The Damaged Heroes Collection [Box Set #1: The Damaged Heroes Collection] (BookStrand Publishing Mainstream)

by James, Sandy

  “Sheila! Need you!” Ross yelled.

  His thirty-something secretary poked her head through the door a few seconds later. “Yeah?”

  “I’ve got to go to Montana. Can you book a flight?”

  “Montana? Are you sure planes actually go there? Something as technologically advanced as an airplane might frighten the locals,” she replied with a smirk.

  Though he normally appreciated her sense of humor, Ross scowled. “I’ll need a rental car, too. And get the address and whatever papers Arthur needs signed.”

  She wrinkled her brow. “You’re really leaving? Who gave you parole?”

  “You’re a riot, Sheila. Just get it done.”

  Chapter 2

  “What kind of brain-damaged person drives around in a friggin’ sports car during a blizzard?” The cup of cocoa Laurie had been sipping when she saw the car through the kitchen window now sat on the counter cooling while she was walking through a blizzard.

  Trudging through the nearly blinding snow, Laurie muttered to herself as she made her way to the half-buried Sebring. The cold air burned her lungs. Her legs had already begun to ache from exertion. She quickly worked up a sweat from the effort it required to move in the thigh-deep snow. Sticky and cold, what a wonderful feeling.

  Exhaustion had set in by the time she reached the convertible. Her initial agitation had morphed into concern. The Circle M ranch house and barn were the only structures for miles. She was the only hope for anyone stranded in that car. The cold drained her strength, and she was terrified she would find someone unable to walk back to shelter.

  This whole situation seemed like a bad TV-movie. Frozen to Death: The Laurence Miller Story.

  Brushing the clinging snow away from the driver’s side window, she pressed her forehead to the glass, trying to see if anyone was still inside. Huddled up on the seat was a guy the size of a Chicago Bear dressed in nothing more than a suit and an overcoat. Panic sizzled through her. She pounded on the window, hoping for a reaction but got none. With her heart slamming a fast rhythm in her chest, she tugged at the door handle. Locked. Damn it.

  “Mister! Hey, wake up!” she shouted as she beat her fist against the window. “Come on, wake up!” But the guy didn’t move.

  She trudged around to the passenger’s side and tried that door. Much to her surprise, the silly thing opened. At least she wouldn’t have to try to pry through the convertible’s thick top to get to the man.

  She slammed the door against the snowdrift several times before it would open wide enough for her to slip her tall frame inside. Unfortunately, once she got inside the car, so much snow slid past the door that she couldn’t manage to pull it closed again.

  Shit, this is not good—not good at all.

  Pulling off a mitten, Laurie touched the man’s face to see if he was still alive. Although his lips had turned a pale shade of blue, his cheek was warm to her touch and she could see small puffs of his breath coming from his nose. She breathed a quick sigh of relief, but it was short-lived. She had to get the big lummox back to the ranch house before they both froze to death.

  Laurie gave the man’s cheek a small slap to try to rouse him, but he just sat there. Not a peep, not a twitch. She slapped a little harder. Nothing. Damn it. When she hauled her hand back to really let him have it, she found her wrist caught in a cold grip as strong as a tightened vise.

  “Don’t.” The man could talk after all.

  “Sorry,” she offered. “I was afraid you were a goner. We need to get you somewhere warm.”

  The man scowled at her. “Hey, you’re letting the snow in. Shut the door.”

  You’re quite welcome. Laurie rolled her eyes and jerked her mitten back on her hand. “Merde. If you didn’t notice, the snow won’t let me. Are you coming back with me now, or do I just leave you here?” Not that she really would.

  “Where... where are we going?”

  Realizing how slurred his words had sounded, Laurie began to understand. This guy had already slipped deep into hypothermia, and she needed to get him warm. Quickly. “My house. Come on.”

  “Why don’t we just drive?”

  Man, he was really out of it. “Come on,” Laurie encouraged again. “I’m taking you home.” She hit the lock mechanism to open the driver’s door and pushed her way out of the car. Kicking as much snow aside as she could, she was able to close the passenger door.

