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“So you’ve got quite the bump there,” Jordan said as he moved toward her, chart in hand.
His professional voice was gentle, caring, and yet oh, so sexy.
“I—I skipped breakfast and felt a little dizzy,” she said, unwilling to admit she’d flat-out fainted. She could have eaten the Grand Slam breakfast at the local Denny’s and she still would’ve passed out at the sight of Bruce Wilkins’s gaping head wound.
“Mmm-hmm.” Jordan laid down the clipboard, lathered his hands to the elbows at the nearby sink, then snapped on a fresh pair of gloves before stepping up beside her.
Was he going to touch her?
Of course he was. He was a doctor after all. He could hardly examine her head from across the room. But right now Darci could use a little distance between them. The antiseptic smell of the hospital was overpowered by Jordan’s own clean scent. Soap, pure male and…what else? Words like woodsy and musky came to mind, but that wasn’t right either. Jordan didn’t strike her as the musky type.
No. His scent was more like fresh squeezed limes and—
Tequila, the imp prompted, inspiring images of body shots and salt and…good grief, she’d hit her head all right! And lost her mind in the process.
Jordan frowned in concentration and gently touched the lump on her forehead.
“Tender?” he asked.
Darci winced. “Very.”
She felt raw and vulnerable sitting there with his wonderful, strong and capable hands on her…and aching for more.
It had been way too long since she’d enjoyed a man’s touch, or even a simple date for that matter. The threats Christopher had made at his former school in Northglenn had taken over their lives, consumed Darci day and night for the past several months.
“Looks like you could use a couple of stitches,” Jordan said, jarring her from her thoughts. “Or maybe we can put some butterfly clamps on the laceration. Less scarring that way.”
“Sounds good,” Darci said. She tried not to flinch as he tended to her wound.
“There, that should do it. Don’t get it wet for a few days, and let me know if you notice any heat or further swelling. If the pain gets bad, take some Tylenol.”
“What—not two aspirin and call you in the morning?” Darci blamed her head injury on the lame quip. Just because he’d eyeballed her a little when she’d first come in…or had he? Maybe she’d imagined it. But it didn’t matter anyway. Just didn’t mean a thing. For all she knew there was a Mrs. Cowboy Boots in the picture.
So why couldn’t she quiet that damned imp in her head?
Jordan studied her as he peeled off his gloves, then reached for a pen and notepad. He scribbled something, and Darci spoke quickly. “I don’t need a prescription. It doesn’t hurt that bad.”
He handed over the scrap of paper and Darci looked at it and nearly choked. He’d jotted down a pair of phone numbers in a neat, looping scrawl unlike the stereotypical hard-to-read doctor’s handwriting.
“Call me if you have any complications—excessive headache, vomiting, that sort of thing,” he said. “Either Dr. Samuels or I will be on call.”
“Thanks.” Darci folded the slip of paper and put it in her purse.
She could’ve looked up the hospital number in the phone book. Had he given her his home number?
Don’t be silly.
Maybe she could ask him to write out a prescription for her after all. One for a woman who’d been too long without a date. An anti-man drug. Maybe an antihistamine. Inwardly she snickered at her own lame humor.
Lord, she’d had no idea a head injury could turn her into a ditz.
CALL ME?
Jordan put his key in the front-door lock and opened the dead bolt. What had he been thinking? There was no reason to have given Darci Taylor his home phone number in addition to the one at the hospital. At least it wasn’t his cell. He didn’t need to be bothered day and night with minor medical emergencies.
But then, she probably wasn’t the type to do that anyway. Darci seemed like a strong, confident woman who took matters into her own hands.
You want her to call.
The voice inside his head taunted him as he deactivated the alarm and called out to Michaela that he was home.
Darci had looked vulnerable as she sat in the exam room with a head injury, though. She obviously wasn’t cut out to work in the E.R. admittance. Maybe she’d get a job elsewhere and then he could stop thinking about her.
Besides—he hadn’t been interested in a woman since Sandra had died. No point in starting now.
“Mac!” he called again, using the nickname his daughter preferred.
“In the kitchen, Dad.”
She was at the table, eating a frozen yogurt and working on her laptop. The way her head was tilted, with her long, light brown hair caught up in a ponytail, she looked so much like her mother.
Jordan’s chest tightened.
“Is that homework?” She was allowed online, but with limited access.
He had to protect his daughter.
