Page 132 of Stolen By the Billionaire
He was insulted, both for the ropes themselves and her opinion that he would buy flimsy equipment. “They’re twisted silk over nylon and much stronger than you think. I’ll go for them. Stay here.”
As he turned away, he knew she wasn’t going to stay.
Blaze sighed as he turned back and reached into his hip pocket for his wallet. He removed a sheaf of bills stuffed in there, save one, and held it out to her. “This is all I have on me. While I’m gone, if you decide to take off, at least this will get you started. I’ll inform Logan of your decision.”
Sarah looked from his eyes to the money in his hand several times before she said, “I’m just going to stay here with the mare and the foal to keep them calm. I’ll be right here when you get back.”
He shook the cash. “Take it.”
Her dark eyes were wide, not in an innocent ingenue way, but in a controlling-her-rage because he was being a dumbass-dickhead sort of way. She said, “Put your money back in your wallet and get the ropes.”
Blaze didn’t. He just held out the cash. “If you decide to take off on me, I’ll know that at least you have some money to get started. I don’t want you out there somewhere alone and with no resources. I’m not leaving until you take it.”
Sarah snatched the money from his hand and stuffed it in the pocket of her baggy men’s sweatsuit. “Fine. Now hurry back with the ropes so we can rescue this poor baby.”
Blaze flat-out ran back to the car, his long legs stretching over the tall grass and covering the mile-and-a-half distance in ten minutes.
Damn good thing he still trained with his SEAL brethren.
At the car, he rifled through his duffel, found the kinbaku ropes, and then sprinted back to the foal, refusing to ruminate over how much those elegant, handmade Japanese skeins had cost him and what was going to happen to them.
If Sarah wasn’t standing at the mud puddle with the livestock, Blaze was going to lose his mind.
The thought of her out there in the world with no one to protect her and the White Russian Mafia and God only knew who else hunting her was driving him fucking insane. She was an ingenue and a literal Iowa hayseed, and the world would chew her up and spit her out unless someone much like himself took a stand and fought them off.
When he crested the last hill, Sarah was squatting next to the fear-panting foal, stroking its nose to keep it calm while the anxious momma-horse danced around them, and Blaze almost stumbled in relief.
Once down in the hollow, he made short work of weaving the scarlet and gold silk shibari ropes into a sling to go under the baby horse’s midsection and another for under its butt.
As advertised, he was good at tying knots.
When the net was prepared and shoved under the skinny belly of the colt, slicking his arms and legs with mud up to his elbows and knees, he and Sarah grasped the silken ropes and pulled, straining against inertia and suction.
“Tell me more about Logan,” Sarah said through gritted teeth while she pulled.
Blaze walked a few feet to the right to change the direction he was pulling. “He’s got a wicked sense of humor.”
She scoffed, “I don’t know where he got that. My dad was a stereotypical Russian. If you thought he was joking, you were wrong.”
“A lot of it is sarcasm, but he does. He gave a hundred percent of himself to his friends. One time when I was in Chile for war games, I got separated from my unit. Never mind how.”
“Okay, how?” she asked, grinning while her boots skidded in the muck.
“It involved some guys from the Lautaro Brigade, which is the Chilean Army’s special forces unit, and alcohol with breakfast. They took me skydiving because they’re paratroopers. I’m trained with a parachute. I’ve jumped out of all kinds of aircraft. Anyway, they pushed me out of the plane over the Chilean wilderness and laughed in my com as I floated down, calling me a sucker and gloating that I was going to miss the rest of the war games walking back to Santiago.”
Sarah was aghast. “Those jerks!”
Yeah, Blaze had called them a hell of a lot worse than that. “When I landed, I had one bar of cell phone signal, and I called Micah, Twist, and Logan. Logan was in Cordoba, Argentina for some damn reason, and fucking with those assholes appealed to his wicked sense of humor. He chartered a plane and a helicopter to pick me up by GPS signal. I was literally sitting in the hotel bar, wearing Logan’s Armani suit, when those assholes walked back in. That’s his sense of humor and his sense of honor, too. I know Logan and those guys will always have my back.”
Sarah nodded, but she was still frowning at the foal as they worked to free it.
Blaze watched the sun traverse the sky as they worked, pulling the rope at one angle, then another, then another.
The foal finally came free of the mud with a popping sound like a slime monster had smacked his lips around the little colt’s legs.
With the resistance suddenly gone, Blaze dropped the rope so he wouldn’t hurl the wee horse into the sky and injure it more, and he ended up on his ass on the grass, rolling backward.
He slapped his hands on the weedy ground, literally slowing his roll.
