Rescue Me

and wiped her nose. Her red watery eyes narrowed. “I want both of them to catch the crabs and die in a fiery crash.”
    Whoa. That was harsh and exactly why he steered a wide path around women who wanted relationships.
    “I want them maimed and mangled and I have a hankering to run them over with my uncle Henry Joe’s Peterbilt!”
    A pain settled in the back of Vince’s head and he suddenly had a hankering of his own. A hankering for the taste of gunmetal in his mouth.

Chapter Seven
    T he tap-tap of Sadie’s heels echoed in the old ranch house as she followed the light toward the kitchen. She didn’t even want to think about what she’d just done in the bride’s room at Tally Lynn’s wedding. She hadn’t meant for anything to happen. She hadn’t meant to embarrass herself more than she’d ever been embarrassed in her life, but it all had happened so fast. He’d kissed her and touched her and wham bam . It was over almost before it began.
    The only bright spot, the only thing that gave her a modicum of relief, was that no one besides her and Vince knew what she’d done. After she’d run from the room, she’d said a quick good-bye to Aunt Bess and Uncle Jim, and she was sure that if anyone had seen her and Vince, it would have spread faster than a Texas wildfire. Faster than her feet could run from it.
    She hadn’t stuck around to say good-bye to her other relatives. She hadn’t wanted to risk running into Vince. She’d send Tally Lynn and the others a nice note once she got home, excusing her rude exodus on a headache or broken ankle or heart failure. The last wasn’t far from the truth. Just the thought of Vince’s big, hot hands all over her made the blood rush from her head and made her feel faint out of sheer humiliation. Although if she was a man, she probably wouldn’t be beating herself up about it. She’d probably consider herself “lucky” and forget it.
    The quicker she got out of Texas, the better. Obviously, Texas made her lose her mind, and it just went without saying that never seeing Vincent Haven again was a big, fat bonus.
    She moved past the formal dining room and into the brightly lit kitchen, with its stone floor and yellow daisy wallpaper her mother had hung in the sixties. She expected to see her father sitting at the breakfast nook, nursing a glass of sweet tea. It wasn’t real late and he had probably just returned from Laredo, but instead of her father, the Parton twins sat at the nook, chipped mugs sitting on the table in front of them.
    “You two are staying late tonight.” Sadie slipped off her shoes, and the tails of her coat brushed the floor as she bent to pick them up. With the straps of her heels hooked in her fingers, she moved to the refrigerator. She’d said her good-byes to both of them earlier. They really shouldn’t have waited for her. Nice, but unnecessary.
    “Oh Sadie, I’m so glad you’re finally home.”
    With her free hand on the refrigerator handle, she looked at the two women over her shoulder. “Why?” She glanced from one worried face to the other, and the events of the past hour melted away.
    Clara Anne, the more emotional twin, burst into noisy tears.
    “What?” Sadie turned toward them. “Is Daddy home yet?”
    Carolynn shook her head. “No, honey. He’s in the hospital in Laredo.”
    “Is he okay?”
    Again she shook her head. “That stallion kicked him and broke some of his ribs and punctured his left lung.” Her lips drew together. “He’s too old to be messing with those stallions.”
    Sadie’s shoes fell to the floor with a thump-thump . There had to be a mistake. Her father was always very careful around high-strung stallions because they were so unpredictable. He was as tough as an old saddle, but he was almost eighty. She shook off her coat and moved to the nook. “He’s been around those horses all his life.” Breeding American paint horses had always been more than just a hobby to Clive. He loved it more than raising cattle, but cattle ranching paid better. She hung the coat on the back of a chair and sat next to Carolynn. “He’s always so careful.” He’d been kicked and stepped on and thrown many times but never seriously hurt. Never anything that required more than a few hours in the hospital getting stitched back up. “How could something like this happen?”
    “I don’t know. Tyrus called a couple of hours ago with a few of the details. He said something happened with the lead rope. Your daddy