Michaela nodded. “I’m writing a report on the opening chapter of a book we’re reading.” She rolled her eyes. “Why do teachers always make us read boring things instead of something we’d actually like?”
“Good question.” He bent and kissed the top of her head. “One that kids asked even in my generation.”
“They had books back then?”
“Very funny. What’s this?” He picked up a piece of paper from the countertop. A flyer about parent-teacher meetings and an open house being held at the school a week from Tuesday.
“It’s a welcome-to-the-school-year thing,” Michaela said. “Sorta lame, but I guess we’re supposed to go.”
“They’re serving refreshments,” he said. “At least we can score some cookies.”
Michaela returned his grin. “You’ll like my homeroom teacher. She’s cool.”
“Awesome. Can’t wait. How about we go out on the boat this weekend?”
“Cool! Can Jenny come? We want to check out some new horse magazines.”
The cabin cruiser slept four, and Michaela’s best friend often came along on overnight excursions as well as day trips.
“We’ll see. Right now, why don’t you just worry about what you want on your pizza.”
“We’re going to Trail Inn?”
Restaurants in River’s End were a scarce commodity, but Trail Inn was the best pizza joint within fifty miles, and his daughter’s favorite. “You’d better know it,” Jordan said. “As soon as I change out of my scrubs.”
“And after I check on Chewy again.” The stray dog Mac had begged him to take in that summer had come with a surprise—puppies, born a week ago.
The medium-sized, red-and-white dog had turned out to be a blessing. Caring for Chewy and her puppies had been the best form of therapy for Michaela—something that made his little girl smile more than she had since her mother’s death. And Chewy was a good watchdog—something he’d wanted to get Mac, though he’d been a little leery of the more aggressive breeds.
Chewy had quickly become a spoiled family member, temporarily distracting Mac from her obsession with horses. She’d been trying to talk Jordan into buying her a horse like her friend Jenny’s, which Michaela wanted to ride. Her hip injury would likely never get much better, and Jordan was worried that a fall from a horse might make it worse.
“I’ll run next door and say thanks to Louise.” The neighbor kept an eye out for Michaela, even kept his daughter at her house at times, when Jordan wasn’t home. “Then we’re off. We can swing by and rent a couple of DVDs—heck, it’s Friday night. I’ll even watch The Sisterhood of the Traveling Trousers again.”
Friday nights had always been pizza and movie night for Mac and Sandra.
“Da-ad.” His daughter snickered. “It’s Traveling Pants, and there’s a part two, you know.”
“No, I didn’t know. Hey—even better. We can watch both of them.”
“I know what you’re trying to do,” she said, quirking her mouth into a crooked little pucker—a Sandra habit. “And I love you for it, Dad. Thanks.” But her eyes held sadness.
“I love you, too, snicker-doodle.”
AS SOON AS JORDAN DRAKE had finished tending to her injury, Darci had insisted on going right back to work, but Shirley demanded she take it easy. “You just watch me work, and you’ll get the hang of things,” the older woman said. “We’ll worry about the details when you’re feeling better.”
Things had been fairly slow for the rest of the morning, though they picked up in the afternoon. By the time four-thirty rolled around, Darci was ready to go home. She was tired, her head was throbbing, and she was worried about Christopher. She’d asked Stella to keep an eye on him at the ranch after school until she could make other arrangements, and Chris had been furious.
“I don’t need a babysitter,” he’d said. “I’m old enough to stay home alone for a couple of hours.”
“Yes, you are,” Darci had told him. “But age and privilege are two different things, and you’re going to have to earn my trust before I leave you by yourself.”
“Whatever. Just do me a favor, and don’t ask old lady Bataway to watch me.”
Their neighbor, Eileen Hathaway, was a busybody and overprotective of her enormous dog, a Newfoundland.
“Disrespect isn’t going to help you any. And I’m sure there’s not enough money in the bank to get Mrs. Hathaway to babysit you anyway.”
Now as she drove toward the Shadow S Ranch in a wind-blown sprinkling of rain, she hoped Christopher hadn’t given Aunt Stella a hard time. Of course, if he had, Stella would likely put a boot to his butt. Maybe that was what he needed. Maybe she’d been so busy worrying over everything that had happened in Northglenn that she hadn’t been hard enough on him.
Lord knows she’d experienced her share of anger and frustration. Yet she’d made a huge effort to tamp her feelings down and cave in to Christopher’s wants and needs. No more, though. She was through being Mommy Doormat.
