Her Fifth Husband?

Her cell phone—she’d left it in her purse inside. If she could just get up she could use one of the plastic chairs as a walker and hop inside to call 911. Although after yesterday…

Maybe a different dispatcher would be on in the mornings.

Tears streamed down her cheeks, leaking trails of mascara through her blusher, dripping off her chin onto her Tilly MacIntire blouse. She unfastened her other shoe and tossed it aside. What good was one shoe when its mate was ruined? If it weren’t for the fact that nothing flattered a woman’s legs like putting them on a pedestal—and she was just vain enough to want every advantage she could possibly get—she’d burn the treacherous things the minute she got home.

But first she had to get there.

She was on her knees, trying to grab the leg of a chair and drag it closer when she heard someone step out onto the sundeck behind her.

“What the devil have you done to yourself?” a familiar voice boomed.

Startled, she twisted around and stared up at the voyeur—the man who had scared the wits out of her just yesterday.

Oh, please, her inner woman groaned, not like this!

“Help?” she said weakly.

By the time they were in Jake’s SUV on the way to the hospital in Nags Head, Sasha had set aside her misery to make three firm vows. First, no more five-inch heels—at least not when she was working. Second, starting now she would cut her carb count in half. No more Krispy Kremes, no more double lattes.

In other words, no more anything worth eating.

Jake had insisted on carrying her down the stairs. As her only option was bouncing on her butt all the way down, which would’ve left her rear end in the same shape as her right hand, she’d let him sweep her up into his arms. As if pain alone weren’t bad enough, the feel of being cradled against a hard, warm body had rattled her to the point that she hadn’t even argued.

She’d already forgotten the third vow, but it probably concerned steering clear of any man who could melt her resistance with no more than a growl, a glower and the way he smelled. Like soap, toothpaste and coffee, plus something earthy and essentially male.

Not to mention the fact that his touch alone was like poking her finger into a light socket.

She’d still been quivering inside when he’d settled her onto the passenger seat and arranged something to prop her foot on. He’d reached for the seatbelt and she’d brushed his hands away. “I can do it myself.”

“Then do it,” he’d snapped.

What the devil did he have to be angry about, she wondered, feeling sorry for herself and, oddly excited at the same time. She was the one with a broken ankle, not him. She was the one whose right hand was probably going to get infected and swell up and have to be amputated. Plus, she’d probably end up with blood poisoning. For all she knew she might be allergic to antibiotics. So she’d die of anaphylactic shock or whatever grisly symptoms that sort of allergy caused.

He drove fast, easing off each time he approached the stoplights so that he wouldn’t have to slam on the brakes if a light suddenly changed. Grudgingly, she appreciated it. Her ankle throbbed like a bad toothache, and she hated pain, purely hated it. Always had. A stoic, she was not.

“You all right?” he asked as they passed the Wright Brothers Memorial at Kill Devil Hill. At least he’d quit growling. In fact, he sounded almost concerned.

“No, I’m not all right, I hurt,” she snapped. Childish, but then, what did she have to lose that she hadn’t already lost? Her dignity?

Ha.

“We’ll be there in a few more minutes,” he said. “This time of year, you probably won’t have to wait. They’ll give you something for pain and then do X-rays, my guess.” He had propped her foot up on a plastic carton he’d padded with a folded shirt. She was cradling her splintery hand in her other hand on her lap. “What’s wrong, did you hurt your hand, too?” he asked.

Well, shoot. Now he even sounded sympathetic. She couldn’t handle sympathy. It had been in short supply back when she could have used it—back when she’d spent her lunch money on cheap makeup to conceal bruises inflicted by her father’s fists, only to have him accuse her of painting her face like a hussy. Which often as not earned her a few more bruises.

Jake pulled up in front of the beach hospital and said, “Wait while I go get a wheelchair.”

“Don’t be silly, I don’t need a wheelchair.” She had never even been to a hospital before, except as a visitor.

“Okay then, put your arm over my shoulder.” He leaned into the open door and eased his arm under her knees.

If she’d had a single rational thought in her head before, it was gone by the time he carried her inside. The man was definitely high-voltage.

“You’ll have to do the paper work,” he told her, “but I’ll see if I can’t speed up the process.”

