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Not Just a Cowboy
Caro Carson
This was what her life was like, he realized.
Everyone came to her when they needed something. She didn’t expect Luke to be there for any other reason. Did no one seek her out just to talk during a work shift? To play a game of cards in the shade when they were off duty? To share a meal?
He didn’t feel like smiling at the moment, but he did, anyway. She’d asked if he needed anything. “Nope. Nothing.”
She tilted her head and looked at him, those eyes that had opened so wide now narrowing skeptically. “Then what are you doing here?”
I can’t stop thinking about you. I want to feel you against me again.
* * *
Not Just a Cowboy
Caro Carson
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Despite a no-nonsense background as a West Point graduate and US Army officer, CARO CARSON has always treasured the happily-ever-after of a good romance novel. After reading romances no matter where in the world the army sent her, Caro began a career in the pharmaceutical industry. Little did she know the years she spent discussing science with physicians would provide excellent story material for her new career as a romance author. Now, Caro is delighted to be living her own happily-ever-after with her husband and two children in the great state of Florida, a location which has saved the coaster-loving theme-park fanatic a fortune on plane tickets.
For Barbara Tohm,
my very own fairy godmother
Contents
Cover (#ue9013498-0141-58e7-bed9-a80a41300a94)
Introduction (#uc21398ae-b167-5a4e-a72c-f96902f000ce)
Title Page (#u556624eb-b7ce-55b0-8ddf-dc0034cfcd27)
About the Author (#u5b4a8a49-69b2-525b-9e10-f622a051c1b5)
Dedication (#ub16ff6c8-c745-50cf-a040-8b38e004af2b)
Chapter One (#ulink_b05ddc81-6d8c-5dff-88ed-a77d496e5cb1)
Chapter Two (#ulink_96b44b45-7876-58c8-9c72-b7c971550196)
Chapter Three (#ulink_ee56bf68-dc50-5837-a1e1-1b5b82b1469c)
Chapter Four (#ulink_98eaa062-7b48-5820-8621-2bad162a1dd9)
Chapter Five (#ulink_1b107589-242f-5692-9e92-f0b92bac0db1)
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)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#ulink_d10009ca-093c-52e3-a51f-39f0040ccf84)
Patricia Cargill was not going to marry Quinn MacDowell, after all.
What a dreadful inconvenience.
She’d invested nearly a year of her life to cultivating their friendship, a pleasant relationship between a man and a woman evenly matched in temperament, in attractiveness, in income. Just when Patricia had thought the time was right for a smooth transition to the logical next step, Quinn had fallen head over heels in love with a woman he’d only known for a few weeks.
A year’s planning, a year’s investment of Patricia’s time and effort, gone in a matter of days.
She tapped her pen impatiently against the clipboard in her hand. She didn’t sigh, she didn’t stoop her shoulders in defeat, and she most certainly didn’t cry. Patricia was a Cargill, of the Austin Cargills, and she would weather her personal storm.
Later.
Right now, she was helping an entire town weather the aftermath of a different kind of storm, the kind that made national news as it made landfall on the coast of Texas. The kind of storm that could peel the roof off a hospital, leaving a town in need of the medical assistance that the Texas Rescue and Relief organization could provide. The kind of storm that let Patricia drop all the social niceties expected of an heiress while she assumed her role as the personnel director for a mobile hospital.
Her hospital was built of white tents, powered by generators, and staffed by all the physicians, nurses, and technicians Patricia had spent the past year recruiting. During Austin dinner parties and Lake Travis sailing weekends, over posh Longhorn football tailgates and stale hospital cafeteria buffets, Patricia had secured their promises to volunteer with Texas Rescue in time of disaster. That time was now.
“Patricia, there you are.”
She turned to see one of her recruits hurrying toward her, a private-practice physician who’d never been in the field with Texas Rescue before. A rookie.
The woman was in her early thirties, a primary care physician named Mary Hodge. Her green scrubs could have been worn by anyone at the hospital, but she also wore a white doctor’s coat, one she’d brought with her from Austin. She’d already wasted Patricia’s time yesterday, tracking her down like this in order to insist that her coat be dry cleaned if she was expected to stay the week. Patricia had coolly informed her no laundry service would be pressing that white coat. This Texan beach town had been hit by a hurricane less than two days ago. It was difficult enough to have essential laundry, like scrubs and bed linens, cleaned in these conditions. Locating an operational dry-cleaning establishment would not become an item on Patricia’s to-do list.
Dr. Hodge crossed the broiling black top of the parking lot where Texas Rescue had set up the mobile hospital. Whatever she wanted from Patricia, it was bound to be as inane as the dry cleaning. Patricia wasn’t going to hustle over to hear it, but neither would she pretend she hadn’t heard Hodge call her name. The rookie was her responsibility.
Patricia stayed standing, comfortable enough despite the late afternoon heat. Knowing she’d spend long days standing on hard blacktop, Patricia always wore her rubber-soled Docksides when Texas Rescue went on a mission. Between those and the navy polo shirt she wore that bore the Texas Rescue logo, she could have boarded a yacht as easily as run a field hospital, but no one ever mistook her for a lady of leisure. Not while she was with Texas Rescue.
As she waited in the June heat, Patricia checked her clipboard—her old-school, paper-powered clipboard. It was the only kind guaranteed to work when electric lines were down. If Texas Rescue was on the scene, it was a sure bet that electricity had been cut off by a hurricane or tornado, a fire or flood. Her clipboard had a waterproof, hard plastic cover that repelled the rain.
She flipped the cover open. First item: X-ray needs admin clerk for night shift.
There were only two shifts in this mobile hospital, days and nights. Patricia tended to work most of both, but she made sure her staff got the rest their volunteer contracts specified. She jotted her solution next to the problem: assign Kim Wells. Patricia had kept her personal assistant longer during this deployment than usual, but as always, Patricia would now work alone so that some other department wouldn’t be shorthanded.
Second item: Additional ECG machine in tent E4.
That was for Quinn, the cardiologist she wouldn’t be marrying. She’d make a call and have one brought down from Austin with the next incoming physician. She could have managed Quinn’s personal life just as efficiently, making her an excellent choice for his wife, but that concept wouldn’t appeal to the man now that he was in love.
If there was anything Patricia had learned as the daughter of the infamous Daddy Cargill, it was that men needed managing. Since Patricia genuinely liked Quinn, she hoped the woman he married would be a good manager, but she doubted it. Fortunately for Quinn, he didn’t need much direction. Cool-headed and logical—at least around Patricia—he would have been a piece of cake for her to manage after living with Daddy Cargill.
Third: Set up additional shade for waiting area.
The head of Austin’s Texas Rescue operations, Karen Weaver, was supposed to be responsible for the physical layout of the hospital as well as equipment like the ECG machine, but Karen wasn’t the most efficient or knowledgeable director to have ever served at the helm of Texas Rescue. Waiting for Karen to figure out how to get things done was hard on the medical staff and the patients. Patricia would find someone to get another tent off the truck and pitch it outside the treatment tents.
“Patricia.” Mary Hodge, sweating and frowning, stopped a few feet away and put her hands on her hips.
“Dr. Hodge.” Patricia kept her eyes on her to-do list as she returned the curt greeting. The woman had earned her title; Patricia would use it no matter how little she thought of the doctor’s lousy work ethic.
“Listen, I can’t stay until Friday, after all. Something’s come up.”
“Is that right?” Patricia very deliberately tucked the clipboard under her arm, then lifted her chin and gave Dr. Hodge her full attention. “Explain.”
Dr. Hodge frowned immediately. Doctors, as a species, gave orders. They didn’t take commands well. Patricia knew when to be gracious, and she knew how to persuade someone powerful that her idea was their idea. But Patricia was also a Cargill, a descendant of pioneers who’d made millions on deals sealed with handshakes, and that meant she didn’t give a damn about tact when a person was about to welch on a deal. Dr. Hodge was trying to do just that.
The doctor raised her chin, as well, clearly unused to having her authority challenged. “I have a prior commitment.” Unspoken, her tone said, And that’s all you need to know.
Patricia kept her voice cool and her countenance cooler. “Your contract specifies ninety-six hours of service. I haven’t got any extra physicians to take your place if you leave.”
