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She sighed. Warning bells had sounded when she first saw him, standing alone on the street, a duffel next to him. Tall and lean with short dark hair, he had a definite presence.
Those bells really pealed when he’d grinned and said she was pretty. She was familiar with charm, too familiar, and this man had it written all over him. It had been in his smile, as well as the compliment, in the warmth of his voice even though she had been late picking him up, smelling like cow and dressed like a ranch hand. That charm scared her as little else did.
That was of no consequence now. Guilt weighed heavily on her, and she didn’t often feel that particular emotion. He had come here directly from a military hospital. He experienced blackouts, which was why he had needed a ride. Her friend Josh was reticent about what had happened to him, but then he was about everything. Maybe that’s what she had expected when she’d volunteered a ride: someone like Josh.
This man was nothing like Josh.
She knelt beside Clint and helped him remove his boot. Having experienced the same injury several times, she knew how painful it could be. His body tensed, and his lips pressed tightly together. He released a long breath when his foot was free, but no other sound escaped. He looked directly at Hardy and quipped, “If Isobel is usually docile, I would hate to see one of your cows that isn’t.”
Hardy chuckled. “You’re all right, boy,” he said.
Clint removed his sock and studied his injured foot. It was red and already swelling, but the skin hadn’t been broken. He touched the skin, feeling around, as he’d had some medical training.
“I’m really sorry,” she said, truly contrite now. She stripped the soiled gloves from her hands and pulled on clean ones from the bag, then she knelt next to him and examined his foot. “We’ll stop by the doctor when we reach Covenant Falls...” Her voice faltered. She was close to him, too close. His eyes were a rich, dark brown. Almost black. Challenging. Too challenging.
“No need,” he said. “I’ll be fine.”
She shook her head. “I want X-rays,” she insisted, trying to keep her voice steady. “I might lose two good friends if I don’t take care of you, and so far I haven’t done very well.”
“I’ve had a lot worse injuries,” he said. “Maybe not as humiliating. I have met the enemy, and it is Isobel.”
Stephanie couldn’t help but grin.
“You do smile,” he said.
“Occasionally,” she replied. “Can you stand? I’ve been stepped on several times. It’s an occupational hazard. I know how much it hurts.”
“But obviously not fatal.”
Dang, but he was getting to her. No.No.No.
She held out her hand. He took it, and heat ran through her like an electrical charge. He rose easily, even gracefully, although he gritted his teeth as he put weight on the injured foot. He took a step and nearly buckled, his face draining of color.
His clothes were filthy. Hay tangled in his hair and dirt smudged his face. He smelled like the wrong end of a cow.
Yet, he looked far more attractive now than he had standing in new clothes at the bus stop. The rueful half smile was all too beguiling.
Didn’t make any difference.She’d worked too hard to get to where she was today. She was a terrible judge of men. Twice, she’d allowed outward appearances to blind her. A third would prove her the fool she’d felt at the end of both of her marriages. Now she ran like hell when her body tingled with even a little initial attraction.
She couldn’t run right now. She had agreed to pick up Clint Morgan and now she felt responsible for what had just happened. Hell’s bells, she was responsible. Josh was not going to be pleased, and he and his wife were among the few people whose opinion she valued.
She inwardly shuddered as she thought about telling him. Josh planned to be waiting at the cabin. Now the meeting would be at a doctor’s office.
Hardy had watched with concern. “You’re welcome to come inside and clean up a bit,” he said.
Clint inspected his clothes, and his eyes lit up with mischief.
“I’m good,” he said. “Dr. Phillips and I will be a matched pair.”
She groaned. She looked almost as bad as her charge. “We’ll stop at the doctor’s office just to make sure nothing is broken.”
“Nothing is,” Clint assured her.
“I would rather have a doctor tell me that,” she replied stiffly. “I’m responsible...”
His gaze hardened. “You are not responsible. Hardy is not responsible. I’m responsible for being so damned clumsy. I volunteered, remember. I’m not a hothouse flower.”
Anger, mixed with frustration, laced his voice. She nodded, backing off. She well knew the frustration of feeling helpless.
“Okay. Can you get into the van?”
He nodded, then shook Hardy’s hand. “I hope you don’t have more problems with Isobel.”
Hardy grinned. “I’m afraid she needs a few lessons in gratitude. I, however, don’t. You need anything, you have a friend here.” He turned to Stephanie. “You should hire him. You could do a whole lot worse. And send me your bill for Isobel. Include any charges from Doc Bradley.”
