most beautiful woman he’d ever seen and rattling on about his damn clumsiness after he’d just given her a demonstration of it by busting up her arm.
“Look,” she said. “I’m sure this folksy charm works on all the local girls, but I’ve got the disadvantage here of being in pain. Let’s save your life story for after I’m medicated, okay?”
Lukas clamped his mouth shut and managed to help her up into the truck and shut the door without jostling her again. When he went around to the other side and got in, the cab was already full of the scent of her skin. It tied his tongue up all over again. Good thing, too. Otherwise, the big-city princess might have managed to bite it the rest of the way off.
GILLIAN FUMED as the truck turned onto Ludington Avenue. Her arm was killing her and the big lug wasn’t even going to bother saying he was sorry. She looked at him out of the corner of her eye. Make that big adorable lug. That tousled hair the color of pale honey that fell over his fore-head in loose curls. That snub nose and small, sensual mouth. On another man it all might have looked wimpy. But on top of that big body, it just made him look like a small-town Tarzan. No—make that lumberjack. He worked with wood. She knew that much. She could smell it on him and there was sawdust on the plaid shirt he wore tucked into jeans that hugged his massive thighs and made his—
Gillian blinked. What in the name of Vogue magazine was she thinking? Well, she was thinking about what big, hard-looking thighs he had and about what they might feel like if she just reached out and…
This time she blinked and bit her lip at the same time. She deliberately jarred her arm just so she could feel the pain and remember that she had no business whatsoever ogling Paul Bunyan’s thighs.
“Are you all right?” he asked when she gasped in pain.
“No, I am not all right. Thanks to you,” she added testily, reminding herself that he still hadn’t said he was sorry for what he’d done. “I just hope you’ve got your checkbook with you.”
He glanced her way. “My checkbook?”
“This,” she indicated her arm, “is all your fault and you’re paying for the emergency room.”
“Of course I’ll pay. And I’ll give you the money for those overpriced boots, too. But no way am I taking the complete blame this time.”
“Um—reality check. You are completely to blame.”
“You were the one standing out in the middle of the street. They teach you to do that out there in New York City? Cause we don’t teach kids in Timber Bay to stand out in the street much.”
“It’s the middle of the night. Who knew it wouldn’t be safe to cross the street?”
“You weren’t crossing, you were standing.”
“I mean—” she went on as if he hadn’t spoken “—who knew that a giant prowled under the streets of Timber Bay at night and that there was always the danger of him just breaking through the damn concrete whenever he felt like it—no matter who was standing there?”
As far as Lukas was concerned, she was being totally unreasonable. “You were standing on a manhole. I’m a man. You gotta expect these things sometimes.”
“That is totally insane. I was safer in the streets of New York than I am here. First you throw a pile of wood at me—”
“That was an accident!”
“Then your niece ruins a few hundred dollars’ worth of cosmic gray metallic satin—”
“Chloe? Chloe ruined that silver thing you were wearing?”
“Cosmic gray,” she repeated through clenched jaws. “And yes. She ruined it when she decided to serve me mud pies.”
“Hey, Chloe is a sweet kid but she’s not even a year-and-a-half old yet.”
“So what’s your excuse?”
“Listen, princess, I said I was sorry—”
“What did you call me?”
“Princess.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“Ha. Did I strike a nerve, princess?”
“I told you not to call me that. And no, you did not.”
“No, I did not what?”
“You did not say you were sorry. Not even once.”
Hadn’t he? Lukas ran over the past minutes in his mind. He must have said he was sorry. But as he pulled into the hospital parking lot and drove around back to the emergency entrance, he honestly could not remember apologizing.
He parked, got out of the truck, and went around to the passenger side to open the door for Gillian. He helped her out as carefully as possible. He could see it cost her some to let him. He had the feeling that at this point she’d rather kick him in the shins with her silver slipper than take his arm.
As soon as the electronic doors swooshed open and let them inside the hospital, Gillian was swept away. He paced while he waited for her to fill out forms and answer questions. He thought he’d get to talk to her when she was sent to the waiting area, but she’d no sooner sat down than a nurse came out and got her. Slow night, apparently, in the E.R. Lukas had never wished for other people to have bad fortune in order that he might get something he wanted, but he sure could have used a little laceration, or a broken toe maybe, so he’d have enough time to apologize to Gillian. Because she’d been right about that, at least. He hadn’t apologized.
What was the matter with him? Lukas never, ever argued with women. Oh, he and his sister Molly tussled like all brothers and sisters, but as far as other women went, Lukas was pretty easygoing. So what had gotten into him tonight? Gillian could have a broken arm and it was all because of him. He remembered how her face had grimaced in pain, and felt ashamed for arguing with her when she was hurt. His mom would skin him alive if she knew.
As he always did when he was bothered by something, Lukas pulled out the piece of wood he kept in one pocket and the knife he kept in the other and sat down in the waiting room to whittle. He knew from the night Chloe was born that the hospital staff wasn’t crazy about having shavings all over the waiting-room floor so he mostly just worked on smoothing out the lines of the chess piece he was carving. When he heard the click of high heels on tile, he looked up to see Gillian coming down the short corridor between the treatment cubicles and the waiting room. Her left arm was in a sling. Oh, man. His heart swelled when he saw it. It must be serious. And it was his fault. And he hadn’t even said he was sorry.
He got up and started toward her. “I—” he began.
“You,” she said, sticking out her good arm, palm up like a traffic cop, “don’t come one step closer.”
She sailed past him and was nearly to the exit doors before he got his wits about him.
“Wait! What did the doctor say?”
She turned around. “It’s sprained, McCoy, that’s what he says. My arm is sprained. I have to keep it in this—this sling. And he says it’ll be a couple of weeks before I can fully use it again. A couple of weeks, McCoy. I don’t have a couple of weeks. I’ve got a boutique to get ready to open. Now how do you suppose I’m going to be able to do that with only one arm?”
She started for the door again. He couldn’t let her get away without apologizing.
“But—wait! I’ll drive you home. I want to—”
“I called a cab. There is no way I’m getting that close to you—or any other member of your family—ever again,” she called over her shoulder just as the doors slid closed.
Lukas ran to catch up to her, but by the time the doors opened again and he hurried outside, the cab was already pulling away.
“OW!” Gillian exclaimed when she stuck herself in