“The Rembrandt.” He turned back and poured the whipped eggs into the pan. “I imagine that was rare, wasn’t it?”

“Yes. Though there were a few other times that weren’t so bad, because I was able to learn something. That made all the difference.”

“Such as?”

“Well, I learned to ride horses for a Trial at a horse farm in Austria.”

“What?” He glanced at her. “I didn’t see anything mentioned in Kaskov’s notes on you about horses.”

She chuckled at his surprise. “I made sure that not many people knew about that Trial. I was supposed to work in the stables exercising the horses so that I could get information when they were moving Montara, a prize racehorse, to another stable so they could steal him. Volkov wanted him because his stud fees were enormous, and he planned on either ransoming him or selling him outright.” She made a face. “I didn’t know anything about riding horses. I’m sure that was the point of the Trial. Because they never made it easy for me. They took me to a stable outside Moscow, hired two stallions for me, and told me they’d give me three months to teach myself what I needed to know.”

“Son of a bitch. You could have been killed.”

“That’s what I thought for the first three days. I couldn’t stay on the damn horses. But then I watched the other riders at the stable and studied everything they did and didn’t do. And I saw the expressions on their faces…The next week I started to learn. Soon I managed to stay on the stallion’s back, and I let him free to run.”

Tanner’s gaze was fastened on her face. “And how did it feel?”

“How?” She was suddenly no longer in the kitchen but back to that day in Moscow with the stallion streaking around the track and the wind tearing at her hair. “It was wonderful. And frightening. Like nothing I’d ever felt before. It was almost like the thunder of the music in a Tchaikovsky concerto.”

“And nothing could be any better than that,” he said softly. “I can see it in your face.”

“Can you?” She shook her head and smiled. “I’d never felt anything like that before, and it made me want to reach out and see what else was out there that I’d never experienced. That was a good day, and the time working in Austria was good, too.”

“But only until the end?”