“I’m needed back at West Central.”
Patricia had recruited as many physicians as she could from West Central Texas Hospital. The hospital had been founded by Quinn MacDowell’s father, and his brother Braden served as CEO. She knew the hospital well. It had just been one more item on the list of reasons why Quinn had been her best candidate for marriage.
Her familiarity with West Central gave her an advantage right now. “West Central is perfectly aware that you are here until Friday. If you went back this evening, people might wonder why you returned ahead of schedule.”
The woman started to object. Patricia held up a hand in a calming gesture. It was time to pretend to be tactful, at least. “You have a prior commitment, of course, but some people could jump to the conclusion that you just didn’t like the inconvenience of working at a natural disaster site. Wouldn’t that be a terrible reputation to have in a hospital where so many doctors somehow find the time to volunteer with Texas Rescue? I do hope you’ll be able to reschedule your commitment, just to avoid any damage to your professional reputation.”
The threat was delivered in Patricia’s most gracious tone of voice. Dr. Hodge bit out something about rescheduling her other commitment at great inconvenience to herself. “But I’m out of here Friday morning.”
“After ten, yes.” Patricia set Dr. Hodge’s departure time as she unflinchingly met the woman’s glare.
Dr. Hodge stalked away, back toward the high-tech, inflatable white surgical tent where she was supposed to be stitching the deep cuts and patching up the kinds of wounds that were common when locals started digging through rubble for their belongings. Patricia didn’t care if Hodge was angry; that was Hodge’s personal problem, not Patricia’s.
No, her personal problem had nothing to do with this field hospital, and everything to do with her plans for the future. Every moment that Texas Rescue didn’t demand her attention, she found her mind circling futilely around the central problem of her life: How am I going to save the Cargill fortune from my own father?
The radio in her hand squawked for her attention. Thankfully. Patricia raised it to her mouth and pressed the side button. “Go ahead.”
“This is Mike in pharmacy. We’re going through the sublingual nitro fast.”
Of course they were. After any natural disaster, the number of chest pain cases reported in the population increased. It was one of the reasons she’d recruited Quinn to Texas Rescue; she’d needed a cardiologist to sort the everyday angina from the heart attacks. The initial treatment for both conditions was a nitroglycerin tablet. The pharmacists she’d recruited always kept their nitro well stocked, but a new pharmacy tech had freely dispensed a month’s worth to each patient instead of a week’s worth, and the hospital had nearly run out before anyone had noticed.
Patricia had recruited that pharmacy tech, too. She accepted that the shortage was therefore partly her fault. Even if it hadn’t been, Patricia would’ve been the one to fix it.
She pressed the talk button on her radio again. “You’ll need to make what you’ve got last for several more hours. I’m going to have to reach quite a bit farther out of town to source more.”
She’d find more, though. Failure is not an option was the kind of cheesy line Patricia would never be caught saying, but it fit the mission of Texas Rescue.
Patricia started through the white tents toward the one that housed her administrative office. The Texas Rescue field hospital had been set up in the parking lot of the multi-story community hospital. The missing roof of the town’s hospital had rendered it useless, and the building now stood empty. Its shadow was welcome, though, to offset the Gulf Coast’s June heat. She noticed the Texas Rescue firefighters had moved their red truck into the shade, too, as they used their axes to clear debris from the town’s toppled ambulances. The fire truck’s powerful motor turned a winch, metal cables strained, and an ambulance was hauled back into its upright position.
There was a beauty to the simple solution. The ambulance had been on its side; the ambulance was now upright. If only her world could work that way...but Daddy Cargill had tangled the family fortune badly, and Patricia needed more than a simple winch to set her life back on track.
The shade of the damaged building couldn’t be doing much to help the firefighters as they worked in their protective gear. Patricia barely tolerated the steamy heat by wearing knee-length linen shorts and by keeping her hair smoothed into a neat bun, off her neck and out of her face. There hadn’t been a cloud in the sky all day, however, and the heat was winning. Thank goodness the administration’s tent had a generator-run air cooler.
Unlike the surgical tents, her “office” was the more traditional type of structure, a large square tent of white fabric pitched so the parking lot served as the hard but mud-free floor. Before pushing through the weighted fabric flap that served as her tent’s door, Patricia caught sight of Quinn at the far side of the parking lot. Tall, dark and familiar, her friend stood by a green Volkswagon Bug, very close to the redheaded woman who’d stolen his heart—an apparently romantic heart Patricia hadn’t suspected Quinn possessed.
Her name was Diana. Patricia knew Diana’s forty-eight hour volunteer commitment was over, and her career in Austin required her return. Quinn was committed to staying the week without her.
Patricia watched them say goodbye. Quinn cupped Diana’s face in his hands, murmured words only she would ever hear and then he kissed her.
Like the worst voyeur, Patricia couldn’t turn away. It wasn’t the sensuality of the kiss that held her gaze, although Quinn was a handsome man, and the way he pulled Diana into him as he kissed her was undeniably physical. No, there was more than just sex in that kiss. There was an intensity in the kiss, a link between the man and woman, a connection Patricia could practically see even as Diana got behind the wheel of her tiny car and drove away.
The intensity in Quinn’s gaze as he watched Diana leave made Patricia want to shiver in the June heat.
It was too much. She didn’t want that. Ever.
Nitroglycerin.
With renewed focus, she pushed aside the fabric flap and entered her temporary office, grateful for the cooler air inside. The generator that powered their computers also ran the air cooler and a spare fan. The tent was spacious, housing neat rows of simple folding chairs and collapsible tables. It was the nerve center for the paperwork that made a hospital run, from patients’ documents to volunteer’s contracts.
Her administrative team, all wearing Texas Rescue shirts, kept working as Patricia headed for the card table that served as her desk. Only a few nodded at her. The rest seemed almost unnaturally busy.
She didn’t take their lack of acknowledgment personally. She was the boss. They were trying to look too busy for her to question their workload.
She was grateful, actually, to slip into the metal folding chair without making any small talk. She placed her clipboard and radio to the right of her waiting laptop, opened its lid, and waited for the computer to boot up—none of which took her mind off that kiss between Quinn and Diana.
The kind of desire she’d just witnessed had been different than the kind she was generally exposed to. Her father was on his third wife and his millionth mistress. He was all about the pet names, the slap-and-tickle, the almost juvenile quest for sex. Quinn had been looking at the woman he loved in a totally different way. Like she was important—no, crucial. Like she was his world.
That kind of desire would be demanding. Unpleasantly so. Burdensome, to have a man need her so completely. It would only get in the way of what Patricia wanted in life.
She didn’t want the perpetual adolescence of a man like her father, but neither did she want the intensity of a soul mate. No, she just wanted a husband who would be an asset, who would efficiently partner her as she achieved her goals in life. A man who would slide as seamlessly into her world as one of her beloved sailboats glided through water, barely disturbing the surface.
“Coming through!”
A fireman crashed through the tent’s door, dragging another firefighter behind him. He pulled off his friend’s helmet and tossed it on the ground as he yelled “Water!”
No one moved. Lined up in their matching polo shirts, Patricia’s entire workforce froze with their fingers over their keyboards.
The next second, Patricia was on her feet, coming around her table toward the men. Clearly, the second guy was overheated and on the verge of passing out.
“There’s cool air here,” she said, stepping out of the way as she pointed toward the side of the tent where the blower was located.
The first man, a giant in his helmet and bulky uniform, hauled his stumbling buddy past her. He dropped to one knee as he lowered the man to the asphalt in front of the cooler, then took his own helmet off and set it lightly on the ground. He let his head drop as he took one long, deep breath. His black hair was soaked through and his own skin was flushed from heat, but then his one-second break was apparently over, and he was back in motion.
To Patricia, the two men were a heap of reflective tape, canvas straps, rubber boots, and flashlights tucked into more straps and pockets on their bulky, beige uniforms. It took her a moment to make out what the first man was doing. He’d zeroed in on the toggles that held his friend’s coat shut.
His friend fumbled at his own chest with clunky, gloved hands. “S’my coat.” His words were slurred. “I get it.”
