned forward to take Greta’s hand, offering sweet comfort. Greta smiled directly at the black-haired beauty, effectively erasing Arden from her vision but allowing her to glimpse Smith’s sudden, wary stillness.

“Well…” He paused, then continued, not quite hiding the sympathy in his tone. “That would be terrible.”

He, she felt increasingly convinced, should know. If he didn’t, she was endangering herself and perhaps Arden and Val—even Dido—by continuing. But life was risk.

“Astute as ever.” Arden’s poise had degenerated into dry sarcasm. Interesting.

“College,” Smith reminded her amiably. But, observing the contrast between his current apparel and the upper-class confidence of his posture, Greta felt sure he’d spoken from firsthand experience.

“Our family never wholly recovered.” She could not admit her childish resentment, nor how long into adulthood it had followed her. A foolish marriage, for all the wrong reasons. A bitter divorce, for the right ones. So many lost years. Instead, she cut to the significant part of the story. “But when Papa developed Alzheimer’s, someone had to care for him. My mother was gone by then, and my brother, and I’d bought back the house, so I took him in. And that’s when Papa began to explain.

“At first, I thought him delusional.” Greta’s laugh came out harsh, startling her spaniel. “He was delusional, or he never would have spoken of such things. When I asked him, during sentient periods, he denied everything with such vehemence that I stopped asking. But when he confused me with others, with men from his past, I became curious and encouraged his stories.

“He admitted to having joined an ancient secret society of powerful men.

“And he admitted to ruining us by crossing them during the War.”

Arden had heard much of this story once already. So, while Greta told how her father had challenged the Comitatus and their precious status quo, Arden found herself watching Smith.

Carefully, though, so nobody would notice.

She’d generally avoided him during their youth, despite their fathers’ friendship. Smith had been too full of himself, too loud and boylike—trouble on two feet. Only when they began moving in the same post-college circles did she really start watching him, still more annoyed than intrigued. His cocky immunity to her charms—and she wasn’t foolish enough to deny them—had bothered her. The more caustic the run-ins they had, the more she assumed their dislike to be mutual. They couldn’t seem to spend ten minutes in each other’s company without finding something to disagree about…which eventually proved downright fascinating. By the time he’d bitten out a sudden invitation to a party, like a dare in the middle of a fight over nothing, she’d been so surprised that she’d stuttered out agreement. And then…

Then the attraction that flared up between them, no longer held back by their pretense of mutual enmity, had almost consumed her.

How long had she already been in love by then?

It wasn’t just that he was handsome, though he was. She noted the long line of his back now, the pull of his shoulders under his faded brown T-shirt, worn to a softness she could only imagine under her fingers. She noted the defined muscles of his tanned, bare arms, his elbows on his jeaned knees as he leaned nearer Greta to hear the story. The brush of his too-long brown hair across his neck. That action-hero profile. The stubborn, uncompromising jaw—far more recalcitrant than his daring grins let on—which she could remember kissing the tension out of one night, while his hands had done sinful things across her…

She shifted uncomfortably in the love seat, crossing her ankles, her feet still bare. Smith’s gaze slanted momentarily in her direction, dancing with mischief as if he knew just what she’d been remembering, before returning to Greta.

Oh…sugar. They should have slept together and gotten it out of their systems, but she was a six-month-minimum girl and they’d kept breaking up at five-and-a-half months, then starting over. Maybe she’d been afraid to surrender that last bit of control, or afraid the reality couldn’t match the anticipation, which—good God in heaven! That last time, they were a day from six months and she’d honestly looked forward not just to making love, but to planning a future with him.

And then the phone call.

She should have dated more seriously since their breakup, but none of her gentleman callers had, well…challenged her. Not like Smith. Which should have been a good thing, but apparently was not.

He claimed to want to protect her, which shouldn’t make her feel quite as gooey inside as it did. The warmth of his body, so close to hers in this un-air-conditioned home, was bad enough without her mistaking stalking for affection. He’d come back—which, as far as reasons to like him went, was even worse.

