Birthright

cabinet as he yanked open another, one they’d earmarked for first-aid supplies.
    “I didn’t run into a tree.” She kept her eyes closed, tried to ignore the vicious throbbing in her head. “Someone came up behind me, shoved me into it, right after I—”
    She broke off, jerked straight. “The gunshot. Oh my God, Jake. Are you shot? Are you—”
    “No.” He grabbed her hands before she could leap down from the counter. “Hold still. Do I look shot to you?”
    “I heard a shot.”
    “Yeah, me too. And I saw what I cleverly deduce was a bullet hit a tree about five feet to my left.” He ran water onto a cloth. “Hold still now.”
    “Someone shot at you.”
    “I don’t think so.” It was a nasty scrape, he thought as he began to clean it, more gently than she deserved. “I think they shot at the tree, unless they were blind as a bat and had piss-poor aim. He wasn’t more than ten feet ahead of me when he fired.”
    She dug her fingers into his arm. “Someone shot at you.”
    “Close enough. I told you to lock the doors and stay inside.”
    “You’re not the boss. Are you hurt?”
    “No, I’m not hurt. But I can promise, you’re going to be when I put this antiseptic on that scrape. Ready?”
    She took a couple of cleansing breaths. Nodded. The sting took her breath away. “Oh, oh, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!”
    “Almost done. Keep swearing.”
    She did, viciously, until he blew on it to ease the burn. “Okay, worst is over. Now look at me. How’s your vision?” he asked her.
    “It’s okay. I want some pain meds.”
    “Not yet, you don’t. You were out cold. Let’s go through the routine. Dizziness?”
    “No.”
    “Nausea?”
    “Only when I remember how I let that jerk get the jumpon me. I’m okay. I just have the grandmother of all headaches.” She reached out. “Your face is scratched up some.”
    “Briars.”
    “Could use some of that nice antiseptic.”
    “I don’t think so.” But he put it back in the cupboard so she didn’t get any ideas. “It couldn’t have been just one guy. You were down and out a good fifty feet from where I was when he plugged the tree.”
    “And he came up behind me,” she agreed. “I heard the shot, and I took off.”
    “You screamed.”
    “I did not. I called out in understandable concern when I thought you’d been shot.”
    “You screamed my name.” He positioned himself between her legs. “I always liked that.”
    “I called out,” she corrected, but her lips twitched. “And I took off running. But I didn’t get far. I’m thinking it was ten, fifteen seconds between the shot and when the lights went out. So there had to be at least two of them. Our old pals Austin and Jimmy?”
    “If it was, they’ve upped the ante.”
    “I want to kick their asses.”
    He touched his lips, very gently, to the unbroken skin beside the scrape. “Get in line.”
    “I guess we call the cops.”
    “Looks like.”
    But they didn’t move, not yet, just continued to look at each other. “Scared me,” Callie said after a moment.
    “Me too.”
    She put her arms out, drew him in. Funny, she thought, how much shakier she felt now that she was holding on to him than she’d felt before. But she didn’t let go. “If anybody gets to shoot at you, it’s going to be me.”
    “Only fair. And I’m, obviously, the only one entitled to knock you out cold.”
    Oh yeah, she thought as she kept her cheek pressed to his. The irritating son of a bitch was the love of her life. Just her bad luck.
    “Glad we agree on those points. Now let’s call the sheriff.”
    “In just a minute.”
    “You know, what you were talking about before we were so incredibly rudely interrupted? About how we never took the time to, like, romance each other? How you never seduced me? I never seduced you either.”
    “Callie, you seduced me the minute I laid eyes on you.”
    She let out a half laugh, nearly as shocked by the statement as everything that had come before. “I did not.”
    “You never believed it.” He eased back, touched his lips to her cheek, then the other in a gesture that had her staring at him in equal parts surprise and suspicion. “I could never figure out why you didn’t. I’ll call the sheriff, then get you something for that headache.”
    “I can get it.” She started to boost herself down, but he gripped her arm. There was frustration on his face now, something she’d rarely seen unless it was laced with anger.
    “Why can’t you