Fight for Her by Kelly Favor

close to one another…she didn’t know that she could honestly take it.
    “Krista,” he said, softly.
    She turned her head and their eyes met. This close together, the shock effect was magnified tenfold. His eyes were still and calm and completely focused on her in a way that she’d never felt before from anybody in her life.
    He’s going to kiss me, she thought. Everything in her wanted that, more than she even realized.
    Her lips parted, opening, waiting for his lips to touch hers—finally giving her what she’d been waiting for since the moment they’d met.
    But he didn’t kiss her. Instead, he smiled. “I gave you a really hard time,” he said. “And it was never my intention to hurt you.”
    “I’m the one who showed up on your doorstep and tried to force you to talk about things that you didn’t want to discuss. I had no right to do that.”
    “I’m a big boy, Krista. I don’t think you forced me to do anything. The truth is, I wanted to talk to you. Maybe I didn’t want to do an interview, though.”
    She put a hand up to keep the ice pack steady on her neck. “If you didn’t want to do an interview,” she said, “then what did you want?”
    He looked down for a moment. And then his eyes met hers. “I wanted to…”
    Suddenly, from outside the cabin, a horn honked twice, startling her. She jumped a little in her seat.
    “Who’s that?”
    “That must be Ryder,” he said, getting up from the couch.
    “Wow, that was fast.”
    “He’s only just down the road from here.” Gunner got up and went to the door.
    “Yup, that’s Ryder.” He laughed and shook his head, then opened the door and yelled outside. “What the hell are you doing out there?”
    Krista stood up, walking hesitantly toward the front door.
    “What are you, scared of me?” someone yelled back.
    “Hardly,” Gunner said, chuckling. “Don’t…don’t you dare knock my wood pile over.” Suddenly, he was sprinting out the door.
    Krista didn’t know what on earth was happening. She went quickly to the doorway, just in time to see Gunner racing at breakneck speed down the steps and towards the man out in the front yard.
    Gunner moved faster than anyone she’d ever seen, and Krista had been at enough sporting events to see some very fast people in her life. But Gunner was like a panther.
    She knew it must be Ryder out front because she saw a tow truck parked nearby.
    Ryder was smaller than Gunner, but he was stocky, wearing a sleeveless black shirt and jeans. He met Gunner head on as if to tackle the bigger man.
    But at the last moment, Gunnar scooped Ryder up and actually lifted him straight into the air, above his own head, like he was doing a dumbbell press. Ryder was not a small man. He probably weighed somewhere in the vicinity of two hundred pounds.
    Gunnar was laughing crazily as he spun Ryder in mid-air and then somehow deposited him back onto level ground again without hurting him in the least.
    Ryder was laughing hysterically too, like a kid who’s just gone on a scary but fun rollercoaster ride. “That was so sick!” he said. “Holy shit!”
    “I told you not to mess with my damn woodpile. Do you know how long it took me to stack that wood?” Gunner asked him.
    Ryder was still whooping and hollering. “Oh, man. I almost had you, too.”
    “Sure you did. You were so close.”
    Krista came outside, waving, as Ryder saw her. “You must be the lady with the unfortunate car situation,” he said, catching his breath. “I passed it on my way up.
    Thought I’d come and say hi before towing it back to my shop.”
    “Yeah, that’s my car all right. I’m so sorry you had to come up here on short notice—I hope it wasn’t too much of an inconvenience.”
    Ryder shook his head. He was a very handsome guy himself. Light brown, wavy hair, muscular, with playful eyes and dimples when he grinned, which seemed to be all time. “No inconvenience, ma’am. I’d do anything for this guy right here.” He gave