His eyes narrowed perceptively. "You couldn't even push me off you when we were on the bed and you expect me to believe you draggedme over a hundred yards?"
"You're here, aren't you?" she shot back.
"I guess I am." If she was lying, J.T. decided she had it down to a science. He searched her gaze, seeing nothing but a delicate pureness that reached deep into his soul and tugged. Startled by the warmth unfurling in him, he glanced away.
Her chair scraped against the wood floor as she scooted back and stood. "I'm sure you've heard that people do incredible things when they find themselves in a panicked situation. Adrenaline and all that," she said, gesturing with her hands.
"Yeah, adrenaline," he agreed, suddenly tired of doubting her every word. What other explanation could there be? And if she meant him harm, she'd had plenty of opportunity to do so while he'd been unconscious. As outrageous as her story sounded, everything she'd told him was possible.
Rubbing a hand over his jaw, he watched her flit about the shack. She put away their dishes and washed up the coffee pot, then stored everything where she'd found it in the pantry. She worked quickly, efficiently, and he marveled at how at home she seemed with none of the normal everyday conveniences one usually takes for granted.
"Let me help," he offered, pushing back his own chair. Before he could stand she shook her head and sent him an adamant look.
"Absolutely not." Folding the blanket on the bed, she set it at the foot of the mattress. "You sit and relax. I'll take care of this. You need to save your strength."
He didn't like feeling like an invalid. "I'm fi-"
A firm hand on his shoulder pushed him back into his seat. "Stay put." Her tone rivaled a drill sergeant's.
He resisted the urge to click his heels, salute her, and say, "Yes, sir."
"Are you always so bossy?" he asked, repeating her earlier question to him.
"Only when I'm in charge," she replied over her shoulder.
She bent over to dig something out of a tin can in the pantry, and his gaze slid over her bottom, admiring and appreciating her curves. "I'm not going to win this one, am I?"
"Nope. Have a snack and relax." Turning, she tossed him a sealed package of dried apricots, and he caught the bag.
Using his teeth, he tore open a corner of the plastic bag. Pinching a dried apricot between his fingers, he examined the shriveled piece of fruit or a second before deeming it edible. "Relaxing isn't one of my strong suits."
Caitlan picked up the damp pair of jeans draped on the far side of the table and shook them out before folding the denim into a tidy square. "You might want to get used to it, at least for a few days. You really should give your head, and your body, time to recuperate from your accident." She added a folded shirt to his pile of soggy clothes.
He looked up, intending to tell her he wasn't about to sit around for a couple of days. Even the nastiest of flus couldn't keep him down, and he wouldn't let this mishap keep him from overseeing the ranch and cattle, either. Especially if someone was bent on sabotaging his livelihood.
Ultimately, he popped another apricot into his mouth and kept his protest to himself. He didn't owe this woman an explanation, and he didn't need her permission to do anything. As protective and concerned as she seemed to be, he considered himself lucky she'd be gone once they reached the ranch house.
"I'm surprised no one has found us by now," he commented, reaching for his cowboy boots, sitting under the table. "My horse should have wandered back to the ranch without a rider. Unless whoever hit me over the head killed Quinn, he should have gotten there last night, which should've alerted someone that I'm out in the pasture alone." He glanced out the window, try ing to gauge the hour. "How long ago did it stop raining?"
"Sometime last night."
He watched her with his briefs, her fingers tucking and creasing the cotton easily, as if she'd been folding his underwear for years. The intimacy of the simple task started a slow burn in his veins and made him too aware of how her hands might have felt against his flesh as she'd stripped those same briefs off him last night.
Jamming his right foot into his boot, he scowled in disgust as a cold dampness seeped into his thick sock. Since he lacked an extra pair of boots in the shack, and he didn't relish walking the three miles back to the ranch house in bare feet, he put the other boot on and arranged his jeans over the tops.
"What time is it anyway?" he asked, realizing his watch was no longer strapped to his wrist. "And what did you do with my watch?"
"It's right here." She glanced at the timepiece before handing it to him. "Ten A.M. Your watch, at least, iswaterproof," she said, an unrestrained grin canting the corners of her mouth.
"I don't think-" J.T.'s hand froze as he reached for his watch, and his heart stopped midbeat. Every thought flew from his head and the room seemed to shrink as he stared at the dimple creasing Caitlan's right cheek, a single dimple identical to the one Amanda had when she grinned. The same violet-blue eyes, the same dimple…
Sweet, haunting memories crowded in on him, suffocating him with their poignancy. Then, like a cloud of smoke, the recollections dispersed, and it was Caitlan he wanted to touch, Caitlan's feminine scent that wrapped around him, seducing him, tempting him, making him long for something that was just beyond his grasp and always would be.
He squeezed his eyes shut, hating the vulnerable way he felt, despising even more that this woman made him remember and feel things he thought he'd permanently locked away. Dammit, why her?
"J.T., are you okay?"
She placed a caring hand on his arm, and he flinched as her fingers seared him through the thin material of his shirt. Swearing at his reaction, he put distance between them the only way he knew how, shoving up a wall in front of his emotions before he made a fool of himself. "I need to take care of some personal matters, if you know what I mean. Outside. Alone."
She nodded and backed away. "I understand."
The hurt look in her eyes grabbed at him, but he kept his tone deliberately brusque. "As soon as the shack is cleaned up, we'll start toward the ranch."
"Are you sure you're up to it?"
He wasn't about to spend the afternoon in the shack with her; too small a room with too many possibilities. He strode to the door and opened it, welcoming the slap of brisk morning air.
"We'll get to the house even if I have to crawl," he said, then glanced back at her with purpose, his harshness fading. "Oryou could always drag me." Before she could offer a retort, he stepped outside and closed the door.
Caitlan looked out the window and watched as J.T. strode toward a copse of trees, wondering at the light flutters in her belly as she admired the leashed power and strength of his body. An altogether strange sensation, she thought, like none other she'd experienced as a guardian angel. Something about J.T. Rafferty elevated her nerves to a level of consciousness and made her feel things that were dark and surely forbidden to her. Yet she couldn't seem to stem the desire and longing sweeping through her. She was even more ashamed because the feeling wasn't at all unpleasant to her.
Once J.T. disappeared from view and she knew she'd have a few moments to herself, she cleared her mind of those disconcerting thoughts and closed her fingers around her medallion.
"Yes?"
"You guys gave me a real doozy of an excuse to convince J.T. how I found him unconscious," she said, remembering his doubts. "He probably thinks I'm a real ditz."
"It was the best we could do at such short notice. He believes you, which is all that matters. Your expressions and emotions flowed naturally. Now, please, you mustn't summon us unless it's an absolute emergency. We've been swamped since you left."
Sighing, Caitlan let the medallion drop back between her breasts. Time to get back to work, she told herself. She had a very obstinate man to protect.