“Yeah, sure.” The black-haired fireman pushed his buddy’s hands out of the way and kept unfastening.
Patricia knelt beside him, ignoring the rough asphalt on her bare knees, and tugged off the overheated man’s gloves. “Do you want me to radio the ER? We’ve got a back board in here that we could use as a stretcher.” She turned to speak over her shoulder to the nearest person. “Bring me my walkie-talkie.”
“He’ll be fine once he’s cooled off.” The black-haired man tugged the heavy coat all the way off his friend, then let the man lie flat on his back in front of the cooler. “You’re feeling better already, Zach, right? Zach?”
He slapped the man’s cheek lightly with the back of his gloved hand. By now, Patricia’s team had gathered around. She took her walkie-talkie from her staff member, and the black-haired firefighter took one of the bottles of water that were being held out. He dumped it over Zach’s hair. The water puddled onto the asphalt beneath him.
Zach pushed his arm away, still clumsy in his movements. “Stop it, jackass.” His words were less slurred, a good sign, even if he spoke less like an admin clerk and more like a...well, like a fireman.
The black-haired man turned to Patricia. Their eyes met, and after a second’s pause, he winked. “Told you. He’s feeling better already.”
Patricia kept looking at his impossibly handsome, cheerfully confident face and forgot whatever it was she’d been about to say. He had blue eyes—not just any blue, but the exact shade that reminded her of sailing on blue water, under blue sky.
He shook off his own gloves in one sharp movement, then shrugged out of his own coat. As he bent to stuff his coat under his friend’s head, Patricia bent, too, but there was nothing for her to do as he efficiently lifted his friend’s head with one hand and shoved his coat in place. She straightened up, sitting back on her heels and brushing the grit off her knees, but she stayed next to him, ready to help, watching as he worked.
As the muscles in his shoulders moved, his red suspenders crisscrossed over the black T-shirt he wore. A brief glance down the man’s back showed that those suspenders were necessary; his torso was lean and trim, while the canvas firefighter pants were loose and baggy. The stereotypical red straps weren’t just designed to make women swoon....
She looked away quickly when he finished his makeshift pillow and straightened, too.
Propping his left forearm on his bended knee, he extended his right toward her in a handshake.
“Thank you for your help, ma’am.” His voice was as deep as he was large. Deep, with a Texas twang. “My name’s Luke Waterson. Pleased to meet you.”
He had cowboy manners even when he was under stress, introducing himself like this. She had to hand that to him as she placed her hand in his. His skin was warm and dry as she returned his handshake in a businesslike manner. He was still a giant of a man without his fireman’s coat, broad-chested with shoulder and arm muscles that were clearly defined under his T-shirt, but he returned her shake without a trace of the bone-crushing grip many men used.
Patricia knew some men just weren’t aware how strong their grip was, but others—including her father’s cronies—used the too-hard handshake as a form of intimidation. If this fireman had wanted to play that game, Patricia would have been ready.
But he didn’t hold her hand too long or too tightly. He let her go, but that grin deepened, lifting one corner of his mouth higher than the other as he kept those sailing-blue eyes on her.
Patricia looked away first. Not very Cargill of her, but then again, men didn’t often look at her the way this young fireman did. A bone-crushing handshake? No problem. She could handle that. But to be winked at and grinned at like she was...was...a college coed...
As if.
She’d never been that flirtatious and carefree, not even when she’d been a college co-ed. In college, she’d come home on weekends to make sure her father’s latest bed partner wasn’t robbing them blind. She’d gone over every expense and co-signed every one of her father’s checks before they were cashed.
Lord, college had been a decade ago. What was it about this fireman—this Luke Waterson—that made her think of being twenty-two instead of thirty-two?
He used his heavy helmet to fan Zach’s face, a move that made his well-defined bicep flex. Frankly, the man looked like a male stripper in a fireman’s costume. Maybe that explained her sudden coed feeling. When she’d been twenty-two, she’d been to enough bachelorette parties to last her a lifetime. If she’d seen one male review with imitation firemen dancing for money, then she’d seen them all.
Those brides had been divorced and planning their second weddings as everyone in her social circle approached their thirtieth birthdays together. Patricia had declined the second round of bachelorette weekends. Always the bridesmaid, happy to have escaped being the bride.
Until this year.
The real fireman used his forearm to swipe his forehead, the bulge of his bicep exactly at her eye level. Oh, this Luke was eye candy for women, all right. Muscular, physical—
There’s no reason to be so distracted. This is absurd.
She was head of personnel, and this man was wiping his brow because he was nearly as overheated as the unfortunate Zach-on-the-asphalt. If Patricia didn’t take care of Luke, she’d soon be short two firemen on her personnel roster.
She plucked one of the water bottles out of her nearest staff member’s hand. The young lady didn’t move, her gaze fastened upon Luke.
Annoyed with her staff for being as distracted as she’d let herself be, Patricia stood and looked around the circle of people. “Thank you. You can go back to work now.”
Her team scattered. Patricia felt more herself. It was good to be in charge. Good to have a job to do.
She handed Luke the bottle. “Drink this.”
He obeyed her, but that grin never quite left his face as he knelt on one knee before her, keeping his gaze on her face as he tilted his head back and let the cool water flow down his throat.
Look away, Patricia. Use your radio. Contact the fire chief and let him know where his men are. Look away.
But she didn’t. She watched the man drink his water, watched him pitch it effortlessly, accurately, into the nearest trash can, and watched him resume his casual position, one forearm on his knee. He reached down to press his fingers against his friend’s wrist once more.
“He’s fine,” Luke announced after a few seconds of counting heartbeats. “It’s easy to get light-headed out there. Nothing some shade and some water couldn’t fix.”
“Is there anything else I can get you?”
He touched the brim of an imaginary hat in a two-fingered salute. “Thank you for the water, ma’am. You never told me your name.”
“Patricia,” she said. She had to clear her throat delicately, for the briefest moment, and then, instead of describing herself the way she always did, as Patricia Cargill, she said something different. “I’m the personnel director.”
“Well, Patricia,” he said, and then he smiled, a flash of white teeth and an expression of genuine pleasure in his tanned face. His grin had only been a tease compared to this stunning smile. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
He meant it, she could tell. He’d checked her out, he found her attractive, and that smile was inviting her in, inviting her to smile, too, inviting her to enjoy a little getting-to-know you flirtation.
Patricia couldn’t smile back. She wasn’t like that. Flirting for fun was a luxury for people who didn’t have obligations. She’d never learned how to do it. She’d known only responsibility, even when she’d been twenty-two and men had been interested in her for more than her bank account and Cargill connections.
It almost hurt to look at Luke Waterson’s open smile, at the clear expression of approval and interest on his handsome face.
She preferred not to waste energy on useless emotions. And so, she nodded politely and she turned away.
Chapter Two (#ulink_b05aaf8c-d1cb-5e50-aa2a-fc837bd6829f)
So, the princess doesn’t want to play.
He’d given her the smile, the one that had kept the woman of his choice by his side for as long as he could remember, whether at a bonfire after a high school football game or at a bar after a livestock show in Austin. Patricia-the-personnel-director, apparently, was immune.
That was a real shame. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been around a woman who was so...smooth. Smooth hair, smooth skin, a woman who handled everything and everyone smoothly. She spoke in a smooth, neutral voice, yet everyone ran to do her bidding as if she were a drill sergeant barking out threats. This Patricia was the real deal, a Texas beauty who looked like a princess but had a spine of steel.
It was a shame she wasn’t interested. He watched her walk away, headed for the chair she’d been in when he’d first hauled Zach in here. He liked the way she moved, brisk and businesslike.
Businesslike. He should have thought of that. She was clearly the boss in here. The boss couldn’t flirt in front of her staff. If they weren’t in her office space, would he be able to get her to smile?
Luke switched his helmet to his other hand and kept fanning Zach. Maybe it wasn’t that she wasn’t interested. She’d been a little flustered when they’d shaken hands, not knowing quite where to look. Maybe she wasn’t interested in being interested. That was a whole different ballgame.
She wore diamonds in her ears, discreet little studs, but none on her fingers. If she wasn’t married or engaged, why not give him a smile?
