Chapter One
There was something to be said for the comfort of plush leather seats in a superior made luxury car. Too bad Dale Johnson couldn’t say the same for the two wheels underneath him. At first, driving out of town, the roar of the engine beneath him and the wind in his face felt insanely good. The sense of freedom had been missing too damn long from his life. The long-forgotten sensations almost made up for the mess he’d gotten himself into. Almost.
Now that he’d been on these never-ending Texas back roads for more hours than he cared to count, he wished he’d bought himself a secondhand car instead of this two-wheeled kickstand that unlike a car, would not require frequent refueling, gas station cameras be damned.
Of course, maybe after a good night sleep on a real mattress, caution will win out again. Then again, he was going to need a lot more than a single night’s sleep to put his life back in order—and his back. According to his calculations and the last road sign he’d seen, he should be arriving in Tuckers Bluff in about another hour or so. What he needed now was to just get off this machine for at least a few minutes and stretch, walk off the numbness taking over the few body parts that didn’t hurt like an SOB. It hadn’t taken long after leaving Dallas to realize he would not be getting away with riding for a few hours straight without stopping. At this point, with every added mile, his back strenuously voted for more rest stops. Too bad he couldn’t plug the heating pad into the engine. Slowing to the side of the road, he came to a stop and gingerly eased his way off the bike. A whole hell of a lot slower than he would have liked, but at least he was moving. Sure beat the alternative.
A swig of cool water went an even longer way to easing the burn in his throat, if not the ache in his back. Careful not to twist, he did his best to stretch the sore muscles and decided walking a few minutes more could only help. Propping one foot up on the nearby fence, he gazed at the horizon laid out before him. It had been one hell of a long time since he’d seen so much of nothing in one place. Focusing on the clear sky as blue as a child’s crayon, he forced himself to think of childhood drawings, the bright blue dress his date wore on prom night—the one he’d worked so hard to talk her out of—and the twinkle in his grandmother’s slate blue eyes while she sang an Irish limerick. Anything not to think of the similarities to the dry, flat and hotter than Hades sandbox.
Some days the Marine Corps seemed so far away, so long ago. Other days, the years spent someplace nobody wanted him to be, certainly not the natives, seemed too close for comfort. Now back in the civilized world—and on occasion he questioned exactly what about modern day urban life constituted civility—hanging onto hope for a better world seemed an awfully damn hard thing to do.
Screwing the cap back on the water, he gave himself a mental kick. Wallowing in his own dang thoughts wasn’t going to make things any better either. Things were what they were. Tucking the bottle back in his backpack, he took one lingering look at the vastness before him. Time to get moving. Swinging his leg over the seat with a little more agility than when he’d climbed off the new motorcycle, he knocked up the kickstand and started the engine.
Spitting bits of roadside dirt and gravel, the tires gripped the asphalt road. Ready to push every single horsepower to its limits, he leaned forward and that sixth sense that more than once had saved his life pushed him to glance quickly across the road. His heart and his motorcycle skidded to a sudden stop.
The last thing he’d expected to see in the middle of Damn Nowhere West Texas was a horse up on its hind legs, front feet kicking, and a petite beauty sliding off its back—crashing hard on the unforgiving dirt. Flashes of heavy hooves with a thousand pounds of momentum coming down on her was all it took for him to spin around and race across the road. Both in the sandbox and the civilized world, he’d had enough of needless death to last him a lifetime. Enough was enough.
* * * *
“Whoa.” Hannah gripped the reins, pulling tightly on the horse. “Whoa girl,” she repeated, but there was no calming the animal down. She knew from the second Starburst's ears twitched that she might be in trouble. The sound of the rider back on his bike, kicking the engine into gear and roaring to life from across the road had put the mare on high—and nervous--alert. It was Hannah’s own fault really. At first when she’d seen the driver stopped in the distance, she taken too long to debate whether to hightail it out of there or go find out if the stranger needed help. Sometimes cell phones didn’t cooperate out here.
In this neck of the woods stranded riders on motorcycles was not the most common thing in the world. On the other hand, strangers passing through did happen, so anything was possible. After all, West Texas wasn’t exactly outer space.
But before she’d had a chance to process moving forward with this new horse, the stranger had seen fit to rev the engine, scaring the living hell out of her mount. If that wasn’t enough he’d done it twice more before taking off like the hounds of hell were on his heels. The overused cliché from one too many romance books fit the situation all too well.
Next thing she knew, Hannah found herself on a very agitated horse. Leaning over the saddle horn, preparing to sweet talk the nervous equine, she’d been caught totally off guard as the mare’s hind legs went up high and landed hard. Hannah might as well of been on a busting bronc at the rodeo. There was no time to shift her weight or soothe the horse. With a quick jerk, the animal’s forelegs came up off the ground one more time. This time, Hannah’s grip broke free of the reins, and staring up at the clear blue sky, she went flying through the air. It all happened so fast, she’d had no time to exhale or mentally prepare. The animal had thrown her as easily as a tempestuous child could throw a rag doll. Only rag dolls didn’t break.
“Miss,” a muddled voice seemed to whisper in her ear. “Don’t move.”
Move? At this point her eyelids seemed too heavy to lift, never mind an arm or leg. Sucking in a slow almost gasping breath, Hannah managed to open one eye and then the other. Sunlight made her want to clamp the lids closed once again, but instead, squinting, she turned her head toward the voice.
“Please try not to move. Does anything hurt?”
“You mean besides breathing?”
Worried eyes twinkled down at her with a hint of amusement. “Yes. Besides breathing.”
She moved her fingers and wiggled her toes. Shifting her arms, she pushed up on her elbows.
“Whoa. I don’t think it’s a good idea to move just yet.”
