"Mom, are you okay?"
"I don't think so," she murmured, staring down at the brightly colored brochures displaying pictures of England, Scotland, Switzerland and more. "I can't let you do this, honey..."
"Mom." Colleen hugged her mother tightly, then leaned back and looked into watery blue eyes much like her own. "You've given me everything for so long. I want to do this. I can do this now and if you fight me on it-"
Laura laughed a little again. "You'll what?"
"I'll hold my breath." She smiled, hoping to coax an answering smile from her mother. Holding her breath had been her threat of choice when she was a little girl and using it now was a deliberate choice.
"You never could stop talking long enough to hold your breath for long," her mother finally said, and Colleen knew she'd won.
"Well, I had very important things to say. Just like now." She plucked one of the brochures from her mother's hands and spread it open, showing the sumptuous cabin her mother and aunt would be sharing on their twelve-week cruise. "Just look at this, Mom. Can you imagine?"
"No," she said, sliding one hand across the high-gloss paper, "I really can't."
"I'm going to want lots of pictures cluttering up my in-box."
"I'll email every day." She frowned. "They do have computers on board, right?"
"Absolutely. Complete with Skype. We can talk face-to-face whenever you have time." As she thought about it, she said, "Maybe we'll get you a computer tablet, too, so you can video chat with me from Stonehenge!"
"Donna's not going to believe this," her mother whispered, unable to tear her gaze away from the pictures of a dream of a lifetime coming true.
Six
A few hours later, Colleen sat across from Sage in a local coffee shop. "You should have seen my mother's face," she said, grinning at the memory.
"She must have been shocked." He could imagine. Hearing her talk about what she'd done for her mother had stunned Sage into silence himself.
Far from the grasping, manipulative woman he'd assumed her to be, she'd arranged for her mother and aunt to have the trip they'd always dreamed instead of spending her money on herself. Admiration flowed through him, along with the desire that had become as familiar to him as breathing over the past few days.
Since that first dinner hadn't brought him any information, Sage had made it his business to spend as much time with Colleen as possible. Though they hadn't been able to speak at the movies, watching her reaction to the drama playing out on the screen had fascinated him. Tears, laughter, a jolt of surprise at the happy ending-she was so easy to read and at the same time, so damn complicated he didn't know what to make of her.
Long ago, he had decided that women weren't to be trusted. That they turned their emotions on and off at whim, the better to acquire whatever they happened to be after at the time. Tears were a woman's best weapon, as he'd discovered early on. But on the surface, at least, Colleen seemed...different.
And that both intrigued and worried him.
"Oh, she really was." Shaking her head, she picked up her burger and took a bite, still smiling. "Mom and Aunt Donna have been planning fantasy trips for years. They go back and forth, deciding what hotels they'll stay in, what countries they'll see. They go online and look up cruise packages, just to torture themselves." She took a breath and sighed happily. "Knowing that they're going to actually get to go and experience everything they've always talked about is just...amazing."
"You're amazing," he murmured, thinking his voice was so soft it would be lost in the clatter and noise from the rest of the patrons surrounding them.
He should have known she'd hear him.
"Why?"
Sage shrugged, sat back in the booth and draped one arm along the back. "Most people, receiving a windfall like you did? They'd go out and buy themselves fast cars, a house that's too big and too expensive, all kinds of things. But you didn't. You bought your mother's dreams."
She smiled. "What a nice way to put it."
Her eyes were shining and that smile lit her face up like a damn beacon. Something inside him turned over and he was pretty sure it was his heart. That was unsettling. Sage had spent most of his life carefully building a wall around his heart, keeping out anything that might touch him too deeply. His family was one thing. His brother and sister were a part of him, and he accepted the risk of loving them because there was no way he could live without them.
But to love a woman? To trust love? No. He'd nearly made that mistake years ago, and he'd steered clear of it ever since. He'd had a narrow escape and hadn't come away unscathed even at that. So the women he allowed into his life now were nothing like Colleen. They were temporary distractions...just blips on a radar that was finely tuned for self-protection. Colleen was something different. If she was who he now believed her to be, then he had no business being around her. But for the life of him, he couldn't stay away.
Frowning now, he said, "What about your plans? Your dreams?"
She picked up her iced tea and took a long drink. "Well, I already told you my main goal. I'm going to get my nurse practitioner's license."
"Because?"
"Because what I'd really like to do is have a rural practice," she said, leaning toward him over the table.
He caught himself wishing she was wearing that red dress again so he could get another peek at her luscious breasts. Instead though, she wore an emerald-green sweater over a white T-shirt with a slightly V-shaped neckline. Her jeans were soft and faded and hugged her curves like a lover's hands. And even the casual clothing couldn't dispel the desire that pumped through him just sitting across from her.
For a man who prided himself on his rational thinking and ability to concentrate on the task at hand, it grated that while she talked, all he could think about was laying her down atop the table and burying himself deep inside her.
"There are a lot of people in the high country who live so remotely it's hard to get into town to see a doctor," she was saying and he could read the excitement on her face with every word she spoke. "Or if they can, they can't afford it."
She kept surprising him.
Wanting to devote herself to a rural practice would be a hard, even dangerous way to build a career. Why wasn't she like other women? Why wasn't she making plans for spa trips and exclusive shopping excursions? Hell, she'd bought her mother and aunt an around-the-world cruise. But for herself, she wanted to live and work in the wilderness areas?
That thought settled in his mind and his brain drew up a series of uncomfortable images. Colleen trying to dig her way out of a blizzard. Colleen's little Jeep careening off a mountain road and sailing down into a rock-strewn canyon. Colleen freezing to death in her car because she'd gotten lost.
His stomach twisted into knots and he told himself that it was none of his business if she wanted to risk her life by working somewhere she had no knowledge of. He was only with her to find out what she knew. There was no real relationship between them. She wasn't his to protect.
But damn it, someone had to set her straight.
"Driving up into the mountains from Cheyenne is going to make for a hell of a commute. Especially in winter," he pointed out, with a warning note in his tone that he hoped would get past the spirit of adventure he saw so clearly in her eyes.
Colleen flashed him a smile that shone from those cornflower-blue eyes and hit him like a sledgehammer.
"That's part two of my plan," she said, clearly pleased with herself. "I'm not going to be commuting every day. That would be silly and time-consuming. Instead, I'm selling my condo and I'm going to buy a cabin or a small house higher up in the mountains."
Those mental images rose up again, only this time, he saw Colleen in a remote cabin, no help for miles around. An icicle dropped down his spine.
"And live there by yourself?" He didn't like the sound of that. Not that there were a million crazies running around the mountains or anything, but hell, you didn't need a human enemy to worry about. Nature could kill you just for the hell of it. And nature in the wilderness had attitude.
"I'm a big girl," she countered, airily brushing aside his concerns. "I can take care of myself."
"No doubt," he said, though he doubted it very much. "In the city. Where there are police to call if you need help. Neighbors right next door. Grocery stores. Not to mention that you grew up in California. What do you know about digging yourself out of ten-foot snowdrifts or how to stockpile firewood for winter? What do you know about driving on roads that haven't been cleared by the county after a storm?"