by Mia Ross
“Sierra told me.”
Wonderful. He and the spunky vet tech student got along like brother and sister, which meant they’d had their share of run-ins and outright arguments. After talking to Sierra for about ten minutes when Erin first hired her, he’d realized that, despite his lady-killer reputation, they’d never be anything other than friends.
Why didn’t he feel the same about Bekah? he wondered. There hadn’t been an instant attraction on his end, but was that because she didn’t appeal to him that way, or because she was so obviously vulnerable, and he didn’t want her to think he was trying to take advantage of her precarious situation?
Or was it something else entirely?
Since he couldn’t answer that, he set about repairing the tarnished image she had of him. But rather than tell her what a good guy he was, he devised a way for her to discover it for herself. “We’ve gotten to know each other a little since you got here. You really think I’m like that?”
“Well...” Clearly sifting through the interesting variety of experiences they’d shared, she eyed him warily, then shook her head. “I guess not. But Sierra knows you better than I do.”
“I think you’re smart enough to make up your own mind about lots of things,” he said gently. “Including me.”
Those gorgeous blue eyes widened in surprise, then narrowed with something much less attractive. “That’s a line.”
“No, it’s not,” he insisted quietly, edging closer so she’d be the only one to hear him. “Who was he, Bekah?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“The guy who scares you so much, you can’t trust me not to hurt you the way he did.”
Panic seized her features, and Drew was fairly certain that if he hadn’t been parked between her and the door, she’d have bolted and never come back. When she seemed a bit calmer, he rested a comforting hand over hers. “You can be honest with me. I won’t tell a soul, I promise.”
Her free hand drifted to her cheek where that nasty bruise had finally faded but was clearly not forgotten. That told him that, although the wound was gone, she still felt the pain of it. Avoiding his gaze, she whispered, “It was a while ago. It’s not important.”
“It is to me.”
When she met his eyes, hers shone with tears he suspected she’d been holding in for a long time. Blinking them away, she took a deep breath and started. “I was living in Cleveland, just barely scraping by. Then I got a temp job at the upscale department store where Richie works. We dated for a while, and then he asked me to move in. He promised he’d make everything better for me.”
“But he didn’t?”
“At first, he did,” she explained in a halting voice. “But after a few months, I felt like he was smothering me. Following me to work, insisting I spend all my free time with him, even though he could leave me by myself and hang out with his friends whenever he felt like it. I didn’t have any friends, and at one point it occurred to me that he wanted to keep it that way. Eventually, I told him I wanted to leave. But he wouldn’t let me.”
The last few words emerged in a strangled whisper, and he braced himself for tears. But they never came. Instead, she squared her shoulders and took a deep breath. “So that’s my sad little story. Pathetic, huh?”
Tragic was the word Drew would have chosen, but he figured that if he shared his impression with her, she’d retreat back into herself and never tell him anything important again. The fact that she trusted him to keep her personal life to himself meant a lot to him. Because of his easygoing nature, most folks saw him as a big goof who didn’t have much going on in the emotions department.
Bekah had called him her hero. He had every intention of proving to her that he was worthy of the title.
“I think the past belongs in the past,” he said truthfully. “I admire anyone who can go through what you have and still keep going.”
“You’re just saying that. I’m nothing special.”
That’s where she was wrong, he thought, although he wasn’t nearly ready to voice that opinion. So, rather than do something that might embarrass her further, he picked up the dessert menu and opened it to the sundaes. “So, vanilla or chocolate?”
“Strawberry.”
“Strawberry it is.” Flagging down the perky waitress, he ordered sundaes for each of them and something called the “topping carousel” that looked as if it contained every kind of ice cream garnish ever invented.
They chatted about lighter topics until their desserts arrived, then challenged each other to try various combinations of toppings until they were both laughing at the concoctions they came up with. It was crazy, but at one point it occurred to Drew that he hadn’t had this much fun in months.
Since meeting Bekah that first eventful morning, every time he felt confident that he had her pegged, she surprised him again. He’d known his fair share of women, and while he liked all of them, none had captured his interest quite the way this one had. Slender but filled with a quiet inner strength he admired, she was by far the most fascinating woman he’d ever come across.
The trouble was, the last time he’d let himself start thinking this way, he’d ended up with a useless diamond ring and a broken heart. So, intriguing as she might be, Bekah Holloway would have to remain strictly off-limits for him. It was better for both of them.
Chapter Five
Bekah had never met a guy so willing to pitch in and lend a hand.
Whether the task was manual labor or folding clothes, it seemed to her that Drew was perfectly comfortable doing whatever needed to be done. By necessity, she’d gotten used to being on her own and taking care of everything herself. But now that there was someone around to shoulder some of the load for her, she had to admit she found having that kind of help comforting.
And a little unnerving. Because in her experience, when you started counting on someone, they held a power over your life you’d end up regretting. While it might be harder to manage on her own, in the long run it had always turned out for the best.
