And all her brothers and sisters.
And her cousins, near and far.
When you’re a member of a large extended family that gets together for camping family reunions every year, where there are literally a couple of hundred people hanging around who look a little too much like you, people will takeanyopportunity to pick atanything.
Some people would think it was funny and a good reason to kid around.
Some of them would be nasty about it because that’s who they were.
And again, yes, she shouldn’t even have those people in her life, and she should walk away from that kind of toxicity.
Or she could just give them nothing to gripe about.
Maxence’s private plane was big enough for fifteen passengers or more, so the four of them—Maxence and Dree, Casimir and Arthur—had spread out and were quite comfortable on the flight.
Because they were flying directly from Nice, France to New Mexico, Maxence had dismissed the Rogue Security operators for the duration of their trip. They had nothing to worry about on an off-schedule jaunt into the heartland of the United States. Marie-Therese and her father were locked up, as was Matryona Sokolov.
They would be fine.
Dree had to agree with him. Her little brothers were probably better protection in the high desert of New Mexico than a bunch of European mercenaries who wouldn’t drink enough water and then fall over, dehydrated.
And they were going directly to Albuquerque, out to her family’s sheep ranch, and then turn around and head back. As long as some random assassin didn’t own a couple of MiGs to shoot the royal airplane out of the sky, what could really go wrong?
During the whole flight, however, Dree was keeping an eye on Arthur Finch-Hatten.
Yeah, Arthur pretended he was the life of the party with those pretty silvery eyes and droll British sense of humor, but she was going tohave it outwith that guy.
But every time she tried to get him alone, somebody interfered.
One time, she almost cornered him up by the cockpit, but the pilot came out and asked her if she would like to sit up front and fly the airplane.
Yes.Yes, she would.
Dree held onto the stick for a few minutes and “flew the airplane,” with the real pilot holding onto the other stick, of course.
Another time when she was stalking Arthur and trying to corner him, Maxence corneredherin a small luggage cubby off to the side of the main body of the airplane, and his scorching hot kiss had made her knees weak.
After supper, Arthur went to “the loo,” which was in the rear of the plane. The bathroom was across from the small galley kitchen where the flight attendants had been making them an impressive array of snacks and meals during the flight.
This time Dree was going to get him.
Arthur was just coming out of the small bathroom, ridiculously huge by airplane standards because it had a shower stall.
Dree was lurking, waiting for him across the aisle in the galley kitchen.
He saw her standing there but turned to walk down the aisle to where Maxence and Casimir were sitting at a table, close to the cockpit.
Dree reached out, grabbed Arthur’s tie like the leash of an ornery dog, and hauled him into the galley.
One of the attendants was standing in the small area between the counters, and she looked up when Arthur stumbled into the narrow space.
Dree hissed at her, “Get lost,” and the woman hurried out, leaving only a trail of jasmine perfume behind her.
Arthur yanked his tie out of her grip and smoothed it over his flat stomach, saying in his cut-glass British accent, “I believe there’s been some mistake. I’m a married man, and I love my wife.”
Dree growled at him, “I’m not making a pass at you, you stuck-up Brit. I’m going to beat the snot out of you for what you did to Maxence.”
Arthur leaned back against the counter, a very English smirk on his face as if he wasn’t afraid of her at all.
