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The doctor frowned at the screen for a moment and then looked up.
Cole braced himself.
“Well, everything looks great.”
A heartbeat passed. And another. Then Cole’s pulse blasted into overdrive. “What?” he breathed.
“It?
??s looking good. The fracture in your pelvis has finally started to mend. The plates in your femur will stay, of course, unless they—”
“But I don’t understand,” Cole cut in. “I was in the saddle two weeks ago. It felt like I was rebreaking everything all over again. I thought I was about to split in half.”
“Well, what did you do? Ride up and down a mountain?”
“Uh…” He glanced at Grace and then back to the doctor.
“Listen, things are tender right now. The bone is still healing, and the ligaments and muscles are all tight. You have to ease slowly back into your old routines. I mean slowly. Five minutes in the saddle on a flat trail. Do that for a few days. Then ten minutes. You can’t just pick up where you left off. Use ibuprofen. Ice it to stop the swelling. It might take a whole year, but you’ll be back out there. No worries.”
No worries. He said it so simply. No worries.
Jesus. He could ride?
“You’re keeping up with physical therapy?”
“Yes,” Cole answered, the word toneless even to his own ear.
“All right. Three more months of that, and I think we’ll be done with you, Mr. Rawlins. It’s been a pleasure.”
He stood to shake the man’s hand. The doctor closed his laptop and left, but Cole just stood there, dumbfounded.
“Cole?” Grace ventured. Her hand touched his back, then slid up to his neck. He could feel each of her fingertips as they brushed his skin.
“I can buy the ranch,” he breathed.
“You can.”
“My leg is okay. My hip…”
“It is.”
He looked down to find Grace smiling at him. And her eyes—for once, they were clear, deep whiskey-brown and filled with hope.
“I guess you’re just a big baby, huh?”
“I guess I am,” he said hoarsely.
“I should’ve known. All that bitching about your leg, but you didn’t have any trouble taking me up against the wall of the shower.”
“Grace!” He looked around to be sure the doctor was gone.
“What? It’s true. You have all the strength in the world when it comes to sex.”
She was right. He was Superman out of sheer, stubborn will when it came to making love to her.
Cole finally relaxed. And smiled. And pulled her into his arms. “Grace.” He sighed. “Did you hear that? I can ride again.” He honestly hadn’t expected it. He hadn’t even considered the possibility that maybe… “My God,” he whispered into her pretty hair. “Did he really say that?”
“He did. Should we go home and celebrate?”
