Parker (3 page)

“Here we go,” he said, and with the
flashlight started knocking out the rest of the crackled glass in
the windshield. Luckily, it was coming out in large pieces and
pellets, and not jagged shards of glass. Thank God for safety glass
and modern technology. “You okay?”

“Yes.”

He wasn’t sure she was. With most of the
glass out of the way now, he edged into the cab, crouching a bit
and facing Reba who had to be extremely uncomfortable hanging
there. It was a wonder the airbags hadn’t deployed.

She looked at him with wide, frightened eyes.
He could still see the emerald twinkle of them in the moonlight.
His heart melted a little, and he reached up to brush long strands
of hair out of her face and then saw the swelling over her forehead
and a cut. “You’re not okay,” he said softly.

She nodded and then said, “No. I’m not.”

“Tell me where it hurts,” he asked.

“My head. My left arm.”

“Anywhere else?”

She shook her head. “No.”

“Not your neck? Back?”

“No. No. I’m okay there.”

Good.
“All right.” He pulled a knife
out of his pocket and looked straight into her eyes. “I’m going to
cut the seatbelt, and you are going to fall, but I’m going to do my
darnedest to keep you from going down hard. Okay?”

She nodded.

“Hold onto my shoulders if you can and just
watch my face. Don’t look at the knife.”

Her stare was fixed on him as he grabbed a
section of the seatbelt at her hip and started cutting away from
her body. It was like cutting through steel, but he wasn’t about to
give up.

“Almost there. Ready?”

“Yes.”

“There.”

Reba’s weight shifted, and Parker caught her.
He tossed the knife to the side. She fell into his arms, and with
his awkward crouch in the cab, they both pitched forward onto the
ground.

Reba landing on top of him.

She raised her head up and looked at him
through a fringe of falling hair. “Well, this is awkward,” she
said.

Parker grinned and chuckled. He liked a woman
with a sense of humor. “Why don’t you roll away from the truck and
let’s get out of here,” he told her.

She did, and he scooped her up and carried
her to the cab of his truck. She protested all the way, of course,
about being able to walk. That he should put her down. That she was
perfectly capable.

But he didn’t listen. He did what his cowboy
instinct told him to do. Protect. Take care of her. And that was
what he was about to do.

****

Reba tried to be patient as this cowboy, her
neighbor, Mr. Parker McKenna, fawned all over her. She sat at her
kitchen table and mentally assessed the situation as he rinsed out
a washcloth and then sat in front of her, carefully swiping grime
and blood from her face.

He’d pulled back her hair with a clip he
found in the bathroom, to keep it from hanging in her eyes. She had
no clue when she’d lost the band holding her ponytail.

This
was
awkward, and not in the way
that she was thinking earlier. She was usually the one to do the
caretaking. That’s who she was. Reba Morris definitely wasn’t used
to other people taking care of her.

Who was this cowboy and what was he doing in
her kitchen?

“I’m not thinking straight,” she said
aloud.

He stopped swiping and looked into her eyes.
“I’m going to get some ice for that bump.”

“Okay.” She nodded like a dutiful little girl
and wondered if she should sit in the chair and swing her legs like
one. Would she get a sucker if she were a good girl?

Reba, where is your brain? What are you
thinking?

Could she help it if she thought him
attractive?

She felt a little off-kilter. Why would she
think of that right now? Her head was killing her. “How can you
tell if someone has a concussion, and what do you do for it?” she
blurted out.

He turned back to look at her, the freezer
door open. “You think you have a concussion?”

“I don’t know. I feel fuzzy.”

“Your body has had quite a jolt. Give
yourself time. I’m getting ice for the arm too.”

She watched as he scooped cubes into two
different quart-sized baggies and wondered how he knew where to
find those. Then he wrapped each baggy in a thin dishtowel and
crossed the room toward her.

Matter-of-fact. Sure and swift. Do the right
thing, Mr. Cowboy Neighbor.

He sat in front of her on one of her
carved-oak kitchen chairs.

“You hold this one on your arm,” he said,
handing her an ice packet. “I’ll hold the one to your
forehead.”

“Goodness, this is unreal,” she said.

