The Rogue Hunter by Lynsay Sands Page B

moving toward the steps. "Which side of the dock did you sink the fish basket?"
    "I'll get them," Alex offered, closing the lid on the barbecue.
    "Where is Sam?" Bricker asked as she started down the steps.
    Alex glanced back, a slightly surprised expression on her face, but she answered, "Inside draining the potatoes for potato salad. Jo's in there too. She's cutting veggies to go with the dip."
    "Thanks." Bricker smiled, and when Alex nodded and turned to continue off the deck, he immediately turned to Mortimer. "Sam's inside making potato salad."
    "So I heard."
    "Well… ?" the younger immortal said grimly.
    "Well what?" Mortimer snapped with exasperation.
    "Well, you should go offer her a hand."
    Mortimer peered at the younger man as if he were mad. "What on God's green earth makes you think I know anything about cooking?"
    "I don't," Bricker snapped. "I just thought you might know at least a little about women and that wooing them means you have to be in the same general proximity."
    "Wooing?" Mortimer almost choked on the word.
    "Getting to know her then," Bricker said dryly. "Go on, go see if she needs a hand or wants company while she's chopping and stuff." When Mortimer hesitated, he added, "You can ask her where everyone around here goes to party while you're at it."
    "Right." Mortimer sighed and headed into the cottage.
    Jo had just gone into the bathroom when Sam heard the screen door squeak open and then slap closed. Standing at the sink, draining the boiled potatoes into a strainer, she assumed it was Alex. "How are the steaks doing? I just have to finish draining these and run them under cold water then mix everything up and the potato salad will be done."
    "The steaks looked nearly done to me, but then I like mine rare."
    Startled by the deep male voice, Sam jerked her head around to see their tall, good-looking neighbor, Garrett Mortimer. Unfortunately, it was not a good move with her ear infection. The world immediately tipped, and she instinctively dropped the pot to grab for the counter and keep her balance. The pot hit the bottom of the sink with a thud and boiling water splashed upward, creating a mini tsunami of scalding liquid that hit her arm. Crying out in startled pain, Sam instinctively jerked backward, then immediately slipped on the hot water on the floor and lost her footing, ending on her bottom on the kitchen's linoleum tiles.
    Sam was vaguely aware of Mortimer shouting out and rushing toward her, but stunned as she was by the fall and the pain now shooting through her bottom and throbbing arm, she simply sat where she'd landed, cradling her pained arm and gasping for breath.
    "Are you all right?" Mortimer asked, dropping to his haunches beside her. "Let me see your arm."
    "Sam? What happened?" Jo cried, rushing back up the hall into the kitchen.
    "I'm fine, I fell," she answered her sister shakily, but her gaze was on Garrett Mortimer's face. While Jo looked alarmed and concerned, their neighbor actually looked angry. What the devil did he have to be angry about? Sam wondered with bewilderment. She hadn't burned him , she thought, and then gasped as he grasped her arm to examine her burn.
    A second slap of the screen door had her glancing toward it to see who else had come to witness the latest humiliation caused by her stupid ear infection. She didn't mind so much when she saw Alex rushing in, but could have done without Justin Bricker, who was on her heels. The man paused just inside the door, his gaze sliding around the cottage, and Sam looked around herself.
    Her parents had built this cottage when she and her sisters were just children, and it wasn't nearly as big or fancy as the cottage the men were staying in. While the front was one mid-sized room making up a small living room/kitchen area combo, the back consisted of three very small bedrooms, a tiny bathroom, and an equally tiny storage room holding the water heater and so forth. There was no second level as in the house next door,