Craving Her Rough Diamond Doc

With a grunt and a shake of her head Imogen dragged the gloves on and followed him. “I’ll help you by dragging the logs to the cabin, and you won’t have to wait so long to run your beloved chainsaw. Give me the rope.”

“No.”

Hadn’t the man figured out yet that she wasn’t going to leave until he said yes?

“It’s hard work. You’ll hurt yourself,” Wyatt added.

“The last place I worked was at a pediatrics unit.” She dropped her gloved hands to her hips, instantly aware of how stiff the gloves were. “Want to know what I learned there?”

“No.”

“Too bad! I’m telling you anyway.” Ass.

“You really don’t like being told no, do you?”

Wyatt actually chuckled a little then, but it was the kind of mirthless, superior man noise she noticed happening at those times the little woman tried to do man’s work—like learning to change spark plugs. Or move logs. Having drinks and passing the time with this man no longer sounded like much fun.

In fact, the urge to hurt him nearly overwhelmed her already limping impulse control. “I learned that if you want something and you’re told no, you should do other stuff that they don’t want you to do. Worse stuff. Until they reconsider your first, sensible request. Or you should just keep asking until they give up from exhaustion.”

He tied the rope around the notched end of the log and straightened, giving her a weird, almost amused look. “How often that work for you?”

“I’d say about three out of four times. People don’t like confrontation.” She amended, “Most people.”

“There’s nothing you can do on the mountain that will bother me enough to change my mind.” He looked at her a long moment then turned, pulling the rope over one shoulder to drag the former tree down to his cabin.

The man clearly had no idea how annoying she could be if she set her mind to it. She almost regretted him putting his shirt back on. Pine cones and prickly seedpods from the sycamores would be great for proving to him and his stupid amazing back how irritating she could be.

Imogen followed, barely resisting the urge to pelt him with prickly tree bits, her mind in a mad scramble for another way to handle him. Amanda didn’t want someone getting comfy in her job while she was away, and Imogen was the pit bull she’d chosen to turn loose on the problem.

But maybe she’d set this up wrong from the start when she’d made it sound like a request. He was under the illusion she was the one who would eventually give up from exhaustion. Or maybe firm but sensible would work where bratty and frustrated had failed.

“Please?” Please should help, at least a little. “I’m invested in this working,” She tried to keep her voice as level as possible—no easy task considering she was one of the people who generally avoided confrontation. Confrontation meant getting involved in subjects that caused big feelings and crossed lines she didn’t like to cross. “Give me a chance to prove myself. Or say yes. I’ll leave and see you tomorrow for work, Dr. Beechum.”

“So…” Wyatt looked her fully in the eyes, somehow making her feel short for once. A little intimidated. That’s the reason people liked to avoid confrontation. Uncomfortable. “Your offer to help move logs is to annoy me into saying yes to hiring you for the practice?”

“Um, no. Maybe that’s how it looks, but offering to help was not to annoy you.” Imogen rubbed her head with the still stiff rawhide glove. “That was a different plan to make you say yes. That plan involved showing you that I’m a quick learner.” She began ticking off fingers as she talked herself up, but the gloves were so stiff her ticking lost the pizzazz she’d hoped to muster. “I’m determined to make it work. I’ll work very hard to make it come out well for everyone, including your patients, Amanda, and even you.”

Wyatt looked at the gloves and back to Imogen’s face. Nice face, even all pink and angry like that. Her help—anyone’s help, really—was the last thing he wanted. If Josh had survived, they’d have been rebuilding together. As the last Beauchamp standing, the responsibility was his alone.

“You really are like erosion.” Exceptional at wearing things down. Absolutely relentless. “If it will make you shut up, go ahead. You won’t make it ten minutes, but move the logs if you’re able.” She wouldn’t be any help. Letting her wear herself out on a log might just get her out of his hair.

He grabbed the chainsaw and safety gear. Before starting it, he watched how she did with her first log. Stubborn woman. No way in hell was she going to get that thing moving without hurting herself.

The rawhide gloves she’d been bandying about looked to have never seen use. Still stiff and not a mark on them. She flexed her fingers a couple times to get them bending then mimicked what she’d seen him do earlier: turn, rope over the shoulder, then lean forward to pull. A few aborted tries and she choked up on the rope, which lifted the end enough to actually get it moving. Stronger than she looked, and smart.

