Her Own Ranger

Her Own Ranger
Anne Marie Duquette

COUNT ON A COPIn Florida's Everglades, Carson Ward is the law.As a ranger, he's sworn to protect the land. But Carson's taken a private oath, too–that he will track down the poachers who killed his father.Alisha Jamison is a well-known wildlife photographer. This assignment in the Evergaldes will be her last–the poachers who attacked her have seen to that.Carson and Alisha team up to search for poachers…and find strength in their partnership of two. They're alike in their independence, their willingness to take risks; they're also alike in their capacity for deep love–and for passion.Danger in the Everglades brings them together. Will it also tear them apart?

He found himself watching Alisha (#ua1440a7e-5fcc-5327-9397-a6f13733e359)Letter to Reader (#u1f2b8d34-23f9-5aff-90df-99d3ad9f631a)Title Page (#u236bc49e-69e8-5511-a497-09442975b018)Dedication (#ub16d36d9-1f85-5e9b-a072-20b3e1230483)CHAPTER ONE (#u555999fb-f5fe-5714-8778-6b8701d4c4c8)CHAPTER TWO (#u569d0eb5-2c63-55f6-82c3-31b862e457f2)CHAPTER THREE (#u010d0567-7520-531a-b692-13a3a1b18b19)CHAPTER FOUR (#u06fc1ce5-0756-50e2-b586-83f957b5e61f)CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SIXTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SEVENTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER EIGHTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

He found himself watching Alisha

I sure screwed up, Carson thought. The best-laid plans ... It was all supposed to be so easy. He’d catch his poachers, she’d get her pictures....

Instead he had a woman here who was more intent on seeing poachers brought to justice than in grabbing any glory for herself. That he admired. But he couldn’t understand her eagerness to put herself at risk again. Why subject herself to the same dangers? Why not let someone else, someone qualified, someone like him, take the chances? That’d been bis plan for her...and she’d rejected it.

Obviously she was a woman of courage—or a stubborn fool.

Despite her scars, he saw rare beauty in Alisha Jamison, both inside and out. She reminded him of those exotic air-orchids, found in places you didn’t expect them, straining toward the light.

She’d be an interesting woman to get to know. As a friend... and as a lover.

“Anne Marie Duquette’s romantic thrillers

are truly thrilling, full of exciting action

and suspense.”

—Tess Gerritsen, bestselling author of Harvest

and Life Support

Dear Reader,

Because my husband was in the navy, our family had the chance to enjoy two years as residents of the state of Florida. During that time, we visited the Everglades. I was so impressed with its unique beauty that sharing it with my husband and children wasn’t tough. I had to set a story there.

While I have remained true in my descriptions of the wildlife, landscape and Seminole history of the Everglades, I have taken certain liberties in my story.

The hotel and sounds I describe are fictitious and are nothing like the primitive campgrounds that exist in reality. Also, although poaching retains a problem in Florida, the efforts of the park service and conservationists have put an end to large-scale alligator poaching on public and private land.

In fact, the biggest threat to the Everglades these days isn’t poachers. The real danger is the need for, and drainage of, the park’s freshwater reserves to support growing populations in the large coastal cities.

Sadly, all the species I’ve referred to in this book as threatened or endangered really are. But efforts are being made to preserve then, so there is hope for this one-of-a-kind wilderness.

It takes a special person to not only survive in these vast wetlands. but to appreciate and protect its creatures. My hero, Ranger Carson Ward, and his lady, Alisha Jamison, are two such people. I hope you enjoy their romance and share their love of the great outdoors.

Welcome to the Everglades!

Anne Marie Duquette

Her Own Ranger

Anne Marie Duquette

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

To Donna, Bill, Luke and Jen

Who share my love for Florida

CHAPTER ONE

June—Miccosukee Seminole Reservation,

north of Everglades National Park

CARSON WARD, SEMINOLE-BORN and tribal-bred, sat in the back of his private canoe, not only to steer his passengers through the silent, unmapped waterways but to watch for the first bullet to warn them. It would come... and probably soon. It was only a question of when.

The poachers working the land guaranteed it. For years now, they’d fouled the waters with the blood of Everglades alligators, and last summer, with the blood of Carson’s father. He’d been a park ranger, too. Ferris Ward had imbued his son with a love of the Everglades and a sense of guardianship toward it. A sense of justice—that was an equally important legacy from his father.

Today was another battle in the war Carson intended to win. The poachers were clever, and as skilled at survival as he was. But this time...

Carson’s smile was deadly. This time, he had an edge against the men invading his people’s ancient homeland. The three other people in his canoe weren’t the tourists they seemed to be. Instead of rangers, they were Seminoles like him—natives who knew their land as no non-tribal ranger ever could.

“Everyone okay?” Carson quietly asked in English. Those present spoke fluent Seminole, but deception was an art that required attention to detail. If they were going to look like tourists, they had to sound like them, too.

Sitting in the point position was Ray Weaver, cousin of thirty-six-year-old Carson and his junior by five years.

“No, I’m not okay. I feel like a damn idiot.”

Carson grinned. Unlike him, Ray wasn’t NPS, a ranger with the National Park Service. As a professional manager of one of the tribe’s more prosperous hotel-casinos. Ray preferred tuxedos to a ranger’s boots. But, like Carson, he’d grown up in these swamps. He considered the Disney World T-shirt and Mickey Mouse hat, complete with ears, an insult to his manhood, even if the baggy shirt beneath the life jacket did cover a bulletproof vest.

Carson was immovable on that point, though he wore no vest himself. He wasn’t foolhardy, but his position in the rear of the canoe meant he was doing most of the steering, something he couldn’t easily accomplish with a heavy bulletproof vest. Wearing one would have ensured that if the canoe upended he’d sink straight to the bottom of the Everglades. Carson preferred to take his chances.

Ray preferred the same, but Carson refused to risk anyone else’s life, hence Ray’s present complaints. Ray was loyal to family and fiercely loyal to Carson’s late father. When he’d discovered Carson was planning this trip, Ray had insisted on coming along as reinforcement.

“If anyone from the casino saw me, I’d die of embarrassment.” Ray touched the mouse ears on his ball cap and flinched. Suffering in silence wasn’t his strong point. “This reeks big-time. I can’t believe people actually spend money on this trash.”

“Hush, or I’ll make you wear the camera around your neck as well,” said the older woman behind Ray. “Remember, noisy with the oars. We’re all supposed to be tourists.”

“I’ve been paddling canoes my whole life,” Ray grumbled. “I don’t know how to be noisy.”

“Try,” Carson insisted. “We don’t want poachers thinking we’re a threat.”

“Fine. I’m splashing. Are you happy, Mother?”

Ray’s mother, Deborah Weaver, was Carson’s aunt and Ferris Ward’s sister. When the poachers had killed Ferris, his widow, Mary, decided to leave the tribe’s wetlands home. Ray found her a job with one of the prosperous tribal bingo halls. Mary, like Ray, detested the Everglades as much as Carson and Deborah loved them. Ray only returned for family reasons, nothing else.

Carson had stayed behind, unwilling to give up his family home or his job as a ranger. Mary repeatedly begged him to join her. He refused, vowing to stay and find his father’s killers, determined to bring them to justice.

As only children, Carson and Ray looked after their aunts; Deborah was a widow, too, whose husband had died of natural causes years ago. Protection was the tribal way. Of the two mothers, traditional Seminole Deborah Weaver had always been the stronger parent, the stronger woman. She’d volunteered to accompany her nephew and son today, shrugging off their objections.

“You should’ve stayed home, Mother,” Ray muttered, not for the first time. “We’ve got armed crazies out here. You could get hurt.”