Well how the heck was she supposed to know if anything hurt if she didn’t move? “I’m pretty sure I just got the wind knocked out of me.” And rubbing her hand to a tender spot behind her ear, she suspected she was going to have one hell of a knot.
“You hit your head, didn’t you?” That serious look of concern took over the stranger’s face again.
“Amongst other things.”
“I’ll give you extra points for a sense of humor. But if you don’t mind, I’d like to check for broken bones.”
She wasn’t sure if he expected her to agree or argue, but the minor attempt at bobbing her head sent a shooting pain up her neck to the burgeoning knot. “Mm hmm,” she muttered instead.
Strong hands carefully swiped from her shoulders down each arm, and then from hip to ankle. The way he held her foot and tenderly turned it left then right, she had the distinct feeling this was not the first time he’d been in a situation like this. Not that he had made a habit of knocking women off their horses, but she guessed he had some experience in first aid. As a matter fact, the way gentle fingers maneuvered across the bone much like a concert pianist making love to the ivory keys, she wouldn’t be surprised to learn he was actually a doctor.
“Nothing seems broken, but the EMTs will probably want to get you on a backboard before taking you to the hospital.”
EMTs? Did this guy have a clue where they were? Despite his concerns, Hannah pushed herself upright.
“I really wish you wouldn’t do that.” The stranger put his phone to his ear.
“If it’s 911 you’re calling, at this time of day you’re going to get Esther at the station, she’s going to call my cousin Brooks, and he’s going to ask me how do I feel. I’ll tell him fine, just had the wind knocked out of me, and he’ll come over for dinner just to make sure. Or, we could do this the easy way.”
Phone still at his ear, his brows dipped. “How’s that?”
“You let me get up. Let me get on the horse. Then wait for me to ride away before turning that horse-spooking Honda back on.”
“It’s a Harley. I’m sorry about the horse, but I’d still like you to stay put until a professional sees you.”
Now that she was sitting upright and breathing easier, she actually took a moment to look at the leather-clad stranger. Not exactly a suit of armor, though he certainly had a streak of male chivalry suitable for a knight rescuing a damsel in distress. That was, if she were in distress. “I’m fine. If it makes you feel any better I promise to call my cousin myself and let him know what happened as soon as I get home.”
The stranger pulled the phone away from his ear and stared down at it. “Doesn’t look like I’m going to reach anyone this way.” He dropped it into a breast pocket and looked around as though wishing a car to amble by.
“You are stubborn, aren’t you?”
A shock of surprise flashed across his face. “Let’s just say this isn’t sitting well with me.”
None of this was sitting all that well with her either. “Okay.” She shoved her hands down on the ground and pushed upright. “Enough is enough.” No sooner had she straightened than the ground shifted beneath her.
“Whoa.” Stretching forward, strong hands gently grabbed her arms. “See? And unfortunately, putting you on the back of the bike isn’t going to be any better than you riding that horse off into the sunset. How far are we from town?”
“You mean the way the crow flies?”
“That far?” He ran one hand roughly across the back of his neck.
She dared a nod, relieved the knot at the back of her head hadn’t objected, and the ground beneath her saw fit to remain stable. “Yes, and you can let go of me now. The world has stopped spinning.”
By now Starburst had made her way over and was gently sniffing at Hannah’s shoulder. “Sorry, girl. Didn’t mean to scare you.”
“Scare her?” The stranger’s eyes rounded.
Hannah scratched under Starburst’s jaw and took in the animal’s unexpectedly calm demeanor. “Maybe you’ll work out after all,” she cooed, “as long as we keep you away from two wheelers.” She lifted her gaze to meet both the cause of her current dilemma as well as her rescuer. “I promise I will be fine but I do need to head back or people are going to start to wonder if I decided to ride all the way back to Dallas.”
“If you insist on riding home at least let me follow you.” The way he looked from her to the saddle and back with such concern in his eyes, she couldn’t very well say no.
“Fine.” Moving in front of the saddle she lifted one foot into the stirrup, grabbed hold of the saddle horn, and just as she started to pull up stars danced in front of the horizon. Prepared to land once again flat on her back, instead she found herself cradled in the stranger’s arms.
“We really have to stop meeting this way.” The man words may have been meant to disarm the situation with humor, but his dark eyes were heavy with concern. “I’m still not so sure about this idea of yours.”
To tell the truth she was starting to have some doubts herself, but there weren’t a whole lot of choices because she sure as hell wasn’t going to get on the backend of that motorcycle, nor was she willing to leave Starburst standing in the field by herself. The only choice she had was to pull up her big girl panties and get herself home, but first she’d have to extricate herself from this man’s arms and prove she could stand on her own two feet. “You can put me down now.”
Of all the possible thoughts crossing his mind, cooperation didn’t appear to be one of them. For just a moment or two she thought he might actually refuse and simply carry her all the way home. Another long pause hung between them before he slid one hand out from under her, letting her feet touch the ground, then cautiously eased the other hand away as well. Taking in a deep breath, she stuck her foot in the stirrup to climb up again, only this time his hands were at her side just in case.
Swinging her leg over, she straightened in the seat and blew out a grateful breath, relieved to be perfectly balanced. “Better give me a head start. I don’t need Starburst spooking again. When I’m almost out of your sight it’ll probably be safe for you to start that contraption up. Agreed?”
Again, another second of hesitation passed but he had to be as aware as she was that they had little other choice. “Agreed.”
Grabbing hold of the reins she tugged left, turning Starburst in the direction of the ranch. The unexpected and almost absurd encounter had her glancing around looking for any sign of a mysterious dog. Nothing in sight. Too bad. Would’ve made one hell of a story to tell her grandchildren.
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