Ramona and the Renegade. Marie Ferrarella

annoyed at the sudden downpour that had wreaked havoc with her schedule, and furious with the tire that had almost caused her to go careening off the road and down into a ditch, Mona was definitely not at her best. In addition to that, the knowledge that, at this moment, she bore a strong resemblance to a resuscitated drowned rat did nothing to improve her mood.

      When she saw who it was, she let go of the tire iron, dropping it to the ground. After a beat. She took in a deep, shaky breath, trying not to think about what might have happened if Joe’s reflexes hadn’t been as good as they were.

      “Joe, you scared me!” she snapped. Turning the bolt of fear that shot through her into anger and aiming it at Joe.

      “Then I guess we’re even.” His voice was calm, but beneath the deadly still exterior he had to admit he was anything but. Moving in closer again, Joe looked down at the tire that was still very much a part of Mona’s vehicle. She hadn’t gotten very far in her attempt to remove it, he noted. Raising his eyes to hers, he asked, “Got a flat?”

      Mona laughed shortly and shook her head. “I always did love the way you could grasp any situation at lightning speed.”

      His expression never changed. “It was a rhetorical comment.”

      She pushed her plastered wet hair out of her eyes with the back of her hand. “So was mine.”

      With the rain beating a faster and faster tattoo on his tan, worn Stetson as it showered down all around him, Joe gave her a long, measuring look.

      For the most part, Mona had been away at college, then veterinarian school these past eight years. Although it didn’t seem possible, every time she came back, she seemed even more beautiful than when she’d left. But her sharp tongue hadn’t dulled a whit. He supposed that there were just some things in life you could count on.

      “You want some help or not?” Joe asked, quietly eyeing her.

      Mona had made it a point never to ask for help. It was a matter of pride with her. Plus, if she wasn’t counting on anyone, if she didn’t depend on anyone, then she would never have to go through the agony of disappointment again. It was a philosophy she was forced to develop very early in life, when she finally realized that her mother would never come back for them the way she’d promised.

      The only exceptions to Mona’s philosophy were her brother, her late grandmother and Doc Whitmore. Over the years, the latter had slowly became the father she’d never known, as well as her mentor. Those were the three who’d brought stability into her life.

      As for Joe, well, Joe was someone she’d gone to school with. Someone who’d always managed to be somewhere in close proximity, like the air and the trees. One way or another, Joe seemed never to be that far out of range. In short, he’d been her best friend, though neither one of them had ever verbally acknowledged the role.

      She might have known she’d run into him before she saw anyone else from Forever, Mona thought.

      In response to his offer for help, her slender shoulders rose and fell in a careless shrug beneath her soaked jacket. “Well, since you’re here and all…”

      As she spoke, she stepped back from the defunct vehicle. Because of the torrential rain and the dust now swiftly turning into mud, Mona found her footing compromised. She was about to slip backward and come perilously close to ignobly landing on her butt if not her back altogether. At the last second, she was rescued from the impending embarrassment by Joe’s quick reflexes. He grabbed her, pulling her forward toward him before she could slide backward. Due to his strength, the abrupt motion was a matter of overcompensation and suddenly, rather than discovering herself sprawled out on the ground and flat against the oozing mud, Mona slammed up against Joe without so much as the width of a raindrop between them.

      She raised her eyes to Joe’s, doing her best to regroup as quickly as possible. Her pulse raced and she didn’t like it. She also didn’t want him taking any note of it.

      “Is that your heart pounding?” she asked flippantly, doing her very best to sound as nonchalant as she didn’t feel.

      “Nope,” he lied. “Must be yours.”

      The same strong hands that had grabbed her now pushed her back by a good twelve inches, if not more. Having Mona against him like that took control out of his hands.

      “You’re an accident waiting to happen,” he told her, his voice flat, emotionless as he tried to deflect any more attention away from the state of the organ that was betraying him. Or one of the organs that were betraying him at any rate, he thought ruefully.

      He nodded toward his vehicle that was parked off to the side. “Why don’t you just go and wait in my car while I handle this?” She was not about to take a chance on slipping again so soon. The last thing she wanted was to hear him laughing at her.

      “What? And miss the learning experience of a lifetime, watching you change a tire?” she scoffed, raising her voice so that the winds didn’t whip it away. “How will poor little me ever learn how to do such a big, manly thing if I’m shut away in an ivory tower?”

      For emphasis, she waved toward the vehicle which became less visible despite its close proximity.

      Joe shook his head. “I see you still have a smart mouth.”

      The grin on her lips was deliberately exaggerated. She batted her eyelashes at him like an old-fashioned movie goddess. “It goes with my smart mind.”

      “Then I guess you must be brilliant by now,” he commented drily.

      Moving slowly, he picked his way around her Jeep, going to the rear.

      “I am,” Mona answered in the same tone, punctuating her sentence with a toss of her wet head. “Where are you going?”

      He glanced in her direction. “Someone with your brilliant mind would know that I wanted to check the condition of your spare before going through the trouble of taking off the flat.”

      “I knew that,” she retorted, then added in a more mellow tone, “but I didn’t know if you did.” She followed him to the rear of her vehicle.

      The spare tire was mounted on the back of the Jeep. Testing the tire’s integrity, Joe frowned and shook his head. This was not good. He spared her a glance over his shoulder and could see by her body language that she’d become instantly defensive before he even said a word. He said it anyway.

      “Don’t you ever check the condition of your spare?”

      Her eyes narrowed beneath her soggy bangs. “Somewhere between studying for my finals—and the examination for my vet license—and juggling a part-time job to pay for little incidentals like food, it must have temporarily fallen off my ‘immediately to do’ list.”

      He ignored her sarcastic tone and answered matter-of-factly. “Well, that’s a shame,” he told her. “Because your spare’s flat, too.”

      Mona closed her eyes. It figured. All things considered, this had not been one of her better days. Opening her eyes again, she looked at Joe. “As flat as the one on it?” she asked.

      You just didn’t substitute one flat tire for another. Flat was flat. His dark eyes would have pinned her to the wall—if there had been one around. “You know better than that.”

      Yes, she did. She was just desperate. And really, really annoyed. With both tires for being flat and with herself for not noticing that the spare had slowly lost its air. And most of all, right now she was annoyed with Joe for pointing it out.

      Hands fisted at her waist, Mona swung one booted foot at the right front tire and kicked it.

      “That’s not going to make it come back to life,” Joe commented.

      She glared at him. “I know that.” The hood she had on provided next to no protection for her at this point and when it slid off her head, she didn’t bother to try to pull it back up. “Now what?”

      The