The shorts were impractical for that kind of labor, but it let him see her legs flex from her calves all the way up to a plump little rear. Hard to look away from. Since he’d come home, Wyatt had resisted all the local attempts to fix him up. But now, with Imogen’s legs and rear distracting him…Swearing off dating since he’d come home might not have been the best decision.

Shake it off. Get back to work.

Imogen worked as long as she could. But even taking a break after every log, her whole body still hurt. Her shoulders screamed the loudest, like a foghorn warning her away from the dangers ahead. She had a new appreciation for packhorses and whatever farm animals had to do this in the olden days—before she’d been around to make stupid points about being a hard worker.

She flopped onto the ground where Wyatt marked more logs to cut, sprawling gracelessly on her back. “Okay. I admit it, this was a dumb idea.”

Wyatt chuckled, and it sounded like honest amusement this time. “They’re heavier than you’d think.”

“And I…” Her voice cracked. She swallowed and tried again. “Can’t remember what I was going to say.”

He pulled a watch from his pocket. “You’ve been at it a few hours. I need to make a call. Think you can make it to the ridge?”

“You want me to climb the mountain with you?” Oh, sure, now he wanted her to go somewhere with him. Now that she couldn’t move.

“Yes.”

For once he didn’t say no. If he were a puppy, Imogen would give him a treat. More yeses was what she wanted to encourage in him. Plus, hard workers didn’t lie down on the job, though they might ask for help to get up. She lifted one hand toward him. “If I fall, just cover me with leaves or something suitably survival-oriented.”

His hand was large and warm, and were she not exhausted, Imogen would’ve sworn her skin buzzed where his touched it. Distracting, and probably due to her poor, overworked hands having to grip that rope so hard for so long. Even if the universe was dead set on punishing her for her stubbornness, at least Wyatt seemed to have softened to her a little. Enough to be cordial, if nothing else.

Once she was upright, he released her hand, waited for her to get a drink, then started up the steep incline. A shorter stride and a slower pace said he was waiting for her to keep up, probably another nod to cordiality. The air no longer crackled with irritation, and Imogen wanted to keep it that way. She tried to move faster than she actually wanted to move: zero miles per hour.

When she resorted to using the trees to slingshot herself further up the incline, Wyatt backtracked and took her by the hand to haul her the rest of the way up the hillside. “Not in the mood to chase you down the hill when you start rolling, or to carry you to the hospital when you fall and crack your head open.”

“So gallant,” Imogen murmured, but she held fast to his hand—grateful not only for the assistance but for the distraction his touch provided. The sensation wasn’t buzzing, though it had a kind of vibration to it. It was more like an energy she couldn’t identify. Waves of tingly awareness raced up her arm and to distant, interesting parts of her body. Parts that now demanded more attention than her screaming muscles. If he could keep this Helpful Polite mask on, she might revisit that drink idea.

“Big step.” Wyatt dragged her attention back to climbing then took both of her hands in his and hauled her the remaining few feet, past the tree line to the grassy ridge.

When she was steady, he released her, fished out his cellphone and strolled a short distance away, leaving her to take in the view.

Imogen folded back onto the ground, her eyes tracing the contours of the rolling green hills that spread out in front of her. “Okay, the view was worth the hike on screaming limbs.”

“Thought it was a good reward.”

He sounded distracted. She glanced his way and watched him scowl at the phone in his hand. “Trouble?”

“Need a new one…” He tapped the screen a few more times and shook his head.

“Want mine? It’s the toughest of cellphones. Waterproof. Easy to use. When you can get a signal, that is.”

“Why do you have a waterproof cell?”

“Sometimes I get caught in the rain with the top off my car.”

He shook his head, but the small smile made it less judgmental. With her phone in his hand, he took a few steps away to make his call.

She should definitely take a picture when he got done. Also maybe take a picture of him and his whole chiseled-muscles thing. Hard. He was probably hard all over. If only he was less mentally hard. Short-sighted. Narrow-minded…

He was probably thinking the same thing about her. Which was fine. If it got her what she needed, he could think what he liked. She already had a friend, and one was plenty. The last thing she needed was to impress another member of Amanda’s family and have them start comparing notes on her. Or conspiring to make her stay.

