“Calm down, Gail,” Grant urged, his voice overriding Darcy’s whisper. “I know you’re worried, but I’m telling you, it’s a sprained knee and—”
“Don’t you, ‘Calm down, Gail,’ me. You’re the damned fool who decided to climb out the window and fell. A second-story window, Grant. I already lost one man I loved and I’m not about to let your dinged-up pride cause me to lose you, too.”
Jeff choked on the breath he’d been taking, sure beyond any reason he hadn’t just heard that right.
“Mom?”
His mother’s head snapped around suggesting she’d only just realized he was there. For an instant her eyes registered the kind of shock and nerves one would expect—but then this was his mother. And in the next instant, those eyes flashed steel. “Not now, honey.”
Jeff felt the span of Darcy’s hands pressing into his chest, as though she meant to hold him back, which was adorable in itself. But unnecessary. He wasn’t going anywhere.
“Grant and my mom?” he asked. All those times the guy mentioned how limber she seemed... He’d assumed Grant’s mind was on osteoporosis. But apparently not.
“I guess he’s had a thing for her...forever. The night he was going to take us out, really had been about spending more time with Gail. And I guess it worked.” Darcy looked uneasy. “This morning Connor called asking if you’d arrived. When they heard the door downstairs a minute later, assuming it was you rather than me, Grant decided the window seemed like his best chance for survival.”
Jeff took a deep breath, savoring the feminine scent of Darcy’s shampoo and lotion and the woman beneath.
“Okay.”
“Okay?” she asked, sounding skeptical.
“Darcy, I’m not going to attack the guy on his way into the ambulance.” When she looked at him seemingly unconvinced, he added, “My mother would kill me.”
And after all the weeks, he got what he’d missed the most. A flash of the gorgeous smile that started it all. The one he’d never get over. The one he still wanted to earn.
Grant grudgingly agreed to let the ambulance take him to the hospital to get checked out and Gail went along with him, leaving Jeff and Darcy at the house alone.
Since getting her into his arms, Jeff hadn’t been able to let go. And Darcy seemed to understand, settling against him.
Damn, it felt so good to be standing beside her. To have his hands on her.
But as the ambulance disappeared down the drive, Darcy took the hand anchoring his arm across her chest and, with a light squeeze, extracted herself from his hold.
“Want to go inside?” she asked, looking more nervous now that the emergency had passed and it was back to just the two of them.
Jeff gave her a stiff nod, then looked back to his car, half parked on the grass, the door gaping wide from when he’d bolted out for the house.
“Let me pull around back. And I’ll meet you there.”
Darcy started to go, then paused and turned back, asking, “Are you okay?”
Not even a little bit. Not yet. “Give me a few minutes and I will be.”