Read Online One Night with a Cowboy (Paint River Ranch) (Entangled Indulgence) by Elizabeth Otto - Free Book Online

talk right now. It was hot, bugs kept landing on her bare arms, and the other guests seemed overly happy about the impending two-mile hike. She tried to be happy. It was exercise. It would help her refocus and forget about her mother’s dismal prognosis, Tucker, and everything else making her tense. Reading didn’t work. Trying to take a nap was useless. Pacing the cabin was getting old. And no matter what she tried to do, her mind kept shifting to the grin on Tucker’s handsome face.
    Over half the state of Montana was likely populated by cowboys and she had to run into the one she never thought she’d see again. The one she hadn’t stopped thinking about in days. The one who’d robbed her of sleep and any moments of rational thought, thanks to the constant mental replay of hot cowboy sex in a hay wagon. It was pathetic.
    She’d wanted to line-drive him right out of the saddle and jump him—if she hadn’t been too terrified to actually get next to the horse. Growing up in the metro in an apartment that didn’t allow animals hadn’t left Sophie many options for experiencing critters. The closest she’d ever been to a horse was the carousel in Como Park. Farm animals looked cute behind the petting zoo constraints at the Minnesota Zoo. Beyond that, she’d fed the fish in her third grade classroom and dissected a pig in tenth grade biology. Ending up at Paint River, surrounded by nature and animals, was a turn she hadn’t seen coming.
    A young man in khaki shorts and black sunglasses came around to the front of the group and handed out maps while Sophie swatted flies and tried to wrangle her brain into a happier place. She’d be going to the nursing home to visit her mother later, and getting her mindset into a calmer place right now would help her deal later on. When a man and woman on horses rode up the driveway and got a little too close, Sophie forgot about calm and panicked, scurrying to the left to get out of the way just as the man pitched sideways, nearly sliding off. If he hadn’t grabbed the horse’s mane in one fist, he would have gone down.
    Sophie’s medical instincts kicked in when her eyes settled on the man’s face. A gray hue lay beneath a pale face, cheeks puffed out trying to fill with enough air to keep the brain going. His chest worked hard, dapples of sweat glistening along his forehead and dripping down his temples. Forgetting the horse, Sophie strode over.
    “Sir? Sir!” She had no doubt he was going to be a classic fainter in about two seconds. The man’s eyes were far away as he wobbled in the saddle. Sophie’s arms outstretched to support him. The map guy rushed over to help, but was too late as the man leaned to the right and slid off the horse. He was too muscular and stocky, his weight a deadfall as gravity took over and he landed partially on top of Sophie. The air squeezed out of her lungs, the man’s sweat dripping onto her neck. Shocked voices filled the air, faces blocking out the sun as people gathered around. A pair of hands helped roll the man to the side so she could get away. Panting, Sophie wiped the sweat from her face and got to her knees, mumbling a “thank you” to the map guy, who had a deer-in-the-headlights expression.
    “Jim!” A woman with blazing blue eyes spread her hands wide as she fell to her knees. “Are you all right?” Jim’s skin was clammy, the pulse at his wrist was normal if a little slow when Sophie gave a quick check.
    “Jim!” The woman called again, taking the man’s face in her hands and urging him to look at her. His eyes fluttered open, his gaze fixed on the older woman’s face. Sophie touched his shoulder.
    “I’m a paramedic,” Sophie said, swallowing back a bitter lump that rolled around in her throat. Am, was. Semantics. “What happened?”
    The man’s fit physique and full head of brown hair made it hard to tell how old he was, but she guessed mid-sixties. Despite the obvious care he gave his body, there was no