“Thank you, but—”
Jess barely knew what hit him. But in the moment before he blacked out he realized Texas Tom was the revengeful type.
LORNA SAT in the grass beside the man of her dreams and thought a little bit more about luck. Was this good luck or bad luck? She’d had a crush on Jess Sheridan since she was thirteen and now, years later, she was spending the evening with him. Just because he was snoring and unconscious didn’t discount the fact that they were together at last.
Here she’d always hoped he’d notice her, and when he did he thought she was digging for food from the garbage. It wasn’t what she’d call good luck, but she’d enjoyed talking to him, even if he’d had too much to drink and acted a little silly and wouldn’t remember her in the morning.
She liked looking at him. Lorna peered into his face, which had always been handsome. His dark hair was a little too short, but it waved nicely on his forehead. He had a large nose that fit his face, and lips that were neither too thin or too plump. His skin was tanned, as if he spent a lot of time outside, and she loved his chin. There was a faint dimple there; she could see its shadow from the corner streetlight and she’d touched it with her index finger just to make sure. His skin was smooth underneath her fingertip; he must have shaved right before the wedding.
He didn’t look as if he was in pain. Or dead. He looked peaceful, like he was taking a nap. His breathing was even and sometimes noisy. There’d been no blood. She’d thought about going for help, but that would mean leaving her rescuer alone near the pile of garbage. Which didn’t seem at all like the right thing to do.
Texas Tom had left in a hurry, especially after she threatened to call the police. Lorna thought it was her screaming that made Tom run to his truck, with the oversize metal tongs he’d used to hit Jess in the back of the head still in his hand. She’d screamed loud enough to wake the dead, but oddly nobody in Beauville came to her rescue. It was Saturday night and she could hear the music blasting from one of the bars around the corner. The beer tent was still standing, but it looked deserted, as if they’d left the cleaning up for tomorrow and gone to party somewhere else tonight.
Lorna looked back at the man sleeping on the grass. She couldn’t leave him here and he was too big to drag home, even though she didn’t live that far away. She could have gone to the sheriff’s office, but she didn’t want Jess to get into trouble. And she couldn’t sit here all night hoping that someone would come along and help her out. No, she was going to have to deal with the man all by herself.
“Jess,” she said aloud, inches from that handsome face. “Jess? Jess Sheridan, wake up.” She tried shaking his shoulder, but she was too gentle. She spoke louder and shook harder and managed to get a muttered oath out of him before he went back to sleep. She supposed the amount he had drunk had more to do with his condition than the blow dealt by a pair of barbecue tongs, but she still felt responsible for his predicament. He’d tried to give her money. How sweet was that?
So Lorna kept talking and prodding until Jess Sheridan opened his eyes and said, “For God’s sake, woman, leave me alone!”
Victory was hers, until she tried to get him to sit up, and then stand. He was heavy and sleepy and wobbly, but he put his arm around her when she told him to and she managed to lead him across the grassy park and across the street. There were lights on in most of the houses that lined the residential end of West Beaumont Street. They crossed Comstock without any problem, though Jess was a large man and Lorna was beginning to wonder if she had made a mistake in her plan of action. Screaming herself hoarse yelling for help might have been better than risking a broken back.
By the time she coaxed him up the three stairs to the front porch of her aunt’s narrow yellow house, Jess had begun to walk under his own power.
“Where are we?” he asked when she settled him against the front of the house so she could get the key out of her pocket and unlock the front door.
“My house.” She swung the door open and urged him to enter the living room.
“Why?”
“Because I couldn’t leave you there in the park,” she explained as she turned on a light. “Not after everything you did.”
“Oh.” He looked confused.
“How’s your head feeling?”
“I’ll live.”
“I hope so.” She smiled up at him. “I didn’t know if I should take you to the hospital. I’d be glad to drive you home now if you’ll tell me where you live.”
He frowned and felt the back of his neck, then looked around the curtainless living room. Boxes were stacked neatly against the walls and the wood floor was bare. “Are you coming or going?”
“I just moved in,” she said, and would have explained about her aunt and her job and probably blabbed the complete unabridged story of her life, but Jess began to sway again. She caught him before he toppled over, then hurried him to the bedroom off the living area, a room she hadn’t had a chance to paint, and the only bed in the tiny house. Thank goodness she’d had time to make it this morning before leaving for the park.
“Sorry,” he managed to say. “The wedding—the whiskey—” He stared at her as she pushed him backward against the pillows. “Funny hair,” he muttered, touching one of the loose tendrils that had fallen on her cheek when she bent over. “Who are you?”
“Lorna,” she replied. “And we may have to go to the hospital after all to get your head examined.”
He grinned at her, making him look devilishly handsome and causing Lorna’s heart to beat a tiny bit faster. “Honey, do I look crazy to you?”
He looked as if he belonged there, was her first thought. And then she caught herself. “You look like a man who has had too much to drink. Sleep it off and I’ll drive you home later.”
“Home,” he repeated, then yawned. “Good idea,” was the last thing he said before leaning back against the pillows and closing his eyes.
Lorna watched him for a moment and then decided he was asleep and would likely stay that way until she woke him to take him home. And she’d wake him, all right, as soon as she scrubbed off the barbecue sauce and washed her hair. She may have had a big crush on Jess Sheridan, star football player of the Marysville Marauders, when she was thirteen. She may have worshipped the rugged sheriff’s deputy who didn’t give her a speeding ticket the first day she got her driver’s license, and she may have even secretly hoped that Jess wouldn’t marry snippy Sue Miller, who didn’t deserve him, and instead would notice that the girl down the street had grown up.
But she didn’t expect him to remember her, even if tonight he was actually in her bed. Aunt Carol would roll over in her grave at the very idea, since the elderly woman hadn’t exactly thought a whole lot of men and had held very loud opinions on the kind of women who took men into their beds before their wedding days.
“Well, Aunt Carol,” Lorna explained aloud as she headed toward the bathroom, “I’m sorry, but I didn’t know what else to do with him.”
HIS OWN SNORING woke him up. That, and the pain throbbing at the back of his neck. Jess opened his eyes and expected to be in his motel room, but his motel room didn’t smell like vanilla and hadn’t been shared with a woman. And there was definitely a woman curled up in the bed beside him. He was afraid to move for fear of waking her up, but his eyes gradually adjusted to the darkness and he saw a faint light at the other end of the room that he hoped led to a bathroom.
He lifted the sheet and saw that he was fully dressed, which only added to his confusion. When he slid out of the bed, he knocked over his boots. The noise didn’t appear to bother the woman, though. She lay curled away from him, long curly hair covering most of her face, her body relaxed and quiet.
Jess