“Yes, I can stand,” he snarled. “I’m not a complete cripple, damn it! I can move about under my own steam.”
“Then prove it.”
The glare he directed at her was enough to sour milk, but she refused to be intimidated. “Save the black looks for someone who cares,” she said, staggering a little as he heaved himself upright and slung an arm over her shoulder. “This isn’t the Academy Awards and even if it were, I’m fresh out of Oscars.”
“You’re a mean-mouthed witch, you know that?”
“Yes,” she said, dismayed by his pallor and the sweat beading his brow. “You have a way of bringing out the worst in me.”
He was well over six feet and muscular, a big, strong man unused to having to depend on a woman. He hated the indignity of being handicapped and despised every laborious second it took for him to hobble across the porch and into the house.
Once there, he used the furniture to take some of his weight but by then the toll had begun to tell. What it cost him to preserve his infernal male pride showed only in the grim line of his jaw and his labored breathing. He would have swallowed broken glass before he’d have admitted to the agony he was suffering.
“Where do you think you’re going?” he panted when she went to steer him past the table to the door on the far wall.
“Where do you suppose? I’m putting you to bed.”
“Like hell!” he said rudely, staggering to the sofa and collapsing in an exhausted heap. “Just leave me here and let me get on with things by myself.”
“And how do you propose to do that? You’re in so much pain you can hardly sit up. So put a lid on the macho act and tell me where you keep your medication.”
“No pills,” he said, turning his face away.
“What do you mean? You do have something for pain control, I hope?”
“Enough to start my own pharmacy,” he said grimly, “but I’ll be damned if I’m letting you dope me up for something as minor as this.”
“I should have figured you’d say that. Well, what about towels—or don’t you believe in using them, either, unless you’re up to your neck in water?”
“Woman,” he ground out, closing his eyes as if that might make her evaporate into thin air, “you’re trying my patience to the limit. Please, for the last time, get the blazes out of my house and leave me alone. I don’t want you here. I don’t need you. I don’t need anything but a bit of peace and quiet.”
“The towels, Liam,” she said implacably.
He dropped his head to his chest and sighed, a great, heaving exasperated exhalation of defeat that blew like a breeze through the stuffy room. “Over there.” He gestured to a tall cabinet in the corner.
“Okay,” she said, taking out two large bath sheets. “These look up to doing the job. Come on, let’s get those wet jeans and shirt off.”
His head jerked up as if he’d been poked with a cattle prod. “You’ve got to be joking!”
“No,” she said, removing his soggy boating shoes. His long, tanned feet were icy to the touch and the skin on the side of his ankles had been scraped raw from his arduous trek up the ramp to the house. “I’m perfectly serious. Whether you want to admit it or not, you’re in shock and you need to be kept warm.”
“Not by you, Janie,” he said balefully. “You’re not stripping me down to my skivvies and checking out my equipment.”
She smothered a laugh. “Then undress yourself.”
“I will,” he said, but made no move to do so.
“Well?” She looked at him expectantly. “What are you waiting for?”
“You,” he said. “Turn around.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake—!”
“Turn around! Better yet, go wait on the porch.”
“How about I boil some water for coffee and get the first-aid kit out, instead?”
He rolled his eyes in despair. “Whatever! Anything to stop your nagging. Just don’t try sneaking a peek.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” she said. “I can’t imagine you’ve got anything I’d be interested in seeing, anyway.”
“You wish!”
She turned away to hide a smile. Didn’t he realize that, if she’d been all that desperate to see what he was so eager to hide, all she had to do was look in the shaving mirror hanging over the sink? But where was the point when, even if she’d had hopes of something more than simply tending his scrapes, he was in no shape to fulfill them?
“You appear to be having difficulties,” she remarked at the cursing and various rustlings going on behind her. “Are you sure I can’t help?”
“You can help,” he muttered savagely. “You can call off your damned dog. I don’t need my ears washed.”
“Don’t be so ungrateful. I’d never have found you if it hadn’t been for him.”
“Remind me to show my appreciation the next time I’m looking for crab bait.” More rustling, less harsh this time, and something hit the floor with a soft thud; his wet jeans probably. “There! I’m done. You can bring on the Band-Aids.”
He was naked from the waist up but had managed to wrap one towel snugly around the lower half of his body, including his legs and feet. All she could think was that if what he’d covered was a tenth as impressive as what he chose to display, it was just as well he’d been seized by pride-induced modesty. Because she’d have stared, no doubt about it! He was….
She swallowed and veered her gaze away from the sculptured planes of the torso in front of her. He was magnificent!
Of course, she reasoned, diverting herself by laying out gauze pads and antiseptic, part of her reaction lay in the fact that she’d never seen him without clothes before. He always wore jeans and a shirt of some sort. And it was difficult to gauge a man’s build when he was in a wheelchair. But the hardness of him…the power and strength!
Regarding her covertly and, she feared, reading her thoughts only too accurately, Liam inquired, “Something wrong, Janie?”
“Not a thing,” she said hoarsely. “Let’s get started.”
Gently, she swabbed at his face. “You’re going to have a black eye by morning.”
