Rose was unlocking the door to the vet clinic when Colt showed up. She immediately blushed; part of her had hoped that he would just decide she wasn’t worth it.

Instead, he was here, smiling that movie star smile. Peering at her dogs, momentarily corralled in the Volvo.

Too good to be true! shouted a voice inside her head.

She scowled at him.

“Hey,” he said, holding up two toolboxes. “I’m not sure what we’re doing, exactly.”

“Uhhh…” was all she managed.

He walked up beside where she had unlocked the doors, and put down the toolboxes. She didn’t mean to, but she took a step back.

There was something about Colt that reminded her of him, of Jared Chalke. She wasn’t sure if it was that he was self-assured, or handsome… God, was he handsome.

But there was something about the tall, dark, and muscle-bound type that she just couldn’t trust.

“Maybe you should go,” she blurted out.

The words were out of her mouth before she could tame them.

He looked confused.

“No, I’m like… free labor,” he explained, as if she misunderstood his presence. “The welcoming committee, like. I’m here to help.”

She bit her lip, and looked at the clinic. Yeah, it would be emotionally easier for him to go… but it would be practical for him to stay.

“Okay…” she said, blowing out a breath. “Let me get the dogs out of the car.”

She walked over to the car and let the dogs out. When she turned around, he was backing up toward the building, looking wary.

“They’re well-behaved,” she said. “Promise.”

“Ehhh…” he said, brows raised. “It’s not that. It’s just that no matter how well-behaved big dogs are, they want to sniff… That can throw me off balance.”

The dogs crowded him, sniffing but not harming him in any way.

She stopped, confused. “What do you mean, throw you off balance?”

She watched as he looked down, then back at her.

“Uh… I’m missing a foot,” he said. “All the way to the shin.”

Rose put a hand to her heart, looking at his feet. She whistled to the dogs, who came and sat near her feet obediently.

He looked perfectly normal. When she continued to study him, he grimaced and pulled his pant leg up. She couldn’t see the foot, as it was in the shoe, but the leg was assuredly cool, hard metal.  

And all she could come up with was, “Oh!”

He dropped the pant leg with a shrug.

“It’s not a big deal.”

Rose felt her face grow pink again.

“I didn’t mean… that is, you shouldn’t have had to show me your injury.”

His lips twitched.

“It happened when I was serving overseas, in the SEALs.” He seemed to inflate slightly at that.

“You were in the military?”

He screwed up his face. “Yeah.”

“Well… thank you for your service,” she said, feeling a bit lame as she said it.

“Yeah, well… Anyway…”

He looked as if he would rather not get into it.

She shook herself. “Yeah. Yes. Ummm…”

He gave her that million-dollar smile again.

“Where do we start, boss lady?”

Boss lady… that’s me, she thought.

“Umm, I have a list,” she said, waving him inside. He gave the dogs a watchful eye, then followed. “We’ll need to sweep and dust, paint… reline and redo the driveway… clean the gutters…”

He raised his brow.

“That’s a lot,” he said.

“Well… I mean, I can pay for someone to do the heavy stuff…”

“Pfft, that’s what I’m here for,” he said.

“Well, what about your…”

She stopped, unsure how to continue.

“My disability?” he said, lips twitching again. “Other than not having a leg from the ankle down, there’s not a whole heck of a lot that I can’t do. Trust me, people have tried to keep me out of things, and failed.”

He said the last with a note of determined pride.

Rose nodded. “Okay. Well… let’s do some things, then.”

“What did you have in mind?”

“I guess we should clean the gutters first,” she said, walking out a little so she could see them.

“I can do that, if you want.”

“Yeah… that’d be nice. I can start dusting and sweeping. Honestly, there’s a couple days worth of work there, at least.”

“Okay,” Colt said. “I guess I’ll get to work. Is there a ladder?”

“Around the side of building.”

“Okay. I’ll get to it, then.”

Rose nodded. She watched him walk over and pick up the only ladder from the side of the building. Noticed the way his muscles rippled as he lifted it…

She turned away. Yeah, like you need a hot guy in the mix right now, she thought. She rolled her eyes at herself as she headed inside.

She looked around. Best to start dusting up high, that way when she swept she would carry it away. She grabbed her feather duster.

Climbing up on a chair, she prepared herself for a lot of dust in her hair and on her clothes.

