Chapter 2 #2
“Closed to the public?”
“It’s nesting season for the Calevan dragons, and this is one of their favorite areas.” They weren’t really dragons, of course, just giant green lizards, often five or six feet long, with wide frills that flared out around their heads when they were excited or disturbed.
Raul’s smile faded into a look of concern.
“No need to worry,” Erica hurried to reassure him. “We’ll make sure not to upset any potential parents.”
“Good. I don’t want to risk their numbers dropping lower because I decided to go camping in their territory.”
The Calevan dragons were an endangered species because their spectacular frills, brilliant teal skin, and tender meat had made them targets for hunters over a couple of centuries.
Raul probably felt especially protective of them because the royal surname was Dragón.
“I’ve got all our equipment ready.” She indicated the four backpacks lined up in the rear of her car, one for her, one for Raul, and one for each of the bodyguards accompanying them.
She had loaded the heaviest gear in the two bodyguards’ packs, while Raul would get the lightest one. “Shall we get started?”
She wanted to make it to the first campsite well before dark so setup would be easier.
She had no idea whether Raul would help or let his staff do all the work.
He had served in Caleva’s militia—as had she—so he should be able to pitch a tent, but he might have gotten special treatment, being who he was.
“Vámonos!” Raul agreed.
She distributed the backpacks to the bodyguards, Dario and Pascal.
Both had brown hair, lean, fit bodies, and intensely alert attitudes.
She could also see the outlines of guns under their fleeces.
She carried a handgun, too, but it was in her backpack.
She hoped never to need it, but if you were with the prince and you were trained to shoot, you brought your weapon.
“This pack is yours,” she said, hefting Raul’s rucksack out of her SUV. She was relieved when he buckled and adjusted the straps with competent efficiency. Evidently, he had hauled his own gear in the militia.
“I have trekking poles for anyone who wants them,” she said, pulling a Raul-sized pair from the car.
In her experience, younger men felt using poles showed some sort of weakness, so she was surprised when Raul accepted them.
His bodyguards did as well, and she began to feel less anxious about how the expedition would unfold.
Except for the rock climbing tomorrow. She would be a nervous wreck as long as the prince was dangling high up on the rock face.
Raul slipped the trekking poles’ loops over his wrists and gripped the cork handles while he surreptitiously watched Erica ready her own poles with expert movements.
It shouldn’t surprise him that she knew what she was doing, given that she had been assigned the task of shepherding him through this remote range of Caleva’s spine of volcanic mountains.
She must also be a skilled pilot since she was responsible for Gabriel’s jet.
Mikel Silva, his father’s slightly sinister chief of security, would hire only the best to ferry around the royal family.
So why did it throw him off-balance that his guide was a woman?
Possibly because it changed the dynamic.
He had been expecting to camp with a group of men.
But it wouldn’t be such a tough adjustment to spend time with this woman whose long dark ponytail spilled in thick waves from the opening in the back of her ball cap and whose body somehow combined soft curves with sculpted muscles.
When she bent to check the basket at the bottom of her trekking pole, his gaze lingered on the stretch of tan fabric over her nicely rounded bottom.
He was glad to feel a mild arousal. It proved he wasn’t as incapable of enjoying himself as everyone kept claiming.
“We can walk two abreast for about half a mile,” Erica said, looking at Dario, Raul’s head bodyguard.
“I’ll take point,” Dario said.
That meant Pascal would be the rear guard, and Erica would be Raul’s walking companion for the next ten minutes. After some chitchat, he could relax and enjoy the view from behind his shapely guide. He let an appreciative little smile curl the corners of his lips.
Dario started toward the trailhead, and Raul swept one pole out in a dramatic gesture. “After you, senorita .”
“Gracias, Senor,” she said with a tight smile as she followed Dario past a sign warning that trail access was forbidden by royal order, due to the nesting dragons.
“Please call me Raul,” he said, falling into step beside her as they entered the dimness of the fog-enshrouded forest. “Formality is out of place in the wilderness.”
She nodded. “Let me know if you need anything. I have protein bars in the outside pocket of my pack.”
“I’ll be sure to speak up,” Raul said. “Tell me how you got roped into this job. Aren’t you supposed to be piloting Gabri’s jet?”