  After some frantic digging, the driver’s door finally opened enough for him to fit through. She tugged at his overcoat to encourage him to move. Without his assistance, Laurie knew it was a futile task. She might be sturdy, but this guy was way too tall and muscular for even someone as strong as her to drag. “Help me out here. Come on. Don’t you want to get warm?”

  “Um. Warm.”

  Laurie decided to try a different tack. “Did you play sports?”

  “Football,” the caveman mumbled.

  “Fine.” This guy must have some conditioned behaviors left from a youth spent on the gridiron. “Get off your lazy ass. Move it. Move it. Move it.”

  Surprisingly, he obeyed. Laurie allowed herself a small victorious smirk.

  “Let’s go. Come on, Sport, we’ve got a game to win.”

  The man shuddered. The cold felt more intense outside the car than inside, but she needed to get him to shelter. The snow still fell in thick flakes that clung to his hair and face.

  Laurie worked her way back to the ranch house, trying to cajole and push the man the whole way. To her utter amazement, they made it. Once she’d pulled him inside the kitchen, she was almost too exhausted to move. Unfortunately, if she didn’t help the man, he’d still be in danger.

  After removing her sodden parka and boots, Laurie shivered in her sweat and snow-dampened clothes as she knelt down next to where he sat like a lump in one of the wooden kitchen chairs. She tugged hard at his overcoat before she finally peeled the heavy, wet garment off. Removing anything that was still damp, Laurie reduced him to nothing more than a t-shirt and boxers. Even his wet socks were gone. She grabbed a dishtowel to dry his damp brown hair, but resisted the urge to rub the cloth along his whitened skin because she didn’t want to do any more damage than the cold had already wrought.

  “Come on. Let’s go in by the fire.” She took his hands to pull him to stand. His size intimidated her, and she’d need his cooperation to get him to go anywhere. While she always considered herself strong, this guy was as solid as a rock. Pure muscle. She figured he must weigh at least seventy pounds more than she did, and there was no way she could move him on her own.

  For a moment, she hoped the guy wasn’t some psychotic serial killer. Did they drive convertibles?

  Nah. They drove Volkswagen Beetles, like Ted Bundy.

  Laurie did have a quick wish that his stupor wasn’t just an act to lull her into complacency. He didn’t look dangerous.

  But neither did good ole Ted.

  “I liked it better outside,” the man muttered. “Warm... hurts.”

  “I know, Sport. Re-warming sucks.” She took one of his cold hands and led him to the great room. He shuffled after her to a sofa situated in front of the stone fireplace. At least he wasn’t giving her a hard time.

  The man yawned, opening his mouth enough Laurie could see his molars. “I wanna sleep.”

  Laurie couldn’t help but smile at him. He sounded so much like a child. “Okay. We’ll get you warm then you can get some sleep.”

  Laurie made him sit on the sofa and then wrapped her afghan around his shoulders. Shivering in her own wet clothes, she realized that she would be of no help to either of them if she allowed herself to catch a chill. “Stay here. I need to change.” Leaving the warmth of the fire, she ran up the staircase as quickly as her exhausted legs could manage.

  After changing to dry clothes, Laurie rushed back to the living room. Tying her damp hair into a ponytail, she knelt on the floor in front of the worn-out man. He hadn’t moved since she went to change. He hadn’t even opened up his e
yes long enough for her to determine their color.

  She reached out to check his bare feet, horrified to discover how cold they still felt. Her education in medicine didn’t go beyond basic first aid, and she couldn’t even call Deepika for advice because there wasn’t a cell tower close enough to the Circle M to provide a signal. The landline had died earlier that day, around the same time the electricity had gone out.

  Acting on instinct, Laurie picked up the man’s feet and lifted her shirt. Taking a deep breath, she pushed the soles against her stomach. The shock of his cold flesh touching her skin stole her breath away and knocked Laurie from where she knelt back onto her heels. The sensation didn’t appear to be much more pleasant for the man. A groan escaped his lips, but he still didn’t open his eyes.

  As she sat with his feet pressed to her, she almost laughed aloud at the thought that it was the first time she appreciated not being skinny. At least she had some padding to absorb the shock of the cold.

