Lois Greiman - [Hope Springs 02] Read Online Free PDF

obstetrician.”
    He narrowed his eyes a little. Flexed his jaw. “I’m just trying to help,” he said.
    “Help?” She stepped back a pace. “Is that what you call it when you disappear for months at a time? When you—” She stopped short, since it was apparent that she was losing her mind. After all, she had told him to leave . . . had insisted, in fact, that he return to the rodeo circuit. She could manage things on her own. She didn’t need a man in her life. After her ex-fiance’s departure, she was thrilled to be on her own, she’d said. But it was clear now that she hadn’t really expected him to believe her, and the truth of her own disjointed illogic made her temper rise like a springtime flood. “How do you know so much about childbirth anyway?”
    He tilted his head at her as if she’d lost her last marble. “Geez, Head Case, is that what’s bothering you?”
    “Where did you even hear the word effacing? ”
    “Everyone knows that stuff,” he said.
    “I don’t.” Her voice sounded a little pissier than she’d intended and seemed to raise his ire.
    “Well, you keep seeing Hedley and you’d better be a quick study.”
    She shook her head. “What is it with you and Brooks?”
    “Brooks . . .” He said the name with an odd accent, then drew a deep breath, slowed down. “. . . is a jackass.”
    “Well, then you two have a lot in—”
    “Hey,” Sophie said. Casie jumped, nearly dropping a pistol as she found the girl in the darkness. “What’s up?” Sophie Jaegar had arrived at the Lazy six months ago as a guest. It was hard to say exactly what her role was now.
    “Casie is going to become a sharpshooter.” Colt’s voice sounded atypically bad tempered.
    “What?” Even in the near darkness of the front yard, Sophie Jaegar was beautiful. Despite a hectic day of giving tours and riding demonstrations, every hair was in place, every fingernail immaculate. Casie had no idea how she did it. Perhaps it had something to do with breeding, or money. Both of which the girl had in spades. Functional family—that’s what she lacked. Hence her original arrival at the Lazy. Her subsequent stay there was a little more complicated.
    Colt shrugged. Casie could feel him trying to unwind. Odd. She’d never even known he could wind. She felt an evil little tug of satisfaction at the advent of that knowledge. Served him right to get all cranked up after the years he had tormented her in high school.
    “How you doing, Soph?” he asked.
    The girl glanced at him. While Emily had adored Colt from the day they first met, Sophie was more reserved, about everything. Casie had never appreciated that fact more than she did right now. “You’re skinnier,” she said.
    He grinned, seeming amused by his lack of ability to charm her. “Shortage of home cooking on the road. How’s that colt coming along?”
    She shrugged, but even in the uncertain light, her enthusiasm was obvious. Damn him and his honest interest in other people. “I’m ground driving him now.”
    “Yeah?”
    “I bet he’s grown a full hand since you saw him last.”
    “You must have him and Ty on the same diet then.”
    Sophie pursed her lips at the mention of the boy she had crossed swords with since day one. “I thought he cared about that old mare of his.”
    “What?”
    “Angel,” she said, referring to the emaciated gray Casie had bought at auction less than a year before. As it turned out, Ty had arrived along with her as an unforeseen bonus. “I thought she was going to keel over right in the cattle pens. He rides her too hard.”
    “She loves to work cattle,” Casie said, reluctant to jump into the conversation but no longer able to resist. “She probably just got keyed up.”
    “Roberts was the one getting excited,” Sophie said.
    They stared at her in tandem. She glanced from one to the other, scowling heavily. “He’d do anything to be the center of attention.”
    Colt raised his brows.
    Casie tilted her head