Paula Graves - Blue Ridge Ricochet

What had happened that night three weeks ago when he’d headed south out of Washington, DC, and disappeared without a trace until now?

Did he have a hidden bad-boy side nobody had ever seen?

She had to find out before he was strong enough to give her real trouble.

* * *

DALLAS EASED HIS eyes open when he heard Nicki’s soft footfalls retreat down the hall. Damn. That had been close.

He’d barely made it back to the bedroom before he heard her key in the front door lock, a tiny clink of metal on metal that he probably wouldn’t have noticed if he hadn’t been listening for it. If he’d still been asleep, he wouldn’t have heard it at all.

But the sound of her leaving had roused him from a deep sleep, leaving his nerves jangling and his mind reeling. He’d dragged himself from bed in time to see her disappear into the woods on the right side of the house, bundled up against the cold.

He’d waited by the window until his legs had given out, then sat in the chair near the fire for almost an hour, going by the clock on the mantel that ticked away the minutes with sharp little clicks of the second hand.

Where the hell had she gone? Did she go to meet someone?

Had she told anyone where to find him?

It didn’t matter, he realized as his vigil ticked over to a new hour. He was too tired and weak to make his escape. He had nowhere to go.

Her footsteps on the porch had jolted him from a light doze a few minutes ago. He’d peeked through the narrow gap in the curtains in time to see her easing her way up the wooden porch steps.

He’d made it back to the bed with only seconds to spare, forcing his respiration to a slow, even tempo even though his heart was racing like a rabbit chased by a fox.

He eased over to his back, wincing a little as the bed creaked. He held his breath, waiting for her to return, but after a few minutes, he realized she must have settled down for the night.

He stared at the dark ceiling over his head, his heart still pounding from the rush of adrenaline that had driven him back to bed.

Where had she gone tonight? Who had she seen? What had she said?

Would he live to regret stumbling into her path tonight?

Chapter Three

Frost painted the cabin windows with delicate fronds of ice, lit by the morning sunlight angling through the glass. Outside, snow blanketed the ground and glistened in the trees, catching every drop of dayglow and refracting it into diamond sparkles.

Nicki pressed her forehead against the icy glass, remembering her six-year-old self doing much the same thing on a snowy morning in the Smoky Mountains, before everything went so awfully, irrevocably wrong.

Footsteps behind her drew her back to jaded reality, and she turned to see Dallas Cole enter the kitchen. He moved with a painful hitch that made her own back ache in sympathy, and the night’s sleep had done little to return color to his cheeks or vigor to his demeanor.

“You look like you could use another week’s sleep,” she murmured, reaching for the empty cup she’d set out for him earlier. “Coffee?”

“Please.” He groped for the back of the nearest chair and settled down at the small table in the window nook.

“Creamer? Sugar?”

“Just black.” He looked at the frosty window. “How much snow did we get?”

“Just a couple of inches.”

His dark eyes narrowed as she set a cup of steaming coffee in front of him and took the chair across from him. “Did you sleep okay on the sofa?”

There was a strange tone to his voice that she couldn’t quite read. “Yeah, it was fine.”

“Thanks for letting me have the bed. Very comfortable.” He took a sip of coffee, grimacing. She’d made it strong.

“Sure you don’t want some creamer?”

“It’s perfect.” His gaze flicked up to meet hers. “Did I miss anything while I was dead to the world?”

There was that odd tone again. “Just the snow.”

“Right.” He looked down at the coffee in his cup.

“Is something wrong?”

He shook his head, not looking at her. “No.”

Now she knew something was wrong. But he clearly didn’t intend to tell her what it was, so she let it go for the moment. “That bump on your jaw went down overnight.”

He lifted his fingers to the abraded spot where his face had grazed the pavement when he fell, wincing at the touch. “Should’ve seen the other guy.”

“What other guy, exactly?”

His gaze flicked up to hers again. “Other guy? You know I got this when I hit the pavement.”

“You didn’t get in that condition by yourself.” She had a pretty good idea how he’d ended up wandering in the woods, but she couldn’t exactly reveal what she knew to Dallas Cole or anyone else.

Her life depended on folks in River’s End believing she was an ordinary fry cook with some medical skills that might come in handy for a group of people who didn’t want the authorities looking too closely at their activities.

“Doesn’t matter now.” He took a long drink of coffee.

“You still don’t want to call the police?”

“No.” He set the coffee cup on the table. “I should probably get out of your hair, though. If you can just point me toward the nearest town.”

“Southeast,” she said, keeping her tone light. “If you were in any condition to walk across the room, much less three miles over the mountain.”

“I’m tougher than I look.”

She couldn’t stop a smile. “Right.”

“You could say that with a little more conviction.” With a sigh, he rose from his seat and turned to look out the frosty window.

Nicki sucked in a gasp at the sight of a streak of blood staining the back of the borrowed jersey. “You’re bleeding.”

He turned his head to look at her. “Where?”

“Your back.” She got up and started to tug up the hem of the jersey.

He turned quickly, putting his hands out to stop her. “It’s nothing.”

“Let me look.”

He closed his hands around her wrists, his grip unexpectedly strong. Tension rose swiftly between them, electrified by Nicki’s sudden, sharp awareness that beneath the facade of weakness, Dallas Cole was a large, imposing male with chiseled features and deep, intense eyes that made her insides liquefy with appalling speed.

Desire flickered in her core, and she tugged her wrists free of his grasp. She took a step back, swallowing the lump that had risen in her throat. “I’m pretty good with a first-aid kit.”

He probed behind his back with one hand, his fingers returning bloodstained. He looked at the red wetness with dismay. “Damn it.”

“I should treat that. Don’t need you bleeding all over everything.”

“No,” he agreed, reaching for the back of the chair as if his legs were ready to give out beneath him. “Can you do it here?”

“Of course. I’ll be right back.”

When she returned with the first-aid kit she kept in the hall closet, she found him shirtless. He’d turned his chair around and sat hunched over the curved back, his arms folded under his head. An alarming Technicolor map of scrapes and bruises crisscrossed his back, including an oozing arch of abraded skin just across his left kidney.

She kept her horror to herself as she unpacked the supplies she needed to treat the wounds. “This is going to hurt.”

“What’s new?” he muttered against his arms.

She pulled up a chair and sat beside him. “I’m going to clean everything first, then put antiseptic in any open areas.”

“Are you going to do a play-by-play of your torture?” he muttered.

“Only if you keep up the surly attitude,” she retorted, pressing a disinfecting cleansing pad to his back.

He sucked in a sharp breath at the sting.