He kept his voice low, but she could hear the tension in it as he spoke.

“So you have to climb a mountain to use a cellphone around here. Sort of negates the convenience factor.” Talking to herself, another sign she was tired, crazy, or that maybe it was time to give up. As she gazed over the scenic panorama, she caught a glimpse of something white in her peripheral vision. On a flat spot inside the trees down the ridge sat lots of big white blocks placed in a rectangle. She waited for him to hand back her phone and asked, “Did you start building up here first?”

“No…” He didn’t need to look where she was pointing to know what had roused her curiosity: the barrier wall surrounding the old family graveyard. She didn’t need to go there. Best leave that undisturbed. She disturbed enough on the mountain without turning her loose on the dead too. “That’s not a house foundation. You had enough of the view?”

“Picture, then I’m done.”

Having confirmed the agency couldn’t get a suitable replacement by tomorrow, he’d best consider whether or not to brave the week alone or give her the shot at the job she repeatedly demanded.

Wyatt waited at the trees for her to get the photo and rejoin him. Her feet dragged—not nearly as much bounce in her step as when she’d haughtily stormed his mountain—but she didn’t look so close to dropping as she had when he’d hauled her with him up the climb. “Need help?”

“No, I’m better.” Betterish, maybe. She stuffed her phone into her pocket and took the kind of deep breath a person did when about to attempt something requiring concentration.

He helped her off the first ledge-like step anyway, then let go. A few steps down and he turned to look back at her, needing reassurance she wasn’t going to fall after he’d worked her like a mule all afternoon. Her own fault, too stubborn to stop when it had got to be too much, but he’d feel bad if she got hurt because he’d let her exhaust herself. He’d never thought she’d actually pose a threat to his rule about the cabin or he’d just have put the earplugs back in. Why hadn’t that occurred to him earlier?

Was this what it would be like to let her work for him? Someone he’d always needed to keep an eye on wouldn’t be much help. As nurses were always in demand, it made them hard to get on short notice. Amanda’s opinion of Imogen counted for something, but he had to wonder if part of her support was just friendship or knowing how fast Imogen would be available. But in his experience, annoying and stubborn were easier to suffer than superior and condescending. Having her work for him might even make him look good enough by comparison that he’d become the one the patients opened up to, rather than his nurse.

His shoulder cracked against a tree, forcing him to look where he was going again. “If you need help, say something.”

“I will,” she called, her voice labored and breathy.

No, she wouldn’t. She’d set her mind on proving she could work herself half to death and suffer no ill-effects. Who could deny Wonder Woman a job?

Maybe he’d been a little premature on the insubstantial label. She was substantial enough to fight for what she wanted.

“I’m fine. It’s a little easier going down. You just have to kind of control your fall by using the trees. They’re like nature’s speed bumps.”

It was the nature’s speed bumps bit that got him. He laughed out loud, surprising himself, and lost his footing. The second time one of her quips had cost him his balance. His legs shot out from under him, and he did precisely what he’d been worried she’d do.

He fell down the mountain.

CHAPTER TWO

IN THE SPACE of a few seconds Wyatt traveled several yards down the mountain and was caked from hip to heel with a layer of dirt. Some time during his impromptu trip the outside of his right forearm had caught against something. It hurt.

“Wyatt!” Imogen shouted his name twice before he sat up. “You’re bleeding.”

“It’s okay. I’m okay.” And just as soon as he finished a mental inventory of his parts and aches, he’d believe his own words.

She knelt and lifted his arm to look at the gash he knew was there.

“Wow, whatever got you must have been sharp. It opened the skin right down to the fascia. Muscle doesn’t look cut. You don’t have a scalpel in your pocket or something, do you? Open pocket knife? Broken glass?” She slid her fingers into his, keeping his arm up and stationary so she could get a better look at it. “It needs stitches.”

“Hard to conduct myself when I’m watching someone else,” he muttered. Stupid. Of course he’d have to fall in front of her. And now that her fingers were linked with his, he realized how small they were, fine-boned and delicate. How in the world had she managed to move the logs at all? Her slender fingers didn’t look strong enough to flex the stiff gloves, let alone haul timber. She may be tall, pushy and annoying, but her hands were soft. Feminine.

