Riding the storm - By Julie Miller Page 0,60

defensive posture melted in a heart-deep sigh. “I just hope he’s okay. I hope everyone in Turning Point is okay.”

Reading her concern, feeling her pain like a wound inside himself, Nate reached out and caught that wayward tendril of golden hair that fell across her downturned face. He rolled the silky strand between his sensitized fingertips before brushing it across her soft cheek and tucking it behind her ear. With a nudge of his palm against her jaw, he tilted her face up to his. “He’s probably more worried about you than anything. But I’m sure he’s fine. You had to get those lucky, hard-headed survival genes from someone. From the sound of things, I gather your mom isn’t the hang-tough-when-the-chips-are-down type.”

“Yeah, my dad’s the tough one. On the outside, at least.” She offered him a game smile that was equal parts gratitude and reassurance. “But I had you to help me. Whether or not I thought I needed you, you turned out to be pretty handy to have around.”

Nate shrugged and let his hand slide down to cup the side of her neck. “Well, what’s left of me, anyway.”

Jolene’s smile flatlined. “Don’t do that.”

Snatching his hand away, Nate wondered how he’d overstepped the boundaries of familiarity when they’d held each other for warmth and comfort all through the night. “Sorry.”

“Don’t put yourself down. Don’t pretend that there’s something broken or inferior about you. You’re not disabled.”

“Jolene—”

“I’ve seen you in action, cowboy.” She pricked up like a scrawny hen defending her nest, skin flushed, blue eyes blazing. She poked him harmlessly in a bruise-free spot at the center of the chest, and he wisely retreated a step. “And while I’m sorry that your leg’s busted and your shoulder’s torn up and you’ve got a lot to deal with on the inside, that’s not what I see when I look at you.”

Nate propped his hands on his hips. He’d gotten lectures like this from his sister. But then, Jackie was his sister. She was supposed to jump his case from time to time to get him off his pity pot.

“Okay, Miss Smarty-Pants. Tell me what you think you see. And then I’ll get you straight to the ophthalmologist.”

Jolene counted the points off on her fingers. “Your eyes. Gorgeous color and they say a lot. Right now I’m ignoring their message, but it’s coming through loud and clear.”

He narrowed said eyes into a skeptical frown as she hit finger number two.

“Broad shoulders. They have to be with all the responsibility you insist on carrying on them.”

Third finger. He wasn’t convinced. “Hands. They…well, they…” Her cheeks seared a rosy pink. She inhaled a deep, steadying breath that shamelessly drew his gaze to the rise of her breasts. She swallowed hard. He took note of that movement, too. “I seem to recall mentioning magic of some kind.”

Jolene had made the magic, Nate realized. She was the magic. He’d just responded to it. Helplessly. Hungrily.

In a flash of vivid memory, Nate pictured all the things his hands had done to her on the couch, all the things he still wanted to do. And later that night, the way he’d simply gotten to massage her neck, to hold her through the trailing edge of the storm. He’d found a comfort, a sense of peace that was every bit as humbling as her body’s feverish reactions to the stroke of his hands and mouth.

Things were getting stiff behind the zipper of his jeans again. And despite every common sense rule he tried to apply to his life, his palms itched with the desire to touch her again. To reclaim the feeling of home and heaven that he’d found with Jolene in his arms.

Nate wavered. Jackie’s talks never went like this.

Jolene held up the fourth finger. “Your backside.”

“My backside?”

“That’s right. Your tush.” Now she was making light of things again, talking up a streak to press her point. “I took an informal survey among eligible females here on the ranch, and we decided we like the view going as much as we like the one heading toward us.”

“We decided?”

“Take the compliment, California. And don’t put yourself down in front of me again. Now get out of here. I have work to do.”

Nate wanted to believe she saw him as this studly guy who could deliver. But it was just the situation talking. The whole Adam and Eve thing. Being the only man and woman for miles probably made him look pretty good for a change. They’d been forced