Here she was in her kitchen—her new home, her
sanctuary, the place where she was supposed to find herself—being
taken care of by someone else.

Without impositions.

This wasn’t the plan, was it?

Or was it?

“But thank you, Parker. I’m not sure what I
would have done if you hadn’t happened by….”

“I saw your lights spin and flip from the
porch. I got there as soon as I could.”

“Well then, again, many thanks.”
You were
watching me from the porch?
“But I think I’m fine now. I know
you’re tired; it’s been a helluva day for you. I’m sure you want to
head back—”

He put a finger to her lips. “Why don’t you
stop talking for a minute, and let’s just take a minute to assess
everything. Make a plan for what else needs to be done.”

“No plan,” she said. “I’m fine here.”

“Let’s make sure you don’t need to go to
ER.”

She shook her head. “No ER. I’ll be fine.”
Her insurance was still being worked out, and she hadn’t had time
to establish a health care provider here in Montana. Getting hurt
wasn’t on her radar screen, and she didn’t want to deal with the
hospital hassle tonight.

Not part of the plan.

Plan. She had to stick with
her
plan.
This hiccup was not going to get in her way.

She’d carried her plan out nice and orderly,
up until now. She’d bought the Crandall place, sold most of her
possessions back in Kentucky, and moved here to start fresh. She
didn’t have to worry about her job because she carried her job with
her wherever she went. Have laptop, will travel. She was here to
heal from a few difficult years and, according to her plan, find
herself.

Even indulge in life’s pleasures. Big and
little.

Maybe even
all
of life’s pleasures.
Especially the sexy ones.

She looked into Parker McKenna’s face. Their
gazes tangled and darted off each other. Hell’s bells. What kind of
pleasure might this cowboy provide?

“You’re not fine.” Parker stood, pulling the
ice away from her head. “In fact, in case you do have a concussion,
I need to make sure you don’t go to sleep. Let’s move you to
someplace a little more comfortable so you can put your feet up.”
He nodded off to her right. “Your living room that way?”

“Yes. But—”

Parker took her elbow and guided her to a
standing position. “This way.”

“I’m really okay, Parker. You can go. I’ll
stay up and watch late night TV, or work on my project, or bake
something.”

He didn’t acknowledge any of that and marched
her into the den, where he quickly assessed the room, and evidently
decided the sofa was the best place for her. “There. Does the
footrest come up on this?”

“It does, but—”

“Good. You sit here. Get that ice pack on
your arm. I’ll be right back with the one for your forehead.

Again, she dutifully sat. Within seconds, he
had lifted the footrest by pushing a button on the arm, and she
sank back into the soft sofa.

“Oh, this isn’t good,” she muttered. “This
feels too cozy.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll keep you awake.”

Reba looked up into Parker McKenna’s face,
gave him a saucy smile, and burst out with the first words that
came to her fuzzy head. “Oh, I look forward to that, cowboy.”

Then, she winked.

Chapter Three

Late Friday night/early Saturday morning

She winked at him.

She winked at him?

His new neighbor, Reba Morris, just winked at
him.

Parker turned away and stared across the
room. What the hell was that about? Without looking at her, he
headed to the kitchen, certain he’d misunderstood. Maybe it was an
eye twitch of some sort. That’s it. It was a twitch.

Not a wink.

Beyond the kitchen doors, however, he pulled
out his cell phone to see if he had service so he could Google the
symptoms for a concussion.

He didn’t think eye twitching was one of
them.

Neither was winking.

Parker stared at the phone, which indicated
absolutely no bars for service. Reba’s cabin was up in the
mountains a bit far, and often service was spotty up here, but—

And then he shoved it back into his pocket.
He didn’t need to Google anything, anyway.

I look forward to that, cowboy.

Shit. Reba Morris was coming on to him. That
made him sweat, and heat rose to his cheeks.

Dammit!

Well,
that
wasn’t going to happen.
He’d never taken advantage of a woman, and he wasn’t about to start
now. She was hurt. She had a head injury. That had to be it. And
she wasn’t thinking straight, she’d said that earlier, so he had to
be the stronger person here and keep things in perspective.