“Yep, you should’ve kept your eyes in front of you and let me fall if I was going to. I said I’d yell if I needed you.” Imogen wiggled her fingers free and shifted her hands to the hem of his shirt, which she tugged. “Take off your shirt. Need pressure on that and I’m not taking off mine.”

Another travesty.

“It’s not covered in mud?” He looked at himself again, shrugged and raised his arms so she could lift the shirt. Her little hands shook—just the barest tremble—as she helped him out of his shirt.

“Do I make you nervous?”

“Oh, yeah. Earlier with the chainsaw and now I’m afraid that I might ogle you, and that’s hardly professional.” She smiled at him and teased, but he recognized a bedside manner when he saw it. Her voice had changed. Her whole demeanor had changed. The words may be teasing, but the tone was sweet. Much sweeter than she’d shown him so far. Distracting him from the pain and humiliation, and doing a damned fine job of it too.

“Not that it’d be my fault,” Imogen added, helping him up. “I’m sure you spent years bench-pressing fallen trees just so you could make annoying women babble at you when you fall off mountains.” She flipped the shirt inside out and gently wrapped his arm. “Pressure here. Try not to jostle that, there’s grit and debris in the wound. You think a speck of dust in your eye hurts…bits of dirt and wood in an open wound would be torturous.”

Half an hour later Wyatt sat in the passenger seat of her ridiculous purple vehicle, instructing her through town. His little town wasn’t particularly secluded, not like the communities he drove the practice to, but it still took time to get there from the mountain. But it took no time to get through the tiny town to the large lot where his big shiny silver bus was parked.

A much better bus than Dad’s. Getting that wreck off the mountain would give him the incentive to get the cabin built. It just meant going inside first to get stuff. Pictures. Mom’s jewelry box. The family bible. Dad’s crossbow. Important stuff. The only problem? Wyatt didn’t want to go inside.

“This isn’t the hospital,” Imogen said, dragging his mind back.

“No. It’s my practice.” He popped the car door open and stepped out, closing the door again with his knee to keep the pressure on his wound. “Keys, right front pocket.”

Imogen looked at the jeans pocket and then back up at his eyes. The fact that he was standing there, shirtless and bleeding, demanding she fish around in his pocket after he’d spent the day repeatedly refusing her requests registered. “It’s locked.” And his arm hurt, but he wasn’t going to admit that. He added a word to avoid admissions. “Please.”

She crammed her hand into his pocket and retrieved the keys. “Which key?”

He indicated and she let them inside.

“Why are we wasting time here?”

“We’re here because it’s close, it has all required medical supplies, and there’s no waiting.” He followed her, bumping the lights on with his good elbow. “First exam room, you’ll find everything we need in the cabinets.”

Imogen went ahead of him, doing as he’d bid, but obviously not happy about it. “This is silly. I’ll clean it, dress it, then we’ll go to the emergency room. You cannot suture the outside of the forearm on your dominant hand. And, yes, I noticed you’re a righty.”

Time for her to kick up another fuss. If she wanted the job, she’d prove it. “That’s why you’re going to do it.”

“I’ve never sutured.” She grabbed supplies and then headed to the sink to wash up. “And it’s kind of illegal. I’m an RN, not a PA. Actually, it’s illegal for you too.”

“After you glove, wash my arm from the elbow down. Then irrigate with the saline and grab a mirror from the third drawer so I can see it.”

“All that I can do. It’s legal.”

Her thoughts played across her face so clearly she might as well have said them. She thought he was testing her.

Of course he was testing her.

“I bought the supplies. This is my practice, and you don’t work for me,” Wyatt murmured as she set about cleaning his arm. “You’re just a friend I’m trusting to help me out.”

“You have funding. Didn’t the funding buy these supplies?”

Smart. But also cautious and a little too reticent—traits that wouldn’t serve her well around here.

“No. I haven’t actually acquired funding yet.” Another test. One that stopped her cold.