When he reached for Zach’s wrist to check his pulse, Zach shook him off. “I’ll live,” he said, managing to sound tired and pissed off at the same time.
Patricia picked up a clipboard and turned their way.
Luke ducked a bit closer to Zach and spoke under his breath. “Be a pal and lay still a while longer.”
Patricia returned to his side of the tent. She didn’t crack a smile, but she crouched beside him once more. Her arm brushed his, and she jerked a tiny bit, as if she’d touched something she shouldn’t. It was the smallest of breaks in an otherwise excellent poker face, but Luke was certain: she wasn’t totally immune to him.
He sure as hell wasn’t immune to her.
“You can stop fanning him,” she said. “Rest. I’ll take over. You need to cool down, too.”
Aw, yeah. Talk to me some more. Her voice fit her looks, sophisticated, assured. She had the faintest accent, enough to identify her as a Texan, but she was no cowgirl. She had the voice of a woman raised with Big Money, the kind of woman who’d gone to college and majored in art history, he’d bet.
She started fanning Zach with her clipboard, so Luke put his helmet down and studied her profile until she glanced at him. She had eyes as dark brown as her hair was pale blond. She didn’t drop her gaze this time. Luke was torn between admiring her self-control and wishing she’d act flustered once more.
She kept fanning Zach with her clipboard in one hand. With her other hand, she handed Luke another bottle of water. “Here, drink this. You’re as hot as he is.”
He nearly laughed at that. Maybe she wouldn’t flirt back with him in front of her staff, but he couldn’t resist such an easy opening. “Well, ma’am, I’d say thank you for the compliment, but only being as hot as Zach isn’t truly that flattering. He’s just your average-looking slacker, laying down on the job.”
Zach grunted, but didn’t bother opening his eyes. Zach had always been a good wing man.
Luke gestured toward him with the bottle of water. “That eloquent grunt means Zach agrees.”
Patricia looked away again, but not in a flustered way. Nope, now she just raised one brow in faint disgust and turned away, the princess not lowering herself to comment on the peasants’ looks.
Luke chuckled, enjoying this brush with a Texas beauty queen, even if it led nowhere. It was something else to be in the presence of royalty.
She pointed toward the unopened bottle in his hand, but before she could repeat her order, he raised his hand in surrender.
“I’m drinking. I’m drinking.” He had to stop chuckling in order to down the second bottle of water.
Princess Patricia stood abruptly, but she only stepped a foot away to grab a metal folding chair and then place it next to him. “Here, you’ll be more comfortable.”
Not quite royalty, then. Or at least, she was hard-working and considerate royalty.
“Thank you, ma’am.” Before rising, he clapped Zach on the shoulder. “How ’bout you sit up and drink some water now?”
“I’ll get another chair,” Patricia said.
Then it happened. She turned away for a chair. He turned away to extend his hand to Zach. He hauled his friend to his feet; she set a folding chair next to the first. They finished at the same second, turning back toward each other, and collided. He steadied her with two hands. Her elegant fingers grasped the edge of his red suspender for balance. The rubber edge of her boat shoe caught on the rubber of his fireman’s boot, tripping her, and she clung a little tighter. She was tall, but he was taller, and into the side of his neck she exhaled a single, awkward, warm and breathy “oh.”
In that moment, as he stood solidly on his own two feet and held Patricia in his hands, Luke knew that a slender, soft woman had just knocked all two hundred pounds of him flat on his back.
She looked away, then down on the ground, flustered again. The diamond stud in her delicate ear lobe grazed his chin. She let go of his suspender and pushed back a half step, turning to collect her clipboard off the chair she’d placed for him. “Stay as long as you need to,” she said without making eye contact. “I’ll let the fire chief know where you are.”
She left, pushing the tent flap out of her way as impatiently as Luke had when he’d been coming in.
Luke sat heavily where her clipboard had been, frowning as Zach guzzled his water next to him. Patricia had felt every bit of electricity he had, he’d bet the ranch on it. He’d never had a woman who was so attracted to him be so eager to get away from him. There had to be a reason, but damn if he could guess what it might be.
Zach finished his water and started a second bottle. Halfway through, he stopped for a breath. He jerked his head toward the door flap. “Give it up now, rookie. You aren’t getting a piece of that action. Ever.”
“Not here,” Luke silenced him tersely. There were too many people listening to the firemen who’d landed themselves in the middle of a bunch of paper pushers. Luke sat back against the cold metal of the chair and crossed his arms over his chest.
So, Patricia didn’t want to flirt. He could understand that on one level, but he felt instinctively that it went beyond being on duty or in charge. She’d hightailed it out of there, if such an elegant woman could be said to move so hastily, yet they’d just experienced chemistry with a capital C. Chemistry that couldn’t be denied. Chemistry that Luke wanted to explore.
“You ready?” he asked Zach. Without waiting for Zach’s grunt of agreement, Luke stood, then started picking up coats, gloves, and his helmet. As the men headed toward the exit, they passed Patricia’s table. Luke dropped one glove, kicking it mid-stride to land precisely under a chair. Her chair.
Zach noticed. “You gonna get that now or later?”
“Neither,” Luke said under his breath. When they reached the door, he bent to scoop up Zach’s helmet. They stepped outside, into the blinding Texas sun.
Luke handed Zach his coat and helmet. “I’m gonna let her bring that glove to me when she’s ready.”
“You never leave your equipment behind, rookie.”
“True enough.” Luke wasn’t going to argue that point. He was a rookie for the fire department, but he was a twenty-eight-year-old man who’d been running a cattle ranch for seven years. No cowboy worked without gloves, so he’d known to bring more than one pair. He could leave that one for Patricia to find. To find, and to decide what to do with.
Zach smacked dirt and grit off the polished black surface of his helmet. “For future reference, rookie, throwing a helmet on asphalt scratches it all to hell.”
“Battle scars, Zach. We’ve all got ’em.”
Luke didn’t mind his engine’s tradition of calling the newest member “rookie” for the first few months of service, but Zach was laying it on a bit thick, considering they’d gone to school together. They’d played football, suffered through reading Melville and handfed goats in 4-H together.
Zach shook his head. “You may have a way with the fillies on your ranch, but that woman isn’t a skittish horse. She runs this whole place, whether it’s official or not. I worked with her last summer after those twisters in Oklahoma. If you think she just needs patience and a soft touch and then she’ll follow you around like a pet, you’re wrong.”
“We’ll see.” Both men started walking toward their fire engine, taking wide strides out of necessity in their bulky turnout pants and rubber boots.
“You’re too cocky, Waterson. Go ahead and ignore my advice. It’ll be good for you when she shuts you down before you even make it to first base.”
“First base? A kiss? High school was a long time ago, Zach.”
“You won’t get that much, I promise you. You aren’t her type.”
Luke remembered that moment of impact. Chemistry with a capital C, all right. He smiled.
Zach shook his head. “I know that smile. Tell you what. You manage to kiss that woman, and I won’t make you repaint my helmet.”
Luke’s smile dimmed. On the surface, Zach’s casual dare seemed harmless enough. They’d been through plenty of dares before. You buy the beer if I can sweet talk that waitress onto the dance floor while she’s still on the clock. But this was different. Somehow.
“You’re forgetting two things,” Luke said. “One, my mama raised me better than to kiss a girl for a dare. Two, my daddy raised me that if I broke it, I had to fix it. I’ll paint your damned helmet when we get back to Austin.”
“Two more things,” Zach said, laying a heavy hand on Luke’s shoulder. “One, thanks for getting me out of the sun when I was too dazed to do it myself. Forget about the helmet. I owe you more than that.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
Zach let go of his shoulder after a hard squeeze. “And two, that was my glove you left behind, Romeo. If your filly shies away from you, you’re gonna have to go back and get it. Today.”
Chapter Three (#ulink_0635e23f-3ded-5b07-bf44-df9d35a37707)
Darkness came, and Luke was glad that a strong breeze from the ocean came with it. Cutting vehicles loose from downed trees had been grueling in the motionless air the storm had left behind. When the order came to stand down, Luke was glad for that, too. He considered himself to be in good shape, working on the ranch day in and day out, but wielding an ax for hour after hour had been back-breaking, plain and simple.
