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The dog watched as Josh carefully sat on the edge of the seat, slowly lifted his bad leg and winced as he swiveled into position behind the wheel.
“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were telling me ‘I told you so,’” Josh said on a long sigh as he leaned against the headrest for a moment, waiting for the pain to subside.
But agreeing to physical therapy wouldn’t help. It never had—and that last therapist had even made things worse. The perky little therapist Grace kept sending out wouldn’t be any more successful than the ones she’d sent before.
If Grace hadn’t been an old college classmate of his mother’s, he would’ve quit being polite about her ongoing efforts a long time ago.
Bear gave a low woof.
“You’re a traitor, you know.” Josh reached over to ruffle his thick coat. “Falling for Sophie’s dog treats is not a positive measure of your integrity.”
As usual, Bear overflowed his half of the bench seat of the truck. Now, he awkwardly turned around and lay down, his feet slipping and sliding on the leather seat, until his tail pressed against Josh’s thigh and his head was propped against the passenger side door.
He didn’t respond.
“Great. I do this for you, and you’re sulking. I told you it was rainy outside,” Josh said with a laugh as he shifted the truck into reverse. “See if I brave the elements the next time you want to go to town.”
The long gravel lane down to the highway had partially washed out down by the creek, where a culvert under the road hadn’t been able to handle the deluge, and only slippery mud remained. How had Sophie managed to make it up to his cabin in her old Taurus, earlier this afternoon?
If nothing else, she was certainly one determined woman.
By the time he reached the highway, he’d had to circumvent several impassable areas by veering up into the brush at the side of the lane, his truck was splattered with mud, and he was already regretting the decision to head for town.
He pulled into the grocery store parking lot and pocketed his keys, thankful that the rain had now finally slowed to a chilly drizzle.
There were a number of trucks pulled up in front of the coffee shop a few doors down, and there’d been several down at the feed store where a lot of the older guys often sat around drinking coffee. A group of teenagers heading into the grocery store were the only pedestrians in sight.
Josh grabbed his cane and carefully climbed out of the truck, ignoring the searing pain arrowing down his spine. Protecting his weak knee, he eyed the distance to the door. No more than twenty or thirty feet. He could make it, easily.
One of the teenagers turned back, surveyed his progress and gave him a pitying stare, then spun around and joined her friends, their chatter and high-pitched laughter ending abruptly as the automatic double doors closed behind them.
Fifteen feet.
Ten.
Gritting his teeth, he reached the building and the doors whooshed open in front of him. Another few steps and he could steady himself with a grocery cart, pick up the dog food and the few things he needed for himself, and be on his way—
Ahead, he saw a petite, auburn-haired woman zip around a corner with a grocery basket slung over one arm. Sophie. Why did she have to be here now?
He groaned, pasted a strained smile on his face and made himself straighten up.
A muscle spasmed in his back. His balance faltered, sending his foot skidding on the slick, wet tiles of the entryway. In one dizzying moment, he saw the floor rush up to meet him.
And then stars exploded inside his skull.
A teenager shrieked. Footsteps thundered down the aisle by the front door. Sophie froze for a split second, then dropped her basket of groceries and spun around to the end cap of the aisle. Four—no, five girls were standing around someone sitting on the floor.
An all too-familiar oak cane with a carved handle lay on the floor nearby.
Lois, a pudgy, middle-aged clerk in jeans and a purple Aspen Creek Warriors sweatshirt, was kneeling at his side. “Step back, girls. Go on about your business.”
Nervous laughter rippled through the group. “I saw him fall,” one of them exclaimed. “He fell super hard. Is he, like, hurt real bad?”
“Do you need help?” asked another girl, her voice tinged with excitement. “I think he hit his head. I took CPR for babysitting last fall.”
“He’s breathing just fine, and says he’s perfectly okay.” Lois fluttered her hands at them, shooing them away. “Now scoot, and don’t embarrass the poor man any further. I’m just going to help him up in a minute, and he’ll be good to go.”
The girls hovered, obviously loath to miss any excitement, then reluctantly continued on their way down the aisle when Lois fixed them with a steely glare. Their brittle laughter and stage whispers floated behind them as they left.
Sure enough, Sophie could now see the man’s profile, and he was definitely Josh McLaren. His face was pale and strained, but from the high color at the back of his neck, rigid set of his jaw, and lines of tension bracketing his mouth and eyes, the fall had not only been painful, but he was also embarrassed at making a scene.