He didn’t deserve a second—or was that a fifth?—chance. She couldn’t respect herself if she gave him one. Not that he’d even asked. What if he didn’t?

Arden felt far more threatened by Smith’s return than by any supposed Comitatus.

Val’s voice cut through her thoughts. “So you think he told you all these supposed secrets because of the Alzheimer’s?”

“I’m sure of it,” agreed Greta. “To hear him speak of it, the Comitatus were once a society of honor. A society formed by heroes of history and legend. But he finally faced that they’d lost their way, and he was well rid of them. His only regret, in speaking out against their interests, was how his exile harmed the rest of us.”

Again, Arden took the older woman’s hand. She could only imagine how similar ruin would pain her own father. “Daddies want to take care of their little girls.”

Did she imagine something odd in Greta’s expression at that? She must have, because all Greta said was, “My only regret will be if one of you is hurt doing a kindness for an old woman. As you said, Arden—the attack on you last night confirms that my father’s story was true. That is enough.”

“Enough?” repeated Arden, more unwilling than unable to understand.

“You must leave the matter alone.” Greta patted Arden’s hand and released it, then petted Dido’s head before sitting back. “Let it go, just as you were asked. If you pose no further threat to this society’s secrets, they may pose no further threat to you.”

“And let them win?” Arden looked from Greta’s faded, pleading eyes to Val’s pragmatic agreement. “They ruined your family, Greta! And they think they can threaten me with a knife to get their own way? If we let it go, they’ll think that’s appropriate behavior!”

“Seems like they already believe that,” noted Val drily.

“But it isn’t!” In desperation, she turned to Smith. Smith was nothing if not a rebel. Surely he would—

But even Smith, she could see by his wince, agreed with the others. Arden felt as betrayed as she had when he’d called to dump her, no explanation offered, the night they would have…

“It’s not just that it’s dangerous.” At least he knew that argument didn’t stand a chance against her. “But Greta’s the one who asked you to look into this, Ard. Now Greta’s asking you to stop. How polite is it to ignore her?”

Arden rarely scowled—it encouraged wrinkles—but she felt her eyes narrow at how easily Smith hit her weak spots.

“Greta’s not just being nice, Ard,” insisted Val. “This isn’t like, ‘You take the last cookie,’ ‘No, you take the last cookie.’ We don’t want to have to worry about you!”

“Exactly—” Smith cut himself off long enough to exchange a suspicious glance with Val, both surprised to find themselves on the same side of an argument. “Going after the Comitatus won’t just draw attention to you. What makes you think it won’t draw attention to Greta, as well? Or your rec center? For all you know, someone could have followed you here.”

“Obviously,” noted Arden, glaring daggers.

“Someone else.”

“If there’s any chance of danger to Greta, then I certainly can’t just leave.”

“Remember what I used to do for a living?” Used to? For the first time, Arden noted how Smith’s jeans weren’t artfully worn—they were well and truly worn. Gone was his expensive diving watch. His overlong hair couldn’t possibly be a fashion statement. Not without any product.

“You worked in security,” she admitted softly, trying to grasp the concept. Smith hadn’t just left her. He must have left Donnell Security—a business he’d built himself. Smith was…poor.

But he was a Donnell of the Fort Worth Donnells. That simply made no sense.

“If it’ll put your mind at ease, I’ll set up a security system for Greta,” Smith continued. “Will that make everyone happy?”

Val stared at him. “Not me. Why should we trust you?”

But Greta said, “Any friend of Arden’s, dear.” So that was that.

Then Smith just had to go and smile—no, smirk—at Arden, as if he’d won something.

“Friend? We weren’t that close,” she insisted, slipping her feet into her pumps and standing.

If only she could make that true.

Chapter 4

Smith tried not to flinch from Arden’s casual dismissal. “Hey now, sweetness—you aren’t ashamed of me, are you?”

