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Matt stepped away from the bag and held up his hands, an amused smirk on his face. “Listen, something about this woman’s got you wound up in knots. So don’t let it go. Take a chance. Fight.”
“She said no. If it didn’t work the first time, what the hell makes you think it’s gonna work a second?”
Matt let out an exasperated sigh. “Well, don’t do the exact same thing twice in a row, dumbass. Change up your approach. Why do you think she turned you down?”
“She said . . . she just said she wasn’t interested. End of story. No gray area.” Luke stopped his barrage on the heavy bag, pausing to grab some water, the hollow, sad look around Christie’s eyes coming back to him. “Someone hurt her. She’s scared. Guarded.”
Matt nodded. “So if you want a shot, you’ve gotta earn her trust. Show her you can take care of her.”
Luke wiped his mouth with his arm. “So you wanna talk about seeing Leah?”
They switched places again, and Matt resumed his punches. “Fuck, no.”
Chapter 3
December 4
“Was that Luke Grayson I saw you talking to at the end of last shift?” asked Shannon, Christie’s favorite ER nurse, as she slipped several folders into an accordion file.
Christie’s cheeks heated, and she briefly pressed a hand to her face before slipping it into the pocket of her lab coat. “Yeah, it was.”
Shannon sighed and fanned herself. “He is all kinds of delicious. And his brother, Matt? I can’t even.”
“Do you know them?” Christie couldn’t help herself. Even though she’d turned him down, she found herself wanting to know. And she shouldn’t. She’d turned him down to keep her distance. She’d done the right thing. She shouldn’t be asking about him.
“Honey, my family’s been in Cheyenne since 1858. I know everybody. I was a freshman at Central High when they were seniors. I don’t think there was a girl in school who didn’t have a crush on those boys.”
“What were they like?”
“Let me tell you, trouble never looked so good in a pair of blue jeans.”
Christie laughed, leaning her elbows on the counter of the nurse’s station. “Oh yeah?”
“They were good guys, don’t get me wrong. Lots of friends, played sports, got decent grades. But they also stirred up more than their share of trouble. Pranks, making out with girls, a little partying. That sort of thing. When they were seniors, they nearly got expelled for stealing.”
Christie’s eyes widened. “What did they steal?”
Shannon laughed, shaking her head as she remembered. “Luke, Matt, and a few other boys, including their cousin Dean, who was in my grade—I swear, yummy runs in their family—stole a big-ass pig statue from in front of Norman’s Barbeque and left it in the middle of the football field.”
Christie laughed again, trying to reconcile the story with the responsible father she’d met the other day. “I know Luke’s a carpenter. What does Matt do?”
“He’s a Sergeant with the Laramie County Sheriff. For now. He’s headed for Seattle next month.”
“Luke mentioned that.”
“Oh, did he now? Why, Dr. Harmon, are you holding out on me? Did you see him again?” Shannon opened a container she’d retrieved from behind the desk and pulled out two fresh, mouthwateringly delicious looking sugar cookies shaped like snowflakes. “And to think I was going to share my cookies with you.”
Christie snatched a cookie from Shannon and bit into it, the butter and sugar melting on her tongue, sweetness trickling through her as she swallowed. “I ran into him at Home Depot yesterday.”
“Uh huh,” mumbled Shannon around a mouthful of cookie.
“And he offered to help me out with some small repairs around my place.”
“Is that a euphemism?” Shannon’s eyes sparkled with mischief as she quirked an eyebrow.
“Ha, no.” But she was really starting to wish it were. She’d been so anxious in the moment that she’d blurted out the rejection, but maybe it had been a mistake. A sudden flare of anger burned through her, not at Luke, and not even at herself, but at her ex-boyfriend Brian, for turning her into this timid, untrusting, guarded woman who wouldn’t take a chance on a good thing when it was right in front of her. “What happened with Ethan’s mom? Luke told me he was divorced.”
Shannon shook her head slowly. “He sure is. From what I know, he and Angela had been dating for about a year when she got pregnant. They got married pretty quick, and a couple years later, she took off.”