She stared at him for a moment. Hardy was usually cantankerous and argued about every bill. “Will do.” She eyed Clint. “Need some help?”
“A shoulder, maybe,” he said, and she detected amusement in his eyes.
She was trapped. She suddenly wondered whether he sensed her reluctance and had used his foot as an excuse to touch her. But she had offered, and she owed him. She put her arm around him and together they hobbled to the van. “Maybe I should change,” he said, peering at the wet stains on his pants and wrinkling his nose at the accompanying foul odor. “I have clean pants in the duffel.”
Hardy had already headed for the ranch house. Had Clint waited until Hardy had returned to the house before making that decision? Maybe she was just too suspicious. “You can change in the back of the van,” she said. “I have a couple of calls to make.” She hesitated, then asked suspiciously, “Do you need any help?”
“Maybe to get into the van. Not to change,” he said with that oddly attractive upward turn of the left side of his lips. The half smile was crooked and endearing. Vulnerable. And as tempting as forbidden fruit.
She was in trouble. She needed to keep her distance from Clint Morgan. As soon as she helped him into the van, she closed the door without another word. She walked over to the fence, called Doc and told him she would be there in thirty minutes, then she called Josh for the second time.
“We’re a bit more delayed,” she said. “There’s been a little accident and I’m taking Mr. Morgan to Doc Bradley’s.”
A long silence at the other end, then, “What kind of ‘little’ accident?”
“A heifer stepped on his foot.”
Another silence.
“And...” Josh prompted, inviting a fuller explanation that she was loath to give over the phone.
“I’m pretty sure nothing is broken. Just want to be sure. He also...umm...kinda needs a bath.”
“What did you do, Stephanie?”
“You know Hardy Pearson. One of his cows was in trouble. A twisted stomach. Mr. Morgan offered to help. Isobel stepped on him.”
“Who in the hell is IsobeI?”
“The heifer. She’s one of Hardy’s prize breeding stock.”
Still another long silence. It was Josh’s quiet way to indicate he was not happy. “I’ll meet you at Doc Bradley’s,” he said finally and hung up.
Her passenger must have had enough time to change. Then she spotted the new-looking loafers near the fence. She picked them up and headed to the back of the van. She knocked. No way was she going to barge in.
The door opened. Clint Morgan hadn’t changed his soiled shirt, but now wore a new pair of khakis. His feet were covered only by socks, and his thick dark hair was rumpled, as if he’d just combed it with his fingers. His eyes were the color of rich dark coffee, and they appeared far more alive than before the heifer affair. Instead of reflecting pain, they practically danced with mischief.
An unwelcome warmth spread through her. She willed it away. She didn’t trust it. She didn’t trust him. Hell’s bells. She didn’t trust herself.
He stepped down on his good leg, then put an arm around her shoulder for the short hobble to the front of the van. Once again, she felt trapped. He was too close. Along with the lingering cow smell, she got a whiff of a tangy aftershave scent and, oddly enough, it was a sensuous mixture that probably only a vet would appreciate. His arm was warm. The air was also warm and getting warmer, and not just from the sun.
They made it to the passenger side, and he stepped inside, using the door handle for support. She handed his shoes to him and hurried around to the other side of the van. As she settled into the driver’s seat, she was too aware of him, much more so than during the trip to Hardy’s. She was afraid she liked him now. Liked the way he had laughed after Isobel kicked him and his quick quips with Hardy. She was fascinated by his subtle and not so subtle challenges.
Wow, she needed to get herself in hand. “I called the town’s doctor—Doc Bradley—and he’ll be waiting for us. Josh will be there.”
To take Clint Morgan off my hands.
His grin was just too potent. Whenever she saw handsome, smiling men nowadays, she searched for the treachery she was sure lurked within. Think Ted Bundy. Or her former husbands.
Clint Morgan was good-looking with a beguiling smile. Dark, slightly curly hair, dark eyes, strong cheekbones, a cleft in his chin and a slight wry turn to his lips. In short, Clinton Morgan raised every single one of her red flags. But she tried to reserve judgment. All she really knew about him was that he couldn’t drive because of his blackouts, and he was ex-military. Josh had been characteristically uncommunicative. Well, it was none of her business, nor the business of Covenant Falls.
She needed to keep it that way.
* * *
CLINT SAT BACK in the seat, shoved his good foot into a shoe and watched Stephanie drive. She drove with the same concentration she showed when treating the cow. He thought back to that moment she’d smiled. Openly. Not guarded as she had been since they met.