She arched an accusing eyebrow.

“Oh,” he said, not quite as cocky. “You are, huh?”

“As delightful as this has been, what with the history lesson and the stalking, I really do have to go,” Arden insisted. Then she actually smiled.

A warm, real smile.

Smith’s traitorous heart leaped.

“Jeffie’s coming home from camp today,” she explained. So the smile was for her half brother, not for Smith. “I’m picking him up at the airpo—”

“Too much information,” Smith interrupted. How many times had he warned her that the fastest way to be victimized was to let down one’s guard? In light of that, it was probably just as well she didn’t trust him. Dammit.

Arden waved him away like an annoying bug as, with a quick hug for Greta and pat for Dido, she headed out.

“Too much information?” he heard Val demand as the younger women left, the dog whining from her exile at the door. “It’s not like you said you’d been on the toilet all morning or anything.”

He had to imagine the expression on Arden’s face.

Smith’s expression might have rivaled it as he watched the women reach the sidewalk. Greta Kaiser said, “You love her.”

It wasn’t a question.

Spinning to face the old woman, Smith pretended it had been. “Me? No. Sure, we were dating when…” When I lost everything she might have wanted from me. He grinned to reinforce his position. “No love. Maybe some like, if you squint at it and turn your head just right.”

Oh, great job. Make sight jokes to a near-blind woman.

“I’ll just call a friend of mine to bring over the supplies we need for that security system,” he said.

“Help me with these dishes when you’ve a moment, please?” asked Greta mildly, and vanished into the kitchen.

No, Arden was definitely not the only too-trusting woman involved in this latest problem.

As he sat in his car, waiting for Arden and her “friend” to leave the run-down old house they’d come to visit, Prescott Lowell used his laptop to pull up the area tax records.

The house was owned by someone named Greta Lorelai Kaiser.

It didn’t sound familiar, but he made note of it all the same. No surprise that she was a single woman home owner. From what he knew of Donaldson Leigh’s stuck-up bitch of a daughter—opening a recreational center especially for girls, supporting a woman for governor—Lowell figured them for feminazis. Throw in the Mexican woman, who’d almost spotted him as he tailed them from the train station, and there was probably enough estrogen in that house to lower a guy’s IQ by fifty points.

Not that Lowell didn’t like women! But they had their place.

He loved that about the Comitatus. Everyone had their place. And the place of Comitatus members was on top of everyone else.

That was the only reason he’d kept himself from fighting back when Leigh had humiliated him last night, when he’d really wanted to knock the old geezer’s teeth in. There was an order to things—at least within the social sanctuary that was the Comitatus. The younger members of the outer circles respected the older members of the inner circles, because someday they would be part of those inner circles themselves. They would run things the right way.

With strength.

Leigh and his cronies seemed annoyingly tolerant of the threat posed by Arden’s interference. What the hell had Will Donnell meant about womenfolk having suspicions, and “ways to divert them,” anyway? If women stuck their noses into men’s business, as far as Lowell was concerned, you smacked them back so they wouldn’t do it again. That was how to divert them.

But there was no reasoning with Leigh about his precious little girl. So it was up to Lowell to uncover the truth for those inner-circle powermongers, and…

Ah. Here came Arden and her brown-skinned friend now. The friend, clearly low-class, scanned the area around them. For a moment, her eyes paused on Lowell’s car, well down the street. Seeing nothing more suspicious than a luxury vehicle in a cesspool of a neighborhood, she scowled but moved on. Arden, in contrast, looked deceptively refined in a full-skirted sundress and a large, shady hat. She acted as if she had no need of monitoring her surroundings, she was that confident in her place of the world.

Idiot.

Certain he knew where they were going—public transit, again—Lowell waited until the women had almost reached the end of the block before turning the key in the ignition. It wasn’t like they would hear the purr of his finely tuned engine. Shifting into gear, he eased forward….

Tried to ease forward.