The dilemma—embarrass him further with her presence, or stand back and risk the chance that he might falter and fall again?
No contest.
“Howdy, stranger,” she said lightly, moving to his other side as Lois helped him to his feet.
He shot a glance at her and muttered something unintelligible under his breath.
“I told him we should call the EMTs because I do think he hit his head,” Lois said, the crook of her elbow still hooked through his as she handed him his cane. “But he said absolutely not—that he’d be on his way home before they showed up, anyway.”
“I don’t need any help. I need dog food. And then I need to go home,” he said, his voice ragged. He cleared his throat. “But thanks for the thought, and thanks for helping me out. You…probably need to put some mats down by that front door. It’s wet.”
“Here—you can sit on that bench by the entrance, and I’ll get what you need, okay?” Sophie offered. “Just give me your shopping list.”
“I’m not disabled,” he said through clenched teeth. The irony of his words apparently hit him, and his expression softened. “Well…maybe a little. But I can handle this myself.”
“It will take just a minute if you let me help, or it could end up with you slipping again. Your boots are wet and a little muddy from being outside. This could’ve happened to anyone.”
“Right. Which is my point exactly.” He nodded to her, then started slowly down the aisle, his shoulders stiff with the effort to keep each stride steady. “So, thanks for your concern, and please just take care of all your other clients. I am perfectly fine.”
Sophie showed up every morning at the cramped Pine County Home Health office on Main Street to pick up the day’s set of patient folders, any new physical therapy orders, and the necessary equipment and supplies for the clients on her schedule.
An orderly system. A good start to the day.
But her first four days on the job had all ended the same. Failure. And it wasn’t going to happen again.
She’d called the phone number listed on Dr. McLaren’s chart and found it disconnected, then she’d stopped at his cabin three days in a row after that first awkward meeting. He hadn’t answered the door the first two times, but since his dog was there, surely the man had to be somewhere on the property.
Yesterday, McLaren had been outside when she pulled in, and he’d flatly refused to begin therapy. Didn’t he have any idea of how much she could help, and how much better his quality of life could be? Why didn’t he care?
Only his mammoth dog liked to see her show up, and she hadn’t made any progress at all with its owner. That humiliating incident at the grocery store yesterday had probably only firmed McLaren’s resolve.
But after years of dealing with her critical father, difficult grandfather and a kind but apathetic husband, this was one man who wasn’t going to stand in her way, because far too much was at stake.
Sophie climbed out of her car and tossed a dog biscuit at Bear, who had started meeting her with a feverishly wagging tail every time she showed up at the McLaren place. “If I’d known you were this happy over dog biscuits, I wouldn’t have sacrificed my salmon,” she said drily, rubbing the wiry fur on the top of his head. “So, where’s this master of yours hiding this time?”
“I never hide. You just don’t know where to look. And frankly, that’s fine by me.”
She spun around and found her quarry shadowed in the doorway of a log building at the edge of the clearing. Roughly the size of a three-car garage, its weathered exterior blended into the forest as if it had stood there for a hundred years.
She folded her arms across her chest. “Answering a phone or a knock on the door would be common courtesy.”
“Of which I possess very little. So please, if you don’t mind—”
“I want to help you, Dr. McLaren.”
“And I just want to be left alone.” He stood straight and tall, a formidable and darkly handsome man who might have been at home in a boardroom or with a badge on his chest in the Old West, and his words rang with the finality of someone who didn’t intend to see her again. “I thought I made that clear at the grocery store yesterday. So good day, Ms…”
“After my phone calls and the business cards I left on your door, I’m sure you know my name by now.”
He tipped his head in slight acknowledgment as he awkwardly turned away, and she could see he was leaning even more heavily on his cane than usual. He winced, stilled for a moment, then started to close the door.
A flash of desperation shot through her. “Look, I’ve got four clients in their eighties and nineties, and they all have the courage to make their lives better.” She strode across the clearing. “What are you afraid of? That therapy will hurt? That you’ll fail?”
He paused, but didn’t turn back to face her. “That isn’t your concern. I am not your concern.”
“There, you’re wrong.” She stopped in the door way, effectively preventing him from shutting it in her face. “For whatever reason, Grace seems to have a particular interest in you, so giving up is not an option.”
“Maybe I just don’t care. Look, I’ll call her and let you off the hook. Last I heard, I have the right to decline medical services.”
“No.”
That earned a snort of irritation. “And why not?”