The one thing he would have been most glad of, however, never came. Patricia never appeared, not in a flustered way, not in a collected way, not in any way. Whatever the beautiful personnel director was up to, she wasn’t up to it in his part of the relief center. But since impatient Zach wanted his damned glove back, Luke was going to have to go and get it.
Determined to make the best of it, Luke had hit the portable showers when the fire crew had their allotted time. He’d dug a clean T-shirt out of his gym bag and run a comb through his hair while it was still damp. Shaving was conveniently required of the firemen, since beards could interfere with the way a respirator mask sealed to the face. He’d been able to shave without drawing any attention to himself.
All he had to do was tell the guys to head off for chow without him, and then he could take a convenient detour that would lead him past Patricia’s tent on his way to supper in the mess tent. He’d listen for her voice, and if she was in, he’d go in to retrieve his glove. Damn, but he was looking forward to seeing her again.
He was so intent on reaching her tent that he nearly missed her voice when he heard it in a place he hadn’t expected. He stopped short outside the door marked “pharmacy,” a proper door with a lock, set into a wooden frame that was sealed to an inflatable tent, similar to the kind he knew were used for surgeries and such.
“The rules exist for a reason.” Smooth but unyielding, that was Patricia’s voice.
“I thought we were here to help these people,” another female voice answered, but this voice sounded more shrill and impatient. “These people have lost their houses. They’ve lost everything. If I can give them some free medicine, why shouldn’t I? When I went to Haiti, we gave everyone months’ worth of the drugs they needed.”
There was a beat of silence, then Patricia’s tone changed subtly to one of almost motherly concern. “It might help if you keep in mind that this isn’t Haiti. Half of the homes in this town were vacant vacation homes, second homes for people who can well afford their own medicine. You don’t need to give them a month’s worth, just a few days until the town’s regular pharmacies re-open.”
“Then I don’t see what the big deal is.” The other woman, in response to Patricia’s gentle concern, sounded like a pouting teenager. “Nitroglycerin is cheap, anyway.”
“It’s not the cost, it’s the scarcity. I had to send someone almost all the way to Victoria to get more. He was gone for nearly four hours. He used gallons of gasoline that can’t be replaced because the pumps aren’t running yet because the electricity isn’t running yet.”
Luke nearly grinned when he heard that steel slip back into Patricia’s voice. He crossed his arms over his chest and tilted his head back to look up at the stars. She was right about the electricity being out, of course. When an entire town’s streetlights were doused, the stars became brilliant. When all traffic stopped, the crash of the ocean surf could be heard blocks away.
It should be easy to set the right mood to explore a little physical chemistry, and he realized now he’d been hoping to find Patricia—and Zach’s glove—alone. It would have been better if he could have waited until she’d had the time and the desire, or at least the curiosity, to come and find him. But since he needed to get that glove, he’d half hoped she’d be happy to see him walk back into her tent tonight. He’d forgotten something important: Patricia was still working. Still working and still the boss.
He should get to the mess tent. He could stop by the admin tent an hour from now, or three, and he knew she’d be there, working. There was no need to wait for her right now.
Yet he lingered, and listened, and admired the way she stayed cool, alternating between logical and sympathetic until the other woman was apologizing for the trouble she hadn’t realized she’d caused, and Patricia was granting her a second—or what sounded more like a third—opportunity to prove she could be part of the Texas Rescue team.
The door opened and Patricia stepped out. As she turned back to listen to the other person, the generator-powered lights inside the tent illuminated Patricia’s flawless face, her cheekbones and elegant neck exposed with her pale hair still twisted up in that smooth style.
“The regular pharmacies will re-open, don’t forget. This isn’t Haiti. The buildings are damaged, but they didn’t disappear into a pile of rubble. If they had, I promise you, we’d be working under a different policy entirely.”
Luke hadn’t thought of Patricia as a high-strung filly, and damn Zach for putting the thought into his head, but now he could imagine a similarity. Patricia was no ranch workhorse, though. Once, after a livestock show in Dallas, Luke had been invited by a trainer to spend time in the Grand Prairie racetrack stables. He’d found the Thoroughbreds to be suspicious and nervous around strangers, requiring a lot of careful handling. But once they were brought out to the track, once that starting gate sprang open and they raced down their lanes, doing what they were born to do, those Thoroughbreds had been a sight to behold. Unforgettable.
He’d just listened to Patricia doing what she was born to do. She kept people at their jobs, working hard in hard conditions, serving a community. Whether it required her to revive a pair of unexpected firemen or turn around a pharmacy tech’s attitude, that’s what Patricia did to make her hospital run, and she did it well.
The unseen pharmacy girl was still apologizing. In the glow of the lights, Luke watched Patricia smile benevolently. “There’s no need to apologize further. I’m sure you’ll have no problems at all complying with the policy tomorrow, and I look forward to having you here on the team for the rest of the week. Good night.”
Patricia shut the door with a firm click. With his eyes already adjusted to the dark, Luke watched her polite, pleasant expression fade away, replaced by a frown and a shake of her head. She was angry. Perhaps disgusted with a worker who’d taken so much of her time. Without a glance at the brilliant stars, she headed down the row of tents toward her office space.
After a moment, Luke followed. He told himself he wasn’t spying on her. He had to pass her tent to get to the mess tent, anyway. But when she stopped, he stopped.
She didn’t go into her tent. She clutched her clipboard to her chest with one arm, looking for a moment like an insecure schoolgirl. Then she headed away from the tent complex, into the dark.
Luke followed, keeping his distance. When she stopped at a picnic table near a cluster of palm trees in the rear of the town hospital building, he hesitated. She obviously wanted to be alone. She sat on the bench, crossed her arms on the table, then rested her head on them.
The woman was not angry or disgusted. She was tired. Luke felt foolish for not realizing it sooner.
While she apparently caught a cat nap, he stood silently a short distance away. He didn’t want to wake her. He’d look like an idiot for having followed her away from the tents. On the other hand, he couldn’t leave her here, asleep and unprotected. Except for the starlight, it was pitch black. There’d been no looting in the storm-damaged town, but there were packs of displaced dogs forming among the wrecked homes, and—
Hell. He didn’t need wandering pets for an excuse. He wasn’t going to leave Patricia out here alone. Period.
He cleared his throat as he walked up behind her, not wanting to startle her, but she was dead to the world. He sat down beside her. She was sitting properly, knees together, facing the table like she’d fallen asleep saying grace over her dinner plate. He sat facing the opposite way, leaning back against the table and stretching his legs out. The wooden bench gave a little under his weight, disturbing her.
“Good evening, Miss Patricia.”
That startled her awake the rest of the way. Her head snapped up, and she blinked and glanced around, looking adorably disoriented for a woman who carried a clipboard everywhere she went. When she recognized him, her eyes opened wide.
“Oh.”
“It’s me. Luke Waterson. The firefighter who barged in on you today.”
“Yes, I remember you.” She looked at the watch on her wrist and frowned.
Luke figured she couldn’t read it in the faint light. “You’ve only been out a minute or two.”
She hit a button on her watch and it lit up. Of course. He should have known she’d be prepared. She touched her hair, using her fingertips to smooth one wayward strand back into place. She touched the corner of each eye with her pinky finger, then put both hands in her lap and took a deep breath. “Okay, I’m awake. Did you need something?”
This was what her life was like, he realized. Everyone came to her when they needed something. She didn’t expect Luke to be there for any other reason. Did no one seek her out just to talk during a work shift? To play a game of cards in the shade when they were off duty? To share a meal?
He didn’t feel like smiling at the moment, but he did, anyway. She’d asked if he needed anything. “Nope. Nothing.”
She tilted her head and looked at him, those eyes that had opened so wide now narrowing skeptically. “Then what are you doing here?”
I can’t stop thinking about you. I want to feel you fall against me again.
His mother had always told him when in doubt, tell the truth, but he wasn’t going to tell Patricia that particular truth. He settled for a more boring—but true—explanation. “I left a work glove in your tent. I was coming to get it when I saw you walking off into the dark. I was worried about you, so I followed.”
“You were worried about me?” She gave a surprised bit of a chuckle, as if the idea were so outlandish it struck her funny. She got up from the table, then picked up her walkie-talkie and her clipboard, and held them to her chest.