A thumping lurch dragged his attention from his quarry to his car. He pressed harder on the gas, forcing the sedan to move, and the thumps sped up.

Braking, Lowell cut the engine and climbed out into the heat to face a flat tire on the driver’s side front.

And the driver’s side back.

Circling the car, he found the other two tires equally flat. A piece of toothpick, still extending from the valve of one tire, explained how someone had sabotaged the car without him hearing it, or even noticing the slow sinking of the vehicle. Instead of puncturing the tires, someone had arranged for a slow leak in all four.

But—the girls had been in the house the whole time!

Lowell glanced quickly around him, his eyes narrowing at some teenaged boys of mixed ethnicities playing basketball not far down the street. They had worse ways, he supposed, of trapping a fine automobile in this slum, maybe to steal its hubcaps, maybe to do worse.

Narrowing his eyes in warning, Lowell slipped quickly back into the car to phone for auto-club service. But first he pressed the button to lock all his doors and made sure he knew where his gun was, as opposed to his knife.

None of the bloodlines around here deserved an honorable fight!

Grinning from one of Greta’s windows at his automotive handiwork, Smith quickly finished dictating which security system to pick up. “No, let’s not go with the base level—and yes, I’ll pay you back. Let’s go for deluxe. If certain parties figure out who she is—”

“Who is she?” demanded Trace over the prepaid cell phone.

“I’ll explain later. ’Bye.” Then, pocketing the phone, Smith carried the last of the dishes into the kitchen after his elderly hostess, careful not to trip on the dog. Living hand-to-mouth as he now did, he’d gotten pretty skilled at bussing tables.

Descended from heroes of history and legend, huh?

Even as he set down the dishes, the older lady asked, “How well did you know Arden before you and she began dating?”

“Not that well—”

“I can ask her, too,” Greta reminded him, turning the faucet on in her deep old sink. The pipes made a hollow clunk as the water began to run.

“Our families were close, but we didn’t see each other much,” Smith admitted guiltily. Especially not as he’d entered his rebellious teen years, when he might have found her something other than “icky.” Back then, he’d avoided all social obligations like the plague. “Not until after college. I just…That is, she…”

She’d seemed so perfect, he’d thought she would never look twice at him. So he’d pretended disinterest.

Familiarity breeding contempt, she’d met his disinterest and raised him some exasperation.

He’d matched her exasperation and added some scorn. This had gone on for years.

It was Mitch who’d finally called Smith on his behavior. For two people who can’t stand each other, you two sure do end up in the same place a lot.

Thus began their equally turbulent, on-again off-again attempts at dating without killing each other. He’d never had so much fun. Never felt so much frustration.

Just nail her and get it over with already, Trace had insisted.

But Arden had this old-fashioned six-month rule, and they never made it past four without one blowup or another, until finally…

Wait. Why was it any of the old bat’s business? “It was complicated.”

“You loved her,” Greta repeated, adding dish soap.

“No man who loves a woman would dump her, drunk, over the phone.”

“Unless he was protecting her.” She turned to fix her seemingly sightless eyes on him. “Just as you’re trying to protect her now.”

Smith stared back. Silence seemed his best option here.

“You were well-off and respected. Suddenly you had nothing. Meant nothing—at least to the world the pair of you knew. My father’s story must sound familiar.”

This was getting uncomfortable. “So why don’t I do a walk-through of the house, start prepping for when Trace gets here with the security equipment?”

“Quite the dilemma,” murmured Greta. “You took a vow of honor not to speak of it, yet your own honesty won’t let you deny it. Don’t worry. That’s all the proof I need or will ask of you.

“You are Comitatus. Of the blood. Of the tradition. This is how you know exactly what dangers Arden faces. And you, Smith Donnell, were exiled—just like my father.”

Smith opened his mouth to protest—he could so be dishonest! But Greta silenced him with a raised, gnarled hand. “This is why I believe you should have this.”

