volumes about nerves that were strung drum-tight as the reporters’ voices reached them from the hall.
“Lady Helena! Look up! Lady Helena! Over here! Give us a smile for the public who wants to know how you are.”
She flinched at the sound of her name, and he couldn’t help it. He reached out. Touched a hand to her shoulder, gave it a reassuring squeeze as Greg’s voice boomed down the hall.
“Back off, Herkner,” Greg growled at the reporter from the American Investigator, a sleazy tabloid that put the other rags to shame in the exploitation department. “Give the lady a break. And give the other patients on the floor a break, too. Let us get her out of the building and she’ll give you a few words and a chance to shoot some photos.
“Or don’t back off,” Greg baited, the dare in his voice unmistakable, “and we’ll let the ER docs practice a little triage on your ugly face. Your call, of course.”
Matt looked toward the closed door, very much aware of the history between Willis Herkner and Greg Hunt. The reporter had hounded Anna during the Striksky affair. Obviously, Greg held a grudge. More obviously, Herkner was hamburger if he tested those particular waters.
When the racket quieted to a hushed din, telling Matt his plan was working and Greg and Anna were leading the press from the floor, he turned back to Helena.
She was pale and shaken and trying valiantly to keep herself together.
He hunkered down in front of her. “Hey…you okay?”
She worked over-hard to gather her composure and grace him with a look that tried to make a lie of the fact that she was far from all right. “Of course, darling,” she said in that cool, regal tone that dismissed his concern as unnecessary. “It’s just such a bother, isn’t it?”
“And then some,” he agreed, trying to get a read on her, knowing there was more going on behind those brilliant blue eyes than she wanted him to see.
“Look,” she said, all starch and breeding and a bit of impatient prima donna that didn’t quite ring true, “I don’t know why you’re here. And frankly, I don’t care. Just get me out of here. Please,” she added with enough entreaty that he knew she wasn’t as blasé about all of this as she’d like him to think.
He tipped his fingers to his hat brim and because he felt she needed one, he gave her a reassuring smile. “At your service, my lady.”
She smiled then, too. A real smile, not one he suspected she’d used on the public to hide everything from boredom to pain to fear.
“What’s next?” she asked after a steadying breath.
“What’s next is that we sneak you out the rear entrance without catching anyone’s attention.”
And that was going to be no easy feat. He’d been afraid that her release would come to this. The media circus it created wasn’t the worst of it. The worst of it was that her visibility increased her vulnerability. He wasn’t about to give anyone but the people he trusted access to her.
All he needed to do was transport her safely out of the hospital and deliver her to the Hunts. Greg was a fellow Cattleman’s Club member and Matt knew she’d be safe with him and Anna at their ranch until the mystery behind the jewel theft and Riley’s murder was cleared up, and he was certain she was out of danger.
She’d also be out of his line of sight at the Hunts’. Maybe then, she’d be out of his mind, too. Right, and a cactus didn’t have needles. Regardless of where she was in proximity to where he was, he was afraid he’d be seeing those big baby blues for a long time to come.
He drew a deep breath, got back to business. They had to get moving. He eyed her cast. “Can you walk in that thing?”
“I suppose that would depend on your definition of walk. Hobble might better describe it,” she admitted with something close to an apology in her eyes.
He stood. “Hobble’s not going to cut it, I’m afraid.” He scrubbed a palm over his jaw, gave her a considering once-over. “So we improvise.”
Careful of her injuries, he scooped her from the bed and into his arms. She felt good there. Too good. So good, he knew he had to do something to get his mind off the sudden, unplanned intimacy.
“Whoa,” he teased and settled her more securely against his chest. “Not exactly a featherweight, are you?”
Actually she was a sleek and silky armful. His heart kicked into overdrive—not so much from the exertion as from the softness of her breast snuggled hot and full against his chest. It was not the reaction of choice, but he sure as hell wasn’t going to dwell on it. What he was going to do was make the lady relax. Another one of those smiles wouldn’t be too tough to take either.
With staged effort, he shifted her higher in his arms and made a big show of being staggered by her slight weight.
“It’s the cast,” she assured him with a tight little scowl and looped her left arm around his neck. “And the case,” she added, referring to the clear plastic case she cradled in her lap that appeared to be filled with the home-going medical supplies.
He grunted for good measure. “If you say so.”
“Oh, for pity’s sake, get over it. I thought you cowboy types were supposed to be big and strong and well…heroic.” She glared down that titled little nose of hers in such a regal, aristocratic attempt to look huffy it was all he could do not to laugh.
“Begging your pardon, Lady Helena, but I’ve bulldogged steers that weighed less than you.”
She forced a tight smile, but her eyes held absolutely no trace of amusement. “That just makes my day, doesn’t it? I’ve been compared to a lot of things but never livestock. How charming.”
He grinned, but, still aware that she was far more nervous about this business than she was letting on, made sure she understood she could count on him. “It’s going to be all right. You can trust me, okay?”
When those expressive eyes held his gaze, and she softly murmured, “I do,” a long-repressed Tarzan gene made him want to beat his chest and carry her off to some vine-covered treetop hideaway. Since, for more reasons than one, that wasn’t an option, he gave her a quick wink instead and headed for the door.
The hall was devoid of reporters as they slipped cautiously out of the room. He shook off the floor nurse’s offer of another wheelchair and carried Helena to the bank of elevators marked Staff Only. Once at ground level, he negotiated a series of twists and turns as he carried her through the hallways to the rear exit.
“You seem to be rather good at this skulking business.” She tightened her arm around his neck. “Makes one wonder if there might be a bit of a shady past one might need to get a bit nervous about.”
He ignored the warmth of her, the woman scent of her and concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other. “Old American saying—One shouldn’t look a gift rescuer in the mouth.”
She gave a delicate little sniff. “Oh, by all means, rescue away. You’ll get no resistance from me.”
He smiled. “Here’s where we see just how good a sleuth I really am.” He rounded the last corner