Luke stood, too. As if he were handling a nervous Thoroughbred, he moved slowly. He stood a little too close, but unlike this afternoon, she didn’t back away.
He hadn’t imagined that chemistry. It was still there, in spades. Looking into her face by the light of the stars, he wanted to hold her again, deliberately this time. To kiss her lips, to satisfy a curiosity to know how she tasted.
But he wouldn’t. Standing this close, he could also see how tired she was, a woman who’d undoubtedly been handling one issue after another since the first storm warnings had put Texas Rescue on alert. A woman so tired, she’d fallen asleep while sitting at a wooden table.
“Let’s go back to the hospital,” he said, when he would rather have said a dozen different things.
He took the clipboard and the radio out of her hand, then offered her his arm. She slipped her hand into the crook of his elbow immediately, and he suspected she did it without thinking. Her debutante ways and his cowboy etiquette meshed with ease for a second. Then she seemed to realize what she’d done and started to drop her hand.
He pressed her hand to his side with his arm. “It’s dark. This way you can catch me if I trip.”
“This way you can drag me down with you, more likely.” But she left her hand where it was as they walked in silence.
When he started to pass her office tent, she pulled him to a stop. “You need to get your glove.”
He turned to face her, and now it was easy to see every detail of her face in the light that glowed through the white walls of the hospital’s tents. She was so very beautiful, and so very tired.
“I thought that was what I needed when I first followed you out into the dark, but now I know I need something else much, much more.”
He moved an inch closer to her, and he felt her catch her breath as she held her ground. “What is that?” she whispered.
“I need to get you into bed. Now.”
Chapter Four (#ulink_ca0706c7-0c43-5298-92e3-3c516d1fe3fb)
He wants to take me to bed?
What a stupid, stupid suggestion. They were in the middle of a mission, in the middle of a storm-damaged town, not to mention that Patricia felt gritty and hungry and so very damned tired. How could any man think of sex when all she could think of was—
Bed.
Oh.
“You’re trying to be funny, aren’t you?” she accused.
That lopsided grin on his face should have been infuriating instead of charming. She drew herself up a bit straighter. It was infuriating. It was.
Luke had the nerve to give her hand a squeeze before she pulled it away. “There, for a few seconds, the look on your face was priceless.”
“I hope you enjoyed yourself. Now, if you’ll excuse me—”
He didn’t let go of her clipboard when she reached for it.
“Nope,” he said. “You go where this clipboard goes, so you’ll just have to follow me if you want it back.” He took off walking.
She was so stunned, he was several yards away before she realized he really expected her to follow. He turned at the corner of her tent and disappeared—but not before he looked over his shoulder and waved her own damned walkie-talkie at her.
Shock gave way to anger. Anger gave her energy. She caught up to him within a few seconds, her angry strides matching his slower but longer ones as they headed down the aisle between tents.
She snatched her walkie-talkie out of his hand. “You’re being childish.”
“I am.” He nodded, and kept walking.
“This isn’t summer camp. People are relying on me. On all of us. They rely on you, too.”
“And yet, I can still respond to a fire if I hear the signal while I’m enjoying this romantic walk with you. It’s okay, Patricia.”
She yanked her clipboard out of his hand and turned back toward the admin tent. He blocked her way just by standing in her path, being the ridiculous, giant mass of muscle that he was. She felt twenty-two again. Less. Make that nineteen, handing a slightly altered ID to a bouncer who was no fool.
“It’s not okay,” she said, and her jaw hurt from clenching her teeth so hard. “I cannot do my job if I can’t get to my headquarters. Now move.”
Instead, Luke gestured toward the tent they’d stopped next to. “This is the women’s sleeping quarters. Recognize it? I didn’t think so. You were first on scene, weren’t you? You decided where the first tent spike should be driven into the ground, I’ll bet. So, you’ve been here forty-eight hours, at least. You were supposed to have gotten sixteen hours of sleep, then, at a minimum. You’ve taken how many?”
Patricia spoke through clenched teeth. “You’re being patronizing.”
The last bit of a grin left his face, and he suddenly looked very serious. “I just watched you fall asleep sitting up on a piece of wood. Forty-eight hours is a long time to keep running. Take your break, Patricia.”
Patronizing, and giving her orders. She didn’t know him from Adam, but like every other man in her life, he seemed to think he knew best. She was so mad she could have spit. She wanted to shove him out of her way. She wanted to tell him to kiss off. But she was Patricia Cargill, and she knew from a lifetime of experience that if she wanted to get her way, she couldn’t do that.
She’d learned her lessons at her father’s knee, and she’d seen the truth over and over as stepmamas and aunties had come and gone. If a woman got spitting mad, Daddy Cargill would chuckle and hold up his hands and proclaim a soap opera was in progress. His cronies would declare that women were too emotional to be reliable business partners. The bankers would mutter among themselves about whose turn it was to deal with the harpy this time.
No one ever said those things about Patricia Cargill, because she never let them see her real feelings, even if, like her father’s discarded women, those emotions were justified now and again.
Luke was standing over her like a self-appointed bodyguard. He’d decided she needed protecting. That was probably some kind of psychological complex firefighters were prone to. She could use that to her advantage.
She placed her hand oh-so-lightly on his muscular arm, so very feminine, so very grateful. “I’ve gotten more sleep than you think. That power nap was very refreshing. It’s so very thoughtful of you to be concerned, and I’m sorry to have worried you, but I’m fine.” She took a step in the direction of the admin tent.
“Where are you going?”
“Let’s get your glove. It will only take a minute.” She smiled at him, friendly and unoffended, neither of which she felt. She didn’t give a damn about his stupid glove, but it gave her an easy way to get back to her office.
“Forget it. You’re very charming, Patricia, but you’re very tired.”
For a fraction of a second, she felt fear. She’d failed in an area where she usually excelled. She’d failed to manage this man effectively.
Luke lectured on. “The rules exist for a reason. You’ve been working nonstop, and you’re going to get sick or hurt.”
The rules exist for a reason. She wasn’t sure why, but that sounded so familiar.
“Who takes your place when it’s your turn for downtime?” Luke tapped her clipboard. “I bet you’ve got a whole organizational chart on there. I’m curious who you answer to, because you seem to think the rules don’t apply to you.”
“Karen Weaver is the head of the Austin branch of Texas Rescue,” Patricia said. She sounded stiff. That was an accomplishment, considering she felt furious.
“I bet you make sure every single hospital volunteer from the most prestigious surgeon to the lowliest rookie gets their breaks, but Karen Weaver doesn’t make sure you get yours?” Luke used her own trick on her, running the tips of his fingers lightly down her arm, all solicitous concern.
“Karen is...new,” Patricia said.
Luke laughed. The man laughed, damn him. “She’s new and she doesn’t know half of what you do, does she? You don’t trust her to take care of your baby.”
Bingo. But Patricia wouldn’t say that out loud, not for a million dollars.
Luke’s hand closed on her arm, warm and firm. “Karen isn’t you, but she’s good enough to handle the hospital while everyone’s sleeping.” He turned her toward the sleeping quarters and pulled back the tent flap, then let her go. “Please, take your break.”
She wanted to object. She made all the decisions. She was in charge. But even her anger at his high-handedness wasn’t sustaining her against her exhaustion. He’d brought her to the very threshold of the sleeping quarters. To be only a few feet away from where her inflatable mattress lay, empty and waiting...it was enough to make the most adamant woman waffle.
Luke’s voice, that big, deep voice, spoke very quietly, because he was very close to her ear. “I’m not your boss, and you aren’t mine. You answer to Karen, and I answer to the fire chief. But this afternoon, you gave me orders, and I obeyed them because they were smart. You told me to drink; I did. You told me to sit; I did. So it’s my turn. I’m telling you to get ready for bed. I’m going to bring you a sandwich from the mess tent and place it inside the door, because it’s a sure thing that you haven’t taken time to eat. You’ll eat it and you’ll get some rest when you turn off that walkie-talkie, because you know it’s the smart thing to do. You’ve worked enough.”
