After what felt like four hours but was probably more like only one, Abigail heard a very faraway voice calling her name.
“Here!” she yelled with all her lungs. “I’m here!”
Cade’s voice yelling her name got closer and closer.
Abigail felt crazy with relief—she was saved!—and she had never wanted more to be anyplace else. Anyplace that wasn’t here, where she wouldn’t be waiting for rescue from a cowboy who hated her. She strained her ears for the sound of his truck approaching, now that he knew where she was, but she couldn’t hear any kind of engine, except for a whine of a small plane, very far overhead.
Crash, crackle
. The rustling that she’d thought she heard was getting closer. “Here! Over here!” she yelled.
He couldn’t have…could he?
Oh, yes, he had. The rustling she heard was almost upon her, coming up from behind, and then she could see them both—Cade on his horse.
He’d come on horseback to rescue her. The irony of it wasn’t wasted on her. Cade knew it, too—the sour look on his face confirmed that he felt the same way.
“Thanks for stopping by,” she said.
“Wasn’t doing much else today anyway. Only running a sheep ranch without any help because my foreman left for lunch.” Cade drew the horse up close to her. “Tom doesn’t leave for lunch.”
Abigail was briefly terrified of the huge beast above her, even though she knew it was stupid to be scared.
“He won’t—he won’t step on me, will he?” She wanted to draw her legs out of the way, but she was loath to move them at all. The pain was bad enough when it wasn’t white-hot with motion.
Cade only rolled his eyes. He swung off and landed almost at her feet. “Will you be able to get up on the horse?”
“Of course.”
“You do know how to ride, don’t you?”
“Are you kidding me?”
“No.”
“Okay, no, I don’t,” she admitted. “But it can’t be that hard, right?”
“I’m going to have to ride with you, then.”
“Both of us up there? I don’t think so.”
“You don’t know how to ride.”
“I can figure it out.”
“And I’m not risking my best horse to your poor judgment. Can you stand at all? Is it just the one ankle, or do you have more injuries you didn’t tell Tom about?”
“Just the one, and I can stand by myself.” Why this stupid need to impress him? She wanted to appear strong.
So she stood, quickly and firmly, using her arms braced behind her on the tree trunk, placing weight only on her good leg, using her thigh muscles to go straight up. So far so good.
Then her left foot brushed against the ground. She could actually feel herself going pale, the blood draining out of her face, and she slumped for a second while she tried to take a shallow breath around the pain.
He was next to her in that short second, his arms around her, holding her up.
“I’m fine,” she whispered. She cleared her throat. “I don’t need your help.”
He tightened his grasp on her, raising one arm and placing it over his neck. “You do, if only to get on the damn horse. Shut up and do what I tell you.”
Abigail opened her mouth to retort, but realized he was right. She’d never get on that horse without his help, and she’d never get off this hill without that horse.
“Now, hop a little bit over here.” He held her with one arm and steadied the horse with the other.
“I have no idea how to get up there,” she said.
“I’ll throw you.”
“Excuse me?”
Cade’s hands went to her waist. He lifted her up and twisted her so that her good leg went over the horse. At the end of the same motion, he caught her bad leg at the knee, stopping its motion. He caught the leg at the calf, and lowered it to the side of the horse.
She gasped.
“I know that hurt. But it would have been worse otherwise.”
“I know.” She should thank him, but she couldn’t speak through the pain.
“This might be bad, too, but only for a minute, and then we’ll get you out of here. Scoot forward if you can, and hang on.”
Hang onto what? The reins? She didn’t understand their configuration. Did one rein mean go and the other stop? The mane? That couldn’t be right. She was sure she’d seen people ride like that, but that had been in the movies, and this didn’t feel like a movie beneath her. It felt like a massive warm rock. Her legs straddled it, and her fingers dug tight against the muscles of the horse as Cade slung himself up and behind her.
She gasped. Something had hit her foot, possibly Cade’s boot, and she saw stars for a moment. His arms came around her, tightly.
“I’m sorry. I tried not to do that. Okay, hold your legs out in front of the stirrups, and I’ll try to avoid joggling you as much as I can. It might be a little bumpy, though.”
