in her grasp and she loosened her hold. Mindy twirled her long, dirty brown hair around a finger, gave Claire an apologetic grimace and scurried after Tyler.
As Tyler’s arm settled around Mindy in a gesture that Claire knew all too well, heaviness descended on Claire’s shoulders. Billy had possessed her like that. Made her his property. She shuddered and repressed the memory. She was never going to allow herself to be that needy again.
“Lord, please protect Mindy,” she murmured the prayer aloud.
Claire snuggled the puppy and turned to thank the stranger, but he’d walked away. His long legs carried him in the opposite direction of the teens, toward the parking lot at the east end of the park. The pocket-size Bible sticking out of his back pocket snagged her attention. Interesting.
She hurried after him, not wanting him to disappear without thanking him. In this day and age, not many people would have come to her aid.
“Hey, wait,” she called.
He paused, glancing over his shoulder. When she caught up to him, he arched a black brow. His expression was less intimidating now, more playful. She swallowed.
Her first impression that he was good-looking had been marred by the anger hardening his features. She realized he was beyond good-looking and sliding straight toward gorgeous. Everything inside went on alert, like the quills of a porcupine sensing danger.
He raised both brows. Heat crept into her cheeks. “I wanted to say thank you.”
“No big deal.”
The soft rumble of his voice vibrated through her, sending tingles along her nerve endings.
He started forward again and she doubled her steps to match his lengthy stride. “But it was a big deal to this little guy…and to me.”
One corner of his mouth kicked upward in an appealing way as he scratched the dog behind the ear. “You two take good care of each other.”
Claire watched that big, strong hand stroke the yellow fur and envy flooded her. It had been a long time since a man had run his fingers through her hair. A long time since she’d allowed anyone close enough to touch her at all. But this was the wrong man to want that from.
She pushed aside her need for physical contact. “Where are you from?”
“That obvious, huh?”
She grinned. “Most Oregonians don’t have an accent.”
Both brows rose again. “Sure you do. You just don’t hear it.”
She pulled her chin in. “Really?”
He laughed and the sound warmed her all over. “Yes, really.”
Bemused that she sounded as different to him as he did to her, she probed, “And you’re from…?”
“Long Island.”
“You’re a long way from home.”
His ebony eyes took on a faraway glaze. “Yes. A long way from home.”
The loneliness in his voice plucked at her. “Where are you staying?”
His gaze came back to her, those dark eyes alight with an unidentifiable emotion. “I’m not.”
Curiosity gripped her. “Where are you headed?”
He shrugged again.
A drifter. A twinge of sadness weaved through her curiosity. Did the pain she’d seen earlier drive him to keep moving, to drift through life? Looking at his tall, lean frame, she wondered when he’d eaten last. The familiar urge to help, to do something, rose within her.
“Could I make you lunch as a way of saying thanks?” She pointed to the gray two-story building at the north end of the park. “I live there.”
He stopped, tilted his head to one side, and studied her. She gave him a smile of encouragement and tried to slow the pounding of her heart. This man with his dark good looks and bad-boy image was just the kind of guy to turn her crank. But she wasn’t going to let her crank be turned again only to be left idling on the side of the road. Her smile stiffened.
“Don’t you know you shouldn’t talk to strangers, let alone invite them in?”
She barely stopped herself from rolling her eyes. She’d heard similar warnings from all the well-meaning people of Pineridge who thought she shouldn’t open her heart and home to the teens.
Granted, this man was far from a teenager. But he posed a threat on so many levels that she would be wise to heed the warning. Wisdom was something she was still working on. “I run a shelter. Inviting strangers in is part of what I do.”
“A shelter?”
“A teen shelter, to be exact.”
“Why?”
She sighed. The infernal question seemed to be at the top of everyone’s list of questions and asked in the same wary, derisive tone, though his held more edge to it. “The stigma of runaway teenagers is that they’re crazy and out of control. But they’re still just kids. Yeah, they’re rough and tough and act horribly at times. But deep down most are scared, confused and need help.”
“But why you?” He seemed genuinely interested.
It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him the unvarnished truth. Why she felt compelled to make him understand was a mystery. So instead she settled for her pat response. “I remember the anxiety and chaos of those teen years. If I can make a difference in someone’s life, I know I was put on this earth for a reason.”
“That’s admirable.”
His compliment pleased her, as did the almost wistful look on his handsome face.
“But woefully misguided.” His expression hardened. “Thank you for the offer, but I should be heading out.”
“Why are you in such a hurry, if you don’t know where you’re headed?”
He leaned toward her, his jet-black eyes probing and his decidedly masculine scent, full of leather and the outdoors, engulfing her senses. “You’re tenacious.”
Her spine stiffened and she lifted her chin. “Persistence is a virtue.”
Amusement danced in his gaze. “Patience is a virtue.”
Her cheeks flamed at being corrected. “I consider both to be virtues.”
That appealing half-grin flashed again. “Both are admirable traits.” His tone dropped to a deep and husky timbre that she found fully alluring. His accent rasped along her skin like a velvet caress. Her knees wobbled and knocked together. “We’ve established you have persistence, but do you have patience?”
Oh, yeah, she had patience. Hard-won and, at the moment, stretched taut.
Every instinct warned her that this man could endanger her vow to be self-sufficient