Two women behind glass windows stared. Several people in the waiting room glanced up from their outdated People magazines.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, put me down,” Sasha muttered. At this rate she wouldn’t even need a doctor’s help. Being this close to Jake Smith, whoever he was—whatever he was—was distracting enough that she hardly even noticed her throbbing ankle, much less her stinging hand.

Just under two hours later an orderly wheeled her out to the waiting room. Laying aside the newspaper he’d read without retaining a single word, Jake stood to meet her. “All done?” he asked. No cast, just a wrap job, which meant a bad sprain, not a break. “What’s with the hand?” Her right hand was bandaged, all but two fingers and her thumb.

“Splinters. I lost three fingernails, too.”

His eyes widened. “Good God, that’s awful!” he swallowed hard, fighting back nausea.

“I think another one’s loose and I just had them done last week. Now I’ll have to get the whole right hand done over.” Glancing over her shoulder, she thanked the orderly. “I can make it from here just fine,” she assured him with a smile that was undiminished by chewed-off lipstick and smeared mascara.

“It’s the rules, ma’am,” the orderly said, refusing to dump her out of the wheelchair.

Jake shook his head. He crossed to the double glass doors and held it wide. “Come on, don’t be so stubborn.”

Together, the two men eased her from the wheelchair onto the front seat. Jake slipped the orderly a few bucks—didn’t know if it was proper or not, but the kid was about Timmy’s age. Might even have been a classmate.

They drove several miles in silence except for a few heavy sighs coming from the passenger side. The first time they stopped for a red light, Jake tried to get a handle on how bad she was hurting. “We’ll stop by and get your prescription filled, then we’ll cut over to the beach road and put the top up on your car. It should be all right there for a few days until you can drive.”

“Oh, wait a minute—just hold on, I’m not leaving my car unattended.”

“You feel up to driving?” He looked pointedly at her ankle, which was once again propped on the padded carton.

“It’s not a stick shift.”

“Sasha—Ms. Lasiter—look at it from my perspective. If I dump you out in Kitty Hawk, I won’t sleep a wink wondering if you made it home all right. It’d be criminal negligence at the very least if anything happened to you.” They must’ve given her something for pain. From the way she was blinking her eyes, the lady was floating around in la-la land.

“I can call a taxi.”

“That won’t help you move your car. Look, I got you safely to the hospital, didn’t I? Don’t you trust me to get you home?”

Another milepost zipped past. He turned off onto the street that dead-ended at a row of oceanfront cottages that were identical but for color and the placement of a few exterior details. Driftwinds, where she’d left her car, was the next to last one on the cul-de-sac.

“You shouldn’t have to drive me all the way to Muddy Landing.”

She was softening, he could tell. Truth was, he didn’t know why he was going to all this trouble. He should be working on the Jamison case, especially since so far his stakeout had produced zilch.

“You like barbecue?” he asked, climbing back into the SUV after pulling her car into the paved space underneath the cottage, putting the top up and locking it.

Nice wheels. The lady had good taste. He handed her the keys and backed out onto the street.

“Who doesn’t?” She was picking at the bandage on her hand, and he reached over and covered both of hers with one of his.

“Leave it alone,” he said. “Didn’t your mama ever tell you not to pick at stuff like that?”

That warranted a fleeting smile. He had a feeling she was hurting more than she wanted to let on, even after whatever they’d given her at the hospital. Which was kind of surprising, because judging by her looks alone he’d have figured her for a complainer.

Not until some ten minutes later when he came out with two barbecue plates and climbed back under the wheel did it occur to Jake that either they were going to share a late lunch or he was going to eat his share cold somewhere else. “Should I have gotten some drinks to go with it?” he asked as they rolled onto the bridge over Currituck Sound.

“I’ve got iced tea,” she said, which pretty much answered the question.

“Tea’s good.” Jake pushed in a CD and whistled under his breath, keeping time with the music with his thumb tapping against the steering wheel.

With work piling up, his home and his office in a mess and the Jamison case going nowhere, he had no business being where he was, doing what he was doing. He’d never been the impulsive type.

On the other hand, when he started something, he always liked to carry it through. In his business, following procedure was the only way to get the job done.