She set about dusting the ceiling first, then the top half of the wall. She sectioned off the walls as she went.

By the fifth small section of wall, she was sneezing and sweating. She looked at her watch. She’d been working for nearly an hour. The dust she couldn’t do anything about, but with any luck the air conditioner worked.

Rose climbed down off the chair, walking by the entrance to the air conditioner, an old window unit. She stopped midstep, staring.

He was drinking from a water bottle, looking away from her. That wasn’t the bad part, though.

Colt had taken his shirt off… and looking at him was absolutely devastating. He was ripped and tattooed, from the smoking hot line of his shoulders to the dip in his back, the one that made his ass look so…

Delicious.

He turned around and caught her staring. “I got hot. You don’t mind, I hope?”

“N-no,” she said, forcing her gaze away.

That was all right, because she’d gotten enough of a look at his pecs, his arms, and his washboard abs to be turned on.

Holy shit, she thought. I’m turned on. I didn’t think after… I didn’t think I could be…

He looked at her funny, and then wordlessly pulled his shirt back on.

She spoke up. “It’s really okay…”

Colt looked at his watch.

“It’s not that,” he said. “It’s just, I see my brother Sawyer and his son Shiloh coming over here. I figure my brother probably wants to talk business. We own a dude ranch.”

“Oh,” she said, shoulders sagging a little. “I mean… of course. You should go.”

“Let me introduce you real quick,” he said.

He buttoned his shirt as he waited for the other two to join them. She looked at the man approaching, did a double take.

“Are y’all twins?” she asked.

“Nah,” Colt said.

She called the dogs over, ordering them to sit and stay. Colt waited for his brother, introducing her when he was close enough.

“Sawyer, this is Rose Elliott. She’s the new veterinarian.” He put a hand on the boy, who was clearly related. “And this is Shiloh.”

“Nice to—” she started, only to have Shiloh shock her by running to her and hugging her knees. “Meet you…”

“Hi. I’m sorry, he’s a little…” Sawyer tried to explain, then trailed off. “Shiloh, let the nice lady go…”

He let go, only to launch himself at the dogs, who wagged their tails in excitement. Luckily they were well-trained, so they stayed put.

“Dogs!” Shiloh squawked.

Colt swooped in and grabbed Shiloh. “Sorry.”

“It’s not a problem,” Rose said, smiling a little. “I wish that all my customers were so enthusiastic.”

“I’ll be by on Wednesday morning,” Colt said. “The weekend’s pretty laid back around these parts, and then I have some ranch business to attend to.”

“Okay.” She bit back the retort she was going to make, about how she’d grown up an hour from here.

“Nice to meet you,” Sawyer said.

“You too.”

She gestured to the dogs to stay put.

Sawyer held out his arms to take Shiloh as they left. It was only then that she noticed Colt’s limp, more noticeable the farther away he got.

She felt a pang. She might not know him that well, but he was obviously in some kind of pain.

Rose turned to look at the gutters. They were clean as a whistle, a hard task for anyone to complete in just over an hour.

She checked her watch, and then motioned for the dogs to move freely. After she took the dogs home, she would still have plenty of time to visit Shelby’s sick horse.

She locked up the clinic and dropped the dogs off, leaving them outside with the gate to her yard closed.

She drove out to Shelby’s farm, almost half an hour out from town. It was a scenic drive, with flat marshy land broken up by hills here and there.

River Farm had waist-high sugarcane fields, something that Rose didn’t see too much these days. She spotted a two-story main house, done like a log cabin. Not many windows or doors on the house either; Shelby’s house was definitely old-school.

Rose pulled into their circular drive, parking behind several large pickups. She got out, bringing her vet bag, and eyeing some ominous clouds that had sprung up while she’d been driving.

It was early October, so it was still the rainy season here in Louisiana. Hoping it wouldn’t rain her out, she wished she’d had time to construct better shelter for the dogs.

That thought in mind, she hurried up the path to the house. She didn’t even make it to the door, though. Shelby stuck her head out the front door. She was looking perfect in a t-shirt and short shorts, Rose noted with some jealousy.

When Rose was a teenager, her mother had burned modesty into her brain. She got the if you got it, flaunt it thing, but she couldn’t do it.

“Hey! One second,” Shelby said.