“Aren’t you going to give me a bullet to bite on?” she asked, her voice strained.
He laughed, and she felt the laughter in her chest. It was more of a bark than a laugh—as if he hadn’t expected it to happen. Then he cleared his throat.
“What the hell fool thing did you think you were doing all the way up here? Taking a hike?”
“Yeah, that was it.” She turned her head to the side to talk to him, but he spoke right in her ear.
“Bring your trail mix? Next time bring a map, would you? It was damned hard to find you—I’ve been calling your name up here for almost an hour. I went from ridge to ridge before I got the right one.”
“I was looking for stupid Merino.”
“What?”
“The male alpaca. He got out.”
“Mort said he always
was
good at that.”
“Alpacas aren’t supposed to be good at escape.”
“The exception to the rule, I suppose. Why did you think he’d have come all the way up here?”
“I followed his tracks.”
She waited for the inevitable laugh. She was not disappointed.
“Alpaca tracks? Up here? Lady, even I couldn’t do that, and I’ve been practicing since I was a boy. They’re too light, hardly weigh a thing, and these oak leaves move so quickly in the breeze. Maybe in mud or something, but I can’t believe you followed him up here. Can’t believe he was ever up here at all.”
“I think I was doing okay. I really think I was following him.”
“Sure. Go ahead and think that.”
They rode out of a copse and onto a hillside. Far below them Abigail could see the house, the barn, the cottage, the ocean gleaming in the far distance. “Look how pretty that is,” said Abigail.
Abigail could hear the smile in his voice. “The prettiest sight in the whole wide world.”
Abigail shifted her hips so that she could keep her ankle forward, away from his booted foot, and in the process, she ended up scooting her rear end against him. He’d been starting to say something else, but he stopped, abruptly.
“What?” she asked.
“Nothing.” But it was suddenly quite clear to Abigail what the problem was. She felt something behind her, something that wasn’t his jeans. He was hard against her. Her mouth went dry.
It would happen to anyone, she thought. Anyone put together like this, on a horse that was swaying, their two bodies rubbing…It was natural.
But her body was reacting, too, and she couldn’t blame it on being a man.
Could she blame it on the horse thing? She wasn’t used to sitting on a moving object like this…. But no, she knew exactly what was causing her to heat up like this, what was causing the blood in her veins to throb this hard. His arms around her, his maleness behind her, his lips and voice so close to her ear.
She tried to shift forward, out of his way, but she kicked her foot the wrong way, and winced. He caught the motion and moved a hand to her waist.
He pulled her back, harder against him.
“We have to keep you motionless, or it’ll hurt more later,” he said, so close that it sent a shiver down her spine.
She flushed red with embarrassment—it was her proximity, after all, she assumed, that was making him react like this. She wished she could move away, but at the same time, she didn’t want to move a muscle.
Cade’s hand had stayed on the curve of her waist after he’d settled her against him. It rested gently at her hip, and then it moved slightly so that the tips of his fingers brushed lightly against her side through her shirt.
Was he doing that on purpose?
She couldn’t feel her ankle anymore. There was nothing in her mind except for thoughts of what he felt like behind her.
Then he tugged the bottom of her shirt out of her jeans and slipped his hand inside, resting it back at the curve of her waist.
“You don’t mind, do you?” he murmured. “You’ll be better anchored this way. Don’t want anything to happen to you.”
She shook her head. Did his lips brush her cheek? She turned her head the same direction again and said, “Good idea.”
What was this? Didn’t he still hate her because of this morning?
Then she let her head drop back against his shoulder, and closed her eyes. She didn’t want to figure it out, not right now.
His hand barely touched her skin, fingers skimming the sensitive curves, sliding forward so that his fingers moved around her bellybutton and then back to her side. It was an agony of sensitivity. She wasn’t ticklish, but she shivered.
As his hand played up her side, moving ever so slowly toward her breast, she pressed even harder back into him. His hand went higher, pushing her bra up, skimming her nipple with one finger.
