For a doctor dedicated to healing the human body, he
certainly knew how to punish his own. Jake Dalton rotated
his shoulders and tried to ignore the aches and pains of
the adrenaline crash that always hit him once the thrill
of delivering a baby passed.
He had been running at full speed for twenty-two hours
straight. As he drove the last few miles toward home at
2:00 a.m., he was grimly aware that he had a very narrow
window of about four hours to try to sleep, if he wanted
to drive back to the hospital in Idaho Falls to check on
his brand-new patient and the newborn baby girl's mother
and make it back here to Pine Gulch before his clinic
opened.
The joys of being a rural doctor. He sometimes felt as if
he spent more time behind the wheel of his Durango on the
forty-minute drive between his hometown and the nearest
hospital than he did with patients.
He'd driven this road so many times in the past two years
since finishing his internship and opening his own
practice, he figured his SUV probably knew the way without
him. It didn't make for very exciting driving. To keep
himself awake, he drove with the window cracked and the
Red Hot Chili Peppers blaring at full blast.
Cool, moist air washed in as he reached the outskirts of
town, and his headlights gleamed off wet asphalt. The rain
had stopped sometime before but the air still smelled
sweet, fresh, alive with that seductive scent of
springtime in the Rockies.
It was his favorite kind of night, a night best suited to
sitting by the woodstove with a good book and Miles Davis
on the stereo. Or better yet, curled up between silk
sheets with a soft, warm woman while the rain hissed and
seethed against the window.
Now there was a particular pleasure he'd been too damn
long without. He sighed, driving past the half-dozen
darkened shops that comprised the town's bustling
downtown.
The crazy life that came from being the only doctor in a
thirty-mile radius didn't leave him much time for a social
life. Most of the time he didn't let it bother him, but
sometimes the solitude of his life struck him with
depressing force.
No, not solitude. He was around people all day long, from
his patients to his nurses to his office staff.
But at the end of the day, he returned alone to the empty
three-bedroom log home he'd bought when he'd moved back to
Pine Gulch and taken over the family medicine clinic from
Doc Whitaker.
On nights like this he wondered what it would be like to
have someone to welcome him home, someone sweet and soft
and loving. It was a tantalizing thought, a bittersweet
one, but he refused to dwell on it for long.
He had no right to complain. How many men had the chance
to live their dreams? Being a family physician in his
hometown had been his aspiration forever, from those days
he'd worked the ranch beside his father and brothers when
he was a kid.
Besides, after helping Jenny Cochran through sixteen hours
of back labor, even if he had a woman in his life, right
now he wouldn't be good for anything but a PB&J sandwich
and the few hours of sleep he could snatch before he would
have to climb out of his bed before daybreak and make this
drive to Idaho Falls again.
He was only a quarter mile from that elusive warm bed when
he spotted emergency flashers from a disabled vehicle
lighting up the night ahead. He swore under his breath,
tempted for half a second to drive on past.
Even as the completely selfish urge whispered through his
brain, he hit the brakes of his Durango and pulled off the
road, his tires spitting mud and gravel on the narrow
shoulder.
He had to stop. This was Pine Gulch and people just didn't
look the other way when someone was in trouble. Besides,
this was a quiet ranch road in a box canyon that dead-
ended six miles further on — at the gates of the Cold
Creek Land & Cattle Company, his family's ranch.
The only reason for someone to be on this road was if
they'd taken a wrong turn somewhere or they were heading
to one of the eight or nine houses and ranch-ettes between
his place at the mouth of the canyon and the Cold Creek.
Since he knew every single person who lived in those
houses, he couldn't drive on past one of his neighbors who
might be having trouble.
The little silver Subaru didn't look familiar. Arizona
plates, he noted as he pulled in behind it.
His headlights illuminated why the car was pulled over on
the side of the road, at any rate. The rear passenger-side
tire was flat as pancake and he could make out someone — a
woman, he thought — trying to work a jack in the damp
night while holding a flashlight in her mouth.
He bade a fond farewell to the dream he had so briefly
entertained of sinking into his warm bed anytime soon. No
way could he leave a woman in distress alone on a quiet
ranch road.
Anyway, it was only a flat tire. He could have it changed
and send the lost tourist on her way in ten, fifteen
minutes and be in that elusive bed ten minutes after that.
He climbed out and was grateful for his jacket when the
wind whistled down the canyon, rattling his car door. Here
on the backside of the Tetons, April could still sink
through the skin like a thousand needles.
