Page 21 of Lucky Cowboy

While still close, he pressed his lips to her temple. It was a fleeting feel of feather light softness, there one minute and gone the next, yet it felt as natural as anything she’d ever experienced before. Then, in short order and with a friendly if wistful wave, he was gone.

CHAPTERNINE

For a by-the-book guy,Mark sure felt like he’d been bending the rules in excess lately. Mostly it’d been during that single incident when he’d driven straight to Billings to help Val, but part of him felt as if he’d been slipping. He simply didn’t care as much about dotting every I and crossing every T. Any chance he got to spend time with Val Bernard, no matter for how long or in what capacity, he would take.

And that was something he’d never found acceptable for anyone but his family.

He couldn’t feel too bad. Val had been in a tough spot. She’d needed him, so he’d come to her aid. She was going through so much right now, and he wouldn’t be a decent human if he ignored her. They’d developed this bond with each other, one he didn’t know how to describe or define.

He honestly wasn’t sure what to call their connection.

He couldn’t refer to it as neighborly since they weren’t technically neighbors. Nor could he fall back on this being something he did as a law enforcement officer executing his rounds. There was so much more to his interactions with Val, but since they were hardly ever in the same physical location as the other, it was hard to determine what that might be.

With her being not quite but almost within arm’s reach for a few days, however, he’d made a concerted effort to visit with her. His office worked on a rotating shift that included nights, weekends, and even holidays, but since it meant that after that morning he’d be off the following day, it worked out in his favor.

Thinking he’d surprise her, he drove over to Billings unannounced, only to discover her pacing back and forth in the waiting area in a frenzy. Her gorgeous long hair appeared tangled, and as he watched her drag her fingers through it, they caught, making her flinch.

“Val?” He couldn’t have prevented himself from inquiring after her if he’d tried. And he didn’t plan to try any such thing.

“Mark? What are you doing here?”

“Thought I’d surprise you with some moral support. Is something going on?”

“Dad’s incision is infected. At first, they just gave him some different antibiotics, but now they’ve taken him back to surgery.”

Seriously? Talk about her and her dad having to endure too much.

“What can I do?” he asked, and that was when she registered what he’d been holding.

“What’s all that?”

Before heading up to the third floor, he’d made a side trip into the gift shop. He’d picked out some Get Well balloons for her dad and the biggest bouquet of flowers they had for her. The spray had a collection of all sorts of flowers, but the only ones he recognized were the roses and tulips. Tulips were his mom’s favorite.

“Something to cheer you both up.”

He handed them over, and she took a whiff of several of the blooms. They were astonishingly colorful for a hospital gift shop, and the mixture of fragrances made him think of spring gardens even though it was now full summer.

“Why are you so thoughtful?” she asked, sounding distressed. “I don’t understand.”

Bewildered, he held his ground as she began pacing again, this time holding the bouquet out in front of her as she walked. “What don’t you understand?”

“What are we to one another, Mark?”

He could’ve been a statue. He’d never had such a discussion with a woman before. Not with any woman. He’d never been serious enough with a woman to get to this point, but he knew it had to be handled with a bit of delicacy.

“What do you want us to be?”

“We’re friends, I think.” She spoke as if in some stream of consciousness. As if he wasn’t standing there. “But we also feel like more than that. Or at least, like we could become more than that. Maybe.”

She glanced over at him, then approached, setting the bouquet on a chair beside him. He felt like she’d hit the ball into his court. “What are you asking me, Val? Are you asking if we can be more than friends?”

“No,” she said, sitting next to the flowers and patting the seat on her other side. His heart sank, but he sat as she clearly intended him to. “But what if I did?”

Treading carefully, he said, “If you did, I think I’d like that.”

They were now sitting side by side with their shoulders touching, their heads facing forward. They sat there for a long time, neither speaking, but Mark felt perfectly content to sit here with her, relishing her presence.

Staff members came and went. Patients were wheeled by. Family members filled the opposite side of the waiting area, only to depart again to traipse further into the hospital. Val didn’t follow up on their conversation. It seemed unnecessary. Like they were speaking with telepathy rather than having a more traditional talk.

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