a half hour? Are you sure he’ll be okay? And you said something about instruction sheets and eardrops.”
Impulsively, she reached out and clasped his arm. “Shep, he’ll be fine. We won’t let you leave without the instruction sheets.”
As her fingers made contact with his tanned skin, sensations registered from her fingertips to her brain—his heat, the strength of the muscle in his forearm, the tingling in her belly that seemed to come from nowhere. His eyes met hers, and for a moment they were both aware of the contact. She quickly released his arm.
He was wearing a Stetson, and he took it off now and ran his hand through his hair, ruffling it. “Will you take me to him?”
“Sure.”
They walked side by side down the hall. Shep was six inches taller than she was—a couple of inches taller than Clark. But where Clark had been husky, Shep was lean. Clark had worked out with weights to keep his body in prime condition for his job. But she had the feeling Shep McGraw’s muscles came from his work on the ranch and at his lumberyard.
She shook her head to clear it from such insane thoughts. “Will your housekeeper be available this evening?”
Shep arched a brow at Raina.
“I just wondered if she’ll be helping to care for Manuel tonight.”
“More than likely she’ll keep Roy and Joey busy so that I can take care of Manuel. Eva often jokes that I moved from laid-back California to Wild West Texas never expecting life to be as unpredictable as it has been. But I don’t regret one day of it and I don’t think she does, either. I’ll show her anything you show me, in case she needs to know.”
“Is she…older?” Raina asked, telling herself she needed the information for purely professional reasons.
“Don’t let her hear you say she’s older,” he joked, with a wry smile. It was a crooked smile that made Raina’s pulse beat just a little faster. “She’s in her fifties,” he went on, “but won’t say exactly where in her fifties.”
Raina chuckled. “She sounds like a woman after my own heart. We should never have to divulge our age.”
“Let me guess,” Shep said. “You’re thirty-seven.”
“How did you—?”
“Gotcha,” he teased. “I have a friend who’s a doc in Santa Fe. I know how long med school took him. And you started practicing here after your residency, right?”
“A year and a half ago,” she confirmed with a nod.
“That’s about when Joey and Roy came to live with me.”
“And Manuel joined you six months ago.”
“That’s right. It’s been a roller-coaster ride.”
She laughed. “You’re a brave man, Shep McGraw, taking in three boys and having the confidence to raise them.”
“Confidence or insanity,” he muttered.
She laughed again.
They reached a door with big black letters—Authorized Admittance Only. Raina opened the door and let Shep inside. He spotted Manuel right away and made a beeline for him, Raina hurrying to catch up. She glanced at the monitors, then asked the nurse at Manuel’s side, “How’s he doing?”
“He’s doing great.”
Shep caught a stray stool with the toe of his boot and dragged it to Manuel’s bedside. He sank down on it and took the little boy’s hand. “How are you doing, kiddo? There’s nothing to worry about now. I’m here and we’re going home soon.”
“Home?” Manuel repeated, his eyes still a little unfocused.
“Yep, home. Joey and Roy and Eva are waiting for us.”
Raina went to a side counter, picking up a sheaf of papers. She brought them over to Shep, then went over the instructions for giving Manuel the eardrops, as well as changing the cotton in his ears. “Everything’s explained here. If he runs a fever or if anything seems out of the ordinary, call me immediately. My service can page me.”
Shep’s attention shifted from her to his son in the bed. His gaze ran over Manuel—from the little gown he was wearing to the cotton in his ears.
Shep was quiet for a moment, then he swiveled around on the stool to face her. “Are you done here for the day?”
“Yes, I’m off to run some errands. But as I said, my service can always contact me.”
“How would you like to do something a little more exciting than running errands?”
“And what would that be?” She was really curious.
“How would you like to come to the Red Creek Ranch and get a taste of just how wild the West can be?”
Chapter Two
Raina was stunned by Shep’s invitation.
“Why do you want me to come to the ranch?”
For a moment, he looked as if he was going to clam up, pull down the brim of his Stetson and walk away. But then he gave a small shrug, stood, lodged his hands in his back pockets and studied her. “You’re a no-nonsense kind of woman, aren’t you?”
“Does that require an answer?”
“No,” he drawled, with a lazy Texas slowness that made her stomach jump. Then he became more serious. “After what you’ve been through, I imagine you don’t have time for crap. Life’s short, and you know it.”
No one had ever approached the subject of her widowhood quite like this before. She was even more intrigued by this man who had been getting under her skin a little every time he had an office visit with one of his kids. “That’s one way of putting it,” she admitted wryly.
Sliding his hands out of his pockets, he dropped them to his sides. “The truth is…” He hesitated and then said, “I like you and I trust you. Manuel had an operation and anesthesia. The hospital is sending him home just an hour afterward. That doesn’t sit comfortably with me. On top of that, I need to do some things, like the drops and all, and I don’t want to make a mistake. I’ll be glad to pay for your time. I’m not asking you to do this for free.”
He liked her. She decided not to focus on that. “So you’d consider this a house call?” If she looked at this in professional terms—
“Yeah, sort of. Maybe a little longer than a house call. After all, it’s going to be suppertime soon. You could stay and eat with us.”
There was nothing obvious in the way Shep was looking at her, and yet…she was very aware he was a well-built man. From those silver sparks in his blue eyes, she had the feeling he appreciated who she was, white lab coat and all. This was the oddest situation she’d ever found herself in. Over the past nine years, she hadn’t taken a second look at a man, and had always put up a shield or run quickly if one
