Parker by Maddie James Read Free Book Online Page B

turn to sigh. “Great. Because I
want to ask her out to dinner.”
    Parker stood there. What?
    Mike backed up a few steps. “Hey, I have to
run. One of the nurses will get with you when Reba is ready to be
dismissed.”
    Mike wants to ask Reba out?
    That did not sit well with him. Not at
all.
    ****
    Three hours later, Reba found the silence in
the truck cab almost deafening. Oh, they had shared a bit of small
talk on the way out. Parker had asked how she was feeling, what the
doctor said. She avoided his questions with simple, one-word
responses. He didn’t need any more details than what she wanted to
supply.
    She was still a little miffed at his
insistence that she see a doctor, and even more so that she’d just
had to fork over two hundred and fifty big ones for the emergency
room visit, with the promise of a bill to come.
    It wasn’t that money was super tight. It was
simply that she had pretty much depleted the funds in her account
with the move and the renovations, and she was waiting on another
check to come from Jack’s pension any day now. She didn’t like to
run things so close to a zero balance.
    The quiet between them in the truck cab was
unnerving, though. She didn’t want to be rude, but what was
Parker’s problem?
    He had been cordial, of course, and very much
a gentleman—always the quintessential cowboy, she had noted—but his
disposition had turned into one of those moody man moods she
found so incredibly unbecoming.
    Just wallow in it, Mr. Personable .
    Not her problem. For a few more miles,
anyway.
    Oh, hell… “I suppose I should thank
you for getting me to the hospital and sticking around to take me
home. Even though I didn’t want to go in the first place.” She
didn’t look at him but spoke to the windshield.
    He pretty much did the same. “Just being a
good neighbor, Ms. Morris,” he said.
    Hmm . When had she become Ms.
Morris ? “I wasn’t going to let you pay for my bill, Parker. So
you can just get over that.”
    He didn’t respond.
    “I realize you are used to being in control,
getting your way and all that. Big tough alpha cowboy who likes to
ride up, swoop in, and save the damsel in distress. But I’m here to
tell you, I don’t need saving. I can take care of myself.”
    Reba glanced over to look at his profile.
    Parker huffed. “Never said I was any of those
things.”
    You don’t have to say it. You ooze it. “Well, it’s more than implied. It’s the way you carry yourself, the
way you walk. The way you look at a woman like you could…” Devour her . “Never mind.”
    She jerked her gaze back to look at the road. His gaze was now fixed on her face. She could feel the
heat.
    “Anyway, I don’t need saving,” she muttered
again, softer.
    “Maybe not. Maybe just someone needs to look
out for you.”
    She whirled. “Oh, really? And you think you
are that someone?”
    He looked straight at her. “Maybe.”
    Reba clamped her lips shut tight and looked
out the passenger-side window. A strange little tingle shot up
inside her and settled behind her breastbone when he’d said that
single word. Maybe . What did he mean by that? “I’m perfectly
capable of taking care of myself. I’ve done it for a very long
time, and I’ve turned out fine so far, thank you very much.”
    “That so.”
    She twisted back to look at him. “Yes. That’s
very so!”
    He glanced her way. “Look in the mirror,
Reba.”
    “What?”
    “Look at yourself. You have a splint on your
arm, your eye is black, you passed out cold from lack of food and
water—and you don’t need protecting?”
    “I don’t! I am capable!” Why did she feel the
need to justify herself to this man?
    “Look in the mirror.”
    “Why?”
    “Just do it. Pull down that visor and have a
look at yourself. Have you lately?”
    Frustrated, Reba did what he said. She jerked
at the visor, sending dust and a few receipts flying, and then
snapped open the mirror. And gasped.
    “Oh, my God. My eye. My face!”
    Her