The Least Likely Groom. Linda Goodnight
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Название: The Least Likely Groom
Автор: Linda Goodnight
Издательство: HarperCollins
Жанр: Зарубежные любовные романы
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Everybody but Becka. Hand on the door she blew out a long, exasperated breath. “I’ll think about it.”
She thought about it all day long, pulling the yellow sticky note out of her pocket a dozen times to stare at the name and phone number. By shift’s end, she’d reaffirmed her decision. She couldn’t take the chance. No matter that the money would go a long way toward a down payment on another car she absolutely, positively would not work for Jett Garrett.
Collecting her purse from the employee lounge, she soft-soled down the anesthetic-scented corridors and out to the parking lot. Her neck and shoulder muscles ached and the beginnings of a headache tapped at the base of her skull. Tension. Pure and simple.
Last night Dylan had somehow managed to open the front door by himself and had gone out into the yard without her knowledge. Finding her son gone when she got out of the bathtub had shaken her to the core. She’d found him playing not ten feet from the busy residential street. Her yard needed a fence, but fences cost money. She’d simply have to be more careful. Maybe a lock higher up on the door would do the trick.
Her baby boy was getting more adventurous by the day and the idea unnerved her. She’d tried her best to squelch this side of him, warning him of impending disaster but he hadn’t slowed down one bit. Her father warned that she’d make him a sissy, but Dad didn’t understand. He’d been a dirt track racer in his younger days before the diabetes damaged his vision, and he thought a man wasn’t a man unless he took chances. Just because a child still sucked his thumb and sometimes wet the bed didn’t make him a sissy. And even if it did, he would be alive.
Still, last night’s episode coupled with today’s tempting but impossible job offer from Jett Garrett had made this a stressful day.
Climbing into the old white Fairlane, Becka cranked the engine. The starter ground predictably, then a series of pop, pop, pops issued from the tailpipe. Acrid-smelling black smoke swirled in through the open window. All perfectly normal for her dying vehicle except for one thing: this time the engine didn’t start. She tried again, went through another series of smoky backfires and then—nothing. After several more attempts, she—and the car’s battery—gave up.
The tapping in the back of her head turned to hammering. Grabbing her purse, she shoved her shoulder against the sticking door, stepped out onto the warm pavement and headed back inside the hospital to call Sid. Maybe the part required to fix the car had miraculously arrived today, though she had no idea how to pay for it.
No. That wasn’t true. She knew how to pay for it. She was just too scared. As she trudged up the sidewalk, the yellow sticky note felt like a brick in her uniform pocket. She was scared of Jett Garrett. Scared of the energy in him, of the things he made her remember, and most of all, scared of the way her made her feel.
But fear or not, she had no choice. She had to take that job.
Chapter Three
Fresh from a one-legged shower, Jett slipped on a pair of boxers and a T-shirt and eased down onto the side of the bed. He was out of breath from the effort, a fact that ticked him off no end. Since when did a little bitty knee injury turn a man into a wuss? Sure, he had a bolt poking out each side of his leg with a cagelike stabilizer bar attached, but that shouldn’t make him so weak and winded. Nobody had warned him he’d come home with enough hardware attached to his leg to build a bucking chute.
He had to get over this thing. And soon. Time was passing. Rodeos were happening without him. The dream was fading like a new pair of Wranglers in hot water.
With more effort than he wanted to admit, he hoisted up and hobbled to the calendar on the wall. The National Finals were in December. This was mid-August. He flipped the pages, counting the weeks. He needed more wins, more rodeos to have enough qualifying points.
At the knock on the door behind him, he called, “Come on in.”
Must be Cookie, the ranch’s chief cook and bottle washer, though the old sailor seldom knocked. He barged in, blasting like a foghorn, usually grousing because Jett had left something in a mess. Jett screwed up his forehead, thinking. Probably the bathroom this time.
“I’ll take care of it later,” he offered.
“Should you be up on that leg?” a soft, feminine voice, nothing at all like Cookie’s foghorn, asked. He felt an undeniable lift in his spirits. Nothing like a little tête-à-tête with the opposite sex to cheer a fella up.
Putting all his weight on the good leg, Jett pivoted around and let his gaze slide slowly over the small, uniform-clad woman decorating the entrance to his bedroom. Sure enough, B. Washburn, RN, the cute redheaded nurse with the sassy attitude had arrived.
He flicked a glance toward the clock radio on the nightstand in appreciation of her punctuality. It was three forty-five and she didn’t get off until three. That’s what she’d told him when they’d talked on the phone the other night. He’d enjoyed that conversation. Had flirted with her shamelessly in an effort to elevate his own lousy mood. She’d flirted a little herself, though she kept wanting to talk about the job. Imagine. Talking work when you could play.
She came on into the room, pretending to pay no heed to his general state of undress, though Jett was certain he detected a flicker of interest, quickly shuttered. He kept in good shape, knew he looked good, and if the ladies appreciated his body, all the better for him. He certainly knew how to appreciate a woman.
His spirits lifted a little more. He was bored stiff, ready for some kind of stimulus to keep him breathing until he could get back on the road. Nothing like a female to provide that—temporarily, of course. If there was one thing Jett Garrett did not believe in, it was permanency. No permanent job. No permanent home. And most certainly, no permanent woman. He shuddered at the thought of being tied down in one spot with one woman too long. This few-week detour was already making him nuts.
“Did you have any trouble finding the place?”
“You gave excellent directions—for a man.” Offering him a smile to soften the jab, she set a small tote bag on the blue armchair next to the door and started digging through it.
Jett enjoyed the view. Body bent, trim behind pointed toward him, she did interesting things to a pair of ordinary purple scrubs. He’d never really appreciated that color before, but he was beginning to see its virtues.
“Speaking of directions,” she said, “I brought some simplified instructions for using this machine of yours. I should be able to train you in its use and on the rehab exercises in a matter of days.”
Not if he had his way, she wouldn’t. He could be dumb when he needed to be.
“What’s the B stand for?”
Straightening, she gave him a quizzical smile. “Pardon?”
He pointed to her name badge. “B. Washburn, RN.”
On the phone she’d referred to herself as “Nurse Washburn from the hospital,” saying the words in a prissified voice that announced her intentions of maintaining a professional distance. But that wasn’t going to happen. Professional was fine. Distance? Uh-uh.
She touched СКАЧАТЬ