Page 20 of Overdue for a Cowboy

“Oh no. What’s wrong with it?”

“Um…something engine…blah, blah…leaking…blah…needs repair. I couldn’t concentrate after they said the part they needed was on backorder and wouldn’t arrive for two weeks. They’re going to send me an email with all the specifics. They said insurance will cover most of it, but what am I going to do without my car?”

“I can help.”

“I mean, the library is close enough that I can walk to and from work. I’ve done that many times,” she said as if she hadn’t heard him. “But what if I need to buy groceries? And I’m supposed to go over and check on my grandma’s house this week.” Her bottom lip trembled as her eyes welled with tears. “And how am I going to haul the bookmobile? I already missed yesterday. I can’t disappoint all those kids.” She sucked in a breath as she looked over at him with wide eyes. “What if the bookmobile is too damaged to pull? What if it’s beyond repair? I’ll lose the competition and miss my chance at getting the grant for the library. They’re all counting on me. What am I gonna do?”

“Whoa now. It’s gonna be okay,” Dodge said, slipping his arm around her shoulder and pulling her to him in a hug. She’d mentioned the competition before, but he’d hoped to figure out what kind of shape the camper was in before she brought it up again. “Please don’t cry. My heart can’t take it. I said I’d help, and I promise you I will. I can give you a ride to the grocery store or over to your grandma’s house or out to Timbuctoo—wherever you want to go. And we don’t even know how bad the damage is to the camper yet. But I can help you with that too.”

She sniffed. “How?”

“From what I saw, most of the wreckage was on the inside. One of the windows had a tree branch through it, and there were some definite dings and scrapes on the outside, but we’ve got a paint sprayer and pretty much any tool you can imagine out at the ranch. Between me, my brothers, and my grandpa, we can fix just about anything. How long do we have to get it done?”

“A little less than three weeks. It’s a statewide competition, but the judges are scheduled to come to Woodland Hills on the last day of the month.” She peered up at him. “Do you really think we can get it fixed by then?”

He nodded. “Sure I do. I can’t imagine there’s anything you can’t accomplish when you set your mind to it.”

She lifted her sling. “Even with one arm?”

“I’ll be your arms. I’m all yours for the labor end of it. And I’m pretty good with my hands.”

A playful grin curved her lips. “Oh yeah?”

He hadn’t meant it like that. Or had he? Was he flirting with her? It had been so long since he’d actively flirted with a woman, he assumed that he’d forgotten how. But at least she wasn’t crying anymore.

Ignoring the dropped innuendo, he tried to offer her what he hoped was an encouraging smile. “We’ll figure it out. I promise. And the Lassiter men don’t go back on their word.”

The Lassiterwomen, or at least his mother, were a different story. She’d broken all sorts of promises when she’d dropped him, Ford, and Chevy off at her parents’ ranch for the summer, then never came back for them. It was bad enough that she’d saddled them with their ridiculous names, choosing to namethem after the trucks each of their different dead-beat dads had driven away from them in. But then she’d abandoned them too.

Her leaving them with their grandparents was probably the best thing she’d ever done for them—all three boys loved Duke and June Lassiter with everything in them—but it did something to a kid to have both of their parents choose to walk away and leave them behind.

“Thanks Dodge,” Maisie said, cuddling in closer to his chest. “I believe you.”

He hugged her to him, breathing in the scent of her and relishing the feeling of holding her in his arms. It felt good.Shefelt good.Toogood. This was a feeling he could get used to.

Except he couldn’t. Because he’d felt this kind of feeling before, and it had been ripped away. In the space of a few seconds, a semi-truck and a drunk driver had taken everything he’d loved and left him shattered and broken.

Chapter Ten

Being held in Dodge’s arms was everything Maisie had imagined it would be. His arms were strong, his muscular chest solid, and she could easily have spent the whole day nestled against him.

But then he suddenly stiffened and cleared his throat as he pulled himself out of her embrace and pushed to his feet. “How about some lunch? My culinary skills also include grilled cheese sandwiches. And we’ve still got the soup from last night that I can heat up.”

“Yeah, sounds good,” she said, her voice a little unsteady.

What had just happened? One second, he was pulling her close, he might have even been smelling her hair, then the next his arms went rigid, and he was pulling away. Or maybe she had just imagined the intent of his hug.

She’d gotten teary-eyed—dang it, she could cry at the drop of a hat—and he’d probably just felt sorry for her and offered her a friendly hug. Or hadshehugged him? She’d thought he was putting his arm around her, but maybe he was just stretchingout his arm. Had he pulled her to him, or had she just fallen into him?

She smoothed down her shirt and adjusted her sling from where it had shifted during their embrace. “What can I do to help?”

“I got it,” he told her.

She stood and raised an eyebrow at him, offering him the kind of look that meant she was not about to just sit on the sofa and let him wait on her.

His easy grin was back as he held up his hands in surrender. “What I meant to say was, would you like to help me make us some lunch?”

His smile had her stomach doing funny flips that had nothing to do with being hungry. “I’d be happy to. I’ve got a loaf of French bread that will be perfect for grilled cheese sandwiches.”

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