She clicked her tongue, shook her head.
He flashed her the brightest smile in his repertoire. Pure gold, the one that never failed to charm. But he couldn't quite pull off full stun because of the black eye.
She scoffed at his smile. Shot down again. "You look like a junkyard dog after a weekend bender."
"Feels a bit like that too."
"Still," she said with all the primness of an old maid accountant. "I'm very glad you came home."
"Are you?"
"Absolutely." She lifted up a perky, I've-got-sunshine-in-my-teeth smile. Enthusiastic. Classic Kaia.
He saw her in a montage of past moments, hugging animals, splashing in Balmorhea Springs, spinning on the tire swing in the front yard of the foreman's house. She smiled the same. A girl who existed eternally in the amusement park of her mind. He was glad that hadn't changed.
"It was brave of you," she said. "Coming back after so long."
"I have a butt load of faults, but when I commit to something, I'm loyal to the bone. My best friend gets married. I'm there."
Noticing him evaluating her, Kaia's gaze scooted to her hands and she tucked them in her lap. Small hands, delicate but work-roughened, nails clipped short, palms calloused, skin tanned. Several small scars dotted her knuckles, and twin silvered puncture marks puckered the outside of her left hand.
"Ferret bites," she explained. "Vicious little suckers if they feel trapped."
He laughed at her comical expression, but immediately regretted it because it sounded as if he was laughing at her pain. "They better not try that around me."
"You've got plenty of scars of your own. I remember when you got that one." She reached out and traced an index finger over the jagged scar staggering across his palm. He had a corresponding scar that ran the length of his inner thigh. "You cut it on the barbwire fence saving my silly hide from Clyde the bull."
"You terrified the crap out of me. Standing there in your red cape with a bucket of oats."
Kaia crinkled her nose. "I thought I could tame Clyde."
"Testosterone-fueled bulls pastured near heifers in heat are impossible to tame."
"So I discovered. But give me a break. What did I know? I was eight."
"And fearless as hell."
"Animals have never scared me. People on the other hand . . ." She peered into his eyes.
Ridge flexed his hand, felt the sting of the barbwire, as he recalled yanking apart the strands to toss Kaia to safety on the other side of the fence. And there he stood bleeding all over the corral, Kaia's overturned bucket of feed spewed out on the ground, Clyde ducking his head, snorting and pawing the sandy earth.
Kaia had hollered, "Hey, hey!" and then yelled, "Run!" as Clyde charged.
Ridge had thrown himself over the fence like a pole-vaulter, dragging his jeans and his flesh across the long expanse of barbwire, slicing his thigh wide-open. It had taken forty-six stitches to close the wound and the entire time the doctor was sewing him up, Duke bitched at how much it was costing him.
"In retrospect," he said, rubbing a palm down his thigh. "I might have come out better if I'd stayed in the ring with Clyde."
"I haven't thought about that day in years," Kaia said. "But it was a defining moment for me."
"Yeah?"
"I developed a healthy respect for nature."
"But you didn't lose your love of animals."
"I could never lose that. Animals are in my blood. I was born to care for them."
Her perky smile grew so bright Ridge was tempted to put on his sunglasses. Her smile overwhelmed sometimes. Too honest. Too true. Too compassionate. Too much of a reminder of what he was missing.
He cast around for something clever to say, light and deflective, but he had no grip on where this conversation was going. She was his best friend's little sister. He wasn't about to do what his male instincts were urging him to do.
Kiss her.
Kiss her hard. Kiss her long. Kiss her now. Kiss her as if they had a future. Kiss her as if they belonged.
"I hated that you got cut up over me," she said, tracing her finger over his scarred palm.
"You ran for help."
"Your father came and carried you back to the ranch. Blood was everywhere."
Ridge touched the scar on his hand. "When I got home from the hospital, you stuck a Barbie Band-Aid on me."
"I loved Barbie." Kaia sighed. "For me to share my Barbie Band-Aids with you was monumental . . . but I was feeling guilty."