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little tributary, while shimmering rays of the dying sun broke through here and there to cast diamond sparkles upon the darkening water. A lone wading bird stalked the far side of the water, long-legged and graceful.
    A crane. Tall, snow white except for its legs, it was the focal point of the glorious picture there. The bird was so still that if it weren’t for the creature’s coloring, it would have blended with the scene. Like any predator, however, this creature of ethereal beauty was sleek, cunning, and careful. It waited; it watched. Its stillness was so complete that it might indeed have been a painted picture that Taylor Douglas stared upon, a picture of serenity and peace.
    The woman was much the same.
    Yes! The woman.
    Was she alone? Perhaps now ...
    But she hadn’t been before! And so ...
    Though she was dead still, low and flattened against a pine, he saw her. Or part of her. She was well concealed by the foliage. Still, strangely, he sized her up within his mind.
    Slim, graceful, striking, like the bird. Like the crane, she watched, and she waited.
    And, he thought as well, like the crane, she was a predator. No one watched and waited and calculated in such a manner without intending to strike.
    He dismounted from Friar, his bay horse, named for his deep brown color and long shaggy mane. He stretched in a leisurely manner, then hunkered down by the water, dousing his face, yet surreptitiously studying her there, across the water.
    Yes, she watched.
    She thought herself hidden, and indeed, he could see little of her, a long slender arm, a wealth of dark hair, a face as stunningly sculpted and delicate as that of the most elegant of belles. Her eyes were dark, large, hypnotic.
    Pinned on him.
    Ready for battle. To spring to pounce. She waited merely for the right moment ...
    Was she unaware that he had seen her? Most probably. His eyesight was exceptional. It was one of the gifts that made him an incredible marksman, as well as a good scout. And he knew this area as few other men did, just as he knew, indeed, that the Southern forces of Captain Dickinson—little Dixie—were in the near vicinity. He knew he was close to an encampment, and that he would find his prey.
    And yet ...
    He had expected nothing like this. He couldn’t help feeling a certain sorrow. Had the Southern forces become so low, so pathetic, and so depleted that women were doing the work of the army? And so thinking, he couldn’t help remembering back to the beginning of the war, when the reckless bravado and confidence of the men who would be soldiers had brought about the pointless tragedy that would scar his own life.
    No. This was different. This girl was here by no accident.
    He threw more water on his face, adjusted his hat, and whistled for Friar to come to the water. Keeping low, his hat brim over his eyes, he surveyed the area around the little tributary. A number of roads here, different ways to go—different ways out. He rose slowly, seeing that beyond the obvious, there was a trail heading into what appeared to be thick foliage. It was as he stared at the trail that she suddenly made her presence known.
    He’d thought himself a hardened soldier. But she stunned him, froze him in place.
    She swept his breath away.
    She was sheer audacity.
    For suddenly, she stepped from her hideout among the pines in all her glory. Sheer, naked glory. A magnitude of splendor that wiped the mind clean, stealing into the senses, the fantasy of dreams. She was slim, compact, her form clad in nothing other than the superb blanket of her hair, falling down in rippling waves of pure ebony to cover her breasts, belly, and thighs in a manner that teased in the wickedest way ...
    “Good day, Yankee.”
    For a moment, he couldn’t answer. He saw her smile.
    “Madam,” he said, his jaw tense but working.
    “You’re in a Rebel state.”
    “I am.”
    “So ... I assume you’re looking for rebellion, soldier?” she called in a taunting voice. “If