Until recently, she mused while she folded a pair of tattered jeans still warm from the dryer. The Kinleys—and Drew in particular—had gone out of their way to give her a measure of security and a place to call her own. Although she was grateful to them for their generosity, the skittish part of her still felt primed to run at a moment’s notice.
Would she ever feel comfortable enough to settle somewhere? she wondered. The few days she’d spent in Oaks Crossing had made her yearn for something that lasted longer than a limited office assignment or a single growing season.
She wanted a home, she acknowledged with a mental sigh. The problem was, she didn’t know how to make that happen.
“So,” Drew said as he pulled another load from the dryer and dumped it in a wheeled basket. “What have you been able to do with the clinic’s sick computer?”
“Nothing concrete. Every time I fix something and restart it, the diagnostics come up with something else. I’m hoping that if I just keep following the directions, eventually all the errors will be gone, and we can quit worrying about it.”
That made him chuckle. “I don’t know the first thing about those monsters. Where’d you learn about ’em?”
“Temp jobs, mostly. At one point, I worked in a factory where they had a system that kept acting up. It took me a while, but finally I zapped all the bugs, and it worked like a charm. The foreman was so thrilled, he gave me an afternoon off with pay.”
“And what’d you do?”
“Laundry.” Even to her ears that sounded pitiful, and she sighed. “Wow, I’m really boring.”
He didn’t contradict her, but he surprised her by asking, “What would you rather have done?”
Anything, she almost replied, then put the brakes on her cynicism before it could spoil the nice eve
ning they’d been having. “I’m not sure. I was living in Baltimore at the time, so I could’ve gone to an Orioles game.”
He rewarded her with a bright, country-boy grin. “That’s what I would’ve done, for sure. Watching on TV is okay, but there’s nothing like being there in person.”
“When he had the money, my father used to take me to the Bears games on Sundays.”
Horrified that she’d let such a personal detail slip out, she focused on the socks she was folding as if matching them up was the most crucial task she’d ever done.
Then, to her amazement, Drew said, “Before he died a few years ago, my dad used to take all of us to Cincinnati once a year for a Bengals game. He’d book connecting rooms at a nice hotel, so it was crazy expensive, but we always had a blast.”
He didn’t seem old enough to be mourning his father, and the nostalgic tone in his voice told her he missed a lot more than the annual football trip. Unaccustomed to dealing with other people’s tragedies, she quietly said, “I’m so sorry you lost him.”
“Thanks.”
Suddenly, he seemed uncomfortable, and she searched for a way to shift to a less painful topic. Computers struck her as being fairly impersonal, so she went back to that. “Anyway, the laptop at the center is pretty new, so once I get all the nasties cleared off, it should work fine. Then Sierra can stop glaring at it all the time.”
“You should ask her for an afternoon off,” he suggested with a grin. “But don’t do laundry.”
She laughed, and then an idea she’d been toying with popped into the front of her mind. She hadn’t mentioned it to anyone yet, and since Drew was being so nice, she thought it made sense to float it past him to see if it made sense to someone besides her. “Hey, can I get your opinion on something?”
Leaning back against an empty washer, he folded his arms with an expectant look. “Shoot.”
“Well, I know the clinic is having a really hard time financially. Yesterday, Sierra told me that if she can’t come up with a way to bring in more money, you’re going to have to close it down at the end of the year. Have you guys ever thought of doing a fund-raiser to bring in some extra cash?”
“Not that I’m aware of. From what I’ve seen, she and the volunteers have their hands full just trying to take care of all the animals.”
“That’s what I was thinking, too,” Bekah continued excitedly. “Now that I’m there to help out, we could come up with something unique that would draw people to the center for adoptions and admiring the wildlife we have there. Maybe we can tie it in with one of the animal releases that’s coming up soon. We could give it a fun-sounding name, like Animal Palooza.”
“Kinda like a zoo, but with critters you can take home.”
He’d picked up on her train of thought without any effort at all, which ratcheted up her own enthusiasm for the idea several notches. “Right. What do you think?”
“It’s a great idea, but local folks already know about the place, so you need to bring in people from farther away. In case you haven’t noticed, Oaks Crossing is kind of off the map. How’re you gonna get ’em here?”
“The same way you do with any other business. Advertising.”
“Where?”
“Posters, flyers, the internet.” Warming to the topic, she ticked the items off on her fingers. “Does the clinic have a website or media pages?”
That got her the blankest look she’d ever witnessed, and she laughed. “Never mind. I’ll find out, and if we don’t have them, I’ll set them up. Most of that stuff is free, and you can reach tons of people with every post.”
“You know how to do all that?”
“Not yet, but I will. The center is too important to let it go down without a fight.” While she outlined her plan for learning what she needed, a smile crept across his tanned features until it warmed his eyes to a greenish-gold color even a skilled artist would be hard-pressed to capture. “What?”
“You’re amazing, y’know that? You’ve been here a week, and already you’ve come up with a way to make life better for all those animals and the people who care so much about them.”
