“Are you hurt, miss?” he asked anxiously.
Slowly she straightened up and looked at him. He was fairly young, mid-thirties, with short, curly brown hair and troubled brown eyes flecked with green. “N-no, I don’t think so. What…what happened?”
The concern in his expression turned to a frown of annoyance. “You ran a four-way stop and smashed into my brand-new car,” he grumbled. “Why don’t you watch where you’re going?”
She blinked in confusion and looked beyond him to see a white BMW crosswise in the middle of the highway, with a dent in the fender on the passenger side. “But there were no other cars around, and I just glanced down to turn off the radio.”
“Then you didn’t look closely enough,” he scolded. “I was driving on the side road. I saw you coming, but I expected you to stop at the sign.” His anger was heating up.
“I didn’t see the sign,” she wailed. “I had no idea—”
“If you don’t start paying more attention to your driving instead of fiddling with the damn radio, you’re going to have a real smashup one of these days.” His tone was gruff. “Are you sure you’re all right?”
“I’m fine,” she said, although she knew that wasn’t altogether true. She wasn’t injured, but she was shaking so badly that she doubted if she could stand.
Then a frightening thought occurred to her. She carried only the minimum amount of car insurance required by law in California where she lived. She doubted it would fully cover any large bills. “How about you? Were you hurt?” she asked, growing concerned.
“No,” he snapped. “But if you’d been going just a little faster we both could have been. Step out of the car, please.”
“Out of the car? But why?” She didn’t really want to try to stand up yet. She was afraid her quaking knees wouldn’t hold her.
“Because I need to make sure you have enough wits about you to drive without plowing into any more vehicles,” he said angrily.
Kirsten knew she was at fault, but he didn’t need to be so cranky. “Of course I’m okay to drive,” she insisted. “We didn’t collide very hard.”
To prove her point she turned in her seat and put her feet on the ground, then pulled herself up by hanging on to the open door. Her legs were rubbery and she felt a little light-headed, but she wasn’t about to admit it. The quicker she could get rid of this man and be on her way, the better. So far she hadn’t seen any other cars go by.
He looked at his watch, muttered something impatiently, then stepped back several feet along the road and called to her. “Walk over here to me.”
This man was getting to be a real pain, she thought. “I told you, I’m just fine. You don’t need to worry about me,” she called huffily.
“Maybe so,” he answered, “but please do as I say. I have important appointments to keep.”
There was a no-nonsense quality to his tone that indicated he was used to having his orders obeyed, and she was sure it would just be a waste of time to argue.
Taking a deep breath she put one foot in front of the other, then let loose of the door and started toward him. The road surface was rough and her dizziness increased, but she continued to concentrate on not stumbling.
She was almost there when she stepped into a pothole and was thrown off balance. Gasping, she threw out her arms as the man caught her and held her close against him. Her flailing arms circled his neck and she buried her face in his shoulder and clung.
He was strong and muscular, and there was a faint woodsy aroma about him. She wasn’t sure if it was shaving lotion or just the natural scent of the mountain forest.
She was still trembling, but didn’t know if it was shock from the collision or pleasure aroused by the protectiveness of his embrace.
But it wasn’t an embrace. He was simply holding her up to keep her from falling flat on her face. What on earth was the matter with her anyway? It wasn’t as though she’d never been held by a man before.
He didn’t seem in any hurry to let her go, but that was probably because he wasn’t sure what to do with her.
Reluctantly, she raised her head, unwound her arms and pushed gently away from him. Her dizziness had receded, but still the man kept one arm around her waist as they walked back to her car.
“I…I just stumbled,” she assured him. “I really am okay, but thanks for your concern. By the way, shouldn’t we exchange names and addresses? My insurance will pay for the damages to your BMW.”
As soon as she uttered the words she knew she’d spoken unwisely. She shouldn’t have admitted to being at fault until she talked to her insurer.
They reached her four-year-old navy blue Mustang, and he withdrew his arm from around her and reached in his inside coat pocket. “I’m in a hurry,” he said as he withdrew a business card and handed it to her. “If you’ll just write down your name, address and the name of your insurance company I’ll get back to you later. You do live around here, don’t you?”
She unzipped her purse and tossed his card inside, then rummaged around until she found a note tablet and pencil. “No, I don’t,” she answered, “but I’m visiting here for the next few weeks. I’ll give you that address, too.”
She scribbled the information on a sheet of the tablet, tore it off and folded it, then handed it to him. He shoved it in his pocket then helped her into the car and shut the door. “Start the engine,” he said.
She turned the key and the motor purred.
“Looks like it will run okay,” he observed. “You go on ahead. I’ll stay behind you until we get to Copper Canyon to make sure it doesn’t stall.” He backed away from the vehicle. “I’ll be in touch, and for God’s sake watch where you’re going.”
True to his word he followed behind her until they came to the pretty little village, almost hidden from the road by huge old evergreen and shade trees. Then he turned off on one of the side streets while she kept going on the main artery through the town and beyond.
A few miles later she saw the rural mailbox labeled Buckley and turned onto the long driveway that led to the white two-story farmhouse surrounded by trees. There were several outbuildings, including a big red barn. Everything looked just as Coralie had described it in her letters and phone calls.
Kirsten parked beside the house and got out, but as she came around the back of the car she heard a screen door open and close and Coralie came bouncing down the front steps, a welcome smile on her face and her arms out-stretched. The two friends hugged, then leaned back to look at each other.
Kirsten had never seen Coralie look so happy. She positively glowed, and there was no need to ask if her marriage was all she’d expected it to be. It obviously was. Her straight blond hair was still shoulder length and parted in the middle, but now she had it tied back with a scarf, and her deep blue eyes sparkled with happiness.
“You’re positively radiant,” Kirsten told her. “I guess your pen-pal farmer turned out to be Prince Charming in disguise.”
Coralie laughed with delight. “You better believe it,” she agreed. “Just wait till you meet him. I’ve got the perfect man for you, too.”
“Oh, no,” Kirsten said with a grin. “If you’re talking about your husband’s best friend, Dr. Sam, whom you’ve written so much about, you can forget it. I’m not looking to be fixed up with a groom, either homegrown or mail-order. I’m content to bask in