"Hey, there," he called as he approached. "Need a hand?"
The woman shaded her eyes, probably unable to see who was
approaching in the glare from his headlights. "I'm almost
done," she responded. "Thanks for stopping, though. Your
headlights will be a big help."
At her first words, his heart gave a sharp little kick and
he froze, unable to work his mind around his shock. He
instantly forgot all about how tired he was.
He knew that voice. Knew her.
Suddenly he understood the reason for the Arizona plates
and why the Subaru wagon was heading up this quiet road
very few had any reason to travel.
Magdalena Cruz had come home.
She was the last person he would have expected to
encounter on one of his regular hospital runs, especially
not at 2:00 a.m. on a rainy April Tuesday night, but that
didn't make the sight of her any less welcome.
A hundred questions jostled through his mind, and he drank
in her features — what he could see in the glow from his
vehicle's headlights anyway.
The thick hair he knew was dark and glossy was pulled back
in a ponytail, yanked through the back of the baseball-
style cap she wore. Beneath the cap, he knew her features
would be fragile and delicate, as hauntingly beautiful as
always, except for the stubborn set of her chin.
Though he didn't want to, he couldn't prevent his gaze
from drifting down.
She wore a pair of jeans and scarred boots — for all
appearances everything looked completely normal. But he
knew it wasn't and he wanted more than anything to fold
her into his arms and hold on tight.
He couldn't, of course. She'd probably whack him with that
tire iron if he tried.
Even before she had come to hate him and the rest of his
family, they'd never had the kind of relationship that
would have been conducive to that sort of thing.
The cold reality of all those years of impossible dreams —
and the ache in his chest they sparked — sharpened his
tone. "Your mama know you're driving in so late?"
She sent him a quick, searching look and he saw her hands
tremble a little on the tool she suddenly held as a weapon
as she tried to figure out his identity.
She aimed the flashlight at him and, with an inward sigh,
he obliged by giving her a straight-on look at him, even
though he knew full well what her reaction would be.
Sure enough, he saw the moment she recognized him. She
stiffened and her fingers tightened on the tire iron. He
could only be grateful he was out of range.
"I guess I don't need help after all." That low voice,
normally as smoothly sexy as fine-aged scotch, sounded as
cold and hard as the Tetons in January.
Help from him, she meant. He didn't need her to spell it
out.
He decided not to let it affect him. He also decided the
hour was too damn late for diplomacy. "Tough. Whether you
need help or not, you're getting it. Hand over the tire
iron."
"I'm fine."
"Maggie, just give me the damn thing."
"Go home, Dalton. I've got everything under control here."
She crouched again, though it was actually more a half
crouch, with her left leg extended at her side. That
position must be agony for her, he thought, and had to
keep his hands curled into fists at his side to keep from
hauling her up and giving her a good shake before pulling
her into his arms.
She must be as tired as he was. More, probably. The woman
had spent the past five months at Walter Reed Army
Hospital. From what he knew secondhand from her mother,
Viviana — his mother's best friend — she'd had numerous
painful surgeries and had endured months of physical
therapy and rehabilitation
He seriously doubted she was strong enough — or stable
enough on her prosthesis — to be driving at all, forget
about rolling around in the mud changing a tire. Yet she
would rather endure what must be incredible pain than
accept help from one of the hated Daltons.
With a weary sigh, he ended the matter by reaching out and
yanking the tire iron out of her hand. "I see the years
haven't made you any less stubborn," he muttered.
"Or you less of an arrogant jackass," she retorted through
clenched teeth as she straightened.
"Yeah, we jackasses love driving around at 2:00 a.m.
looking for people with car trouble so we can stop and
harass them. Wait in my car where you can be warm and dry."
She was still holding the flashlight, and she looked like
she desperately wanted to bean him with it but she
restrained herself. So the Army had taught her a little
self-discipline, he thought with amusement, then watched
her carefully as she leaned against the trunk of a nearby
tree, aiming the beam in his direction.
He was a doctor with plenty of experience in observing the
signs of someone hurting, and Magdalena Cruz's whole
posture screamed pain. He thought of a million more
questions for her as he quickly put on her spare tire —
what medication was she on? What kind of physical therapy
had her doctors at Walter Reed ordered? Was she
experiencing any phantom pain? — but he knew she wouldn't
answer any of them so he kept his mouth shut.