blinked at him.
“Are you afraid of me?” he asked.
“Not exactly. Not afraid. Really, caution’s just my nature.”
“Well, have you decided whether or not I’m a horse’s ass?” he asked. “Because you don’t have to come to the ranch if you don’t feel secure.”
“A job’s a job,” she said.
He squinted at her. Last would know which way the wind was blowing for this woman. His brothers would give her little attention and make her hungry by starvation.
One minute she’d seemed very warm for him. The next, cool as the weather outside.
She was just his type, even if he’d never known he preferred Amazonian redheads. In fact, she was steaming the creases right out of his jeans. He didn’t want her to lose interest in him.
Princess had ignored Bloodthirsty Black—and vice versa. No Pow! At least at first sight. His brothers understood Pow!
It was time to change his ways. “C’mon,” he said gruffly. “You’ve got a hard day’s work ahead of you tomorrow. You’re going to need all the rest you can get.”
He was rewarded by a flash of disappointment on Kelly’s face. Then she nodded. Directing her toward his truck, he said, “You’ll be able to follow me easily, even though it’s dark. I’ll drive slow. We’ll be at the ranch in about twenty minutes. Pay close attention to the road markings, so that when you leave tomorrow night, you’ll remember your way.”
There. Business totally unmixed from pleasure.
He had her on the run. His brothers would be proud.
KELLY WISHED SHE didn’t feel so guilty! Fannin was so much more man than she’d expected him to be—and he was making her nervous. False pretenses were obviously not her game. She sighed, watching the truck ahead carefully. Fannin was a careful driver, and he seemed equally careful with his heart. What had possessed her to say that he might be a horse’s ass? The moment she had, he’d gone distant on her. She hated that! She was always sticking her size-ten shoe in her mouth.
Then she’d had to fall back on the professional excuse, so it wouldn’t seem like she’d been chasing him when all he wanted from her was a day’s worth of work. What had gotten into her to stand there drooling like a madwoman? If her mouth hadn’t run off with her chances, she would have been in danger of losing all self-respect and throwing herself at that poor unsuspecting man.
Wouldn’t he have been surprised to find her wrapped around him like a well-worn sweater? “Maybe all he really wants is a secretary, Kelly. You assumed he wanted a date, even though he never asked for a date. You thought he was going to make a move on you, and when he didn’t, your sex signals tripped a major breaker. You need to settle down and be professional, be a good representative of Julia’s Honey-Do Agency.”
Joy had certainly not carried any inhibitions. Her baby was still in Fannin’s jacket, nice and warm and secure. Of course, things were a lot less complicated in the animal world. Dogs didn’t bog themselves down with overthought. They looked for love and comfort, and they got it where they could. “Of course, I can’t exactly fit into his pocket,” Kelly murmured. Nor his life.
Then she noticed he was stopping up ahead, suddenly. She thought she had the steering wheel firmly in her hands, but she must have been trembling. The car went over something hard and bumpy in the road, something large, and the steering wheel jerked from her fingers. Gasping, she overcompensated and slid into the ditch. “Oh, for heaven’s sake!” Mentally, she checked for broken anything—everything felt fine. Except her pride, of course, as Fannin’s truck door slammed on the embankment above her.
“You all right?” he called.
Not if you count my humiliation level. “I’m fine,” she called back.
“Anything hurt?” Fannin slid on his feet toward the car and opened her door to gingerly help her out. “Move slowly. Make sure everything’s in one piece.”
“I’m fine,” she said weakly, becoming more unsettled now that the adrenaline was wearing off. “I hit something.”
“A deer.”
“A deer! I didn’t see a deer.”
“It’s lying on its side in the road. Probably was meandering across when someone accidentally hit it. That happens around here sometimes. You’re lucky it was just a small one.”
She shuddered. “How come you didn’t hit it?”
“I saw it, but my truck’s set up higher than your car. I didn’t have time to warn you.”
His fingers felt good as they massaged her neck, her shoulders, her arms, checking her over and steadying her. “I’m fine, really. It was my own stupidity. My mind was a million miles away. I saw you stop, but my reaction was slow.”
“You wouldn’t have been expecting a deer in the road,” he said kindly.
All she wanted to do was melt into his arms. “Where’s Joy?”
“I left her up in the truck. She’d made a nest in my jacket and was perfectly happy not to come back out into the cold. Are you sure you’re fine?”
Looking up at him, she said, “Well, having never hit a deer before, I think I’m woozy.”
He frowned. “Woozy?”
“Yeah. Isn’t that funny? I feel light-headed.”
“Maybe you have a concussion.”
She could hear the instant worry in his voice. “No,” she said slowly, “I didn’t hit my head. I think I’m just envisioning poor Bambi—”
“Hey.” He took her into his arms and held her close. “Don’t think about it, okay? The deer was dead and didn’t feel a thing. You didn’t hurt the deer. In fact, I heard a rumor that it was an evil deer, out looking for little forest creatures to lure from their warm, snug homes. You did the world a favor. Okay?”
“Evil deer?” But she giggled, in spite of herself. “Thanks. I’m feeling better now.” More from his chest and his solid warmth than his silliness, but that felt good, too.
“Good. We’re going to leave your car here, until I can come back with my brothers so they can help me tow it back up this embankment.”
“Oh, no. I don’t want you to go to the trouble. I’ll call a service.”
He laughed, and she loved the sound of it coming from deep in his chest.
“We are the service in this town. Didn’t you see the size of my truck?”
“I hadn’t looked.” She’d only been looking at him.
“Other people buy bling-bling. We bought the biggest trucks they had on the market. Therefore, we became the towing service by default. We even pulled Shoeshine Johnson’s bus out of the pond when it slipped in.”
“How