She disappeared, only to reappear with a rain slicker on. She held a second one out to Rose.

“Here, you might need this,” she said.

“Oh, thanks…” Rose took it, tucking it under her arm.

“The horses are usually kept in a pasture way on the other side of the farm, but I had my brother Micah bring Stella into the barn out back,” Shelby said, gesturing past the house. “Come on.”

Shelby led her around the corner of the house, across her wide backyard. She opened the big rolling door of a barn, then waved Rose in first.

Stella was the only horse in the barn, and quite beautiful. Dark gray, with white dappling on her forelegs.

“She’s pretty,” Rose said as they approached.

“I know, right? Remy says I spoil her because of it.”

They reached the stall, and once she opened the door to the stall Rose could see that the mare was fairly far along.

“The mare’s testy.”

“Gotcha. Let’s have a look.” She stepped into the stall and ran her hands over the mare, who was gentle and sweet. “She’s biddable, huh?”

“Yeah. I used to ride her a lot.”

Rose nodded, moving her hands down to the horse’s belly. She noticed that the horse’s ears went back, and Stella began to shift from foot to foot when she ran her hands underneath.

She moved around, running her hands down each of the horse’s back legs. The shifting stopped. She ran her hands under the horse’s belly again.

This time the horse practically danced, trying to get away from Rose’s touch. Rose stood up with a frown.

“She seems healthy, but she’s doesn’t want me to touch her low in her belly,” she said.

“So… what?”

“So, there might be nothing wrong, but I would keep her close. I’ll come check on her in a week, if that’s all right.”

Shelby pulled a face. “I told Micah and Sawyer that something was wrong with her. I can feel it.”

“Sawyer?”

“Sorry. Sawyer Roman. He’s married to Remy, so he’s my brother-in-law. And he’s really nice, but he thinks he knows everything there is to know about horses.”

“Oh, I uh… met him. His brother Colt is helping me fix up my veterinary clinic. I guess he did something that made the local judge angry.”

“Colt? Probably got into a fight at The Speckled Hen.”

“A fight?” she said, raising a brow.

“Yeah. He can’t seem to resist punching out guys who pick on him about his foot. It’s like… I get it, but how many times can you get into trouble over the same thing?”

“Ah. Well…” Rose said, trailing off.

Shelby leaned against the barn wall, looking speculative.

“Do you think he’s hot? I can totally see it,” she said. “I mean, not for me, but for you?”

“Um, no,” Rose said. “No thanks.”

Shelby grinned. “Maybe later.”

“I should be going,” said Rose, ready to put an end to that conversation. She grabbed her vet bag. “I’ll come back next week to check on Stella.”

She handed Shelby the rain slicker she hadn’t used.

“Okay,” Shelby said, patting Stella goodbye. “I’m pretty sure I’ll see you in town before that, though. I teach piano lessons part time, privately. I’m always in town.”

“All right,” Rose said. “Well, I’ll see you then.”

Shelby nodded and went toward the house. Rose couldn’t help but think of Colt as she drove home, of his penchant for fighting.

Just one more reason why you don’t need him in your life, she thought.

She got home and fed the dogs, made dinner, and then took a shower.

As the hot water coursed down her body, she closed her eyes and bit her lip. She hadn’t… touched herself since the rape, but…

For some reason she couldn’t stop thinking about the way Colt had looked earlier, when he’d had his shirt off. The strong muscles in his back, the perfection of his abs…

The dark line of hair from his navel that led down…

She slid her hand down and massaged her clit, telling herself that she wasn’t thinking of him. It was just… it had been almost a year…

And he was close at hand, with an amazing body.

Simple as that.

She kept going, a consistent pressure, until her knees were weak, until she was panting for breath. She imagined she was on top, that she had control, hitting all the right spots. He was just along for the ride, enjoying everything she did…

She came suddenly, unexpectedly. It shuddered through her, made her feel warm and lazy. She stood and enjoyed the aftershocks, mixed with the hot water washing down her body.

Well… at least I’m not broken, she told herself. I mean, I just got myself off to someone I barely know, so that’s weird… but I’m not broken.

She turned off the water and got out of the shower, trying not to think about the fact it was Friday and that she would have to face him again on Wednesday.

She shook her head and wrapped herself in a towel, wondering what she would do then…