Willowleaf Lane. RaeAnne Thayne

Чтение книги онлайн.

      It must have been the please that finally did the trick. He carried her up the steps then lowered her gingerly to her feet. She braced one hand on the wall and with the other pulled the key out of its zippered pocket of her capris.

      “Thank you,” she said shortly. She should say something more but for the life of her she couldn’t come up with anything that didn’t sound ridiculous.

      “You’re welcome. Consider it my neighborly duty. Are you sure you don’t need me to help you inside, maybe tape it up for you?”

      Oh, she could just imagine him kneeling at her feet, his big hands warm on her bare skin as he wrapped it. “I should be fine.”

      He looked big, muscular. Gorgeous.

      “Give me a call if you need a ride to the doctor. I guess you know where I live.”

      “I’ll do that,” she lied as if she didn’t have a dozen friends and family members she could call, people she would be far more likely to turn to in times of trouble than Smoke Gregory.

      He stood and watched as she fumbled through unlocking the door. Already, the acute pain of her ankle injury had begun to fade to a dull, insistent throb. She figured that was a good thing but it still made it a challenge to enter her house with any degree of dignity.

      When she made it through the doorway, she turned around and gave him a little one-finger wave then closed the door firmly.

      When she knew she was out of sight, she sank onto the conveniently placed bench in her entry and pressed a hand to her foolish heart.

      Of all the rental properties in Hope’s Crossing, why on earth did he have to pick the one just a few hundred feet from hers? She would be aware of him all the time now. Every time she drove down the street and passed his house, she would wonder if he was home, what he was doing, how he smelled....

      If she wasn’t careful, she was afraid she would turn into that fifteen-year-old again, a crazy stalker girl with a crush on the sexiest boy in town.

      No problem. She would just have to make sure she was very, very careful.