Free Country Courtship (The Texas Two-Step Series, Book 2) by Kathy Carmichael

Bobby Gray ran for the turtle, reached down to pick it up—and began yelling. Kelli was horrified to see him waving his arm and, with it, the entire huge turtle in the air.
    Abruptly he flung the reptile into the water. What a jerk. Bobby Gray's yells turned to screams—of pain?
    When Kelli caught up with him, she planned to do some yelling of her own about animal cruelty, but the look on his face and the blood creeping down his arm made her throat freeze.
    Maybe...
    She looked into the water and got her first close-up view of the Chelydra serpentina. Okay, so most people probably knew it as the North American snapping turtle.
    "Are you okay?"
    Bobby Gray stood stock still, clutching one of his hands in the other. Red droplets continued forming.
    "Did he sever your finger?"
    "I think he ate half my hand!"
    "While snapping turtles are carnivores, they don't usually go after anything larger than ducks." She tried to wrest his hand out to where she could see it.
    "Shows what you know." He kept a tight hold on his injured paw. "Haven't you ever heard of evolution?"
    "Animals' eating habits don't generally evolve unless their food sources dry up."
    He nodded toward the turtle and his eyes flashed with a dangerous glint. "You think those things survive on golf balls?"
    "Just let me see your hand."
    He didn't reply. He merely twisted away from her to keep his injury out of her reach.
    "I. Am. A. Doctor. Let. Me. See. It."
    "You administer vaccines to small mammals. That hardly makes you qualified to treat human dismemberment."
    She felt the urge to perform a little dismemberment on him. Her profession was far more complicated than that—even on the dull days. She ground out, "Give me your hand. Now."
    Her way-past-angry tone must have gotten through to him because he relaxed his grasp and lifted his fingers a little so she could glimpse his injury.
    All of his digits were intact, but a nasty bite discolored his left pointer. Bobby Gray appeared relieved when he, too, saw that none of his fingers were missing.
    "Let me staunch the bleeding," she said, turning to grab the first-aid kit out of her golf bag, but realizing she'd left it on the eighteenth fairway when she'd run after Bobby Gray. She did have a mainly clean washcloth—she carried it to wash dirty golf balls—tucked into the waist band on her pants. The green was dry and she'd used the cloth only once.
    Careful to keep the used side away from the poor cowboy—considering his reaction to his injury, he'd probably freak if he saw the bit of clean dirt coming even a little near his injury—she took his hurt hand in hers and applied pressure. Soon the wound closed up.
    Which was good, because being that close to him made her really nervous. He'd been quiet, a little too quiet for her comfort. She looked up and lost her way in his dark lashes and bright green eyes. Rather than his usual wide grin, he displayed a serious expression and she didn't think it was from pain. At least not injury kind of pain.
    What was it then?
    Passion? At the thought, she released his hand and took a step back, almost falling off the bridge and into the murky pond.
    He reached out with his good hand and gently, yet firmly, grabbed her. "Careful."
    He wasn't sure how long they stood that way, his palm clasping her wrist. He sensed rather than felt the pulse in her wrist quicken. Her eyes widened, as if she were alarmed. Her soft breath fanned out across his face as she met his gaze.
    He'd felt their shared energy of mutual attraction before, but what now passed between them was far more significant. Something inside him flared, grew and reached out to her.
    Abruptly she shielded her gaze from his beneath a lock of hair, breaking the connection that held them both mesmerized.
    "I'd better catch up with Dad," she whispered. She practically ran back to the eighteenth hole.
    He didn't want her to leave. He wanted whatever was happening between them to continue and strengthen until he could neatly