Page 14

WELL AT LEAST TELL ME YOU’RE SAFE!

Jodie grinned at Mac.

I’m safe, I promise. I’m at an ER clinic now, waiting to get my ankle looked at. He’s here with me, and I promise, promise, PROMISE I’m in good hands.

Then she added:

LITERALLY in good hands at a couple points.

A pretty pink blush spread over her cheeks.

A door beside the receptionist desk opened and a nurse in scrubs leaned out. “Jodie K?”

“That’s me.” Jodie raised her hand.

The nurse nodded. “Hang on, I have a wheelchair for you.”

Well, that dashed Mac’s hopes of putting Jodie ‘in good hands’ again.

An hour later, they were back in Mac’s truck in the parking lot, Jodie with a new lace-up brace on her ankle, both relieved that it was only a mild grade 2 sprain and not a break. She’d refused crutches, saying that the pain meds had kicked in and she could put a little weight on it now. Mac still helped her to the truck, and insisted on driving her home.

“But my car is still at the trailhead. Take me back there. It’s my left ankle. I can drive.”

Mac put his phone into its holder on the dash and brought up the navigator. He started the engine for the air conditioning but left it in park.

“Yeah, no, I’m taking you home to rest. If you give me your car keys, I’ll get Colin to come with me and get your car.”

Jodie looked glum as she turned toward the window. “But then that’s putting him out, too.”

“Hey.”

She looked back over at Mac.

“It’s okay to let friends help you, Jodie.”

Wait, friends? Did I just friendzone myself?

Her expression fell even further. “I know.” She rubbed her hands over her thighs, almost absently. “But I just hate this.”

“What? Being helped? Or the ankle?”

“Yes. Both. The whole damn thing.” She gestured vaguely. “Being clumsy and falling. Not being able to get myself down the trail. Having to be carried around like a sack of potatoes. I’m such a weakling.”

“Last thing I’d call you is a sack of potatoes,” Mac said, remembering how soft her thigh had felt under his hands and her warm breath tickling his neck every time she laughed. “Or weak. You carried yourself just fine six miles up that mountain before you got hurt.”

“Yeah, sure. Straggling behind Dale.” She gave him a frustrated growl. “I used to be stronger than this. It’s embarrassing.”

Mac swallowed down his fury at Douchy Dale for making her feel like anything less than the goddess she was.

“You’re injured, Jodie. That’s not the same thing as weak.”

Mac wanted to say more, to tell her there was not a blessed thing weak about her. That he had watched her quietly manage—and often prevent—the chaos at Watchdog without anybody realizing how much she did. That she had more grit in one little finger than Dale had in his entire protein-powdered body.

“Tell me where you live. I’ll get you home, get you settled, Colin and me will pick up your car. You’ll feel better after that.”

Jodie studied him for a moment, then some of the tension went out of her shoulders.

“Okay.”