Texas Strong (9 page)

She saw resolve harden on his features. Clearly he would do his best, regardless of the cost to him. But she couldn’t help remembering how lonely he’d seemed, and how her coworkers had warned her off him. “Kids, Tank has a lot of responsibilities. Let’s not bother him with this right now.”

His head whipped to hers. “I want to do it. I’ll figure something out.” Determination rode his features, and she understood that his pride was at stake. That she had to let him try.

“You’ve done so much for us already.”

“I don’t make promises I don’t intend to keep.”

She backed off. “Then thank you. Please sit down, and let’s eat before it gets cold.” She turned toward the stove and dished out the noodles and the sauce. As she moved to the table, he rose and took the dish from her. After he set it down, he rounded the table and held her chair.

She smiled up at him uncertainly. He was such a contradiction. “Thank you.” She glanced at her son. “Take notes, Thad. This is how a gentleman acts.”

Her son’s eyes went wide, but he simply nodded.

Tank took his seat, and the meal began. She sat in the middle of it and marveled.

This must be what normal felt like.

Jake yanked off his surgical mask, yawned really big and doubled over against the wall, stretching his aching back. Hours of surgery were hell on the skeleton; maybe he should check into that yoga class Laura had urged him to take.

He stepped away and arched, then lifted his arms high over his head.

He could sleep for a week. Twelve hours in the sack sounded like heaven. Wrapped around Laura, snuggled in their bed together—

Laura
. What time was it? He pulled his cell from his pocket and strode from the surgical wing to remove himself from all the telemetry. Down the hall that divided operating rooms from ICU, through the double doors that barred entry except during brief visiting hours, past the ICU waiting room—

A figure all but mowed him down. A tearstained face greeted him. “Dr. Cameron? Are you Dr. Cameron?”

He barely had a chance to nod before the woman threw herself into his arms.

“Thank you—oh, thank you so much. My granddaughter—you saved her. My son said—” She burst into noisy sobs.

The parade through the intersecting hallway that was the main artery of the hospital continued, an orderly grinning at Jake’s discomposure, a nurse smiling, an EMT shaking his head as Jake awkwardly patted the woman’s shoulder. “It’s okay,” he murmured. “It was—”
Nothing
, he’d started to say.

But that was wrong. The surgery wasn’t as complex as many he’d done, but they had in fact saved the little girl’s life. Not just him, the whole team. Once more, pride swelled in him. What he was doing made a difference. This—moments like this, here in the beating heart of a trauma center, where events were so often balanced on a tenuous edge, hope off one side, agonizing loss off the other—

There was nothing like being sure that what you did mattered. That you could, with luck and skill, restore a person to those they loved. Battle death and win.

His hollow stomach, his tired feet, the exhaustion he’d felt for hours…all of them vanished in this one shining moment, and Jake closed his phone, stuck it in the case attached to his waistband—

And settled in to let the older woman cry it out.

Feeling like a million bucks.

Chapter Five

T
ank didn’t get there until mid-morning. He’d already been up since before dawn, with too much to do that day and not enough hours. He’d doctored a calf and herded some of Ian’s cattle back onto his land. Then he’d fixed the broken section of fence between his spread and Ian’s.

In the past, he might have ripped into Ian for letting his cows through, but Ian had his hands full already. Tank didn’t have enough head of cattle to need to pasture this far over, while Ian had a thriving herd that required a lot of range.

But Tank hadn’t been unmoved by how close Ian had come to losing Scarlett and their baby. Even he could admit what a fine man Ian was. When the close-knit tribe that was the Four Horsemen had closed its ranks against him years before, Ian, though the leader of the crew, had never been the one who’d encouraged their ostracism.

Tank had been an asshole; he knew that now. He’d generated a lot of ill will as a boy and for years later. But at the time, he’d been a kid living in a nightmare, trying desperately to save his sister and mother from the man who tortured all of them. And he’d failed. Sometimes the sense of failure had been so overwhelming that Tank struck out, and the Four Horsemen provided an easy target, so smug in their limelight, so sure of themselves and their place in the universe that was Sweetgrass Springs.

They were heroes, and he was the villain. That simple. Everybody knew it, and Tank had accepted the verdict. For all the years after, he’d harbored his resentment, his anger at his inability to change the hellhole that was his childhood. And everyone left him to it.

Only his sister reached out to him, and that only recently.

He didn’t want pity.

But the chance at belonging, he discovered, could still tempt him into the light. Last night had shown him that in spades. The treacherous warmth of Chrissy’s dinner table, the powerful sense of connection between her and her children…what he wouldn’t have given for a mother like that, one who was strong and fierce and ready to battle the world for her children. She might be small, but she was mighty in her own way.

She made him want things he knew he could never have.

Get on with it
, he lectured the traitorous longing inside him.
Get this done, then leave them be
.

