Silken Threads by Monica Barrie Page A

Cassandra.
    “Of course,” she’d replied.
    Then her father had turned to Kirk. “All the arrangements have been made for the new stud?”
    “Yes, sir. I’ll be finalizing them on the way back. The papers have been authenticated and certified by the Appaloosa Horse Club and by the Breeders Association.”
    “I expect good news at foaling time.”
    “Plan on it,” Kirk had said. Then he’d stood and looked at her. “Ma’am, I’ll see you at the airport, seven fifteen.”
    “I’ll be there,” Cassandra had said, forcing a perfectly formed but patently false smile to counter his all too intense gaze.
    “I’m sure of that.” Then he’d turned back to her father and shaken his hand before leaving the office.
    When the door had closed behind him, her father had fixed her with a withering stare. “That was a poor way to start things off.”
    Cassandra, her defenses not rebuilt, lowered her eyes. “I know.”
    “It’s not too late, Cassie. You don’t have to go through with this.”
    Cassandra had raised her eyes, and a slow smile spread across her lips. Until her father had spoken, she’d felt extremely vulnerable, but his invitation to give up was the very thing she needed to strengthen her resolve.
    “But I do, Father, and I will!” With that, Cassandra had stood. “Will I see you later, at home?”
    “If not tonight, I will certainly be there to see you off in the morning.”
    “As usual,” Cassandra said to the bathroom ceiling as she opened her eyes and chased away the afternoon’s memory. Her father had always been a busy man—too busy to give her the time she had always wanted, especially since her accident. She had wanted to spend her last night in New York with him and her mother, but as usual, Gregory Leeds was too busy to have dinner with his only daughter.
    So, after she and her mother had eaten a quiet meal, she’d packed her bags. Afterward, she’d gone for a short walk, knowing she might not be back for a year.
    Cassandra stood under the shower, the water cascading from her tall lithe frame like a waterfall. Fifteen minutes later, she was in a soft cotton nightgown, sitting on the edge of her bed.
    Glancing at the clock, she saw it was almost one a.m. She knew she should try to sleep; she would have to get up in less than five hours. She didn’t feel the least bit tired.
    Sleep and Cassandra had become flirting strangers since her father had made his decision. He won’t break me! she declared to herself, refusing to let herself dwell on the one aspect that frightened her more than anything else in the world—the one thing that would make this job an unending personal hell.
    Forcing herself to stop thinking about horses, Cassandra lay down and turned off the bedside lamp. She closed her eyes and tried to sleep, but instead, Kirk North’s handsome face returned to haunt her again.
    “No!” she yelled, sitting up and turning on the lamp. The low flood of gentle yellow light helped calm her down, but Kirk’s face would not disappear, nor did her body’s reaction. Again, as had happened in her father’s office, Cassandra felt the heat rising within her.
    She remembered the way he had so easily handled Somner, and she remembered, too, the hard, tough way he had stared her would-be-fiancé down. The power radiating around him was dangerous, Cassandra knew, for she could feel its call even now.
    And I have to spend twelve months with him. What will happen? Can I do it?
    “I will make it,” she promised. Cassandra understood instinctively, she could not allow herself to fall under Kirk North’s mesmerizing aura. If she was to be his boss, she had to prove she could do the job better than he could.
    Ranching is just another type of business, she tried to tell herself. She tried, but failed. What was a ranch without horses?
    Cassandra shivered. She was nine again, riding along the beautiful green meadow in Long Island. The sun was warm overhead; the large, powerful Thoroughbred