Her Cowboy Hero. Carolyne Aarsen

to finish it.” He gave her an apologetic look. “Do you mind finishing it up for me?”

      Keira glared at her father. She did mind and he knew it. If she didn’t know better, she would have guessed he’d engineered this particular change in plans. But what else could she say with Tanner right there? So she nodded and started stacking the plates.

      “I told you I’d do that, honey,” Monty said.

      “No, you can’t,” Ellen protested. “You promised me and Alice a game of Scrabble after dinner.” Ellen glanced over at Tanner. “Tanner, do you mind helping Keira?”

      “Never been too proud to do dishes,” Tanner said, getting to his feet, giving Keira a careful smile. But from the tightness of Tanner’s lips she guessed he was as unwilling to be around her as she was around him.

      They cleared the dishes as Ellen, Monty and Alice retreated to a corner of the living room that held the game table. Monty held Ellen’s arm, guiding her awkward steps, but they made it to the table without mishap.

      “Your mom seems frustrated,” Tanner said as they brought the dishes to the kitchen. “Not like her usual bubbly self.”

      “She’s fragile and can’t do much for herself, but she hasn’t complained yet.” Keira stacked the plates by the sink and started cleaning them.

      “I’m sure having Alice around helps a lot.”

      “She’s helpful. Of course, part of the reason she’s here is because of her house getting fixed up.”

      “I thought Alice was here to help your mother,” Tanner responded.

      “She is, but she doesn’t need to be here 24/7.” She didn’t mind Alice, but having her around day and night was tiring.

      She busied herself with scraping the leftover food off the plates. Tanner left to get more dishes and she took a deep breath, chiding herself for being such a wimp around him. Goodness, it had been years since they had seen each other. Surely she could get over this?

      Tanner returned to the kitchen, and over the clink of cutlery and the swish of water over the plates, the only other sound was the muted laughter from Monty, Ellen and Alice playing Scrabble in the other room.

      Keira reached for a plate just as Tanner did, and when their hands brushed, Keira jumped. She dropped the plate the same time he did and it clattered to the floor, shattering on the slate tile.

      “Sorry.”

      “My fault.”

      They both spoke at once, both knelt at once and both tried to pick up the broken pieces at the same time.

      Flustered, Keira grabbed blindly at a shard, which immediately cut into her hand. She yanked it back as blood dripped onto the floor.

      “Here, let me help you with that,” Tanner said, catching her hand to hold it still.

      She tried to pull back, which only made the blood flow more freely. “I can take care of this.” She didn’t want him touching her. Didn’t want him so close to her.

      “Hold still,” Tanner said, frowning as they both stood up. “Where’s your first-aid kit?”

      “It’s nothing. Just a small cut.” She tried once again to pull her hand free but she had forgotten how strong and stubborn he could be.

      Tanner’s mouth thinned into a grim line. “Just tell me where the bandages are,” he growled.

      “Is everything okay in there?” Keira heard her father call out.

      “Just fine,” Tanner yelled back. Then he turned to Keira, grabbed a towel and wrapped it tightly around her hand. He made her sit down at the small table in the breakfast nook. “Now. Bandages?”

      “There’s a first-aid kit in the bottom drawer of the island. Far left side.”

      “Good girl.” He strode to the island, retrieved the kit, then brought it back to the table. He opened it, then found what he needed.

      “Give me your hand,” he said, his voice now quiet as he ripped open a bandage.

      Keira tamped down her reaction and held her hand out to him. He knelt down in front of her, carefully removed the towel, dabbed at the cut as he examined it. “You won’t need stitches,” he said as he quickly wrapped a bandage around the wound. “But you’ll need at least two bandages.”

      Keira tried to distract herself from his large hands gently maneuvering the second bandage onto her cut. She felt the calluses on his palms, caught the familiar scent of the aftershave he used, the smell of the shampoo in his hair. The overhead light shone on his hair, bringing out a faint sheen of gold in the brown, and Keira found she had to make a fist of her free hand to stop herself from reaching up and smoothing it away from his face.

      The way she always used to.

      Just then he looked up and their eyes met. Held.

      His expression softened. She couldn’t look away and for a moment it was as if all the years between them, all the events that kept them apart, had been erased.

      “Is everything okay?”

      Alice stood in the doorway of the kitchen, her arms folded over her chest.

      And her presence brought stark reality back into the moment.

      “I...I cut myself,” Keira murmured, pulling her hand out of Tanner’s.

      “Oh, my. Here, let me help you,” Alice said, skirting the broken dish to get to Keira.

      “It’s fine now,” Keira said, tucking her hand against her side as she got up. “Just a cut. Tanner bandaged it up.” She was about to walk back to finish the dishes when Alice stopped her.

      “Why don’t you take my place at the Scrabble game?” Alice said. “Tanner and I can finish up.”

      “Sure. That’s a good idea,” she said, thankful for the reprieve.

      But as she walked past Tanner, she caught his cynical smile, firmly back in place.

      She paused just outside the kitchen, where neither Alice and Tanner nor her parents could see her. She took a moment, leaning against the wall, trying to get her bearings.

      A little help here, Lord, she prayed, willing her tangled emotions to find the peace and equilibrium she had managed to attain before Tanner had dropped back into her life.

      All she had to do was get through the next few days, she reminded herself as she pinned a smile on her face and walked out to where her parents sat by the table. Dad will get the saddle fixed and Tanner—and all the memories and pain he evoked—could be out of her life. Soon.

       Chapter Three

      The last time he’d been in this church building was for David’s funeral.

      Tanner stood in the back of the foyer of the Saddlebank Community Church, looking over the gathered people, painful memories leaning into him. He pushed away his sorrow as he thought of his father and his brother, both now buried in the graveyard beside the church. For a moment he wished he hadn’t come, but lately he had felt the old hunger for his faith gnawing at him.

      He’d arranged to meet George Bamford, owner of the Grill and Chill, about a place he could stay while he waited for his saddle to get fixed. There was no way he was staying at Refuge Ranch another night.

      So he had two reasons to come to church this morning.

      “Welcome to our services.” An earnest-looking young man wearing a skinny black tie and mustard-yellow shirt with a badge that said Usher handed him a bulletin and added a broad smile. Tanner didn’t recognize him. “Are you visiting?”

      “In a manner of speaking, yeah,” Tanner said, taking the bulletin.

      “Let