Even if he did find her attractive—which he
did. And even if the crotch of his jeans was growing even tighter
than it had on the porch—which it was. Tonight was not the night
for canoodling, or whatever they called it these days, with his
neighbor.

Give him a week and maybe he’d change his
mind.

Hell, no!

No. He wouldn’t change his mind about Reba.
In a week he’d be knee-deep in issues concerning his father’s will
and dealing with his stepmother and all of his siblings.
Ignore
it.
She’d probably even be embarrassed if she realized what
she’d done. Shaking his head, he picked up the leaking ice bag and
frowned. He pulled open a drawer and retrieved another baggy,
double-bagged the ice, and then headed for the freezer.

No time for canoodling with his neighbor. No
way.

Although, he couldn’t deny an intense tumble
in the hay might do a lot to alleviate some of the stress he’d been
under lately. At least temporarily.

No.

Get your priorities straight, McKenna.

He squared his shoulders, fished a few more
cubes out of the ice bin and dropped them into the bag—all the
while mentally patting himself on the back for thinking that
scenario through. But that wink she’d thrown him sure was sexy and
inviting, and if it had happened on any other day, in any other
place in time, he probably would have seized the opportunity
head-on.

That part that worried him. There was too
much going on in his life to bring a woman into the chaos. He had
to get his family life straight first. But from the first moment
he’d laid eyes on Reba Morris, he’d found her both interesting and
charming—

That come-hither look, the tease in her
voice, and the twinkle in her wink?

Well, those things made a cowboy drop to his
knees and beg.

****

Reba waited for Parker to come back.

Simultaneously, she wished he would just
leave.

How could she have been such a brazen hussy
to wink at him and say what she had said? Embarrassed didn’t cover
how she felt right now. Good Lord, the man was probably hiding in
the kitchen.

But no. He burst back into the room and,
without eye contact, sat right next to her on the sofa.

“Get that ice on your arm,” he ordered.

She stared. “Yes, sir.”

He gave his head a quick shake. “Sorry, I
didn’t mean to be so gruff.”

Let him off the hook, Reba.
You
probably scared the shit out of him.
“No worries. I’m sure you
have a lot of other places you’d rather be tonight, and it’s been a
long day. In fact, truly, Parker, I am fine. You can leave.”

“No.”

Reba sighed.
Pig-headed man
. She
attracted them. Her husband was the same, until he’d fallen too
sick to challenge her. Much. Even then, she caved to his whims all
too often.

But that’s what people do when the one
they love is dying. Give them what they want—often to the sacrifice
of your own needs.
And she had happily done so.

Not thinking of that now.

His voice softened. “Let me get this on that
goose egg again.” He lifted the new ice bag to her brow. “It’s gone
down some.”

“Good,” she replied. “It felt huge earlier.
Am I cut up?” He’d not let her look in the mirror earlier when they
came in.

“A little. It’s not as bad as I thought. That
one cut on your nose bled the most, and it’s actually small. You’ll
be fine.”

Reba sighed. She wasn’t a vain woman—well not
much anyway—but she hated the thought of her face being messed up.
“Thank God my nose isn’t broken,” she said.

He chuckled. “It’s not.” Then he added, “But
you are going to have one hell of a black eye.”

Reba jerked out from under the ice bag and
looked at him. “What?”

He lowered his hand holding the ice. Looking
her in the eyes, he lifted a forefinger and traced a line under her
left eye. “You’re all puffy and bruised here. It’s already turning
purple.”

The light touch of his finger sent a small
shiver down her spine that she fought to stifle. “Anything else?”
She bit her lip.

Slowly, he nodded. “Yes.” Tenderly, he
dragged the same finger over her eyelid, just beneath her brow. The
motion tickled and tingled. “Here. Swollen already and bruised.
Sorry to say, it’s turning an ugly blue, almost back.”

“Oh. Great.”

But she couldn’t ponder that long because she
was caught up in his gaze. Parker’s eyes were the deepest shade of
brown, and Reba wondered to what depth a woman could sink into
them. He was drawing her in, mesmerizing her with his glare. “I’ve
never had a brown eye before.”