  With his feet warmed, Laurie pushed them aside and rose back up on her knees. She reached out for his hands. All she could think when she touched them was that they felt like cold wood. So stiff. Pulling him to lean forward she laced her fingers through his, touched him palm to palm, and tried to will her warmth into his body.

  Once the shock of his icy flesh slowly passed, it dawned on her that she couldn’t read the man. No small burst of fear over almost freezing to death. No tiny bit of curiosity as to who she was. No… anything. He was nothing more than another blank slate. The second their hands had touched, she should have been able to get a line on his emotions. But nothing emanated from him except cold shivers.

  Much as she wanted to curse over her loss, Laurie pushed her own frustration aside and focused on her poor, cold guest. She sat back and put his feet against her stomach again. Relieved that they no longer felt like two enormous icicles pressed to her bare skin, she was wondering what to do next when the man groaned in pain. Having been caught in the cold a few times herself, she knew how much the re-warming process hurt. And she’d never experienced as severe a case of hypothermia as this man suffered. He probably hurt like hell.

  Pulling away from him, Laurie ran to the kitchen to get some ibuprofen and a glass of water, hoping the medicine would help keep his pain to a minimum. She made sure he choked down the pills and all of the drink before she put the glass aside and sat down next to him on the sofa. He turned his head for a moment and looked at her.

  Brown. His eyes were a warm brown. He yawned again and closed his eyes.

  The guy simply sat like a lump, probably even more exhausted than she felt. Throwing herself off the sofa, she went to the woodpile and pitched several large logs onto the roaring fire. If she fell asleep and allowed it to burn out, their only heat source would be gone.

  Turning back to the couch, she lifted the afghan from around his shoulders. “Lie down. Time to get some sleep.” Like a giant doll, he bent to her will. To share her body heat, she stretched out next to him and covered them both with the thick afghan. He wrapped his arm around her shoulders.

  It’s just an instinct, Laurie. Don’t read anything into it.

  After only a few moments, he drifted off to sleep. His breaths came slow and even, and the rhythm relaxed her. Laurie felt a bit daring as she sat up a little to lay her ear upon his chest to listen for the steady beat of his heart. She took comfort from the cadence.

  Lowering her head to his shoulder, she threw her arm around his chest and sighed at the luxurious feeling of embracing another human being. She never enjoyed this type of close human contact. The ability to read emotions forced her to keep some physical distance, otherwise her mind would be overrun with chaos. The only people she could really hug were her parents and friends, but even then, she read them the moment their skin made contact.

  Whenever Laurie touched someone, she lost track of which emotions were hers and which were being gleaned from the other person. If the emotion was strong, she could simply look into his eyes to have that feeling sweep into her head. Skin on skin made it impossible to ignore the other person’s emotions. It had taken her years to gain enough control over her gift to be able to do something as simple as shaking a person’s hand.

  She could never even kiss a man goodnight after a date. If she tried, and the guy held even a hint of lust, it would be difficult for her to pull away and bring a halt to the whole episode because strong emotions could be overpowering. Adolescence had been almost unbearable. Her own hormone-driven feelings were difficult, but when coupled with a teenage boy’s over-fueled emotions, it was enough to drive her crazy.

  Perhaps one good thing came from the loss of her gift. At least she could touch this man, snuggle against him, without losing her own thoughts and feelings. She drew her knee up and rested her leg over his. This felt nice. Very nice.

  Just how much had she missed in life?

  Laurie snuggled a little closer. She liked the way he smelled. Maybe it was a brand of cologne she had never noticed before or the type of soap that he used. Whatever it was, his scent pleased her. Masculine, warm, and more than a little exciting.

  The Goliath rolled to his side, pulling her higher up on his chest and closer into his arms. Laurie sighed again. She stared at his sleeping face. His cheeks had turned red now, so he was obviously warming up. She liked his wavy, brown hair and his eyelashes of the same dark color. They fascinated her. And he wasn’t one of those guys with an unsettling unibrow. His eyebrows were thick, but not overly so. The light brown stubble on his face looked so inviting she couldn’t resist running her fingertips across the cleft in his chin and his full cheeks. A small bump in his nose told her it had been broken at one time, but she thought that the feature gave his face a bit of character.