Patricia had never had a man speak to her like that. Telling her to stop working. Telling her she’d done enough. It made her melt the way poets believed flowers and verse should make women melt. It made her so weak in the knees, she couldn’t take a step for fear of stumbling.
Weakness was bad.
“You can’t give me orders,” she said, but her voice was husky and tired.
“I just did.” With a firm hand in her lower back, an inch above the curve of her backside, Luke Waterson pushed her gently into the tent, dropped the flap and walked away.
* * *
Patricia felt strange the next day.
It should have been easier to focus on the relief operation after a full meal and a good night’s sleep. Instead, it was harder. That sleep and that meal had come at the hands—the very strong hands—of a fireman who looked like—
Damn it. There she went again, losing her train of thought.
She checked the to-do list on her clipboard. The items that had been done and crossed off were irrelevant. Being at the helm of Texas Rescue’s mobile hospital was like being at the helm of one of her sailboats. Congratulating herself on having handled a gust of wind two minutes ago wouldn’t prevent her boat from capsizing on the next gust. Whether on a lake or at a relief center, Patricia looked ahead, planned ahead, kept an eye on the horizon—or in this case, on her checklist. One unfinished item from yesterday jumped out: Set up additional shade for waiting area.
Patricia tapped her mechanical pencil against her lips. She had the additional tent in the trailer. She just didn’t have the manpower to get it set up. According to the tent’s manual, it would take three people twenty minutes. That meant it would require forty minutes, of course, but she didn’t have three people, anyway. She could serve as one, although she wasn’t good with the sledgehammer when it came to driving the spikes in the ground. At this site, the spikes had been driven right through the asphalt in many cases, and she knew her limits. Driving iron spikes through asphalt, even crumbling, sunbaked asphalt, wasn’t her skill set.
An image of Luke Waterson, never far from her mind this morning, appeared once more. Appeared, and zoomed in on his arms. Those muscles. The way they’d flexed under her fingertips as he’d escorted her back to the tents in the dark...
Luke could drive a spike through asphalt.
Patricia went to her tent and fetched his glove.
Chapter Five (#ulink_19e39e01-8970-5b81-a68c-ffc6ad73be85)
Being a rookie was everything Luke had expected it to be. He’d volunteered for Zach’s fire department just for the chance to be the rookie. For the chance to shed some responsibility. For the chance to have a little adventure without having to do any decision-making. For a change, any damned change, from the endless routine on the James Hill Ranch.
He’d gotten that change on Sunday night. Their fire engine had driven through the still-powerful remains of the hurricane as it had moved inland toward Austin. They’d arrived at the coast only hours after the hurricane had passed through, and they’d had rescues to perform the moment they’d rolled into town.
The repetitive ladder drills they’d practiced for months had finally proven useful as they’d reached a family who’d been stranded on a roof by rising water. Then they’d laid that ladder flat to make a bridge to a man who was clinging to the remains of a boat on an inland waterway. In the predawn hours, Luke had waded through waist-deep brackish water with a kindergartner clinging to his neck.
That experience had been humbling. He’d been seeking adventure for its own sake, but that rescue made him rethink his purpose as a part-time volunteer fireman. He’d been blessed with health, and strength, and in that case, the sheer size to be able to stay on his feet and not be swept away by a rush of moving water. Being able to carry a child who could not have crossed that flood herself had made him grateful for things he normally didn’t give a second thought.
But it was Wednesday now, the water had receded substantially, and they’d “rescued” only empty, toppled ambulances yesterday. Today, they’d cleaned their fire engine. And cleaned it. And cleaned it some more.
He shoved the long-handled broom into the fire engine’s ladder compartment, a stainless steel box that ran the length of the entire fire engine, then swept out dried mud that had clung to the ladder the last time they’d slid it into its storage hold. Yeah, big change from mucking stalls. At least this dirt smelled better.
Luke had looked forward to following someone else’s orders, but being a rookie gave him too much time to think. He wasn’t required to use his brain at all, not even to decide what to clean next. This gave him way too much time to relive the mistakes he’d made with Patricia last night. He’d been childish, she’d said, refusing to return her clipboard. He’d shoved her into a tent, like giving an unwilling filly a push into her stall. He’d slid a sandwich and a bag of chips and a Gatorade bottle under the edge of the tent door like he was feeding a prisoner.
Yeah, he’d been a regular Casanova.
He pushed the broom into the ladder compartment again, and hoisted himself halfway into the compartment after it, head and one shoulder wedged in the rectangular opening so he could reach farther.
Zach’s whistle echoed in the metal box. Luke felt Zach’s elbow in his waist. “Don’t look now, but I think a certain filly is finally curious about the man who has been standing by the corral fence. You patient son of a bitch, she’s coming over to give you a sniff, just like you predicted.”
Luke backed out of the compartment, cracking his head on the steel edge in his haste.
Zach was leaning against the engine, one boot on the rear chrome platform that Luke would be sweeping next. Zach shook his head as Luke rubbed his.
“I just said �don’t look now’ and what did you do? Jumped out of there like a kid to get a peek. You’re losing it bad around this woman, Waterson. Don’t look.”
Luke looked, anyway. Patricia was walking straight toward them, no doubt about it. Her hair was piled a little higher on her head today and her polo shirt was white instead of navy, and God, did she look gorgeous in the sunlight, all that blue sky behind her blond hair.
Luke took a step toward her. “She’s got my glove.”
Zach put a hand in his chest. “I wasn’t in a condition yesterday to fully appreciate the view. Now I am. That’s my glove. I’ll get it. You keep sweeping, rookie.”
He took no more than two steps before Chief Rouhotas appeared from around the side of the engine. The chief was looking in Patricia’s direction even as he stuck his hand out to block Zach. “I’ve got this, Lieutenant Bishop. Back to work.”
Luke crossed his arms over his chest as he watched Chief Rouhotas walk up to Patricia and greet her with his head bobbing and bowing as if she really were the princess she looked like she was. Patricia nodded graciously. They spoke for a minute, then she offered him her hand. He shook it as if it were an honor.
The important detail, however, was in Patricia’s other hand. When the chief had greeted her, she’d casually moved her left hand behind her back, keeping the glove out of sight. She could have given it to Rouhotas, of course. She could have asked for it to be returned to Luke—which would have earned Luke another round of hazing, he was certain, for leaving a piece of equipment behind—but she kept it out of sight as she concluded whatever business deal she was making with the chief. No mistake about it, an agreement about something had been reached. Luke recognized a deal-sealing handshake when he saw it.
He didn’t have to wait long to have that mystery solved. Patricia walked away—without a backwards glance for as long as Luke watched her—and the chief started bellowing orders.
“Waterson. Bishop. Murphy. Report to the hospital’s storage trailer. Bring your sledgehammers. Looks like they need help setting up a tent to make an extra waiting room for the walk-ups.”
Zach and Luke exchanged a look, but Murphy complained. Out loud. At nineteen, he still had moments of teenaged attitude. “Seriously, chief? It’s already a hundred degrees.”
“That’s why they need the shade, genius.”
Murphy opened the cab door and retrieved his own work gloves, muttering the whole time. “We’re not even part of the hospital—”
“They’re feeding us and giving us billets, so you don’t have to sleep in this engine,” Chief cut in.
Murphy ought to know the chief heard everything his men uttered. Luke had figured that out real quick.
“So quit your whining and moaning,” Chief said, “or I’ll let Miss Cargill be your boss for the whole day instead of an hour. You’ll find out what work is.”
Miss Cargill, was it? Patricia Cargill. He liked the sound of it. They couldn’t get to Patricia’s job soon enough to suit Luke. He had no doubt that more back-breaking labor would be involved, but given the choice between sweeping mud here or getting an eyeful of Patricia, he’d take the hard-earned eyeful.
First, of course, they had to pack the engine’s gear back in place. The engine had to be ready to roll at all times. Luke took one end of the heavy, twenty-eight-foot extension ladder as Zach gave the commands to hoist and return it to the partially swept compartment.
It was more grunt work, leaving Luke’s mind free to wander, but there was only one place his mind wanted to go: Patricia. She’d kept the glove. She still wanted to talk to him later, then, maybe to chew him out for last night. That was all right with him. That gave him a second chance.
