Total pages in book: 198
Estimated words: 186242 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 931(@200wpm)___ 745(@250wpm)___ 621(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 186242 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 931(@200wpm)___ 745(@250wpm)___ 621(@300wpm)
Not the tailgate. My thigh.
“Someone reported illegal hunting; I was coming to see if I heard anything,” he answered, setting out a small clear bottle too.
I watched him put on some gloves, then take the top off the bottle and give it a swirl. “I thought hunting season hadn’t started yet?”
He still didn’t look at me as he lifted my leg again at an angle and squirted the clear fluid over my knee. It was cold and it stung just a little, but mostly because the skin was broken. I hoped. “It hasn’t, but that doesn’t matter to some people,” he explained, focused below.
I guess that made sense.
But what were the chances . . . ?
Had Amos told him I was here?
He did the same to the other knee, which was scraped up but not as bad.
“Are you going to get in trouble for not going up there?” I asked him with a hiss as it stung too.
He shook his head, setting the bottle aside and nabbing some precut strips of gauze, which he used to dab under the wounds, drying them. Rhodes worked on me some more before grabbing a couple more gauze pads and putting them over the treated wounds, taping them down.
“Thank you,” I told him quietly.
“You’re welcome,” he replied, meeting my gaze briefly. “Hands or elbows first?”
“Elbows are good. I need to work up to my hands; I think those will hurt the most.”
He nodded again, taking my arm and starting the whole process over again with the solution. He was drying it off as he asked quietly, “Why are you by yourself?”
“Because I don’t have anyone else to come with me.” With his head ducked, I got a really great view of his incredible hair. The silver and brown mixed together perfectly. One could only hope to gray that nicely. At least I did.
Those almost purple eyes flicked to me again as he applied something to my elbow. “You know it’s not safe to go hiking alone.”
Here was the inner dad and game warden. “I know.” Because I did. Better than anyone, probably. “But I don’t really have a choice. I texted my uncle and told him where I was. Clara knows too.” I watched his face. “Amos asked when I was leaving this morning. He knew too.”
His features didn’t shift in the slightest. Amos had definitely told him. Right?
But what? He drove all this way . . . to check on me? Drive two and half hours away . . . for me?
Yeah, right.
“You turned around at the ridge then?” he asked as he covered my elbow with a big Band-Aid.
“Yeah,” I told him sheepishly. “It was a lot harder than I expected.”
He grunted. “Told you it was difficult.”
He remembered? “Yeah, I know you did, but I thought you were exaggerating.”
He made a soft sound that might have been a snort . . . coming from anyone else . . . and I smiled. He didn’t see it though. Fortunately.
“I need to train harder before I try this again,” I told him.
Rhodes took my other elbow. His hands were nice and warm even through the gloves. “Probably a good idea.”
“Yeah—oww.”
His thumb brushed right below the wound of my elbow, and his eyes flicked up. “Okay?”
“Yeah, just being a baby. It hurts.”
“Mm-hmm. You scraped them up pretty bad.”
“It feels like—owwie.”
He snorted really softly again. It was definitely a snort.
What the hell was going on? Did he take his chill pill again?
“Thank you for doing this,” I said once he’d tenderly—and I mean tenderly—put another Band-Aid on my other elbow.
Rhodes took my hand then, flipping the palm up and setting it on top of my leg. “How were you planning on driving home?” he asked softly.
“With my hands,” I joked and grimaced when the pad of his index finger grazed one of the puncture-like wounds. “I don’t really have another choice. I figured I’d just cry and bleed all the way home.”
Those gray eyes moved toward my face again.
I smiled at him as he took hold of the solution again, working it over my hands. His thumb grazing over the tiny wounds there like he was making sure there was nothing else embedded in my skin; then he poured some more. I gritted my teeth and tried to get my mind off what he was doing. So I did what came second nature. I kept on talking.
“Do you like your job?” I asked, making a face he didn’t see.
His eyebrows knit together as he kept on working. “Sure. More now.”
That distracted me. “Why now?”
“I’m on my own now,” he actually answered.
“You weren’t before?”
One gray eye peeked at me. “No, I was a cadet.” He didn’t say anything for so long, I didn’t expect him to say more. “I didn’t like starting over and having people tell me what to do again.”