Maybe Nina Drake could give her some helpful guidance when she saw Christopher on Thursday. Darci had requested a few minutes of the appointment time for her and Dr. Drake to talk.
At the ranch house, Darci rapped on the front door, then pushed it open, glad to get out of the wet weather. Immediately she was treated to the smell of home cooking. Stella and Leon’s dog—a big cream-colored mutt of undetermined heritage—greeted her with wagging tail. “Hey, Jake.” She scratched the dog behind his ears. In the kitchen, she found Stella at the stove, Chris and Leon nowhere in sight.
“Hi, Aunt Stella. Where’s Chris?”
“Doing his homework in the den. How was your first day?” Then she noticed the butterfly clamps and frowned, taking hold of Darci and steering her toward the window, where she could see the wound better. “Lands sakes, what happened to you?”
Darci shrugged sheepishly. “I fainted. It’s no big deal. I’m fine.”
“Fainted? What happened? Here, sit down and put your feet up. Want something to drink?”
“Aunt Stella, I’m fine, really.” But Darci obliged her aunt, kicking off her heels and propping her feet on a kitchen chair. She twisted the cap off the Diet Coke Stella set in front of her and took a long swig.
Her aunt demanded all the details, and Darci was halfway through her story when Christopher came out of the den and headed for the fridge.
She turned to face her thirteen-year-old son, who was nearly as tall as she was. He needed a haircut. His shaggy brown mop, the ends dyed black, hung in his eyes. Green eyes like his father’s. The man who’d left them a year ago without looking back.
“Pull up your jeans,” Darci said. Normally, she would’ve let Chris’s sagging pants hang beneath his boxers without comment. Pick your battles, Darci. Their former counselor’s advice. But today she was in no mood to be conciliatory.
“They won’t stay anyway.”
“That’s what your belt is for.
He grinned. “You actually fainted at work? Bet that went over big—passing out in the E.R.”
“Hey, it’s not funny.” Then Darci softened. “Okay, maybe a little. I was pretty embarrassed.” Especially when she’d had to undergo Jordan’s ministrations.
“Don’t eat too much,” Stella scolded as Chris rummaged around for a snack. “I’ve got a pot of chili cooking.”
“You didn’t have to cook for us,” Darci said.
“No big deal, kid. I figured you’d be tuckered, and Leon went to a lodge meeting so it was just gonna be me and a TV dinner. Now I’m doubly glad I threw something together, seeing as how you’re the walking wounded.” She nudged her niece’s knee affectionately as she passed by the chair where Darci had propped her legs.
“I love your chili, so I’m not going to protest too much,” Darci said. Stella used three kinds of beans, plus lots of chopped celery, onions and garlic.
Chris turned from the fridge with an apple and a wedge of cheese. “Save some of that for the chili.” She indicated the cheddar. “You getting your homework done?”
He wrinkled his nose as he sliced off a chunk of cheese on the cutting board Stella had been using. “We have to write a report for environmental studies on how we can be green at school. I’m about three pages short of the required four.”
“I’m sure you’ll come up with something,” Darci said, glad to see he was actually settling back into public school after homeschooling for the final semester of last year. “Do you like your teachers so far?”
He shrugged. “They’re okay. Oh, yeah, that reminds me.” Stuffing the cheese into his mouth, he dragged his backpack off a chair. “There’s a parent-teacher thing coming up.” He rummaged in his pack and handed her the flyer. “Do we have to go?”
“Well, if it’s parent-teacher, I don’t see why you should have to…oh, wait,” Darci said. “They’re having an open house. And the skate park behind the school will be open, too. Says there’ll be plenty of adult supervision. You should go, Chris. It’ll be fun.”
“Oh, Mom.” He slumped as if she’d shot him with a poison dart. “I don’t need to go to the skate park with a bunch of teacher’s aides watching my every move.”
“Come on, Christopher,” Stella said. “Listen to your mom. If you don’t want to take your skateboard, at least you can see what the school looks like at night…show your mom your locker, visit with your friends.”
“Trust me,” he said, “I don’t have any friends.”
“Well, then this will be a good way to make some.” Stella stirred the pot of chili. “I always thought it was fun to be at school at nighttime.”
“You’re going,” Darci said, remembering her earlier resolve to stop coddling him.
“Fine. I’ll be in the den doing my slave work if anyone needs me.”
Stella chuckled once he’d gone. “Kids. They make everything so dramatic.”
