“Are you sure you know where you’re going?” he asked the donkey, pulling a twig from his hair. He hunched over the animal to avoid low-lying tree limbs but was still assaulted by the occasional bramble or errant branch.
In the middle of nowhere, Lucifer finally hit a breaking point. He stopped, and no amount of coaxing could get him moving again.
“You need a rest or something?” Cole slid off the donkey’s back. Which was easy, since his feet dangled only a foot off the ground. He patted the animal’s neck. “Um. There, there?” Damn, he felt stupid.
When the stubborn mule seemed disinclined to continue, even without the two-hundred-pound burden, Cole pulled thereins over Lucifer’s head and started off on foot, dragging the donkey behind him. He didn’t have the proper shoes for hiking in the wilderness, and ten minutes later, had fallen twice and ripped his pants on a sturdy sticker bush.
The sun was dropping, and with it, the temperature. Dirty and frustrated, Cole mounted the grumpy beast again. “Come on, buddy. I need you.”
Every five minutes, he yelled for Holly and listened for a reply. It had been hours and nothing. It was when the sun finally set that he started to panic. What had he been thinking? He’d been in such a hurry to find her that he didn’t stop to think about what would happen tohimif he didn’t.
He’d just come to grips with the realization he would have to spend the night in the woods—a terrifying thought by itself—when a thrashing noise in the brush sent his heart into overdrive.Please don’t be a bear!
As he scrambled in the saddlebag for a bear horn, a shadowy four-legged creature came crashing through the weeds, scaring Cole half to death. A wolf! Holly hadn’t given him a pamphlet on dealing with wolves. Forgetting his search for the horn, he grabbed and pointed his gun but then hesitated.
The wolf wasn’t growling or advancing, and it didn’t seem very menacing. It barked once and stepped into the dusky light. It wasn’t a wolf. It was Lady! That meant Holly was nearby. Cole prayed it wasn’t close enough to hear the high-pitched yelp he’d let out.
Once his pulse calmed, he found his voice. “Lady! Where’s Holly, girl? Can you take me to her?” It sounded crazy, even to his own ears, but desperate times and all that.
Without any nudging from Cole, Lucifer turned to follow Lady. They beat their way through a path Cole would never have thought to take, and before he knew it, he smelled smoke.
“Holly?” he yelled. He stopped to listen for a response and heard rustling in the bushes. Just as he was about to draw his gun again, Holly burst through the forest, flashlight in one hand, rifle in the other.
“Oh, thank God it’s you,” he said. He took her in. This tall, gorgeous woman, confronting him fearlessly in the dark woods. Yeah, no doubt about it. He was in love.
“Cole?” She flashed the light up and down, and he could only imagine how rough he looked—mused-up hair, scratched face, dirty tennis shoes, and ripped pants. All atop a cantankerous ass, two sizes too small for him. He didn’t blame her when she doubled over with laughter. “What are you doing here?” she managed to get out between giggles.
He slid off the donkey and said triumphantly, “Saving you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
A noise in the brush caused Holly to tense. Buttercup’s ears perked, and Lady instantly went on alert. Holly stood, slipped the bear spray into her pocket, and picked up her rifle and flashlight.
“Lady, no. Stay,” Holly hissed at the dog but too late. Lady took off into the woods to investigate. Holly followed, hoping she wouldn’t go far. She was uneasy leaving Buttercup and the fire unattended.
It was only a minute before she heard her name, echoed by Lady’s bark. It sounded like Cole, but that couldn’t be. He was hundreds of miles away.
She rounded a copse of trees and saw him. Dwarfing Jen’s mule, hunched over and talking to Lady. His hair was all cattywampus, and blood trickled from a few scratches on his face. But he was still as handsome as ever. And a sight for sore eyes. When he claimed to be “saving her,” she couldn’t stop laughing.
“Yeah, yeah. I must look pretty funny,” he said with a smile. “Laugh it up.”
She approached him as he slid off Lucifer’s back. “Jen said you were a day overdue. We were worried.”
“So you came to find me? How long have you been out here?”
“Yes.” He stood tall, obviously proud of himself. “And I don’t know. It feels like a week but can’t be more than a few hours.”
“Did you ride Lucifer?” She raised an eyebrow. “Or did he drag you? You’re beat to hell.”
“Yeah, well. I don’t claim to be a mountain man. Are you all right?”
“Yes. Come on. I’ve got a fire going and don’t want to leave it any longer than I have to.”
He followed her back to her campsite, dragging Lucifer by the reins. At camp, she dug into the saddlebag, knowing Jen would have packed supplies for him. She removed his bridle and saddle, fed and watered him, and tied him next to Buttercup.
“Thank goodness I found you,” Cole said, warming his hands by the fire. “Can you imagine me spending a night in the woods by myself?”
“No. And it was dangerous of you to come after me.” She was happy to see him, but it really was irresponsible for him to traipse into the wilderness just before dark.
