At Close Range by Marilyn Tracy Page A

interview. But at his words, she felt like a three-year-old being dismissed by a social worker.
    â€œOkay. Sure. As long as everything’s okay,” she said, her voice faltering. “I’ll—I’ll just go back now.” She turned, embarrassed she’d come out there, disturbed at the fact that she had, and that she’d done so armed with a handful of items more suited to welcoming an adolescent than an adult who had obviously survived more than his share of hardship. And then to stare at him like a love-starved teenager. She might be love-starved, but she wasn’t a kid anymore.
    However much she might be acting like one.
    I’m Corrie Stratton, and if I survived my childhood, I can survive this.
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    Mack felt like a heel. All she’d done was come to check on him. She’d seen his light on at three-thirtyin the morning his first night on the ranch, and had come out into the cold out of simple kindness and concern for him. And he’d greeted her as if she were a terrorist, was curt to the point of rudeness, then capped it off by lying to her and making her feel like she’d intruded.
    â€œWait. Please…?”
    She stopped but didn’t turn around. “Yes?” Given her voice, even that single questioning syllable sounded like a chord straight from paradise.
    â€œDo you have any aspirin?”
    She slowly revolved back to face him and dug into her pocket. She withdrew a paperback, a notebook, a pen and, finally, a bottle of aspirin. She handed him the plastic bottle.
    â€œThanks,” he said, working at the childproof cap. He had to fight himself not to ask about the other items she started to shove back into seemingly rapacious pockets. But he knew instinctively that she’d brought them for him for some reason.
    â€œHere, let me,” she said, bridging the gap between them as she stuffed the last of her things back into her pocket. She held out her hand for the bottle and he gave it up without a struggle, careful not to touch her. He was too aware of her standing so close to him in the night, too aware of his own near nudity, his terrible scars she didn’t so much as look at, and the way the merest hint of a breeze on the cold night air seemed to tease his newly formed skin.
    She flipped the aspirin bottle open and held it out at an angle, apparently prepared to shake them into his hand. Her hands trembled so much that only three aspirin fell onto his hand and a few more disappeared onto the ground. He closed his palm around her shaking fingers.
    â€œDid I scare you when I threw the door open?”
    â€œYes…and no,” she said, with simple honesty and not a single hint of accusation.
    He couldn’t resist lifting his free hand to cover the tiny one he had trapped. “I’m sorry,” he said.
    She gave a half grimace. “Nothing to be sorry about,” she said. “It’s no big deal.”
    He felt her hand fluttering in his, a small wild bird. He lifted his fingers and hers took wing. As she’d done when he’d arrived at the ranch, she curled her hand in to her chest.
    â€œThanks,” he said, though he wasn’t sure what he was thanking her for.
    â€œYou’re welcome,” she said, but that liquid silk voice of hers seemed to be thanking him instead.
    For a moment, an invitation to come inside his new home curled around his tongue. But it tasted too perfect, too sweet. And he was no longer a man who believed that good things were possible. They were only to be desired. But just for a moment he wondered if her skin would feel as smooth as her voice, if her hair would smell as sweet as the expression on her face.
    â€œI hope the aspirin helps,” she said, and with a little wave, she turned away from him again, but this time without the look of hurt rejection or the blaze of painful color staining her cheeks.
    He let her go, but stood outside until she was back at the main house and