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  “What’s wrong?” he asked, reaching for her because she looked as if she would collapse at his feet. Alarm made his tone rough.

  “No, don’t touch me!” she cried in panic, shrinking away from his hand. The movement brought more pain, and though she bit her lips to keep from crying out, a moan sounded low in her throat. When she had control of herself again she said, “I fell out of the barn loft. I’m too sore to do anything.”

  “Come back inside and let me shut the door,” he said. He didn’t make the mistake of trying to help her, even though she could barely move. He suppressed a strong urge to yell at her because if she didn’t insist on living by herself and doing a man’s work she wouldn’t be hurt, but that would wait. He entered behind her and closed the door, then crossed to the fireplace and quickly added a couple of logs, using the poker to stir up the coals.

  “When did you fall?” he asked curtly, turning back to her.

  “Late yesterday afternoon.”

  At least she hadn’t been lying helpless for days. It had been a week since he had seen her, so she could easily have been injured all of that time.

  He tossed his hat aside and knelt on one knee beside her. “This will hurt, but I’m going to check for any broken bones. Just stand there as still as you can so I can get it over with.”

  “I don’t think there’s anything broken,” she protested. “But I’d be grateful if you’d take care of the animals today. I’m just bruised, so I’ll be able to take care of them tomorrow after I get the soreness worked out.”

  “Don’t worry about the animals. And I’ll see for myself if any bones are broken or not.”

  His mutter was rough, his face grim. He had decided what he was going to do, and she knew she wasn’t in any shape to stop him. Dee clenched her fists as he put his hands under her nightgown and ran them up her legs as briskly and efficiently as if she had been a horse. His probing fingers were necessarily less than gentle, and she sucked in her breath as her sore muscles protested. He looked up, blue eyes narrowed, at her intake of breath.

  “My legs are just sore from work,” she gasped in explanation.

  His hands went higher, to her thighs. The hem of her nightgown bunched over his arms. His touch was hot, his callus-roughened palms and fingers hard on her silky skin. She was acutely aware of her nakedness beneath the thin cotton, and of the heat of his big body as he crouched so close to her that her thigh was practically nestled into the curve of his broad shoulder, and his face was almost against her belly. “Stop,” she whispered.

  He looked up, and she saw that he was enraged. His eyes looked like blue fire. “Stop, hell,” he snapped. “You can forget about your modesty, because this damn nightgown is going to have to come off.”

  “No.”

  He rose to his feet with savage grace. “That’s what you think.”

  She lifted her chin in a stubborn movement. “I can’t take it off. I’ve tried, but I can’t raise my arms.”

  He glared down at her, then abruptly pulled his knife from his belt. She couldn’t move fast enough even to begin to evade him. He grasped a fistful of cloth in the front of the gown, pulled it out from her body, inserted the knife point, and sliced upward. The garment gaped open.

  Dee made a futile effort to grab the edges together again, but in her present condition she was no match for him. He simply brushed her hands aside, then pulled the nightgown off of her shoulders and down her arms. The material caught for a moment on the curve of her hips, then slid downward of its own accord to pool around her feet.

  Panic and humiliation combined to engulf her in an enormous flood. A strange gray mist obscured her vision, and her ears began to ring.

  “Goddammit, don’t faint,” Lucas barked, putting his hands on her waist to catch her in case she did. “Take a deep breath. Breathe, goddammit!”

  She did, because pride refused to allow her to faint like a ninny. The sickening gray mist faded, and she focused on his face, set in lines of pure rage. A strange sort of relief spread through her, because his anger gave her something to concentrate on.

  “Don’t swear at me, you bastard! You cut my clothes off of me!”

  His hard fingers clenched her waist as he fought the urge to shake her. Only the knowledge that she really would faint if he did kept him under control. Damn her, didn’t she know when to quit fighting? She was hurt, and someone had to take care of her because she couldn’t do it herself.

  But color had rushed back into her white face, and that curious panic was gone from her eyes, which had darkened to emerald with her anger. Despite his own temper he almost grinned, because if she were well enough to be angry she probably wasn’t hurt too seriously. Besides, Dee’s anger was exhilarating, intensifying her color and reassuring him of her strength. If he had cut a nightgown off of any other woman he knew, he’d have been faced with screaming hysterics. But Dee had sworn back at him and matched his anger with her own even though she was as helpless as a kitten.

  “Shut up and let me see what other damage you’ve done to yourself,” he said, thrusting his face close to hers.

  Dee swayed on her feet, painfully aware of her bareness as the cool air brushed over her skin, but she couldn’t fight him, couldn’t run from him, couldn’t even manage to wrap herself in a blanket. She loathed being helpless, but reality made her admit that she was. He was looking her over good, and she moved her hands in an automatic attempt to shield herself. A flush pinkened her torso and face.

  “For God’s sake, I’ve seen naked women before,” he snapped, putting his hands on her rib cage and forcing his attention to the tracing of each rib, probing for breaks.

  “I don’t care what you’ve seen,” she snapped back, carefully not looking at him. If she didn’t watch him examining her, she might be able to preserve some small mental distance. “I’ve never been naked in front of a man before.”

  “I’ll pull off my own clothes if it’ll make you feel better.”

  “Lucas!”

  “Dee!” he mocked in the same tone of voice, then he brushed her hair back over her shoulders. The thick mane had veiled her breasts, which were now revealed to be high and creamy, conical in shape, lushly rounded and tipped by small pink nipples. His stomach muscles contracted, and a rush of blood to his groin made his shaft thicken. Damn, she was pretty, all slim and firm and rounded in exactly the right places. He grimly tightened his control, but his nostrils flared at the sweet warm scent of her, and his fingers ached to slide into the notch between her legs. If she hadn’t been hurt. . .

  He fought for sanity. If she hadn’t been hurt, she wouldn’t be standing naked under his hands now. She would be outside doing her chores, encased in clothing, her wild tumble of hair sternly twisted into a knot. But she was hurt, and he had to remember that.

  Her collarbones were straight, without any telltale lumps to signal breaks, and she didn’t flinch at his firm touch even though he carefully watched her face for any sign of pain. He felt her neck and told her to turn her head from side to side, which she did with some care but no great difficulty. Then he walked around behind her, gathered the great mass of hair which fell to her hips, and looped it over her shoulder.

  He swore softly between his teeth.

  “I figure I’m bruised,” Dee said, staring into the fire. “I landed on my back.”

  Her shoulders appeared to have taken the brunt of the fall, because a great black and purple welt stretched from shoulder blade to shoulder blade. Her lower back was also bruised, the discoloration extending down to the twin dimples of her buttocks.

  Gently he checked her ribs and found them sore but not broken, as was the case with her arms. All things considered, she was lucky to have escaped with such minor injuries.

  He began thinking of all the things that needed to be done. “I’ll fix you some breakfast,” he said. “Do you want to go back to bed or sit here by the fire?”

  She turned her head and gave him a baleful look. “I can’t sit around like this