Then they had to decide who would make the proposition to Mr. Gooding. Mayor Buddy volunteered, and everyone heaved a sigh of relief. Mayor Buddy was as wily as they came; he’d make it sound as if they were doing the Goodings a favor and be damn convincing about it. The town lawyer said he’d draw up some papers because they had to have signatures on the deal or the Goodings wouldn’t take it seriously. Whether or not the papers would stand up in court was something else entirely, but from the conversations around her Bo thought that if the Goodings reneged, court would be the least of their worries because the Hobsons would be called in.
Finally—finally—she was on her way home. She was starving but didn’t take the time to stop and get a hamburger because she was anxious about how Tricks and Morgan had fared together. Tricks would be okay; Morgan’s welfare was the most at risk. If Tricks felt put-upon or insulted, she might well refuse to come back inside, and Morgan was too weak to chase after her. He could fall and hurt himself if he tried to push too far.
She didn’t exactly lock the brakes and sling gravel when she slid to a stop beside the Tahoe, but it was close.
The good news was that there was no one lying on the ground unable to get up, and no annoyed golden retriever refusing to obey “Come here.” Maybe they had rocked through without any major problems.
Silly, but her heart was beating a little faster as she opened the door, braced for whatever scene greeted her there. No, it wasn’t silly because she knew Tricks.
Still, she wasn’t prepared. Nothing could have prepared her.
Morgan was sitting on the sofa, all in one piece. Tricks was standing on her back legs in front of him, her front legs braced on his chest, looking up at him with an expression of pure delight while he scratched behind her ears and crooned to her in a deep, soft tone. They were all but nose to nose. At Bo’s entrance Tricks turned her head to look at her, giving her one of those joyous looks that always melted Bo’s heart because she’d never before seen such a happy creature. Tricks looked back up at Morgan, and he bent his head to gently touch his forehead to hers. “There’s Mom,” he said unnecessarily, and Tricks took that as her signal to go greet the center of her life.
She raced over and began dancing around Bo in an excess of joy. Bo knelt and indulged in a frenzy of petting, but she barely knew what she was doing. She felt as if she’d been hit between the eyes with a two-by-four, or maybe punched in the stomach. Something. Even her lips were numb.
No. Oh dear God, no.
CHAPTER 13
SHE DIDN’T WANT TO BE ATTRACTED TO HIM. SHE shouldn’t, couldn’t, be attracted to him. There was no point in it, it was stupid, it was a total waste of time and emotional effort. She knew better.
Yet here she was, almost melting because he was snuggling with her dog. Well, not that exactly; Tricks had a way of making everyone eat out of her paw. It was him, specifically. She wasn’t wearing rose-colored glasses when it came to seeing him for what he was. For the most part he had kept himself very low key, and she appreciated the effort he’d made, but she hadn’t forgotten that he was here because he lived a very dangerous life, one so different from hers she couldn’t begin to relate. He was also a temporary fixture; when he was well, he’d be gone. He wouldn’t stay.
She’d never before been attracted to overt masculinity, the kick-ass-and-take-names mentality. So why him? Her ex-husband had been better looking; feckless, but better looking. Morgan’s features were rough, carved by hard experience. A woman would never look at him and think “Pretty!” but she would definitely look at him and think “Man.” Maybe that was it; maybe it was a chemical reaction, and she was responding to all that testosterone.
Her heart was pounding way too fast, perhaps in panic. She’d been aware of him from the beginning, and it had been easy to delude herself into thinking it was nothing more than his unaccustomed presence in her home making her on edge. She had tamped that awareness down, controlled it, rationalized it. What she hadn’t been able to do was destroy it. The awareness had waited, ticking away like a time bomb; perhaps she’d let herself get too comfortable because the bomb had just exploded in her face and she didn’t know what to do, how to handle it.
He’d changed. If he’d stayed the way he was, she’d be okay because she’d be in caretaker mode. He’d arrived a physical wreck, but now he wasn’t. He’d been here just a little over a week, and though she saw him every day, she was still aware that his color was better, he was stronger, he was gaining weight. Without knowing for certain, she guessed that when she was gone he worked at building his stamina because she couldn’t imagine a man who did what he did for a living being content to simply wait and let his body heal on its own. No, he’d be pushing himself beyond what an ordinary person would, fighting back against weakness, which was further evidence of who and what he was.
He was far from recovered, but in that one week he’d improved enough that he could manage by himself. In the name of self-preservation she should insist that he leave. Doing so would undoubtedly cost her what Axel had already put in her bank account, but she hadn’t spent any of it so she wouldn’t be any worse off than she had been before. It wasn’t as if she’d be destitute; she was okay financially.
But where would Morgan go? He couldn’t go home. He’d have to contact Axel, get some other arrangements made, and on that first day he’d made it plain any further contact could paint a target on his back. He had some money, he had credit cards, he was undoubtedly capable. She could tell him to go.