  Their noses almost touched, and Laurie couldn’t resist the urge to give the handsome man an Eskimo kiss as she lightly rubbed the tip of her nose against his.

  When he didn’t wake at the contact, she became bolder. Touching was such a luxury! She ran the pad of her finger across his lips. They were soft and full. And so very kissable. The sensations running through her were downright intoxicating.

  This is what life was like for all the other mortals on the planet, Laurie realized with a fair amount of envy. They could touch without a surge of another’s emotions blazing a path directly to their brains and drowning them in feelings that weren’t their own. They only knew what they felt.

  She’d never even enjoyed a real kiss. Twenty-friggin’-nine years old and never enjoyed a kiss!

  Before she could talk herself out of it, she lightly pressed her lips to his. When his big brown eyes fluttered open, Laurie wanted to die of embarrassment. But then something amazing happened.

  He put his hand behind her head and pulled her back into the kiss. At first, Laurie’s eyes flew wide open, but the longer the man’s lips played on hers, the more she began to melt. She closed her eyes as she savored the moment. When his tongue swept into her mouth, her toes curled.

  I could get used to this.

  The man pulled away and stared into her eyes. “You’re awake,” she said as a hot flush spread across her cheeks.

  “Um. I guess,” he replied. “Do I know you?”

  “Do you remember being stuck in the snow?”

  “Yeah. No. Maybe... maybe a little?”

  Laurie brushed her fingers across his cheek. “It’s okay. You’re exhausted. Let’s just sleep. We can talk later.”

  He didn’t argue with her. “‘Night, Katie,” he muttered right before he slipped back to sleep.

  Laurie was smart enough to realize the man still didn’t know who she was, and she tried not to feel too insulted. For a moment she envied this “Katie.” This man obviously loved her a great deal. She didn’t remember seeing a wedding ring on the man’s hand, so she didn’t have to feel too awfully guilty about wanting to continue touching the gorgeous guy. Surely his girlfriend would understand that all she had really done was keep him warm.

 
At least that was the lie Laurie told herself before she fell asleep.

  Chapter 3

  Ross opened his eyes and recognized nothing. All he could feel was confused. He was holding tight to a strange woman who seemed to be sound asleep and snuggled up next to him like a warm, contented feline. The confusion didn’t lift.

  Think!

  The last things he could vividly recall were the spinout that threw his rental car off the road and into a ditch and then sitting and watching the snow come down so thick he couldn’t see ten feet in front of him. He remembered quite a bit of a sarcastic obituary he’d composed when he thought he might freeze to death. The picture it painted wasn’t pretty.

  Ross Joseph Kennedy. Would have been thirty-one—if he had only managed to make it to March. Died in a freak blizzard in Somewhere-No-One-Should-Visit, Montana. Survived by his mother, his sister Cheryl, and an aquarium full of saltwater fish. Celibate for at least the last twenty-four months. Worked more than he should have for people who didn’t appreciate his efforts. Mourned by his secretary, Sheila Crabtree, and his fish.

  Most everything after that only came in snippets and disjointed fragments.

  Someone had obviously pulled him from the snow. Did a tow truck come? He couldn’t remember.

  And just exactly who was this woman?

  Ross looked down to see if he recognized her, but her head was tucked neatly against his shoulder, and all he could only see some honey-blonde hair pulled into a loose ponytail. Her deep, even breaths brushed short bursts of heat on his neck and were driving him to distraction.

  Did he remember her eyes being an incredible shade of blue? Maybe. What was her name? Not a clue.

  She seemed mighty comfortable with one arm thrown around his waist and the other tucked next to his side. One of her knees was bent so that a leg draped over his thighs as her other leg stretched out and seemed to touch every inch of his. Even more baffling was how comfortable he felt holding her and how perfectly she fit in his embrace. A quick flash of the yin-yang symbol formed in his mind—two perfectly matched pieces.