Free Secrets of a Summer Night (Stone Gap Mountain) by Kay Stockham Page A

 
    Because he was propped awkwardly against the side of the house, she hadn’t yet noticed. Good news was that appeared to be his most serious injury. His circulation was good, stomach soft beneath hard, toned abs that flexed when she touched him. “You’re right about the shoulder. We’ll get a wrap on you for transport to help hold it steady, but the doc will have to reset it.”
    It was a struggle to speak in a normal tone, especially when she had her hands all over him and his hot, hot body. That really ought to be part of the training. How to not get distracted when the patient was fiiiiiine.
    “I’m never gonna live this down. I’ve never fallen off, not in all the years I’ve been roofing.”
    She smiled at the depressed tone. “Just think of it as taking a mini vacation and getting a tour of the ambulance and hospital.”
    “And getting to spend time with you?”
    Air froze in her lungs, and before she could think of a witty reply, Jim and the other two EMTs on duty appeared.  
    “Good to go?” Jim asked.
    “Yeah,” she said, more than a little breathless and kind of dizzy herself—all from Rand’s comment and nearness.
    “You’re coming with me, right?” Rand asked. “To hold my hand?”
    Her work buddies looked at her in amusement. It wasn’t the first time she’d gotten hit on by a patient, but typically the men were either elderly or drunk.  
    Laney ignored her squad partners, knowing she’d catch some ribbing later for Rand’s flirting, and huffed out a laugh. “They’re my ride. I have to go with you.”

CHAPTER TWO

    Sometime that evening Rand opened his eyes and stared at the white wall across from him, trying to remember what the hell he’d done to hurt so much. It came to him seconds later, right before he realized he wasn’t alone in the room.  
    “Hey,” Laney said simply.   “You’re looking better.”
    She smelled like smoke. Not cigarette smoke but— “What happened to you?”
    She shifted in the chair and shrugged. “Fire run.”
    “Anybody hurt?”
    She shook her head and got up, moving close to his bed.  
    “No. I had to come back for some paperwork and wanted to stop by and check on you. You were sleeping so peacefully I didn’t want to wake you.”
    “You should have. It’s not every day I get to see your pretty face.” Even in the dim light of his hospital room, he saw the blush that flooded her face with color. For a woman who had spent the last few years bartending for her father, Rand found it amazing she could blush at all given what she had probably seen and heard. “You’re missed at The Ace.”
    “Dad just misses the cheap labor.”
    “I wasn’t talking about him,” Rand said, the words more revealing than he’d like.  
    Over the years, he’d watched Laney grow from a gangly young woman into a knockout beauty who turned every man’s head between the ages of nine and ninety. But he was almost fifteen years her senior and too old to be thinking about his friend’s eldest daughter in such a way. It wasn’t right. And there was the small fact that Frank would kill him, no doubt about that.
    So why was it every time he saw her, he felt like someone slammed him in the gut with a wrecking ball? He was too old for her, and he would never be able to face his friend if Frank found out. “Frank still giving you a hard time about quitting the bar?”
    “He wouldn’t be Dad if he didn’t,” she said dryly. “Emma’s been picking up my hours, but I’ve gotten several calls from Dad about how I left him in the lurch despite giving him six months’ notice.”
    Buddy or not, Frank could be a stubborn ass when he wanted to be, yet another reason Rand didn’t want to tangle with Laney’s father over something so personal.  
    He’d thought about asking Laney out more than once—mostly after a few drinks at The Ace with Laney smiling at him from the other side of the bar—but he didn’t want to cause a ruckus in her family, or ruin a