Hot Target

“Yes,” she replied. “What I need is up.” And away from his bare chest and temptation, so she could tend to her knee. “Tie the shirt or whatever you are going to do and let me get up, please. I’m feeling claustrophobic.” Translation—hot—for him.

“We should go to the E.R.,” he said, doing as she wished, tying his shirt around her leg.

“Not a chance,” she said. “I’ll be fine.” She pushed to her feet. Her damn knee wobbled, and Luke caught her a second before she was going down. Pain rocketed up her thigh. She rested her head on his shoulder. “Not now,” she murmured, emotion wrenching her chest the way the tendons were her leg.

Inhaling through the pain, she cursed the vulnerability that her knee created. She was going to have to have help getting inside, but it felt bigger than that. She’d spent the past year working to be strong, to deal with losing her parents and to help her sister do the same, and her new career had offered a positive way to do that. And now her sister was in trouble and the assignment she was on, which would get her out of that trouble, was fast tumbling into disaster. She glanced up at Luke, holding on to his arm. “It’s my knee, Luke. But I’m supposed to be taking care of you, and—”

“Why don’t we take turns?” he suggested, his arm wrapping around her waist, a solid foundation that was comforting and secure. The fingers of his free hand slid under her chin. “I’ll take care of you now. You can take care of me later?”

Something about the way he looked at her, the way he said those words, made her melt inside. It was definite: Luke got to her in a big way. Though she was quite certain that right now, in pain, with him shirtless and holding her, was not the time to make any conclusions about how to deal with their relationship, or lack thereof. Especially since in that moment, she really could not bear the idea of never kissing this man again.

“Okay, then,” she conceded. “I just need to lean on you to get inside.” Suddenly, she was gasping as she was scooped up in his arms. “What are you doing, Luke?”

“Letting you lean on me,” he said. “Now let’s get you to the E.R.” He was already walking toward the house.

“No!” she blurted, clinging to his neck. “No E.R. I just need ice, something to kill the pain and a bandage. That’s all. I’ll be fine. It’s too close to your first game for us to be in the E.R. rather than dealing with the reason I’m here—those letters.”

Luke keyed the security code, shoved open the door to the kitchen and set Katie down at the informal dining table. He quickly grabbed another chair to prop her leg up on.

“I’m going to get blood on the chair.”

“I don’t care about the damn chair, Katie,” he said, lifting his shirt and checking her wound. “You’re going to the E.R.”

“No, I—”

He lifted the shirt all the way off and wiped the wound, which filled with blood instantly, but not before she saw the huge gash. “Okay,” she agreed in frustration. The cut was deeper than she’d thought. The pain in her knee had overshadowed the rest. “I’ll go to the E.R.” She motioned to his bare chest and long, muscular legs. “But you might want to consider putting some clothes on first.”

He tied his shirt back around her leg. “I’d really hoped to have you ordering me to take my clothes off, not telling me to put them back on.”

“It must be a sign,” she said. “You’re meant to keep them on.”

“I don’t believe in signs,” he assured her. “Just hard work. I’ve always worked hard for what I want.” He leaned down and kissed her hurt knee. “And I want you, Katie.”

***

A LITTLE PAST EIGHT in the morning, with Katie lying down in the passenger seat sleeping and a new day’s sunshine already promising to be scorching hot, Luke pulled his truck into his driveway and parked.

Though he wasn’t one to throw his weight around and ask for special privileges, when he was given the chance to slip Katie into a private E.R. room for fast attention, neither of them had complained. She had six stitches in her calf and a swollen knee she refused to have X-rayed, insisting no E.R. would be able to help her. He hadn’t been inclined to disagree. It was a chronic problem, and she needed a specialist. Being that she wasn’t at home near her regular doctor, Luke intended to lend her the team doc later in the day. For now, he wanted to get them both some rest.

Katie sat up and stretched, a moan following that she tried to hide. “I guess that pain pill they gave me knocked me out,” she said. “I hate those damn things.”