A Convenient Proposal(32)

“Why?”

He stopped under the bare branches of an oak tree, shifted to stand in front of her, and cupped her face with his palms. “Because I am your fiancé. I know what I’m talking about.”

She managed a small chuckle. “I guess that’s as good a reason as any.” Then she clasped his wrists with her own strong fingers. “And what about you? Have you decided to believe that you didn’t deserve being dumped a week before your wedding?”

“Well…”

“And that you didn’t do anything to drive Zelda away?”

“No fair, turning my own advice around on me.”

“Oh, yes, it is fair. Zelda could have been honest with you much sooner and made the entire issue less painful. Maybe she couldn’t help falling for Al. But she didn’t have to wait so long, either. Do you see that?”

Arden’s fierce gaze and the determined set of her chin were pretty convincing. “I might be able to see that.”

“Good.” Her mouth softened into a smile.

Griff couldn’t resist taking the chance to sample the curves of that smile with his own lips. He’d always thought smiling kisses offered a special kind of pleasure.

What he hadn’t bargained for was the way even the lightest touch from Arden’s mouth could stir the coals of desire into an open flame. One minute they were sharing light caresses, smooth and easy…but the next minute, smooth and easy got buried under a hot flow of need.

And then a runner breezed past them. “Geez—get a room, why don’t ya?”

Griff loosened his arms, which had somehow gotten wrapped around Arden’s body, and allowed her to back up. She spent a few seconds releasing her grip on his sweater in the process.

“We’ll keep walking, instead,” he said. Hearing the roughness in his voice, he cleared his throat. “Though I like his basic concept.”

Arden nodded. “Walking is good.”

They returned to the Harley, and Griff was just pondering the best place to have lunch when his cell phone vibrated.

The number on the screen was his dad’s private cell phone.

“Excuse me,” he told Arden, then answered the call. “What’s up?”

His afternoon plans got shot to hell with three sentences.

He nodded, though Jake couldn’t see it. “I’ll be right there.”

Arden gave him an inquiring look as he closed the phone.

“Dad’s in surgery with an emergency and an office full of clients,” Griff explained, handing her the smaller helmet. “And he just got a farm call that’s also an emergency, of the life-threatening kind. I’m going to have to go out there.”

“Of course.”

He blew out a frustrated breath. “I don’t even have time to take you back to the house. I could call Kathy—”

“Let’s just go where you need to be,” Arden said. “Don’t worry about the extra baggage.”

Grinning, he climbed onto the bike. “Yes, ma’am.”

A five minute ride got them to the clinic, where Toni, one of the vet techs, was standing by the back door. “Your truck is loaded,” she told him, after a curious glance at Arden. “Stacy Winfrey got the horse to the barn and she’s waiting for you.”

“Thanks.” He took the keys she offered. “Toni, this is Arden Burke. Can you show her into my office, get her something to eat and make her—”

Arden put a hand on his arm. “Could I come with you? I’ll stay out of the way.”

Griff frowned. “This is not a good call. It’ll be messy. We might lose the animal.”

She straightened her shoulders. “I’ll be okay. I won’t make a fuss.”

He didn’t have time to dither. “Get in. I’ll phone,” he told Toni, and slid behind the wheel.

“Not the first case I would choose to come back on,” he muttered, more to himself than her.

But Arden had heard him. “What happened?”

“This is a breeding farm with about fifty mares and a bunch of stallions, including this one—Rajah, a Thorough-bred. They paid well over a quarter of a million for him.”

“Dollars?”

“Oh, yeah. The handsomest guy you’d ever want to see, but on the high-strung side. Today, he decided to go through a board fence.”

She put a hand over her mouth. “Oh, no.”