Too Fast to Fall (Jackson Hole 1.10)

That was when his heart had dropped into his gut with the weight of a locomotive. She hadn’t answered her phone. She hadn’t called anyone. Jenny was gone and she’d never even pass through Jackson again.

But no. She was coming back. His heart was racing for no reason. She was fine.

He glanced down at the box on the seat next to him, then back up to the road, and his eye caught on a flash of yellow coming on fast. Of course it was coming on fast. It was Jenny Stone.

For the first time in twenty-four hours, he felt his mouth stretch into a smile. “Jesus, you idiot,” he muttered, thinking he meant Jenny and her speeding, but realizing that he meant himself.

She flew past with a whoosh and Nate shook his head and pulled around to follow her. “Unbelievable.” He didn’t catch up at sixty, so he hit the siren and pushed the pedal to the floor. This woman was…she was…fucking beautiful and maddening and alive and he couldn’t let her get away.

He couldn’t.

* * *

JENNY GLARED AT THE ROAD in front of her, watching for slippery patches and roaming elk and trying not to consider that she was taking a big step in her life. She was just driving home. She was just rushing to get into work. She needed to take a shower and dig out some clean clothes so she could get to the saloon on time, because she was determined to never be late again. It would take months to work off the embarrassment of having not shown up for a shift. Her stomach twisted with shame.

She’d been working since she was fifteen, and she’d never ditched a shift, or shown up drunk, and she’d definitely never behaved so badly that she’d been fired from her position of twenty years. “Focus,” she ordered herself, pissed off that she’d been thinking of her mom so often lately.

“Focus,” she said again, but the word ended in a wail of shock when she glanced over and saw a flash of blue-and-red lights in her side mirror. Then the cry of the siren caught up with her own wail until she shut her mouth with a snap.

Her eyes jumped down to the speedometer, but she’d already lifted her foot from the pedal, so she had no idea how fast she’d been driving.

Even she couldn’t understand half of the expletives that began flowing from her mouth, though she managed to repeat a few favorites several times.

Slowing, she pulled to the shoulder, then edged onto gravel out of fear of the semis that frequented this highway. By the time she stopped, her hands were slippery with sweat and she wiped them over and over on her jeans.

Please don’t let it be Nate. Please don’t let it be Nate.

She’d rather it be an unsympathetic stranger who’d throw her straight into jail than to have to face Nate like this. Cowardly and shamed and throwing all her promises about speeding back in his face one more time.

Jenny scrambled to open the glove compartment to grab her insurance information, but she crumpled it in her hand when she heard the thud of a closing car door. Tears clouded her eyes. She didn’t want to look. She couldn’t.

But she did. And when she saw Nate walking toward her, his sunglasses off, her tears dried as if they’d never formed. This was too horrifying for crying. All she could do was stare straight ahead as she rolled down her window. All she could do was wait for it to be over.

His body blocked the window. “Jenny,” he said. She didn’t look. “Hey.”

She shook her head and held up the insurance information. “I’m sorry,” she rasped.

He didn’t answer. She didn’t breathe.

“Damn it, Jenny, I don’t need that.”

Right. She dropped her hand and stared down at it. “I’m sorry.”

“Stop saying that.”

When she finally tried to draw a breath, she couldn’t force it past the lump in her throat.

“Please look at me.”

No. She didn’t want to see his face. She didn’t want to see his eyes. Why did this have to be the one time he wasn’t wearing glasses?

“Please,” he said again, and she looked up. Just so he’d get this over with and let her go. She couldn’t bear it another—

“What’s that?” she asked, blinking in shock at the big red velvet box in his hands. Special handcuffs just for her? But it wasn’t just a box. He held it toward her and she saw that it was heart-shaped. “What are you doing?”

“It’s for you.”

“But why?”