LITMIR.BIZ

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as she was shaking her head, trying to come up with some other explanation, Elizabeth was amused at her sister’s words. For a while there, before the flu struck, everything had been “amaze.” “Totally amaze” was Maggie’s highest praise.

      “Are you a unicorn who turns into a man, or a man who turns into a unicorn? I think you’re prettier as a unicorn.”

      Elizabeth bit back a grin at the man’s rather startled and somewhat annoyed reaction to her sister’s artless question and statement. She didn’t agree at all with Maggie’s assessment—the horse had been a handsome animal but the man was… well, he was a handsome animal, too, she admitted.

      “Maggie. That was rude.”

      Her sister looked at her, eyes wide. “How is it rude?”

      “Ah…” She looked helplessly at the stranger, who scowled back at her. “Men aren’t pretty. They’re handsome.” They also didn’t magically transfer from man to horse, or back again, but knocking Maggie’s fantasy would be cruel, right now. If that was how she dealt with the stress, it was harmless enough. He seemed willing to go along with it, despite the scowl, so that was either a point in his favor or really creepy—and that still didn’t get to the question of how this man knew them, or…

      “Was the horse yours? We’re terribly sorry, we didn’t mean… It appeared when we needed it—we would have returned it, if we knew where it came from….”

      There was no way that she was going to explain to this man how his horse had literally rescued them. She knew what had happened, but the words couldn’t come out of her mouth.

      “Libby, I told you! He is the unicorn!”

      “Maggie…” It was one thing to indulge Maggie’s fantasies, but Elizabeth wasn’t sure how far she wanted to go with that.

      “It’s true! You know I know!”

      Maggie’s voice had a strained, pleading quality to it. Her sister wasn’t the sort to make up stories—she didn’t need to. But this was asking too much for even Elizabeth to believe.

      Josh fought down his growing irritation, unable to believe that he was standing there while two females argued over his identity. Hell, he couldn’t believe that they were even having that argument. No sane human being could believe in unicorns at all, much less one that shifted between human and horse form; it was the stuff of legends and myths, not reality. Were they insane? Had he stumbled upon a pair of escapees from a mental hospital? If so, they were two seriously good-looking patients: the girl was still coltish and awkward, but her sister had an elegance that only added to her striking good looks. And those eyes… When she had turned and he’d gotten his first real look at those dark, almond-shaped eyes, something inside him had plummeted all the way from his head to his knees. He suspected it might have been his brain.

      The last thing he needed in his life right now was complications—more complications, he amended ruefully—and time was wasting. He needed to be on his way. And yet, something had made him come to their rescue… and that something wouldn’t let him leave them stranded here, even though every bit of horse sense he had was telling him to go, now.

      He had spent all night standing watch over them, listening to them sleep, the way a herd stallion would watch over his mares. The need to protect them was still strong enough to override his own instinct for self-preservation, his need to be moving, to follow the tug in his gut before it destroyed him.

      “Damn it, the last thing I need are two females on my back.” Literally. Although they’d both stayed on quite well—long and lean, like natural riders. He felt a burn start at the thought of a woman riding him, and beat it down fiercely. Bad enough that he had to deal with this damnable rut, he wasn’t going to let it overtake his larger head, too.

      The rut demanded that he move, that he find his mate, and complete the natural cycle of the Mustang. So why had he come to help them, stayed with them—why the hell had he allowed them to see him in both forms? He was nearly thirty, old enough to know better, damn it, not act like some fool yearling.

      “It’s my fault,” the younger one—Maggie—said suddenly, as though hearing his thoughts. “I called you.”

      “Maggie!”

      The older girl—woman—sounded scandalized.

      Maggie refused to be silenced. “He deserves to know, doesn’t he? I didn’t mean to, I was just so scared when those guys showed up, and then he was within reach, and…” The girl shrugged helplessly, and he revised his estimate of her age—she couldn’t be more than twelve or thirteen. No wonder his instinct kicked in; she was barely a yearling herself. But what did she mean—called him?

      “It’s a gift,” she said, hearing his thoughts again, somehow. “I’ve always been able to do it. Call animals, I mean. Libby doesn’t want me to tell anyone, because people get scared, but you should know. Because I’m sorry. It’s one thing to call an animal, but not a person. That’s not polite.”

      Josh felt like someone had punched him in the chest. “You called me. Right.” Nobody called him; he was broken to no damned halter. No Mustang ever answered to any call but their own desires.

      “I did.” She sounded almost insulted that he didn’t believe her. “I didn’t mean to, but you were there and you heard me, I guess. You don’t believe me. That’s okay, nobody ever does. Watch.”

      She turned away from him, a defiant tilt to her shoulders, and stared into the limbs of the tree above them. He turned to the older girl—a young woman, closer to his own age than her sister—but she was watching Maggie with a worried expression on her face. Because she was crazy, both of them were crazy? Or because the girl was about to do something that worried her? He turned back to watch the younger girl, waiting for an answer.

      “There,” Maggie said, speaking up into the tree. “Hello, little one. Come down here, please?”

      He got the feeling that she was speaking out loud for his benefit, not her own, and then all thought fled as a large reddish-brown squirrel jumped down from the branches and scurried across the ground to wait at Maggie’s feet, beady black eyes bright, plump tail fluffed in anticipation, perched on its haunches as though awaiting further instructions.

      “Be careful,” he found himself warning her. “It might have rabies, or…”

      “It doesn’t,” she said confidently, and bent down to pick the squirrel up. It not only allowed her to handle it, but the rodent also ducked its head under her hand as though anticipating a caress. He would have sworn it was a domesticated pet, except that there was no way…

      “All right, Maggie,” her sister said. She sounded tired, still worried, but amused at the same time. “You’ve proven your point. Now put greykins down—you know full well that even the gentle ones carry germs and ticks, and all sorts of things that you can’t protect yourself from.”

      “Yes, ma’am,” Maggie said, and let the squirrel go. It paused, as though disappointed, and then its natural caution resumed and it scampered up the nearest tree, an outraged chittering floating down back to them.

      “It didn’t like being summoned,” he said dryly, his mood made worse, not better, by proof of her claims. He had been yanked off his course by a teenager’s whim?

      “Oh, it’s just cranky,” Maggie said airily. “Squirrels are always cranky. Are you? I’m sorry, I really am. I just never thought the animals minded so much, being summoned—they never seem to object.” Her expression changed as she suddenly considered that they might, indeed, object.

      “I’m not an animal.” Was he annoyed? Josh thought that he might be, now that he’d had proof shoved in his face; this slip of a girl had managed to pull him away from his own agenda, tangling him up in whatever was going on with her and her sister without so much as a by-your-leave or pretty-please.

      Still. Remembering the man who had been threatening them, the

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