Karen Smith - The Texan's Happily-Ever-After

Shep smiled the first smile that had come naturally since he’d entered the emergency room. “You knew I was going to ask.”

“You’re the type who would.”

“Type?”

“You care, Mr. McGraw. You ask questions and you want answers. That’s a good type to be when you’re a parent.” There was admiration in her voice.

“You’re going to have to practice using my given name.”

Another blush stained her cheeks. “Maybe I will. I’ll walk you out.”

As they strode side-by-side to the reception area once more, Manuel stilled on Shep’s shoulder. He could tell the little boy was almost falling asleep. His crying had exhausted him.

Raina must have seen that, because as they stopped at the entrance to the hallway leading to the pharmacy, she peered around Shep’s shoulder at Manuel’s face, and then gently patted him on the back. “I imagine he’ll get more sleep tonight than you will.”

“You probably imagine right.”

Standing there like that, staring down into her eyes, Shep felt totally unsettled. His gut tightened, his collar felt tight and he was overcome by a desire to kiss her.

He was absolutely crazy.

A woman like Raina Greystone Gibson wouldn’t give a man like him a second look. Her husband had been a hero.

And Shep?

He was no hero…and because of his past, he never would be.

The following Wednesday, Raina hurried to the day-surgery waiting room. Manuel had been her last surgery of the day, and she was eager to bring his father good news. However, when she reached the doorway to the waiting room she stopped cold as her gaze went immediately to an obviously nervous Shep McGraw.

To her dismay, she felt flustered, knowing she was going to have to talk to him again. That was ridiculous! She didn’t fluster easily. But something about this tall, lean cowboy got to her, and she couldn’t figure out why. Since Clark had died, no man had made her feel much of anything. But then, the way Clark had died probably had something to do with that.

Closing her mind to memories she didn’t revisit often, she watched Shep McGraw for a few seconds. He sat alone, away from the others in the waiting room, staring at the cable-channel news on the TV. But she could tell he wasn’t really absorbing what he was watching. He’d checked his watch twice since she’d stood in the doorway.

Why did he get to her? Because he was such a concerned dad? Shep had had such a difficult time stepping away from Manuel to let the baby be taken to surgery. Still, she’d seen concerned fathers before. Maybe he got to her because he was a single dad doing the best he could with the boys he was adopting?

That had to be it. After all, she knew Manuel’s story because Shep had given her the baby’s history the first time she’d treated him. Manuel had gone into foster care malnourished and sickly when he was almost seventeen months old. A month after that, Shep had received a call from a contact working in the system who’d told him about the boy, asked if he was interested in adopting a third child. Shep had gone to see Manuel and made the decision on the spot. Thank goodness the toddler’s mother had finally cared enough to sign away her parental rights. Manuel’s father was nowhere to be found.

Raina suspected some particular motivation drove Shep to save children from the system. She was becoming more and more curious as to what that motivation could be. Not for the first time, Raina reminded herself her interest couldn’t have anything to do with Shep’s six-foot height, dark brown hair, the very blue eyes that reminded her of a Texas sky on a clear summer day. He could probably crook his finger at a multitude of women and they’d come running. But he wasn’t crooking his finger, and she wondered why.

She’d heard he was well off. He’d bought a huge ranch on the outskirts of Sagebrush, invested in a barnful of horses, remodeled the house and refurbished the barn. He’d also purchased a business—a lumberyard. He might look like a cowboy on the outside, but inside she got the feeling he was a shrewd businessman. He’d supposedly made a bundle selling commercial real estate in California before moving to Sagebrush. Yet he didn’t flaunt his wealth. In fact, the locals said he spent a good bit of time at the lumberyard as well as working his ranch.

He glanced at the doorway. Spotting her, he was on his feet in an instant.

She stepped a few paces to the side of the doorway for a little privacy, faced him and smiled. “Manuel came through the procedure with flying colors. He’s in recovery. If you’d like to come sit by his bed while he wakes up, that’s fine. After he’s aware that you’re there, we’ll wait another half hour or so until the anesthesia wears off. Then you can take him home.”

“Just a half hour? Are you sure he’ll be okay? And you said something about instruction sheets and eardrops.”

Impulsively, she reached out and clasped his arm. “Shep, he’ll be fine. We won’t let you leave without the instruction sheets.”

As her fingers made contact with his tanned skin, sensations registered from her fingertips to her brain—his heat, the strength of the muscle in his forearm, the tingling in her belly that seemed to come from nowhere. His eyes met hers, and for a moment they were both aware of the contact. She quickly released his arm.

He was wearing a Stetson, and he took it off now and ran his hand through his hair, ruffling it. “Will you take me to him?”

“Sure.”

They walked side by side down the hall. Shep was six inches taller than she was—a couple of inches taller than Clark. But where Clark had been husky, Shep was lean. Clark had worked out with weights to keep his body in prime condition for his job. But she had the feeling Shep McGraw’s muscles came from his work on the ranch and at his lumberyard.

She shook her head to clear it from such insane thoughts. “Will your housekeeper be available this evening?”

Shep arched a brow at Raina.

“I just wondered if she’ll be helping to care for Manuel tonight.”

“More than likely she’ll keep Roy and Joey busy so that I can take care of Manuel. Eva often jokes that I moved from laid-back California to Wild West Texas never expecting life to be as unpredictable as it has been. But I don’t regret one day of it and I don’t think she does, either. I’ll show her anything you show me, in case she needs to know.”

“Is she…older?” Raina asked, telling herself she needed the information for purely professional reasons.

“Don’t let her hear you say she’s older,” he joked, with a wry smile. It was a crooked smile that made Raina’s pulse beat just a little faster. “She’s in her fifties,” he went on, “but won’t say exactly where in her fifties.”

Raina chuckled. “She sounds like a woman after my own heart. We should never have to divulge our age.”

“Let me guess,” Shep said. “You’re thirty-seven.”

“How did you—?”

“Gotcha,” he teased. “I have a friend who’s a doc in Santa Fe. I know how long med school took him. And you started practicing here after your residency, right?”

“A year and a half ago,” she confirmed with a nod.

“That’s about when Joey and Roy came to live with me.”

“And Manuel joined you six months ago.”

“That’s right. It’s been a roller-coaster ride.”

She laughed. “You’re a brave man, Shep McGraw, taking in three boys and having the confidence to raise them.”

“Confidence or insanity,” he muttered.

She laughed again.

They reached a door with big black letters—Authorized Admittance Only. Raina opened the door and let Shep inside. He spotted Manuel right away and made a beeline for him, Raina hurrying to catch up. She glanced at the monitors, then asked the nurse at Manuel’s side, “How’s he doing?”