Looking For Trouble by Becky McGraw

truck and got in slamming the door
behind him. She heard the truck roar to life, then heard a screech
of the wheels, as he left.
     
    Two hours later, sitting outside the
emergency room doors in a wheelchair, with her ankle in a hot green
cast, and her heart in the bottom of her stomach, Jess had another
regret...that she'd sent Wade away, because she was mad. Now, she
didn't have a ride, because she'd forgotten there was no cell phone
coverage at the Double B ranch, and her purse was in the van, which
meant she didn't even have money to call a cab, or use the pay
phone again. She'd had to borrow fifty cents from someone in the
waiting room to make the first call to Jazzie's cell, which didn't
go through.
     
    If worse came to worse, she'd have to try
and wheel herself to the hotel, which she thought was about three
miles away...or wait until Jazzie or Travis figured out she was
stranded here. Giving into the pain medication they'd shot her up
with in the emergency room, she slid down in the wheelchair and
dozed off.
     

CHAPTER THREE
     
     
    The party was pretty much winding down, when
Wade got back to the Double B, and everyone was going home. He
pulled to a stop outside the tent, and went to find Jazzie to tell
her that she needed to go pick her stubborn friend at the hospital.
Wade was done fighting with her, he was only telling Jazzie,
because he wanted to make sure she had a ride.
     
    The things he'd discovered about the lithe
blond tonight, pretty much told him he didn't want to have anything
else to do with her. Not only was she a conniving liar and a
player, her morals seemed to be pretty damned shaky. Wade never
thought he'd see the day when he met a woman he thought was too
wild for him, but he could now say, he'd met that woman. Her games
were Olympic caliber events...she had her routine down pat, and
definitely scored tens on execution. The men she targeted didn't
have a chance.
     
    Wade considered himself a decent judge of
character, and he couldn't resign himself to the fact that he'd
been so damned wrong about her though. Now that he'd calmed down
some, a few pieces of the Jess puzzle didn't quite fit in his
mind.
     
    For one, when they'd made love a year ago,
if she'd been three months pregnant, he felt sure her stomach would
have been at least a little rounded, it hadn't been...it was
concave if anything...and there weren't any other typical signs
either, not that he'd been with any pregnant women that he knew of,
but he wasn't totally dense to the signs.
     
    The first person he saw when he walked under
the tent was Beau Bowman, who was talking to Jazzie by the stage,
flirting with her. It was obvious to him then that Jess hadn't lied
about not having a meeting planned with Beau. That man was a
straight shooter, and he wouldn't be flirting with one, if he had
plans with the other. Wade got an uneasy feeling in his stomach,
when he walked over to them.
     
    Jazzie immediately broke away from Beau and
walked toward him. With concern pinching her black brows together,
she demanded, "How's Jess? Where is she?"
     
    Wade swallowed hard, knowing this spitfire
who was Jess's best friend was not going to be happy with him, "I
don't know, I left her at the hospital..."
     
    She put her hand on her curvy hip, then
leaned forward and narrowed her eyes, and Wade knew she was
building up steam to blast him. The fiery little Latina's face
reddened and she took a step toward him, then put her finger in his
chest, and hissed, "What the hell do you mean, you left her
at the hospital? You promised you were going to take care of
her! If this is how you do that, then I'm glad she didn't
tell you!"
     
    Guilt flooded him, because she was right,
but how could he take care of someone who didn't want to be taken
care of? "She told me to leave her there, she didn't want my help,"
he said defensively.
     
    "I don't give a damn, you should have
stayed! She's stubborn and hard-headed and when she gets in a snit,
she's even worse!