Rogue Stallion Read Online Free PDF Page B

or work-related stamped on it. Like the mugs with the police insignias.
    “What are you looking for? Sentiment?” he chided. “You won’t find it here. I’m not a sentimental man.”
    “You’re a caring one, in your way,” she returned. “You were kind to Ellen and Chad.”
    “Taking care of emotionally wounded people goes with the job,” he reminded her. He picked up his coffee cup and sipped the black liquid. His dark eyes searched hers. “I’ll remind you again that I don’t need hero worship from a social worker with a stunted libido.”
    “Why, McCallum, I didn’t know you knew such big words,” she murmured demurely. “Do you read dictionaries in your spare time? I thought you spent it polishing your pistol.”
    He chuckled with reserved pleasure. His deep voice sounded different when he laughed, probably because the sound was so rare, she mused.
    “What do you do with yours?” he asked.
    “I do housework,” she said. “And read over case files. I can’t sit around and do nothing. I have to stay busy.”
    He finished his coffee and got up. “Want another cup?” he asked.
    She shook her head and stood up, too. “I have to get home. Tomorrow’s another workday.”
    “Let me open the latch for Mack so that he has access to the backyard and I’ll take you over there.”
    “Won’t he run off?” she asked.
    “He’s got a fenced-in area and his own entrance,” he replied. “I keep it latched to make sure the neighbor’s damned cat stays out of the house. It walks in and helps itself to his dog food when I’m not home. It climbs right over the fence!”
    Jessica had to smother a laugh, he sounded so disgusted. She moved toward the dog, who suddenly growled up at her.
    She stopped dead. He was a big dog, and pretty menacing at close range.
    “Sorry,” McCallum said, tugging Mack toward his exit in the door. “He’s not used to women.”
    “He’s big, isn’t he?” she asked, avoiding any further comment.
    “Big enough. He eats like a horse.” He took his keys out of his pocket and locked up behind her while she got into the car.
    They drove back toward her place. The night sky was dark, but full of stars. The sky went on forever in this part of the country, and Jessica could understand how McCallum would return here. She herself could never really leave. Her heart would always yearn for home in Montana.
    When they got to her cabin, there was a single lighted window, and her big tomcat was outlined in it.
    “That’s Meriwether,” she told him. “He wanderedup here a couple of years ago and I let him stay. He’s an orange tabby with battle-scarred ears.”
    “I hate cats,” he murmured as he stopped the car at her front door.
    “That doesn’t surprise me, McCallum. What surprises me is that you have a pet at all—and that you even allow a stray cat on your property.”
    “Sarcasm is not your style, Miss Larson,” he chided.
    “How do you know? Other than the time you were sick, you only see me at work.”
    He pursed his lips and smiled faintly. “It’s safer that way. You lonely spinsters are dangerous.”
    “Not me. I intend to be a lonely spinster for life,” she said firmly. “Marriage isn’t in my plans.”
    He scowled. “Don’t you want kids?”
    She opened her purse and took out her house key. “I like my life exactly as it is. Thanks for the lift. And the shoulder.” She glanced at him a little self-consciously.
    “I’m a clam,” he said. “I don’t broadcast secrets; my own or anyone else’s.”
    “That must be why you’re still working for Judd Hensley. He’s the same way.”
    “He knew about your problem, I gather?”
    She nodded. “He’s been sheriff here for a long time. He and his wife were good friends of my parents. I’m sorry about their divorce. He’s a lonely man these days.”
    “Loneliness isn’t a disease,” he muttered. “Despite the fact that you women like to treat it like one.”
    “Still upset about my bringing you