“It’s my week off from flying since I’ll be on duty for el duque and Senorita Pierson’s honeymoon in two weeks.
I grew up in Ciudad Militar by the naval base, which means I know the area quite well.
” She strode along easily. “ El duque is aware that I have spent a lot of time hiking and camping in these mountains.”
Was she supposed to have been on vacation this week? A brief twinge of guilt swiped at him, but it was too late for him to fix it now. “Is your family military?”
“My father was a rescue diver. Civilian, but assigned to the U.S. Navy,” she said.
Raul noted the past tense in her statement. “He must have been very skilled if he was appointed to the base.”
“He was awarded the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom. Posthumously,” she added.
“I’m very sorry for your loss.” Raul detected a note of pride undercut by sorrow in her voice. “Only a true hero can earn such an honor.”
“He saved twenty-two sailors trapped in a sinking boat before he had a catastrophic equipment failure,” she said. “It’s exactly how he would have chosen to die.”
Now he remembered the accident and the story of her father’s heroism, but her voice had held the tiniest bit of an edge. He hesitated. There was something more to her story, a hidden undercurrent, but it wasn’t his business. “Did you receive your pilot’s training in the Calevan militia?”
She nodded. “I started flight school before I graduated from university, because I knew that’s what I wanted to do.
” She cast him a sideways smile. “When I was a teenager, I had the privilege of touring one of the American aircraft carriers. Since then, I’ve always wanted to fly a fighter jet off the flight deck.
That must be such a rush. But you have to be a major celebrity to even hitch a ride off a carrier. ”
“You sound like an adrenaline junkie,” Raul said, intrigued.
“Not really. I plan meticulously. I check and recheck my equipment. I train hard. But if something unexpected happens, well, that’s half the fun.” She grinned, her hazel eyes lighting up. “You know when we do the evasive maneuvers while taking off from Caleva? That’s my favorite part of flying.”
“I stand by my statement.” He understood more about why she had been chosen as his guide.
“You were in the militia too,” she said. “What was your specialty?”
“Defusing bombs.”
Her eyes went wide with surprise.
“Joking,” he said. No one would allow the heir to the throne anywhere near a bomb. “I did some sniper training. I have good eyesight and steady hands.” Also, snipers could be positioned away from the front lines.
“Do you still shoot?” she asked.
“Twice a year at reserve training.” He gave her a wry smile. “I’m better with an épée, thanks to my father challenging me to regular duels.”
She gave a little snort. “That will come in handy if you time-travel back to the sixteenth century.”
She had a sense of humor, then. He liked that.
“It’s excellent exercise.” He used one of his trekking poles to demonstrate an advance lunge. “Especially against Pater, who is known for his ruthless spirit on the piste . I find myself fighting for my life.”
“I heard he was aiming for the Olympics before he became king,” she said.
“He would have brought home a gold medal, ciertamente .” Raul didn’t share the fact that Luis’s father, King Carlos, had stopped his son from participating, believing that if Luis lost, it would bring shame to the crown.
Unlike Carlos, Raul’s father was a supportive parent, encouraging Raul to follow his interests.
However, both kings shared a conviction that they had the right to meddle in their sons’ lives.
The trail grew steeper, and Raul was glad to have the trekking poles. He noticed that Erica barely planted hers, while he was using his to give himself a little boost with each upward step. Maybe he should fence with his father more often.
The trail bent around a large boulder and narrowed.
“My apologies, Senor , but I must go in front of you to make sure we’ve stayed on the correct path,” Erica said.
“Por supuesto,” Raul agreed. “But it’s Raul, not Senor. ”
“Right,” Erica said, picking up her pace to pull ahead of him.
So she wasn’t going to drop the formality. He took that as a challenge.
He had been correct about the view in front of him. She had muscles that flexed under the stretchy fabric of her trousers, but she also had some delicious curves that he would find pleasurable to cup his hands around.
For a few minutes, he simply enjoyed watching her march up the trail without apparent effort.
Soon, though, he had to pay attention to his own footsteps as the trail became rocky and tilted sharply upward.
The dark green leaves of the laurels and hollies added to the foggy dimness, and he kept his gaze down to avoid twisting his ankle on one of the roots snaking across the path.
