Page 30 of Silent Threat
“They deliver. But as long as you have this monster, I wouldn’t mind skipping the delivery fee.”
As she stepped between his car and hers, she caught sight of her employee ID card on her driver’s seat, so she grabbed that and put it back into her purse.Must have fallen out last night.Then she climbed up into the pickup.
“Big, right?” His voice dripped with manly satisfaction.
“As far as environmental impact goes? Might as well set the Redwood National Park on fire.”
“I don’t think the National Park Service would agree.” He sniffed toward her cup. “That doesn’t smell like coffee.”
“Herbal tea. Hibiscus pomegranate.”
He shook his head as he started the engine. “That’s not normal. You know that, right?”
“Considering the effect caffeine has on the nervous system, everyone should—”
He raised his index finger between them. “If you bad-mouth coffee, I don’t think we can be friends.”
She watched him as he drove out of the parking lot.
Friends.Is that what they were becoming?
Not really.
He was her patient. In a few weeks, he would be gone. He shouldn’t need a lot more time in intensive therapy than that. What the staff did at Hope Hill worked.
Annie liked seeing patients getting better and stretching their wings, flying away. And she’d be happy for Cole when he did the same. If she felt a pang of something else at the thought of him leaving, she shoved the knowledge away.
“Might as well stop by the feed store on the way over.” She gave him directions. Best to just focus on the work.
At the store, she picked out what she needed and asked for help with loading the truck. While she was chatting with Maddie at the counter, the woman’s eyes rounded as she openly ogled Cole through the window. She was forty, newly single, and definitely enjoying the freedom to look.
Annie turned, her gaze snared by the sight of Cole tossing fifty-pound feedbags into the back of the truck one-handed. And when Maddie sighed, Annie might have echoed her.
Then she snapped out of it and ran. If he hurt himself, the physical therapist was going to strangle her.
“Cole!” But because she was behind him, he couldn’t hear her, so she had to tap his shoulder.
“What?” he turned, his gaze immediately snapping to her mouth. He wasn’t even breathing hard.
“Don’t hurt yourself.” As soon as the words were out, she knew she shouldn’t have said them.
A hard look came into his eyes. “I’m not useless.”
“That’s not what I meant. Obviously, you’re stronger one-handed than I am with two. But you’re still recovering.”
“No.”
“No what?”
“I’m not recovering.” The words came out clipped. “I’ll never berecovered. My right arm will never regain full movement.”
Her heart fluttered and maybe bled a little. But the last thing he’d want was her pity.
So she said, “Let’s not pretend you can’t do twice what normal men can, with one arm tied behind your back. Honestly. To be frank, this kind of petty whining is completely unappealing. Also unbecoming a Navy SEAL.”
She passed him and put the milk for the skunks into the cab. When, from the corner of her eye, she saw him shaking his head and going back to work, she got into the cab without offering to help.
A couple of minutes passed before he slid behind the wheel next to her. “Don’t think I don’t know you’re trying to manipulate my emotions with some kind of therapist ninja tricks.”
