Date with a Cowboy: Iron Cowboy / In the Arms of the Rancher / At the Texan's Pleasure. Diana Palmer
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hall. Seconds later, Tony stuck his head in the door.
“You like spaghetti?” he asked.
“I love it,” she replied, smiling.
He smiled back. “I’m just about to take up the pasta,” he said. “It fell off the wall when I threw it there, so it’s got about two minutes left before it’s al dente.”
“Al who?” she asked.
He glowered at her. “Al dente,” he repeated. “Just right for the teeth. When you throw it at the wall and it sticks, it’s just right to …”
“What the hell have you done to my kitchen wall?” came a roar from down the hall.
“I have to check that the pasta’s ready!” Tony called to him.
Jared stomped down the hall, glaring at his bodyguard. “You’ve got streaks all over the damned paint!”
“They wipe off, boss,” Tony assured him. “Honest.”
“You couldn’t just stick a strand of it in your mouth and chew it to see if it’s ready?” Jared grumbled.
Tony’s eyebrows arched. “Who bit you?” he asked.
Jared’s face was like iron. He looked furious. “The bread’s burning.”
Tony rushed back down the hall without another word.
Jared glared at Sara. “Harley Fowler’s in the living room.
He stopped by to see about you.”
“That’s nice of him.”
“Nice.” His green eyes were glaring. “I don’t have time to run a hospital complete with visiting hours,” he muttered.
She flushed with embarrassment. She hadn’t expected Harley to come looking for her.
Jared backstepped at her expression. She’d just had surgery and he was acting like a jealous boyfriend. He caught himself and tried to relax. It didn’t work. Harley was poaching on his preserves. “I’ll send him in. Don’t encourage him to stay long or drop in unexpectedly again without calling first.”
“I won’t,” she began, but he was already halfway down the hall before she got the words out. She felt terrible. She was imposing on him. She should never have suggested that they take care of each other when they got sick. It was apparent that Jared already regretted agreeing to it.
Harley didn’t look much better than Sara did. His lips were compressed and he was carrying his wide-brimmed Western straw hat.
“How’re you doing?” he asked.
She sighed. “I’m feeling much better,” she said.
“You don’t look it. Why don’t I phone Lisa and see if you can stay with her and Cy until you’re back on your feet?” he suggested.
“I really don’t need looking after,” she replied. She felt uneasy. “Harley, do you think you could drive me to my house?” she added in a low voice.
He scowled. “You’re not well enough to look after yourself, Sara. You won’t even be able to lift a gallon of milk until that incision heals.”
“I don’t drink milk and I want to go home.” She pulled herself off the bed, grimacing because it hurt. Jared had her pain capsules, but she’d be damned if she was going to ask him for them. It was clear that he didn’t want her here.
She moved to the foot of the bed. She’d forgotten that Jared had carried her down the hall. Walking it was going to be an ordeal, and she didn’t dare ask Harley to carry her, although she knew he would if she asked.
Harley’s arm shot out and caught her as she began to weave. “Here, you’re not able to do this, Sara,” he said firmly.
“What the hell are you doing?”
Jared walked right around Harley, picked Sara up and put her back in the bed. “Stay there,” he said shortly.
She flushed again. “I will not! I just asked Harley to drive me home.”
Jared felt his height decrease. “You’re not able to stay by yourself yet.”
“I am so,” she retorted.
Jared glared at Harley as if the whole thing was his fault.
“You’ll take her out of this house over my dead body,” Jared told the younger man. He said it very softly, but it was a threat. Harley had seen eyes like that over the barrel of a gun. The hair on the back of his neck stood up.
“I’m in the way here,” Sara interrupted, sitting up. She winced and held her incision with her fingertips. “I’ve got frozen TV dinners and I need to get back and take care of Morris, anyway!”
“I fed the cat today,” Tony the Dancer said from the doorway. He was wearing a huge white apron and holding a slotted spoon. He frowned. “Something wrong here?” he queried when he tallied up the taut faces.
“She’s trying to escape,” Jared muttered.
“Hey, don’t you listen to him,” Tony said firmly, pointing the spoon at Jared. “It was only the one time I dropped baking soda in the sauce by accident. This sauce is perfect. You don’t need to run away on account of my cooking.”
“You cook?” Harley exclaimed, looking at the tall, muscular man with the olive complexion and wavy black hair in a ponytail. He looked as dangerous as Jared Cameron. And Harley had reason to know what dangerous men looked like.
Tony glared at him. “Yeah. I cook. What’s it to you?”
Harley actually moved back a step. “Nothing at all!”
“Lots of men cook,” Tony said belligerently. He glanced back at Sara and frowned. She was near tears and she wouldn’t look at Jared. Tony’s threatening expression melted into concern. He moved to the side of the bed. “I made you a nice apple strudel for dessert,” he coaxed, “with freshly whipped cream.”
She bit her lower lip. “You’re so nice, Tony,” she said, trying to sound normal even as her lower lip quivered.
“Here, hold this.” Tony put the spoon in Jared’s hand and sat down beside Sara, tugging her gently against him so that he wouldn’t hurt her. A hand the size of a ham rested against her back, covering almost half of it comfortingly as he drew her head to his broad shoulder. “Now, now, it’s all right,” he said softly.
She bawled. Jared and Harley glared daggers at the big man, but neither of them said a word.
Harley shifted on his feet. “Sara, I’ve got to get back home. You call me if you need anything, okay?” he added with a speaking glance at Jared.
“I will,” Sara said in a thin, sad voice. “Thanks.”
“No problem. See you.”
He hated leaving her, but the whole situation was getting out of hand. That big fellow who cooked wasn’t going to let Jared Cameron hurt Sara in any way. Harley knew she’d be safe, or he wouldn’t have budged.
Jared walked out of the room behind him, totally disgusted, still carrying the spoon.
Six
Tony tugged a tissue from the box on the bedside table and dabbed it against Sara’s wet eyes.
“Now you stop that,” he said, smiling gently. “The boss has a nasty temper and he doesn’t always choose his words before he opens his mouth. But he never would have asked you to come here if he hadn’t wanted to.”
She looked up at him from swollen red eyes. “He was awful to Harley.”
Tony grimaced. “There’s stuff going on that you don’t know about,” he said after a minute. “I can’t tell you