“Have…?”

She stooped, pressed on a piece of the built-in shelving—and a panel suddenly swung loose from the wall.

She had an honest-to-God hidden compartment.

No wonder she’d bought the house back!

Smith watched as she swung the panel back on a hidden hinge and claimed a slim, velvet-wrapped bundle, not a yard long. She laid her treasure on the kitchen table and slowly, reverently, folded back its rich purple wrapping to reveal—

Smith stared.

It was a sword. A double-edged short sword, to be precise, and yet, somehow…more. It caught the summer shadows as if it glowed.

But swords didn’t glow. Especially not seriously old swords—and this one was seriously old…or, more likely, a replica. It looked like something from some gladiator movie, Troy or Spartacus. The blade, extending out of a hilt studded with green gemstones, expanded into a swell at the tip that gave the oddly gold-colored metal a faint leaf-shape.

An impression of sand and salty wind swirled into Smith’s mind for just a moment before he blinked it away.

“The sword of Aeneas,” Greta explained softly.

Smith stared at the sword. Then at the old woman he’d just met. Then back down at the sword.

Well, that was unexpected.

“The what of which?”

“Woo hoo!” exclaimed fourteen-year-old Jefferson Leigh, sliding his leather backpack across the front foyer like a bowling ball. “I’m home!”

“Yes, you are,” agreed Arden as she closed the door behind him, taking pleasure from her baby brother’s high spirits. She’d needed a distraction from the return of Smith Donnell into her life, and Jeff, as always, did the job. His cheeks glowed with health under dark hair even curlier than hers. Camp in Switzerland had energized him. “Which is why we do not throw luggage.”

“Arden!”

“Jeffie!” she parroted back his long-suffering moan, eliciting another grin. “Carry your bag to your room and I’ll make sure Esperanza has a snack for us, all right?”

He saluted. “Ma’am, yes, ma’am!” As if it had been some kind of military camp, instead of a training ground for sons of privilege.

She couldn’t believe how he’d grown in two short months, all feet and elbows. Then their father came in from the backyard—from his detached office—and she believed it after all. Donaldson Leigh was no small man, himself.

“Jeff!” he bellowed. “Let the help take care of your bags and come tell me about camp! Arden, you’re staying the night to spend time with your brother, aren’t you?”

When Jeff turned his big eyes on her, Arden was lost. Heaven knew she could ignore Smith’s warnings of possible danger to her. She could even dismiss Val and Greta’s concern as paranoia. She could resist her father’s paternal pushiness. But Jeffie…?

And what could be safer than her father’s house?

“Of course I am. Go on to the kitchen, I’ll meet you there.” She watched her father sling a burly arm over Jeff’s narrow shoulders, too pleased to force the issue of the backpack. Instead, after they’d vanished, she grabbed the pack and carried it upstairs herself.

She saw no reason why perfectly healthy boys should abandon even their carry-ons. But her stepmother, Jeff’s mom, hadn’t been gone for a year yet.

Today, it was enough to see her brother smile.

Some men, at least, didn’t hide secrets behind every jibe and grin. Some men…

But she’d meant to forget Smith. Sugar.

Leaving Jeff’s backpack on his bed, she felt the unlikely roughness of its leather straps as it slid from her palm. Intrigued, she looked closer.

The good quality of the leather had been nicked and carved, as if by a boy playing with a knife.

Jeff hadn’t etched anything disturbing, really—his name, a frowning face, the symbol of his favorite band. Still, the idea of her baby brother playing with even a Swiss Army knife disturbed her, and not just because of the memory of last night’s blade.

Arden reminded herself that she had to let him grow up sometime. He’d turn fifteen in a few weeks. In a year, he would have a learner’s permit….

Arden trailed her fingers across the nicked leather—a perfectly good backpack, mutilated—then curled them into a fist. No. Not her business.

Wondering why she had such trouble understanding males in general, Arden left Jeff’s room and shut the door.

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