Would you like to ride, too, Miss Becky?
He nearly groaned when he remembered the promise he’d made to two little kids who didn’t ask for much. He’d have to see if Ian or Mackey had a gentle mare he could borrow. The thought grated at him. If only Veronica and Jackson owned horses, but they hadn’t gotten around to that. Jackson was too busy with his company and Veronica with her flower farm. If one of the kids asked for a horse, he knew one would be produced immediately, but neither of the twins had.

I don’t have any friends
. Becky’s sad smile.

He could do something about that, too—if he dared. His sister would help any child, no matter who was asking.

But damn it, he didn’t want to be asking. He was better off alone, the way he had been for years.

“Could I get you some coffee or water or something?”

He jolted at Chrissy’s voice. “You’re supposed to be at work.”

She shook her head. “I have the day off, thanks to Brenda. She took my shift.”

He didn’t like this, not one bit. How the hell was he supposed to focus on the work when she stood beside him, smelling like sunshine and sin?

“So what is a pulley?” she asked.

He grabbed the escape. “There are several, but it’s this one on the tensioner. I’ll take it off, so I can see if the problem is a bearing, as I suspect.”

“Can I help?”

He was already shaking his head when he considered again. “Maybe. My hands are big, and reaching down there is a challenge. But I don’t want your hands to get hurt.”

“What’s the worst that would happen? Scraped knuckles?”

“Probably, but still…”

“Tank.” And she touched him again, one slender hand on his bicep. He sucked in a breath at the unexpected contact.

She jerked her hand away. “Sorry.” Her smile was rueful. “I’m a toucher. I can’t seem to help it.”

Touch me again. Anywhere
. The unexpected yearning just about laid him flat again. He forced his gaze back to the engine. “It’s okay.”
Crap. What an idiot
. It was so much more than okay, and yet it was far too disturbing. He lived his life keeping iron control over impulse, never allowing himself to break free.

God, she made him want to be free. Wanted to see what freedom felt like.

But he couldn’t risk it. Especially not with her, all sunny smiles and sweetness.

He bent to the task of fitting the ratchet to the bolt holding the pulley in place. He barked his knuckles and exhaled, then worked at it again.

“Would you let me try?” she asked.

He hesitated. She had pretty hands, and he didn’t want them hurt. “Do you have any gloves?”

She frowned. “Not work gloves—Wait. Could I use dishwashing gloves?”

“You really don’t have to—”

She was already halfway to the house. “Be right back!”

He sighed. He needed her to stay in there, to stay far away. Being in such close quarters with something he couldn’t have was torture.

But she returned, beaming, bright pink gloves on her hands. “I’m so excited. I need to know more about my car. It’s ridiculous to be this ignorant when I’m responsible for two children. If you have time, would you show me more?”

He’d like to show her the world. But he couldn’t, so he focused on the work at hand. “It’s probably too tight for you to loosen, but if you can get the barrel of the ratchet around the head of the bolt, I can do the rest.” When he saw her frown, he continued, lifting the ratchet for her to examine. “See the opening? The head of the bolt is in the middle of this pulley, and it’s shaped exactly like this hole. You just need to fit it over the head of the bolt, and I’ll provide the muscles.”

With a very serious look on her delicate features, she switched places with him and bent over the engine.

He tried not to notice how sweet her behind was in those jeans, but he wasn’t Superman. Or a monk—though he might as well be.

Tank forced himself to look away and concentrate on what she was doing. She fastened white teeth on her delicious lower lip as she worked with the ratchet. Then she jumped and squealed. “I got it—oh, wait! Oh, drat, that’s what I get for celebrating. Give me a second, okay?” She bent over again, and Tank closed his eyes to keep from cruising them over every inch of her body.

A few seconds later, her grin was as triumphant, but she wasn’t wriggling for joy. “Okay. I have it. What now?”

He should have thought this through. The
what now
was that he had to get very close to her and substitute his hands for hers. He closed his eyes again for a second.
Down, boy
. “Hold on until I get a grip on the handle.” He bent to the task, her sweet-smelling hair brushing his nose and his jaw. His big fingers slid over her small ones, and he wanted to keep them there forever. “Okay, pull your hand away. I’ve got it.”

She pulled her hand away, but she didn’t move, and he could feel her all along his side. Ignoring her was impossible, and he wanted to bark at her to get away before something happened that they would both regret—

Except he wasn’t sure he would regret it. Even if he should.

Then she turned her beaming face toward him. “This is fun!”

Their mouths were so close. Their breaths mingled.

Her eyes widened, but she didn’t move away.

Please, move away. Because I can’t
.

But she didn’t. Instead, she lifted a hand and cupped his jaw. Then brushed a kiss to the corner of his mouth.

Fractions of an inch would align their lips so he could kiss her properly, and he wanted that worse than he’d wanted anything in his life—but he couldn’t let go. He didn’t dare.

Instead he turned his face and focused on the ratchet.

And felt her hurt as he did it.

Trust me, you’ll thank me for this.

Even if he would hate himself.