“Whatwhat’slike?” she asked with undisguised concern.
“You can’t understand how it feels.” He dropped his fist to his chest, daring that damn morgscle to defy him again, to fail to carry out its responsibility. “You haven’t ever...” An invisible band around his chest began to crank down, cutting off hisair supply and making his heart pound so loudly in his head he struggled to hear anything else. “I think I’m having a heart attack.”
Her grip on his face tightened. “Look at me, Tyson.”
He shook his head, two short, fast jerks of the chin. “Get off me. Go get help. Please.”
“If I call your brothers, they’re going to bring in paramedics. Given the remoteness of the ranch, you’re going to end up with a Life Flight helicopter in your front yard and guests ogling the cowboy they’ve only heard about but haven’t ever seen. They’re going to airlift you to Amarillo where they’re going to give you something from the benzodiazepine family of meds to get you to calm down.”
“Move!” he wheezed. He pulled her biceps and twisted his hips, trying to move her.
No luck.
“First you have to look at me.” The unforgiving authority in her voice demanded he comply.
Fear gripped him with all the fury of a pit bull after a fresh bone. All his life he’d been written off as someone who needed micromanagement, a dreamy-eyed kid with his head in the clouds and a quick smile that lacked substance. That stopped now. He was a grown man, and it was about time people started treating him like one. He’d survived more in the past two months than most people encountered in a lifetime, from the injury to the loss of memory to the pain of recovery. Resentment burned in him as he met her stolid stare.
“Tell me where you are.”
“Under you.”
One corner of her mouth kicked up. “Do you remember the last time you were there? It was in Fort Worth.”
“I can’t—”
She continued, talking over him. “You said it wasn’t where you wanted to be then, either.”
“Clearly, I was an idiot. Now move.”
“Clearly.” She stroked his hair off his forehead. “I didn’t hurt you then, and I won’t hurt you now.” Continuing with the soothing motion, she talked. And talked. And talked some more. She told him about her favorite nice restaurant—San Francisco Steak House—and how she’d once driven seventy miles just to get to her favorite drive-through burger joint—Whataburger.
She told him how she’d had to argue with the salesman when she’d bought her last pickup truck because the man believed “a lady should never need four-wheel drive.” That particular story had been delivered with several eye rolls.
She told him how she’d ended up getting drunk in college one night when she and some friends had gone bowling. She’d allegedly bowled the best game of her life—274—chomping on an unlit cigar and sporting a Hawaiian shirt she’d won off an elderly man on the neighboring lane. It was all alleged because she couldn’t remember anything after the third game. And then she’d grimaced as she recounted the raging hangover the following morning.
She told him how she’d missed her senior prom because, even at seventeen, horses had mattered more than boys, and she insisted she’d never been as boy crazy as her friends had.
“Not until you met me anyway.”
Kenzie smiled down at him, the look in her eyes no longer challenging but rather filled with humor and the warmth of good memories. “Sweetheart,” she said as she waggled her eyebrows à la Groucho Marx, “you were never a boy.” She leaned forward and gently nipped his chin. “You still drive me crazy, though.”
His hands moved of their own volition, coming to rest on her bare hips. “Feeling’s entirely mutual.”
“What are we going to do about that?” The question, while delivered in a light tone, had a thread of seriousness woven through it.
He considered her, tracing his thumbs over the slight swells of her hips, letting them dip into the shallow depressions in front of her hip bones. “Hard to say. You going to keep talking me down from panic attacks?”
She lifted one shoulder in a casual shrug. “Why not? I can’t do anything with the horses. Not until the snow melts anyway. How long does it usually stay on the ground?”
“Could be days, could be weeks. Never can tell around here.” He shifted under her, settling his burgeoning erection against her core. “About the panic attacks—I suppose we’ll have to work something out. You’re a hell of a lot cheaper than my prescription.”
He had the sinking feeling she would prove herself to be far more addictive, though.
12
KENZIECOULDHAVElolled around in bed all day without complaint, but there were chores to be done. With snow on the ground, it was all the more important that the animals were taken care of. She’d see to Indie and Gizmo, but she had no intention of doing it alone. Nope. If she had to hog-tie and drag him, Ty would come along.
Standing at the foot of the bed, jeans in hand, she considered the man lounging amid the rumpled sheets and wadded-up pillows. “You look thoroughly pleased with yourself.”