He’d thought her pretty before, but when she smiled, she was stunning. And when her blue eyes had darkened with concern while she examined his foot, he’d felt a tingling interest he hadn’t experienced in a long time.
Down, boy. He knew nothing about her. He had a pile of troubles at the moment. Plus, he wouldn’t be staying long. Just long enough to chart out a future.
But in that moment immediately after the cow had stepped on him and she’d knelt next to him, their eyes had clashed, challenging each other. It had made him feel alive for the first time since the car accident. Call it sexual attraction, awareness, or whatever, something was there, at least for him.
“I don’t need a doctor,” he said. “I’ve seen enough injuries to know this doesn’t even count as a pinprick.”
“Then you didn’t need my shoulder?”
She had him there. His foot hurt like hell, but he probably could have walked on his own. He just hadn’t been able to resist the offer. “It helped,” he said, somewhat lamely.
A small smile started on her lips, then faded. “We are going. So far my track record in seeing you safely to Covenant Falls is near zero.”
Was she being adamant because of this Josh? She’d made it clear she valued the opinion of his benefactor more than his. It was rather a blow to his pride, but then except for that one extraordinary moment on the ground, she’d been stilted since they’d met. It was as if she knew something about him, something she didn’t particularly like. The reason he’d left the army? That he failed his buddies for a dumb stunt?
At least he hadn’t had a blackout during the afternoon. He didn’t know what triggered them. The doctor suggested tension, anxiety, but they occurred at other times, as well. The only warning was a god-awful headache.
“I really am sorry,” she said, breaking into his thoughts. “I shouldn’t have asked you to help. You haven’t much experience with animals, have you?”
He shrugged. “It felt good to be doing something useful, even holding two legs of a reluctant cow.” He stayed silent for a moment, then said, “Tell me about Josh Manning. All I know is he’s a vet, not to be confused with your kind of vet.”
“He’s a good guy. He’s one of about three people whose opinion I respect.”
Clint raised an eyebrow. “That’s not very many.”
“I’ve been here only five years,” she said with a trace of a grin. It was the first time she’d lowered her guard with him. He knew about that. He had his own walls and recognized them in others.
“Just what does he want? Why is he doing this?”
“Josh inherited the cabin from a fallen friend, a fellow soldier, and rehabbed it. It was a mess when he arrived. Time and partying kids had pretty well destroyed it. He worked like hell to fix it, and he doesn’t want it to fall into disrepair again.”
“Couldn’t he rent it?”
“Covenant Falls isn’t exactly on the tourism map,” Stephanie said. “Josh and his wife hope to change that, but in the meantime, he wants someone to use it, and who better than a vet.”
“And the town?” Clint asked. “I looked it up. It’s pretty small.”
“It is. And quite elderly on the whole. A little over three thousand people spread over a large space. Most have lived there all their lives.”
“Where are you from?”
Her lips tightened. “Pennsylvania. Once upon a time.”
“What brought you here?”
“What brought you to the army?”
A deflection. Interesting. But then everything about her was interesting. Contradictory. There was a standoffishness, a message that said “hands off,” yet she had been very easy with the rancher. And his being stomped on by a heifer had apparently broken through some kind of barrier. She wasn’t a bundle of warmth, but she was communicative. Progress.
He shrugged. “I wanted to fly. The army was the fastest and cheapest way to do that.”
“Risky, though.”
“Not if you know what you’re doing.”
“What did you fly?”
“Choppers. Black Hawks mostly.”
“How long?”
“Seventeen years.”
He waited for the next question. Why had he left? It didn’t come, which either meant she wasn’t interested or she already knew. He tried to tamp his growing interest in her. He couldn’t even get from point A to point B without help. It was galling. He leaned back in the seat and closed his eyes. His foot throbbed, but it was a minor annoyance. It was the emptiness ahead that was agonizing.
* * *
WHY HAD SHE asked so many questions? It only invited more conversation and questions of his own.
Still, curiosity tickled her. She glanced at him. His eyes were closed. Resting? Dang it, but he was...
Remember your first reaction. That smile. The compliment. Remember Mark’s smile.
Still, it was her fault he was injured. She’d needed him, true, but she and Hardy could have handled the cow alone. It would have taken longer, been riskier. She hadn’t truly given Clint a choice, though, knowing full well she had challenged him. She’d known he would take it, having judged in the first few minutes of their meeting that he couldn’t ignore a challenge. However, she hadn’t expected him to get stomped on and, when he had been, to laugh.