White knuckling his cane, he slowly turned back to face her. The lines of tension bracketing his mouth and sheen of perspiration on his forehead betrayed just how much the movement cost him.
She’d tried polite professionalism. She’d tried challenging his pride. Now, she could only bare her heart. “Because you are too young to live like this, with a disability that we can fix. You have too much to offer this world.”
Pain flickered in his eyes. “And what would you know about that?”
“Well, you obviously have a medical degree. You could be doing some good around here. We have so few doctors in this county—and the ones we have are retiring left and right. Wouldn’t it be better to work again, instead of just moping around this place?”
“I’ll never go back into medicine again.” His voice was harsh. “It’s time for you to leave.”
“Then…try to get better just for yourself. Take away some of the pain you live with every day.”
A muscle ticked along the side of his jaw as a tense silence lengthened between them.
“Why,” he asked wearily, “does this matter so much to you?”
“Initially it was because my boss insisted, but now you’ve become the biggest challenge in my caseload, Dr. McLaren,” she admitted. “And I cannot fail. You need help, and I need a job—right here in Pine County.”
The hard line of his mouth softened. “And why does that matter? There’s a big world out there.”
She locked her gaze on his, willing him to give her a chance. “Family reasons. Important reasons.”
“You are one stubborn woman,” he said on a long sigh.
And with that, she knew she’d won. She tried to contain a grin of victory, then simply gave up. “One of my most endearing traits.”
“Yeah. Endearing.” He eyed her with renewed suspicion. “We’re talking about next week or the week after. Right? Not today.”
“You’re on my schedule for Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at four-thirty—”
“Three times a week?” A pained look crossed his face.
“For starters. We’ll cut back gradually as time goes on.” She looked at her watch. “But we’ve already used up a good part of your time and I can’t stay late today, so maybe we can start your assessment on Monday instead.”
A wry look flashed in his eyes. “Big plans, tonight?”
“With the two most important men in my life.”
He blinked at that. “Good. Then you can be on your way.”
He gripped his cane and slowly crossed the distance from the outbuilding to the cabin, the stiff set of his shoulders and awkward gait belying his effort to walk with an even stride.
Her heart caught at what that effort cost him, and she had to stop herself from moving to his side to help. “You won’t be sorry, Dr. McLaren. This is the first day of a new life for you. I promise.”
He was already sorry, and that rust bucket of an old car of hers hadn’t even made it down the lane to the highway.
If it hadn’t been for that humiliating incident at the grocery store, he would not have capitulated. Ever.
He’d certainly fallen before on his home turf. Had felt weak and helpless and useless.
But that incident in public, with a gaggle of shrieking teenagers surrounding him and a motherly store clerk murmuring comforting platitudes in his ear more suited for a three-year-old with a scraped knee, had been the final straw.
He deserved an eternity of penance for what happened to his wife. He had probably deserved to die with her. But to be on the floor, helpless and pathetic and dizzy, the object of pity, wasn’t something he wanted to experience ever again.
And then there was Sophie herself.
Today, her expression of concern and gentle insistence had made him want to rebelliously refuse. Yet something about that sprinkling of freckles over her pert nose and the hint of humor dancing in her eyes had made him want to get to know her a lot better, too.
Because of that and more, he was back to wavering; not wanting her coming back here for deeper reasons than he wanted to think about.
But he didn’t have her cell number, and calling the Home Health office meant risking the chance of having Grace answer the phone. He certainly wasn’t taking her on again.
The cell phone on his belt vibrated. Lifting it, he read the screen and sighed, debating about answering. But failing to answer would only spur more calls and eventually, a harried trip from Sacramento by his only sibling, followed by more hovering and overt concern than he could handle.
“Josh,” Toni exclaimed. “When you didn’t answer last night and early this morning, I was starting to panic. I told Tom that I was going to have to book a flight if I didn’t reach you by this afternoon.”
Tom, a quiet, friendly guy with the energy level of a ninety-year-old, was the exact opposite of his overly anxious wife, and had probably been trying to calm her down with little success. How the man managed to live with such a whirlwind of energy was truly a mystery.
“I’m fine, Toni. Phone reception is just iffy here.”
“But when you didn’t answer—”
“What do you think might happen? I’m perfectly independent. In good health. Content.” None of it was true, but allaying her worries meant keeping her where she belonged—at home—instead of having her descend into his life again for a weekend or longer. He loved her. He knew she loved him. But in this case, distance was the best antidote to an awkward situation.