“Amanda said you were in danger of losing your funding.” She lifted her gaze from the wound and stared at him with the biggest blue eyes he’d ever seen. Big blue eyes with a smudge of dirt under one. It was good his hands were occupied because he had a sudden urge to thumb the smudge away.

She had to stop staring at him like that. Made it hard to focus. She was probably experiencing the same thing. He was making the tests too hard.

“That’s what I told her, and if you’re her friend you won’t tell her different.” Her mouth had fallen open with surprise. Wyatt tilted his head to try and see what she was doing as it was the only way to keep from staring at her mouth. He coughed. “She wouldn’t accept her full salary if she knew it came from me and not from a fund.”

She started moving again. Despite her suspicions and the long day, her hands moved steadily and gently over the wound. “So, this is a regular practice? That stuff about getting the use up…”

“That’s true. There is funding available if I can get the patient base big enough. Until then…” She should smell terrible. He knew he smelled awful after the long day, but she smelled good, and she’d worked herself hard—probably to the point of dehydration.

She dried his arm after flushing the wound and checking under magnifying glass for any debris. Whatever her thoughts about his revelation, she kept them to herself. “It looks clean to me, but I still wish you’d—”

“You want me to trust you. Show me I can.” He reached out with his other hand, making contact with her forearm. Whatever strange chemistry rumbled between them, she felt it too. Her gaze fell to his hand, compelling him to take it away. “Today I saw a hard worker, someone who wants to help. Now show me someone who is willing to take the same chance on me that she’s asking me to take.” Wyatt smiled, trying to soften what amounted to a dare.

“That’s not the only problem. You’re trusting me to do this right without any practice. I’ve never so much as stitched up a turkey for Thanksgiving.” Imogen held the mirror up so he could see the wound. Seeing it made it sting worse, but she was right—flayed to the fascia. Should be easy to stitch.

“If you can follow directions, you’ll do fine. If you mess up, I’ll go and get new sutures put in tomorrow. But if they’re good, I’ll give you two weeks to prove you can handle the position.”

“I thought I’d already proved myself on your mountain.” Imogen pointed an accusing gloved finger at him.

“I never said yes.” Antagonizing her before making her stitch him up might not be the best idea he’d ever had, but he’d rather she snapped at him than a patient. “I just let you move the logs.”

Her eyes called him an ass again, but to her credit she bit her tongue.

“You were being very annoying,” Wyatt said, and when she scowled, he held up one hand, “But I can now see your bedside manner is different.” When she still scowled, he corrected himself. “It’s better. Good.”

“A month. That’s the bare minimum required for a fair trial,” Imogen countered.

“Is it?” Wyatt couldn’t help but grin at her. She was ballsy, and that was something people here would respond to—it was easy to respect bravery. “One month, unless you do something so terrible I can’t keep our arrangement. Behave, and don’t annoy my patients.”

He was the cousin of her best friend, and they were close. Close-ish. Imogen wasn’t entirely certain what that entailed, but it didn’t matter. He might be kind of a jerk, but she had to believe he wouldn’t do something to ruin her life. Oh, sure, he might not hire her because she allowed herself to be talked into doing something illegal, but the chances were slim that he intended to jeopardize her license.

Imogen wanted to say no, be as uncooperative as he’d been all day. She’d learned how to be stubborn the last time she’d held still for six months. But being flexible might actually get her what she wanted. Unless he tried to trick her again.

She considered his expression, saw nothing but sincerity there and sighed. Like she had a choice. She wasn’t built to leave someone suffering if she could help them. Leaving him with an untreated injury just because he ticked her off…Couldn’t do it. And she couldn’t go halfway on her promise to Amanda—she made promises so infrequently already.

“I suppose we should numb it. Where’s your pharmacy? And tell me what to give you.” If the stitches were crooked, loose or too far apart, it was his own bossy fault.

He rattled off directions and sent her packing with his keys to a locked cabinet for drugs and a suture kit. Not even a flinch when she gave him the injection. He just started explaining how to work the needle and the kind of stitch he wanted.

Imogen drew a deep breath and picked up the instruments. She’d seen this done a million times. She’d removed stitches a million times too. No problem. It was just like repairing a hole in her favorite dress. If her favorite dress happened to be made out of human flesh. Ugh. Amanda had better have booze at her house left over from her non-pregnant days.