Maybe his idea of rock climbing in the mountains wasn’t so lame after all.
Erica came to a sudden halt, staring down a trail that branched off from the one they were on.
Raul came up beside her. “Should we turn here?” He sounded more winded than he liked.
“No…it seems odd…” She shook her head and said more firmly, “No, but we’re almost to a good place to take a break.”
“A break sounds like an excellent idea,” Raul said, his leg muscles burning, although he wondered what she considered odd about the side trail. Since she had dismissed her concern, he let it go too.
“Water and protein bars will help,” she said with a quick grin before she launched herself upward again.
So would sitting down. He sucked in a breath and followed her shapely backside a little farther.
“Dario,” she called to the bodyguard ahead of them.
“We’re going to take a break just beyond these trees.
” As soon as Dario rejoined them, she plunged off the trail and led them all into the woods, following a narrow path through a grove of picconia and scattered viburnum.
The forest thinned, and Raul stepped into a rocky clearing that offered a view out over the ghostly gray fog that they had climbed above.
Now he could see the distant ocean, sparkling blue in the early sunlight.
A large gray naval vessel created a vee of wake as it cut through the sea.
Erica stood gazing at the vista, her lips curled in a tiny smile of wonder. He stopped beside her, and she flicked a quick glance at him. “Beautiful, isn’t it?” she asked. “This is one reason I love hiking up here.”
He scanned the shoreline to find the U.S. military base, the most inland part of which was still obscured by the low-lying fog. “Is that an aircraft carrier coming in?”
She pulled a small pair of binoculars from her jacket pocket and lifted them to her face. “You do have good eyesight. It’s definitely a carrier.”
“Maybe they’ll offer jet rides off the deck,” Raul joked.
“If only,” she said with a sigh before swinging her pack off and setting it on a boulder. Producing a couple of plastic-wrapped protein bars from the pocket, she offered them to Raul. “Direct from the palace kitchen.”
He accepted them with an inward wince as she pulled out a brand-name bar for herself. His food would all be separate because it had been inspected for poison by security before being handed over to Erica. After Luis’s near death by thallium poisoning, Mikel was taking no chances.
Raul dropped his pack on the ground and perched on another boulder, ripping open the plastic and taking a bite of the protein bar. It was, of course, delicious.
“Make sure to drink plenty of water.” Erica pointed her water bottle at him. “You don’t realize how dehydrated you get hiking at altitude when you’re not used to it.”
So she had noticed him huffing and puffing, the result of too many meetings and not enough exercise. He should change that. With a mental sigh, he pulled his water bottle from the side pocket of his pack and took a long swig before devouring both protein bars.
Looking around, he noted that Dario and Pascal had taken up sentry positions, while Erica had disappeared. Bathroom break, possibly.
He let the sun’s growing warmth soak into him, fighting the temptation to slide down to the ground and fall asleep with his back propped against the boulder. Evidently, he was tired.
His eyelids drifted closed, and all the meetings Yvette had wiped off his schedule loomed in his mind, adding a new weight to his exhaustion.
He would have a lot to catch up on when he got back.
This so-called vacation had come at a bad time, when he had the extra obligations as Gabriel’s best man, as well as substituting for his cousin in working on DragonFest. He exhaled a long breath as stress set his stomach roiling.
He opened his eyes to focus on the ship, wondering where it had come from. It had gotten almost to the base before he realized that Erica hadn’t returned yet.
“Hey, Dario, shouldn’t Erica be back by now?” he called out.
“ No se preocupe . She said she’d be gone for about fifteen minutes,” Dario said, checking his watch. “Pascal’s in contact with her.”
“Where did she go?” Raul asked.
“She said she wanted to check on something,” Dario said.
Raul didn’t think Erica required his assistance, but he needed a distraction, and he was curious about what she had spotted that merited further exploration.
His experience as a prince was that people felt obligated to stick around him when they were responsible for his well-being.
He liked her independence, but he wanted to know what had caused her temporary disappearance.
“You can track her satellite phone, right?” Raul asked, remembering her puzzled expression as she had stared down the trail that branched off from theirs.
“Of course.”
“Then let’s go find her.” He stood and shrugged on his pack.