“It’s not that big a deal,” she insisted, feeling self-conscious about the praise. “I just want to do something to help.”
“I know,” he murmured, his smile deepening to something she couldn’t quite define. “That’s what makes you amazing.”
Because it was Drew, she knew he meant it. Smiling back, she felt the part of her that had been cowering in the shadows for so long take a tentative step back into the light.
And then, as if that wasn’t enough, he offered her something she’d never consider asking him for. “A campaign like that sounds pretty ambitious for one person, so if you need a hand with anything, let me know. I can’t do any of the technical stuff, but I’ve got a nice digital camera for taking pictures to use online or on flyers.”
“You’re a photographer?”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” he admitted with a chuckle, “but I love hiking and kayaking, and whenever I go fishing I usually come back with more cool nature shots than fish. Not to mention, the undeveloped land around the farm is a great place for taking pictures.”
“I can imagine. I haven’t gotten around to much of the area yet, but what I have seen is absolutely beautiful.”
“Fall is pretty, but spring and summer are gorgeous. If you stick around long enough, you can see for yourself.”
Was he asking her to stay? she wondered briefly before discarding the notion as ridiculous. She was hardly the type of woman a handsome, charming man like Drew Kinley would be interested in as more than a friend. Then again, there had been something unusual in the look he gave her when he told her she was amazing.
But she knew where those sorts of looks led, she reminded herself sternly. Nowhere good. Now that she was getting back on her own two feet, she had no intention of risking her newfound security by ceding even a slice of her life to anyone else.
Thanks to Richie, she’d suffered through enough romantic complications to last her a very long time. Maybe forever.
* * *
Saturday afternoon, Drew stopped by the clinic with his camera to get started on his new assignment as a wildlife photographer. After snapping a picture of the dainty fawn in the outside baby corral, Drew checked the viewfinder. She was cute enough, but something was missing. When he noticed Bekah brushing a llama someone had dropped off, he realized what his photo needed. “Hey, Bekah—got a sec?”
“Maybe,” she replied in a suspicious tone. “What do you want?”
“A model.” He’d meant to flatter her, but judging by the glare he was getting now, he’d missed the mark entirely. “I mean, someone to pose with the fawn. She’s adorable, but I think it’d be an even nicer shot if we showed one of the people who’ve been taking care of her.”
“Sierra’s the one you should use, or one of the volunteers who have been here so long. They do all the hard stuff.”
“But they’re not as pretty as you.”
“Will you stop?” Despite her protest, she laughed, which was what he’d been after in the first place. “I’m no prettier than anyone else who works here.”
He disagreed wholeheartedly. A steady diet of his mother’s cooking and a string of good nights’ sleep had done wonders for the raggedy waif who’d blundered into town with a broken-down car and a nasty case of cynicism. She still wasn’t the most outgoing person he’d ever come across, but she no longer ducked her head when she met new people coming into the center. Not to mention, she’d proven to be a quick study at everything she attempted.
Even Sierra was impressed, he mused with a grin. And she was notoriously hard to please.
Since he didn’t want to push Bekah into accepting his compliment—however sincere it might be—he deftly switched tracks. “So, will
you help me, or is this little deer-y on her own?”
“I don’t know what the other girls in town tell you, but you are so not funny.” Rolling her eyes at his play on words, she finished with the llama and walked over to join him. “What do you want me to do?”
“Just play with her like you do when you feed her in the mornings. It’s really cute, and I think we’ll get some good shots out of it.”
“Okay.”
She wound her ponytail around the top of her head and picked up her discarded ball cap from a nearby bale of hay. When she pulled it down low, it shaded her face so he couldn’t have recognized her in a single-person lineup. Confused by the costume change, he frowned. “What’re you doing?”
“I don’t mind being in the background, but I don’t want my face splashed all over the internet for people to see.”
People, meaning Richie, Drew added silently. He wished there was some way for him to assure Bekah that she was finally safe from her abusive ex, but he’d been around long enough to understand she had to come to that realization on her own. “All right, we’ll do it your way.”
She rewarded him with a bright smile, and he decided that giving in to her just this once hadn’t been so bad, after all.
Catching the small deer around the shoulders, Bekah took an apple slice from the pocket of her coveralls and held it in her palm for the critter to sniff. Once he’d gotten some stills, Drew discreetly toggled his digital camera into video mode to catch the sight and sound of a true animal lover doing what she did best.
“Who’s a good girl?” Bekah cooed, scratching the fawn up and down her back in a motion that made the animal squirm with delight. When the attention stopped for a few seconds, the deer butted against her in an unmistakable demand for more. Laughing, Bekah obliged her, and Drew kept the camera as steady as he could while he held in his own laughter.
There was nothing quite like watching her with the animals, he thought in honest admiration. It didn’t take a genius to guess that she felt a connection with these lost and abandoned creatures, and they seemed to sense her compassion for them. She loved them, and they knew it.
