list time. When she opened her eyes, she checked the cut first and saw that the bleeding was slowing. After replacing the square of cloth, she slipped her fingers behind his head to check the back. The instant she touched the bump, he winced and made a sound.
So he’d suffered a double whammy to his head. No wonder he was woozy. Shifting her coat aside, she ran her hands on a quick journey from the back of his neck, down his arms. When he neither winced nor yelped again, she drew her palms from his shoulders to his waist, then from his hips down those long, long legs. The man was one solid wall of muscle.
And she still wanted him. There was no mistaking the heat that had flared to life deep inside of her as she’d run her hands over him. No controlling it, either. She knew what she was feeling. She wasn’t stupid, so she’d pegged it the first time she’d seen him. Lust. Pure and simple. And incredibly intense.
Whoever believed that lightning couldn’t strike twice was dead wrong. But wherever the lust had come from, it could just go back there. She had a job to do—a possible thief fleeing down a mountain, an injured man who was sliding into shock and two statues of St. Francis. Her plate was currently full.
She glanced down to where her hands still rested on his ankles. First step—she had to stop touching him. Releasing her grip, she was about to get to her feet when a sudden thought occurred to her. When she’d patted him down, she hadn’t felt a wallet. But she checked his pockets just to make sure. She located a cell phone, but nothing else.
Had Gabe Wilder taken this man’s wallet? Why?
She glanced back at his face. His eyes were closed now, and he looked even paler. She had questions, but he was in no condition to answer.
Fishing in her coat pocket, she located her cell and tried again.
Nothing.
Then she stared at the time. Nearly nine-thirty. Rising, she glanced around the small room and spotted the landline on a counter. There was no dial tone when she lifted the receiver. Even if she’d been able to call 911, it would take help some time to arrive. So she was on her own.
Grabbing some candles she found next to the phone, she lit them. Then she located a pile of linen towels and mopped up the water around his head and shoulders. Finally, she dropped to her knees and took his hand again. It was so cold. “It’s all right,” she murmured. “You’re going to be all right.” As if to reassure herself of that, she lifted her square of T-shirt again and checked the cut. It was clean and not very deep. “You probably won’t need stitches, and the bleeding has nearly stopped.”
And she doubted he heard a word she was saying. But when she tried to pull her hand away, his grip tightened again—as if she were his lifeline.
“Statue …” he murmured.
“It’s still here,” she said.
“Both …?”
“They’re both here.” Curious about how much he’d seen, she leaned closer. “What happened?”
He didn’t answer her this time, and a second later his hand went limp in hers. She felt the instant surge of panic and shoved it down. The steady rise and fall of his chest beneath their joined hands assured her that he was still with her.
For the moment.
“It’s going to be all right. It’s going to be all right.” And it was. It had to be. Step number one was to get him warm.
Shivering, she slipped back into the jacket she’d discarded earlier and buttoned it up; then she tucked her coat around him again. There had to be something in the closet that she could use to keep him warm.
Behind the first door she opened, she found choir robes hanging on hooks. Though they were a different color, they reminded her of the robe that St. Francis wore in the sculpture. She thought of the statue’s special prayer-answering powers. In spite of the fact that she’d tried praying to him once before without much success, she decided to give him a second chance.
“Help me keep him safe and well until I can get him medical attention,” she murmured. Then she started pulling robes off their hangers.
GABE STRUGGLED TO FIND his way to the surface again. He’d done it once, hadn’t he? Or had he just dreamed that he’d seen Curls leaning over him?
Focus.
His thoughts were spinning like little whirlpools—just out of reach. There was something important, something he needed to take care of. The statue … the effort it took to remember had pain stabbing his head again.
Okay. For a moment, he gave up, letting himself drift. And he saw her again.
Curls.
The moment her image took shape in his mind, his headache eased, and the memory slid into place. He let himself drift with it. He’d been at the St. Francis Center shooting baskets, and he’d sensed someone watching him. Not his friends, Nash and Jonah, who never made it to the center until noon. And sure enough, there she’d stood in the small garden beside the basketball court, her hands wrapped around the narrow poles in the wrought-iron fence. She’d looked like a prisoner. Perhaps that’s what had appealed to him, what had triggered a sense in him that they were kindred spirits.
Because at that time, he’d felt like a prisoner, too, trapped in promises that he wasn’t sure he wanted to keep. He’d stood beside his mother’s bed holding his father’s hand as they’d both sworn their vows. He’d promised to never follow in his father’s footsteps, and his father had promised to give up his lifelong profession.
But the promise hadn’t done his father much good. Raphael Wilder had been falsely accused and convicted, and he’d died shortly after in prison.
So why should he bother to keep his promise? That was the question he’d been asking himself as he’d lunged, dribbled and shot basket after basket. And all the time she’d watched him. When he’d finally wheeled to confront her, it had been her eyes that had captured him.
He’d seen admiration and hero worship in them. Those had been balm to the raw, angry feelings of a thirteen-year-old who’d been newly orphaned.
So he’d taught her what he’d known about the game, and no teacher could have dreamed of a more responsive student.
The memory blurred for a moment. That wasn’t what he should be thinking about. There was something else. Something important. Urgent. When he reached for it, pain pierced like a fiery arrow.
Curls.
This time when the image surfaced, it wasn’t the child who had enchanted him, saved him when he was thirteen, but the woman who had gripped his hand and said that everything would be all right.
And it would be. He let out the breath he’d been holding and slipped under again.
TO PREVENT HER TEETH from chattering, Nicola clamped them together as she dragged the last choir robes out of the closet and added them to the pile at the injured man’s feet. Thank heavens there’d been a generous supply. And they were heavy.
In spite of her efforts to keep her mind on the task at hand, she couldn’t prevent herself from thinking about her reaction to the man. At twenty-six, she was no stranger to