She was waiting by the trailer, no glove in sight, when he and his crew walked up in the non-flammable black T-shirts and slacks they always wore on duty, even under their bulky turnout coats and pants. They were big men, all of them, and they carried sledgehammers, so they were stared at openly as they hauled the several-hundred pound tent out of the trailer and carried it on their shoulders, following Patricia down the row of hospital tents.
When a nurse wolf-whistled at them, Luke grinned back. Whether working on the engine or on the ranch, a little female appreciation never hurt his spirits.
He wasn’t getting any of that appreciation from Patricia, unfortunately. Or maybe he was, but her calm, neutral expression certainly gave none of it away.
They dropped the tent where she indicated, and Murphy and Zach started freeing the straps. That was a two-person job, so Luke kept himself busy by taking their sledgehammers and setting them aside with his, right at the feet of the woman who was pretending he didn’t exist.
“I’ve been officially informed that you are my boss today,” Luke said, giving her the smile she was so good at ignoring, but which he liked to believe she wasn’t entirely immune to. “What do you want to do with me? Tell me to go to hell, maybe?”
She didn’t say anything, but held a cell phone up in the air and squinted at its sun-washed screen. “The cell towers are still down.”
“I think it’s only fair that we reverse positions after last night. I was a bit overbearing, so now it’s your turn. You should order me to get in bed. I’ll be very obedient.”
She lowered the phone with a sigh and gave him a look that could only be described as long-suffering martyrdom. “I assume you are, once more, enjoying yourself ever so much.”
He smiled bigger. “Around you? Always.”
She shook her head, but he caught the quirk of her lips. He wasn’t in the dog house, after all. Her next words confirmed it.
“Thank you for the sandwich last night.” Before he could say anything, she smoothly changed the subject. “There’s no cell phone service. The towers are usually fairly high priority after a disaster. Phones have really become essential to daily function—”
“You’re welcome. What are you doing for dinner tonight?”
“Absolutely nothing. I’m your boss. I can’t go on a dinner date with a subordinate.”
“You’re only my boss until this tent goes up. Twenty minutes, tops.”
“It’ll take forty,” she countered.
“Twenty, and you have to eat dinner with me.”
“You’ve made yourself a bad deal.” But she held out her hand, and they shook on it.
After unpacking the tent, Luke drove the first spike into the earth around the remains of the town hospital building’s shrubbery in a single, satisfying stroke. He glanced in Patricia’s direction, ready to deliver some smack-talk that twenty minutes was all they’d need at his pace. But her back was to him, the walkie-talkie pressed between her shoulder and ear as she signed a form for one of her staff members who’d appeared from nowhere. She’d missed his fine display of manliness.
The heat was already broiling. Murphy and Zach shed their shirts to a few appreciative female whistles, but Luke, too aware of Patricia, kept his on. Call it instinct, but behind that neutral expression, he thought the wolf whistles from the women bothered Patricia.
Maybe she just thought others were being lazy. Actions spoke louder than words or whistles. While passers-by slowed down to watch the men at work, Patricia helped. She didn’t just give verbal directions, although she did plenty of that to get them started, but she also held poles, spread canvas, untangled ropes. She cast a critical eye at Murphy’s first guy line, then crouched down, undid his knot, and proceeded to pull the line beautifully taut while tying an adjustable knot that would have impressed any lasso-throwing cowboy.
Since Luke threw lassos in his day job, he was impressed. “Where’d you learn to tie knots? Do you work the rodeo circuit when there aren’t any natural disasters to keep you busy?”
“You’re quite amusing.” She didn’t answer his question as she moved to the next line. “Once it’s up, I want to be able to pull the roof taut. There’s more rain in the forecast.”
And since she wanted it taut, she did the work. Patricia Cargill, with diamonds in her ears, didn’t stand on the sidelines and giggle and point at shirtless men. She worked. Luke thought he might be a little bit in love. He’d have the chance to explore that over dinner. They had half the tent up already, and only ten minutes had passed.
The spikes on the other side of the tent, however, had to be driven into asphalt. Although they adjusted the lines to take advantage of any existing crack or divot in the asphalt, their progress slowed painfully as every spike took a dozen hard strikes or more to be seated in the ground. The sun cooked them from overhead, the asphalt resisted their efforts, and then Patricia’s walkie-talkie squawked.
“I’m sorry, gentlemen, but I’m needed elsewhere. You’re free to leave when you’re done. I’ll come back to check on things later.”
“Doesn’t trust us to put up a tent,” Murphy grumbled.
Patricia was a perfectionist, Luke supposed, a usually negative personality trait, but if she wanted a job done just right, it seemed to him she had good reason for it. When she’d told him rain was in the forecast, she hadn’t needed to say anything else. A tent that sagged could hold water and then collapse, injuring those it was supposed to shelter. Luke understood that kind of perfectionism.
He stepped closer to her. “Just take care of your other business. Don’t worry about this shelter. That roof will be stretched as tight as a drum. I’ll check all the guy lines before we go.”
She looked at him, perhaps a bit surprised.
“In other words,” he said, “I’ll fix Murphy’s knots.”
She almost smiled. Luke decided it counted as a smile, because it started at her eyes, the corners crinkling at their shared joke, even if it didn’t quite reach her perfect, passive lips.
“Thank you,” she murmured, and she started to walk away.
“I know it’s been more than twenty minutes,” Luke called after her, “but you could still eat dinner with me.”
She kept walking, but tossed him a look over her shoulder that included—hallelujah—a full smile, complete with a flash of her pearly whites. “A deal is a deal. No welching, no cheating, no changing the terms.”
Zach interrupted Luke’s appreciation of the view as Patricia walked away. “Hey, Romeo. It’s not getting any cooler out here. How about we finish this up?”
Luke peeled his shirt off to appreciative cheers from the almost entirely female crowd that had gathered, then spread it on the ground to dry. Without cell phones, TVs or radios, Luke supposed he and Zach and Murphy were the best entertainment around.
For all his talk about hurrying, Zach was going all out for the onlookers, striking body-builder poses and hamming it up for the ladies for the next quarter hour as they finished the job.
Luke double-checked the last line, then bent to swipe his shirt off the ground. The sun had dried it completely. He stuck his fists through the sleeves, then raised his arms overhead to pull the shirt on. Some sixth sense made him look a little distance away. Patricia was leaning against a tree, eyes on him, watching him dress, not even trying to pretend she was looking at anything else.
She was caught in the act, but long, gratifying seconds ticked by before she realized it. She was so busy looking at his abs and his chest, she didn’t realize he was looking back until her eyes traveled up to his face.
Bam. Busted.
She ducked her head and stuck her nose in her clipboard instantly, as if the papers there had become absolutely fascinating.
Luke pulled on his shirt, tucked it into his waistband, picked up his sledgehammer and walked toward Patricia, who was conveniently standing in the path he needed to take to get back to the fire engine. Her paperwork was so incredibly absorbing, she apparently didn’t notice that a two-hundred pound man had come close enough to practically whisper in her ear.
“That’s all right, darlin’,” Luke said, giving her a casual pat on the arm as he continued past her. “I enjoy looking at you, too.”
* * *
Patricia could not look up from her clipboard. She was simply incapable of it. A coward of the first degree, humiliated by her own weakness. She was so grateful she could have wept when Luke kept walking after telling her it was all right.
It wasn’t all right.
He’d caught her looking. Caught her, and loved it, no doubt, as much as he’d undoubtedly loved that crowd of women feasting their eyes on him with his shirt off. Was every man on earth a show-off, so eager to be adored that they had to flash their cash or their fame or their looks—whatever they had that foolish women might want?
She forced herself to look up from the clipboard. The other two firemen had their shirts on now, too. Their little audience had dispersed and the men were headed her way, following Luke. She smiled thinly at them and said her thanks as they passed her.
Every man in her world certainly was after as much female attention as he could get, even her father, who’d long ago let himself go to flab once he’d realized his money would keep women hanging around. He wore tacky jewelry encrusted with diamonds as he drove a classic Cadillac convertible with a set of longhorns, actual longhorns, attached to the front. The sweet young things of Austin fell all over themselves to hitch a ride around town in that infamous Cadillac. It was revolting.
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