“It won’t be the first time,” he said, flinching at the sting of the antiseptic.
That, though, was the easy part. The palms of his hands and the underside of his forearms were speckled with fragments of creosote-impregnated cedar. “These slivers have to come out,” she said, wielding a pair of tweezers and turning her thoughts firmly away from the smooth, tanned flesh and solid musculature of his arm, “otherwise they’ll become infected for sure.”
“Hey, you’re not drilling for gold, you know!” he yelped at one point as she dug out a particularly stubborn splinter lodged in his palm.
“Keep still and stop being such a baby,” she scolded, applying hydrogen peroxide to the various puncture wounds. “I’m done at this end. Pull the towel up a bit and let me have a look at your ankles.”
“No,” he said flatly. “The towel stays where it is.”
She glanced up at him in surprise. “For heaven’s sake, Liam, I’m talking a couple of inches only. Even you can’t be that well-endowed!”
But he was in no mood for humor. “Leave it,” he said, his expression so closed that she knew there was no point in persisting. “You’ve done enough, and I’ve had enough for one day.”
Mystified, she shrugged and closed the first-aid box. “If you say so. But if you want my advice—”
“I don’t.” He shrugged irritably and combed his fingers through his still-wet hair. “It’s not that I don’t appreciate what you’ve done, but it’s been a long day and I’m wiped out.”
“Yes,” she said. “I can see that you are. I’ll make you something hot to drink, then I’ll get out of here. Is coffee okay, or would you prefer soup?”
“Coffee will be fine.”
“Of course. It’ll take only a minute or two to make.”
But that was more time than he had to spare. When she came back to the couch, he
was snoring. His hands lay loosely at his waist, their red welts bright against the pale blue towel. His chest rose in deep rhythm with every breath he took. But it was his face which captured her attention. The unguarded expression; the spray of thick, dark lashes shadowing his eyelids; the curve of his mouth, more lenient in repose than anything he betrayed when he was awake—they touched her in a way she hadn’t known for a very long time.
Leaving the coffee on the table, she went into the bedroom and returned with his sleeping bag. Careful not to disturb him, she covered him for, with the passing of the storm, cooler air had come in from the sea and the room would be cold by morning.
His earlier pallor had gone, replaced by a flush of color. Cautiously, she bent and slid her fingers lightly over the welt near his eye and down to his jaw. He was not feverish. His breath fanned her cheek, intimate as a caress.
Was that what prompted her to lean closer and kiss him? Or was it a sudden hunger to discover the inner man she’d never met before, the one who revealed himself to her only in sleep?
She’d intended a peck on the cheek, but somehow she found his mouth instead and lingered there. His lips were firm and cool and utterly unresponsive beneath hers. He was so deeply asleep, he’d never know the shameless liberty she’d taken, and just as well because the impulse had left her awash with a mess of emotions she didn’t dare begin to explore.
Shaken, she turned off all but one small lamp and tiptoed out to where Bounder lay waiting for her on the porch, Liam’s soggy shirt dangling from his mouth.
She could dish out punishment better than any woman he’d ever known. Touching him with her soft, pretty hands. Stroking her fingers up his arm and over his face. Making him want things he couldn’t have—like turning his back on lessons too well learned to be shoved aside on the strength of nothing.
Because that was what he amounted to these days. Nothing! And he’d been coping well enough with that, until she showed up on the scene.
I’m fresh out of Oscars, she’d said in that superior, know-it-all way of hers, but he’d fooled her with his performance, nonetheless.
Just as well she was such an innocent. A more experienced woman would have realized in a flash that the only part of him apparently unmoved by her impromptu kiss lay above the waist—and even that had taken uncommon willpower on his part!
She was dangerous—all the more so because she had no idea of the emotional punch she packed. It was time for him to move out of the line of her guileless fire, in which case perhaps this afternoon’s aborted trip to Regis Island was a blessing in disguise, after all.
When he’d checked the message on his voice mail, just after lunch that day, the last thing he’d expected to hear had been a woman’s breathy tones announcing, “Liam, it’s Brianna. Tom finally caved in, not without persuasion I might add, and told me where you’ve disappeared to. The Thorntons have invited me to spend a couple of weeks with them on their motor cruiser just north of your island, so I thought I’d stop by for a quick visit on my way home—say two weeks from Saturday? I’m leaving tomorrow, so call me soon, darling, and let me know if this suits. Can’t wait to see you. Kisses.”
Furious with his friend and business partner for revealing his whereabouts, he’d hurled the phone across the room. But while they might be miracles of modern technology, cell phones weren’t built to withstand the kind of abuse his had suffered. The impact when it landed had smashed the casing and put it out of commission for good, prompting him to take a run over to Clara’s Cove to use the pay phone in the general store, despite the thunder rumbling in the distance.
At the time, risking getting caught in bad weather had struck him as the lesser of two evils.
Brianna Slater was a man-eating piranha and his first thought had been to put an end to any idea she had of landing on his doorstep, especially with him captive in a wheelchair. Only when he’d come close to capsizing the boat before he was halfway to his destination had he changed his mind and decided suffering her company was preferable to drowning. And on reflection, perhaps it wasn’t such a bad idea because she’d surely dampen Jane’s enthusiasm for his company. Brianna wasn’t one to tolerate competition.
