shoulders. “You need to keep it from bucking back if you hit a knot. Keep it under control.”
Control, she thought. She hadn’t felt “in control” in ages.
“Like this?” she called, handles in a death grip, her eyes glued to the blade sinking into the wood.
“Just like that,” he called back and, just like that, the weight of the free end of the limb cracked it downward and the blade went through.
A second of disbelief was replaced with a grin as she swung toward him.
“Don’t!” His hand shot forward, the side of his face bumping the corner of her goggles an instant before his hand caught hers to hold the saw in place. Bent against her, he’d turned his head to hers, his lips inches from the startled part of her own.
“The brake,” he said. With a small movement of his hand, the throttle dropped back to idle. “You need to set it as soon as you finish your cut. It’s safer that way.”
She realized now why he’d stayed behind her. Had she swung around, she could have caught him with the blade in his thigh.
Taking the idling machine from her, he shut off the motor, set the saw on the ground.
In the sudden silence, she could hear her heart hammering in her ears. Shaken from the start he’d given her, horrified by what she could have done to him, she dropped her glance to the short placket on his pullover as he rose and turned to her.
“Erik, I’m so sorry.”
His forehead furrowed as he pulled her hand from her mouth and lifted the orange band at her temples. Removing the goggles, he looped them over the fabric covering his forearm.
“Hey. It’s okay.” Hating how he’d killed her quick smile, he touched his gloved finger to her high cheekbone. It was there that the goggles would have bumped. “We hadn’t gotten to that part.” Another second and they would have, he thought, searching her pale features. He just hadn’t expected her to get excited about felling a limb. “Next time you’ll remember.”
He couldn’t feel the smoothness of her skin through the thick suede. He could imagine it, though. Just as he could too easily imagine so many other things he knew he shouldn’t be thinking about her.
Detachment wasn’t an option at the moment. Not with her looking so frightened by what she could have done. “Right?”
Beneath his hand, he felt her faint nod. What he noticed most, though, was how her head turned toward his hand, as if somewhere in her subconscious she craved that unfettered contact, too.
She’d done the same thing last night, right about the time he’d been thinking about reacquainting himself with the feel of her mouth. Heaven knew how tempted he’d been to do just that. But he acknowledged now what he hadn’t then. It hadn’t just been complications with her he wanted to avoid. He hadn’t wanted her thinking of anyone but him when he kissed her. And last night had been far more about easing the doubts that had haunted her for so long than whatever it was that kept him from caring about how easy she was to touch.
Rory watched his glance shift over her face. She had no idea what he was thinking, what it was vying with the concern so evident there, but from the way his eyes narrowed on her cheek, he seemed to be looking for a bruise.
“It didn’t hurt,” she told him, praying she hadn’t caused him one as she unconsciously lifted her hand to his temple.
“I don’t see a mark,” he murmured. “But that doesn’t mean you won’t have a bruise later. You should get some ice on it.” He gave her an encouraging smile. “There’s plenty of it.”
She felt far too concerned to smile back. “I don’t see one on you, either,” she told him, tipping her head to get a better look. “Not yet, anyway.”
Erik’s smile faded. He couldn’t remember the last time a woman had touched him simply to make sure he was okay. There was caring in that touch, a hint of worry, a little gentleness. As complex as it seemed, it was really such a simple thing. Something basic. Yet her unveiled concern pulled hard at something deep inside him. Something he hadn’t been sure still existed, and which would have felt decidedly threatening had he had time to consider what it was.
“Mom? Come help me?”
At her son’s request, Rory’s hand fell. Only now aware of how she’d reached to be sure Erik was all right, and of how they must look standing there checking each other out, her glance darted to where Tyler stood by a stack of pine on the porch.
He wanted help with the wreath.
Taking a step back, she called that she’d be right there.
Erik met her lingering disquiet.
“Stop worrying. You’re quick. You’ll get the hang of this,” he insisted. “We’ll give it another try later. In the meantime, you did fine. Really.”
“Except for the part where I nearly disabled you,” she muttered, half under her breath.
“I had you covered, Rory. You were a long way from anything like that.”
A split second was hardly a long way. She’d have pointed that out had his assessment of her capabilities not just registered. It was like last night, she thought, when he’d talked her through the doubts and turmoil of the past year. It seemed he didn’t want her doubting her abilities, or herself, about anything.
He clearly expected her to challenge his last claim. The quick part, probably. She couldn’t. Last night he had called her beautiful, smart and stubborn. The stubbornness she would concede. That he thought her beautiful and smart still left her a little stunned. But what mattered to her most was that for him to feel so certain about her meant he might actually believe in her himself.
Until that moment, she hadn’t realized how badly she wanted that sort of faith—that trust—from him.
“I’m going to go help Tyler now.”
His eyes narrowed on hers. “You’re good, then?”
He wanted to know if she believed what he’d said.
I had you covered, Rory.
“I’m good,” she said, and with him already turning to his task, she headed for the porch to rescue the boughs and her rosy-cheeked child.
He had her back. He wasn’t going to let anything bad happen as long as he was there.
He couldn’t begin to know how much that assurance mattered to her.
Erik had told her not to worry.
Rory wasn’t sure she knew how to do that. The unwelcomed trait had become second nature. Yet what concerned her far more than her lack of skill with gas-fueled equipment was how she found herself wishing Erik’s solid presence could be part of the community that encouraged her with its potential.
Ed
