LITMIR.BIZ

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      Zack shrugged. “Well, Dani isn’t here to listen and emulate. Besides, it’s not every day I see a friend shot.”

      “You say I need to recoup, Zack?”

      “That’s right.”

      “So how is it going to help my recuperation when I get out of this bed and kick your sorry ass?”

      Zack hesitated before giving in with a laugh. “I can’t fight you now, because you’re already down and I feel sorry for you. If I let you get up and attempt to hit me, you’d probably start bleeding all over the place again and rip your stitches, and I’d have to let you win.” He held up both hands. “Stay put. I’ll find out how soon you’ll be moved to your room and when Delilah can join you.”

      Pain ripped through his shoulder as Mick did a double take. “Delilah?”

      Zack stared. “Don’t tell me you didn’t even know her name.”

      “So?” Learning her name hadn’t been his top priority. Touching her had, and he’d accomplished that while also protecting her. A nice start, except for the fact that someone wanted her dead, and had shot him trying to accomplish the deed. But he’d figure that one out eventually. In the meantime, he had no intention of letting anyone hurt her.

      “So you took a bullet for a complete stranger?”

      Very quietly, Mick asked, “Wouldn’t you have done the same?”

      And because Zack already had once, long ago, he turned and walked out.

      The second Zack pushed aside the curtain and left, a nurse stepped in, ready to check Mick’s vitals and reassure him. She lingered, and Mick couldn’t help but smile at her, despite his discomfort and his current frazzled frame of mind. She was about five years older than he, putting her in her early thirties. She was attractive even in sensible white shoes and a smock. She smoothed his hair, her fingers gentle, while she explained that he’d be there overnight, but would likely leave in the morning, and that they’d put him in his own room very soon.

      Still being polite, Mick was careful not to encourage her. He wanted to meet Delilah, wanted to talk to her, hear her voice when she wasn’t frightened, see her smile again. She was the only woman he wanted at the moment, and he was relieved when the orderly showed up and announced it was time to take Mick to his room.

      Any minute now he’d meet her, really meet her. And he promised himself that not long after that he’d kiss her…and more. He didn’t know how he’d manage that, all things considered, but he would. He had to taste her, had to stake a claim in the best way known to man.

      He discounted his wound. It wouldn’t slow him down; he wouldn’t let it slow him down.

      He needed her.

      “I’M CAPABLE OF WALKING on my own.”

      Josh, the man “escorting” her to Mick’s room, gave a disgruntled sigh and removed his hand from her arm. He’d been pushy and demanding, a total stranger insisting she follow his orders. She’d done so, once she realized he was a friend of the man who’d protected her.

      But she didn’t like him, and she definitely didn’t like the distrustful way he loomed over her. He pretended gentlemanly qualities, but she knew he held on to her so she couldn’t get away. She’d already told him a dozen times that she had no intention of leaving.

      Not that Josh paid any mind to what she had to say.

      He had “slick” written all over him, from the way he held himself to the way he noticed every single female in the vicinity. She understood his type. Josh was one of those men who felt superior to women, but covered that nasty sentiment with charisma and a glib tongue. No doubt, given his good looks and outrageous confidence, women regularly encouraged him.

      Del just wanted to get by him so she could meet the other man, the one who’d risked his life for her.

      Josh slanted her one of his insulting, speculative looks. “I hope you don’t go in there and give him any grief.”

      When she didn’t answer him, he added, “He did save your sorry, ungrateful little butt, after all.”

      She could hardly ignore that! Del whirled and stuck a finger into his hard chest. “I know. I was there,” she snapped. Her control, her poise and any claim to ladylike behavior were long gone. Today had been the most bizarre and eventful day of her life. “You’re the one who doesn’t seem to understand that I need to see him, that I should have been there with him all along, to thank him—”

      He glared at her, rubbed at his chest and walked away. Del had to hurry to catch up to him. A few seconds later they turned a corner, and Josh pushed a door open. “Here we go,” he said. And then under his breath, but not much under, she heard him mutter, “Thank God.”

      Through the open doorway, Del could see the occupied hospital bed, and she drew up short. Heavy emotion dropped on her, making her feel sluggish in the brain—which was a first. Her breath caught. Her stomach flipped. Her heart fluttered.

      He lay almost flat, his long, tall body stretching from one end of the narrow bed to the other. She remembered his height when he’d covered her, protecting her and all but dwarfing her despite her own height. She remembered the power of him, too, the vibrating tension and leashed strength.

      His beautiful, dark brown hair now looked disheveled, spikey from the earlier rain and his injuries and… Her bottom lip quivered with her loss of composure.

      He was the most beautiful man she’d ever seen, though she hadn’t really seen him until he threw himself on top of her and saved her life. At first she’d thought he was with the robbers, and she’d known so much fear she’d actually tasted it.

      Instead, he’d taken a bullet meant for her.

      Her heart stuttered to a near stop. What kind of man did that? He didn’t know her, owed her nothing. She’d barely noticed him in the store before that.

      But when he’d chased the bad guys just like a disreputable Dirty Harry clone, she’d looked him over and hadn’t been able to stop looking. He’d been all hard, flexing muscle, animal grace and speed.

      Now he was flat on his back in a hospital bed. She sighed brokenly, choking on her emotions.

      He turned his head at the sound she made, and those deep brown, all-consuming eyes warmed. A slight, heart-stopping smile curved one side of his mouth, and he looked sexy and compelling. In a deep, dark voice hoarse with pain, he whispered, “Hi.”

      Just like that her heart melted and sank into her toes. There was so much inflection, so much feeling, in that one simple hello. Vaguely, she heard Josh saying, “Delilah, meet Mick Dawson. Mick, Miss Delilah Piper.”

      Del paid no attention to Josh, her every thought and sense focused on the large dark man in the bed. In the bed because of her. No one had ever done anything even remotely like that for her. Her life in the past few years had been, by choice, a solitary one. Even before then, though, her relationships had been superficial and short-lived—nothing to inspire such protective instincts.

      The reality of what he’d done, what he’d risked for her, threw Del off balance emotionally, just as the sight of him stirred her physically.

      Without another thought, she moved straight to the bed. Mick looked at her, still smiling, but now with his eyes a bit wider, more alert, a little surprised. She sat near his hip and stroked his face. She needed to touch him, to feel the warmth of his skin, the lean hardness of his jaw…. Unable to help herself, she kissed him.

      Against his lips, she said with heartfelt sincerity, “Thank you.”

      He started to say something, but she kissed him again. It felt…magically right; she could have gone on kissing him forever. His mouth was firm, dry. Five o’clock shadow covered his jaw, rasping against her fingertips, thrilling her with the masculinity of it. Heat, scented by his body, lifted off him in waves,

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