Oh, yeah? And what have you started this time?

Three

Sasha desperately needed to reach her own front door unaided, if only to assert her independence, but after the first few steps she grudgingly accepted Jake’s help. This had definitely not been one of her better days. Awkwardly, she dug out her keys. He took them from her uninjured hand. “It’s the key with the fingernail polish,” she told him.

Independence could wait another few minutes.

Without releasing her, he managed to unlock the front door. “Want me to carry you over the threshold?”

Her look said it all. Over my dead body. Sprained, splintered and disheveled didn’t count.

Once inside, he steered her toward the three-cushion sofa. “First, let’s get you elevated. Then if you’ll point me to the kitchen, I’ll make you an ice pack.”

“How do you know what I need?”

This time it was his look that said it all. “Trust me, I’ve seen a sprain or two. Underneath that bandage you’re probably already turning purple.”

Sasha wanted to tell him to take his sympathy and his barbecue plate and go back to wherever he came from, because she didn’t need him.

Only she did. This was Faylene’s day to work for Lily, and Marty was just back from her honeymoon, still busy washing sand and salt out of her trousseau.

“The doctor called it a type-II sprain. He said something about torn ligaments, but I wasn’t really listening.” Admittedly, she had a few bad habits, one of them being deflecting bad news by concentrating on something else. In this case, she’d been focused on the possibility of insuring her more expensive shoes. “He mentioned ice. I think there’s a gel pack somewhere in the freezer, but I usually use frozen vegetables.”

“You do this often?”

While she gave him her patented supercilious look—naturally arched eyebrows tinted half a shade darker than her hair helped—he eased her down onto the sofa and gently lifted her legs up onto the cushions, which involved a lot more touching than she needed at the moment. Her skirt twisted around her hips and she tugged at it with her good hand, wishing she’d worn something longer. She had mini and maxi, nothing in between.

“Here, let’s lift your foot up and slide a pillow under your heel.” His voice was like blackstrap molasses—rich and sweet, but with a definite bite.

While she wondered where he came by his expertise, he slipped another pillow under her knee, which involved more touching. Considering she was still in appreciable pain, even after a dose of prescription-strength anti-inflammatory medication, she shouldn’t even have noticed. If she didn’t know better, she might think her whole body had been sensitized. The slightest brush with sumac and she broke out in a rash. The slightest brush of Jake Smith’s hands on her thigh or the back of her knee raised goose bumps in places he hadn’t even touched.

Granted, she’d been on a self-imposed diet these past few years, but she wasn’t that starved for masculine attention.

He stepped back and looked her over. “There, that better?”

Wordlessly, she nodded, feeling her cheeks burn. The curse of a redhead’s thin skin. “This is so embarrassing.”

“No need to be embarrassed, it could happen to anybody.”

If she read him right—and she was good at reading people—he might as well have added, Anybody crazy enough to wear skyscraper shoes lashed to her ankles. Was there such a thing as breakaway ankle straps?

“How’s the hand?” His were on his hips. Tanned, capable hands planted firmly on narrow masculine hips.

Just quit thinking what you’re thinking! “It’s fine.” She looked down at the fingers she’d jammed. Her newly exposed natural nails looked like naked little orphans.

“Sit tight, I’ll be back with your ice pack in a minute.”

“No hurry. I think I’ll get up and tap dance on the coffee table.”

He shot her a quick grin as he headed for the kitchen. Distracted, she almost forgot her misery. He had a nice smile. He had a really nice backside, which she noticed only because it was more or less at her eye level as he left the room. Strong legs, too—at least he hadn’t dropped her when he was carrying her down all those steps.

Not that she would have fallen too far, the way she’d clung to him with both arms.

“Peas or corn, either one will do fine,” she called after him.

“Got it.”

“You do this a lot?” he asked again a few moments later as he shaped a bag of frozen peas around her bandaged ankle. “Use ice packs, I mean.”

“Headaches,” she said, and then snapped her mouth shut. Just because he happened to be there when she’d needed a hand—just because he’d driven her to the hospital and waited for her, stopped at the drive-in window of the pharmacy while her prescription was being filled, taken care of her car for her and then driven her home after stopping to get barbecue—that didn’t mean he needed to know her entire life history.

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