Wincing, he eased to a sitting position and flexed his bad leg. It hurt. The damned thing always hurt. But no worse than usual, and for that he would be forever grateful to whatever god had been looking out for him. When the chair had started its crazy backward slide on the greasy ramp, he’d known a terror worse than anything he’d felt at the time of the accident that had almost maimed him for life.
Understand this, they’d told him when they’d released him from the hospital. You’re lucky you’ve still got two legs. Don’t push your luck. You’ve had your share of miracles. Rehab’s going to be long and arduous. Don’t try rushing it if you seriously expect to walk again without a cane.
A fat lot they knew!
He swung his good leg to the floor then tenderly lowered the other and attempted to stand, easing himself up as carefully as if he were balancing on eggs. Still, tongues of fire seared the length of his bad leg, severe enough that even he couldn’t contain a groan.
Clamping his teeth together, he waited for the agony if not to pass, then at least to subside to a dull roar. It did not. It gouged holes in his pain threshold until the sweat poured down his face and he was shaking from head to foot.
Son of a bitch!
Defeated, he fell back down on the cushions, out of breath and out of patience. A chill crept over his skin as the sweating stopped. Exhausted to the point that even he was willing to admit it, he pulled the sleeping bag over himself and closed his eyes.
“Tomorrow,” he promised the shadow-filled room. “Tomorrow I’ll start over again. I’ll get this thing licked or die trying.”
CHAPTER FIVE
OVERNIGHT, the throbbing in his leg settled into the dull ache of what, for him, had become normality. Awaking to a morning that was clear and pleasantly cool, he inched to a sitting position and gingerly flexed his toes.
So far, so good!
The crutches were under the bed. He’d packed them, along with all the other paraphernalia that went with being crippled, despite his doctors’s grave warnings that he wasn’t going to need them for at least another three months. “I’ll be the judge of that,” he’d informed them.
Hopping on his good leg and dragging the other along as best he could, he made it to the bedroom, dressed, hauled out the crutches for the second time—the first had been when little Miss Goody Two-shoes got herself stuck up a ladder—and hobbled back to the kitchen, victorious. Hell, they were a piece of cake! If he’d known it was going to be this easy, he’d have used them sooner.
Whistling, he set the kettle to boil for coffee and opened the front door, figuring he’d take a couple of practice runs up and down the porch before venturing farther afield. With any luck, he’d be mobile enough to hike along the path heading north, away from her house, before she was up and about. The last thing he needed was her flapping around him and dishing out unasked-for advice.
Luck deserted him the minute he clumped outside. There on the porch was his wheelchair. In it was a basket of muffins still warm from the oven, with a note attached.
Hope you had a good night. Will stop by later to make sure you’re okay.
“I don’t think so, honey,” he muttered, glaring at the muffins. If they’d been bran, he’d have tossed them over the railing without a second thought. But she’d filled them with raspberries and some sort of spice that had his mouth watering. The way to a man’s heart and all that!
Only one thing to do: forget the coffee, along with any other ideas of a leisurely start to the day. He needed to be out of there fast, before she showed up, and hope she got the message.
Not that that was too likely, he reflected gloomily. She was too overflowing with the milk of human kindness, not to mention feminine wiles.
Unable to resist, he grabbed one muffin before heading inside again. His backpack hung on
a coat hook behind the door. Quickly, he stuffed in a nylon wind-breaker, a bottle of water, a can of nuts, a couple of chocolate bars. Passing by the wheelchair on his way out again, he eyed the muffins, fought a brief and losing battle with his pride, and added a couple to his other supplies.
“Just for good measure,” he explained to the world at large, “in case I need an energy boost to get myself back in one piece.”
Shortly after, he was on his way, swinging along the other end of the wraparound porch to the far side, and the steps which he hadn’t been able to use before. Eight of them, a bit steeper-looking than they’d seemed when he’d viewed them from the wheelchair—but oh, brother, the freedom they offered!
The path below, running at a gentle incline away from the house, was broad; wide enough to take a car, almost. A couple of hundred yards farther along, it veered right, away from the sea, and disappeared into a belt of cottonwoods.
“Goal number one,” he muttered, bracing himself for the descent. “Once out of sight under those trees, and I’m home free. She’ll never find me.”
When ten o’clock rolled around and there was still no sign of life at Liam’s place, Jane gave up pretending she didn’t care. This wasn’t like him. She’d lived next door to him long enough to know he was an early riser. Welcome visitor or not, she’d have to investigate.
Once she’d reached the decision, urgency lent speed to her step. “Why did I wait so long?” she panted to Bounder, the nagging worry she’d tried to ignore bursting into full bloom as she slithered and slipped her hasty way over the wet grass. “What if he was more badly hurt than I realized? What if he’s dead?”
If her heart hadn’t been pounding so furiously, she’d probably have heard Liam sooner and realized that he was very much alive. As it was, when she first approached the cottage, all she noticed was the wheelchair, complete with basket of muffins, still on the porch, evidence enough, if proof was what she needed, that her fears were not without merit.
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