He kept his hand moving on her skin, pinching and lightly twisting her nipple. She was as aroused as if he had his fingers inside her instead of on her breast. Her eyes were shut tight, and his breathing was as uneven as hers in her ear.
“Shit.” His hand jerked out from under her shirt. He sat up straight and held the reins with both hands in front of her, and she had to follow suit. Her eyes flew open, and she saw that not only were they almost at the barn, which surprisingly dismayed her, but that Janet and Tom were just getting out of Tom’s truck.
“The prodigal returns,” said Cade, loud enough for Tom to hear as he led the horse up next to the truck.
“I don’t get a lunch break? Not allowed? I’ll alert my union.”
Janet laughed, a high peal of humor that made Tom’s eyes light up. He was smitten, it was clear. Men often were.
But then Janet’s expression changed, going from high flirt to nothing but concern.
“Sweetheart, how are you? But what? How? Falling out of a
tree?
”
“We have to get you to a doctor,” said Tom.
“No, I’ll be fine.”
They all shook their heads in unison, and Janet said, “We’ll
all
go with you. We’re off! It’s an adventure. I mean, of course, darling, this is hell for you. But for us, we’ll fete ourselves as heroes, with Cade being the hero of the day. Of the year! Now get her off that horse, cowboy, so I can give you a kiss for valor.”
Cade steadied Abigail in place with his hands, and she tried in vain to forget where his hand had just been. It was no good, though; she still felt the burn of his palm against her skin, her breast.
She took a deep breath and willed her color to go down. She knew she was beet red. Maybe they would blame it on pain. That was for sure what
she
was going to blame it on.
Cade swung off, effortlessly, hardly moving Abigail at all in the process. Then, from the ground, he reached up his arms and told her how to fall from the animal into his arms.
“I’ll guard your leg and your foot, trust me.”
And even though he was the same guy that had told her just that morning that he would never trust her again, she did trust him. She fell to the side, raising her good foot, lifting it over the horse. She slid into his arms, and he turned at the last moment, raising her body so that her foot didn’t hit the ground.
But it still hurt so bad she wanted to swear a blue streak. So she did, raising Tom’s eyebrows and making Janet howl with laughter.
“Our little sailor,” she said. “Now, let’s get you to the car. We’ll take mine, since we don’t want to have to throw you in the back of a pickup, and it seems as if it’s all you people have around here.”
Cade started to tell Janet that he’d just take her himself, but she cut him off.
“We’re coming, too. You’ll need someone to keep you company while she gets X-rays.”
Cade shook his head, and leaned Abigail against Tom’s truck as if she were a stick of wood.
“Cade, I think we should,” said Tom. “It’s a nice idea. What if she needs something? Gets lonely in a hospital.”
Cade looked at him incredulously. “Tom? When you had appendicitis, you stuck a vial of horse penicillin in your leg and didn’t go to the hospital until a week later, when your appendix burst. You were out in less than twelve hours and back at work a day later. You don’t do hospitals.”
Janet looked impressed.
Tom said, “Just ’cause I’m a stubborn cuss doesn’t mean she has to be, does it? And maybe I learned my lesson. Always better to go to the doc sooner rather than later.”
“I don’t know what you’ve done with Tom, but put him back the way he was before you leave,” Cade said to Janet.
Janet merely snapped her fingers at him and said, “Bring our girl to my car. It’s over on the other side of the house, by the cottage.”
Cade sighed. “Does everyone always do what she wants?”
“Everyone,” said Abigail. “Always.”
“For God’s sake. Hold on.”
And he swung her up in his arms.
“I’m too heavy for you!”
“A hay bale weighs more than you.”
“Are you sure?”
“After fifteen years of baling hay, yes, I’m sure. Now, quit kicking around. You’ll hurt yourself.”
So Abigail relaxed, and let herself be carried. Strangely enough, it felt good. She felt safe. Her ankle hurt like hell, but the rest of her felt just fine.
The magic of knitting is that very small acts add up into something substantial, useful, and beautiful
.
—E.C
.
C
ade hadn’t been to this hospital since Tom had called him for a ride after his appendectomy. But he knew where it was, and he followed Janet’s car, grumbling to Tom the whole way.