Seduction of Saber (Saving the Sinners of Preacher's Bend #3) (9 page)

Julia groaned even louder because Liddy was making
things even more uncomfortable by circling the man like a prowling tigress. There
wasn’t an inch of Mr. Patterson her friend didn’t assess—twice.

“Yeah, and now he gets to stay here for the whole
week. For free. Thanks to my father’s disturbing temper,” Julia admitted.

Liddy held out her hand to Saber. “I’m Liddy…taken,
and happy about that. But if you got even a week out of our dear, sweet,
incredibly naïve school marm, you are certainly playing your cards right.
Perhaps you’re just heaven sent, hmm?”

Saber smiled down at Liddy’s face then shook her hand.
“It’s Saber Patterson. Nothing heavenly-sent involved with my being here. But
thanks for noticing, just the same.”

Liddy snapped her head back.

Julia could see the wheels spinning in her friend’s
head, the obvious fact she was noticing the blond hair, silver blue eyes, and
bulging muscles, same as every woman alive likely did.

“Saber Patterson? Surely not
thee
Saber
Patterson?” Liddy asked.

“Yes, ma’am, the one and only.”

Liddy dropped Saber’s hand like a hot potato, taking a
huge step back. “I’ve heard all about you.” With a touch of awe held in her
voice, she eyed the bull-rider up and down, crown to heels.

“Don’t you believe everything you hear, Little Lady.”
Saber had turned his sight to Julia, giving her a wink.

Forced to dissect because an odd feeling was hitting her
gut, surely jealousy wasn’t playing a role in this?

She began chewing on her bottom lip as if tomorrow
wasn’t coming.

“No. It’s all good, every single word of it,” Liddy
announced brightly. “They said you did something at some hotshot hospital in
Miami for a kid. Saved his life, in fact. I read all about it in the newspapers.”

“Like I said, don’t believe everything you hear or
everything you read in the gossip rags.” His voice had dipped into what sounded
almost like regret.

“No. It was front page news in all the newspapers.
Everyone at work had been talking about it. Lawyers tend to stick their noses
into other people’s business when it involves a doctor. You did a pretty hefty
miracle for a kid, then disappeared; oddly, never to be seen again. Talk was
you might’ve had an accident somewhere. Amnesia. Because no one seemed to know
why you left Miami so swiftly, or where you ran off to hide,” Liddy continued.

Of course, if anyone would know how this felt, it would
be Liddy. She’d done her own disappearing act nearly ten years ago; leaving
Jake in the lurch, and Julia too, simply because she’d found out about his
cheating on her with Eliza Porter.

All water under the bridge at this point.

Julia remained mum, but damnit! She really wanted answers
now. If he saved a kids’ life, why wouldn’t he want to talk about it? If not
mistaken, she could swear he looked ready to run.

**

Saber felt uncomfortable about Julia’s friend talking
about any of this, even having brought it up. He had to get her to drop it,
soon. Else, his stay would no longer be offered, his cover blown, and
everything he’d worked for destroyed by accusations and lies.

He’d worked too damn hard at blending in with the
crowd to have it fall apart now. And Julia was glaring at him; made him feel
lower than a beer-drinking slug crawling across hot pavement just to get into the
prized blue-ribbon garden on the opposite side. Was it because of this
unexpected conversation taking place? She’d been so easy to read before. Now?
Not so much.

He knew there was only one way to find out the cause
for her oddity. Saber chose to take the least most painful way out of this by
not
asking what that was. If he played his cards right, perhaps this time he would not
have to explain the actual horrors of his past.

He would not have to tell another soul why he left
Miami, or why he could never go back.

Liddy couldn’t help but stare at Mr. Patterson. What
she’d read about this man over a cup of coffee when living in Miami, had been
truly incredible. The guy was an absolute genius in the medical field. What in
the world was he doing in Preacher’s Bend? And why was he riding a bunch of devil-hearted
mammals for a living? Wanting to get hurt, or worse? Killed?

No one with half his brains would be riding angry
bulls only to make a bit of cold hard cash. The mere thought of it was making
her sick to her stomach and having her doubt her sanity up to this point.

He’d said his name was Saber Patterson. How many men out
there had a name like that? It wasn’t exactly John Smith or Mr. Jones. And with
his charming good looks, not many men out there even looked as he did—cowboy
surfer . Saber Patterson was a brilliant individual, a doctor no less. He was Godly
gorgeous. If she wasn’t so head over heels in love with Jake, she would be
sorely tempted to shove Julia aside from this particular hot male specimen just
to be first in line. And Julia wasn’t even giving Patterson the time of day.

That wasn’t the Julia Liddy knew and loved. Back in
their younger days, her friend would’ve been falling all over this man, doing
everything and anything imaginable to get him into her panties. A little
teasing, a little sashaying, a sexier outfit …Jesus! She’d at least be wearing makeup
on her face.

Something was up.

Julia looked terrible. There wasn’t stitch of mascara,
eyeliner, or lipstick on her mouth. It was as if within the last few months her
dear friend had given up. She wasn’t even trying to catch his interest.

Tangible, so real, she could almost see it with her
own eyes. These two were hiding something from her.

“So? You ride dangerous bulls for a living?” she asked.
“What’s that like?”

Julia had chosen to head into the kitchen to make them
a pot of coffee. Always the polite hostess, Liddy couldn’t chastise her friend
for wanting a moment’s reprieve from the conversation.

Saber nodded. Both then moved to sit on opposite sofas
inside the Tressle Boarding House.

He never quite settled into the sofa before she jumped
on him.

“Okay. Now that Julia has gone out of the room, start
spilling the beans,” she warned, glancing first at the kitchen doorway, then at
Mr. Patterson.

“Excuse me?” The man sputtered, rising in breakneck
speed to gain his feet.

Liddy’s eyes followed his movements. “I said start
spilling the beans, Mr. Patterson. You, my good man, know exactly what I am
talking about.” Her glare reached its intended target. “I am fully aware of who
you are, and what you did. I wasn’t about to say so in front of Julia. So why
are you hiding in a low budget rodeo? Why aren’t you still practicing medicine
down in Miami? And why did you leave the state so suddenly after doing
something damn near close to a miracle?”

Saber looked taken aback. “I am not hiding out in
anything, Ms. Giotti.” He shoved his hands deep into the front pockets of his
jeans, drawing the material tight.

Liddy almost groaned aloud, catching herself at the
last second.

“It’s
Mrs
. Giotti. But that’s an entirely
different story, and we don’t have all day to sit around and chitchat about my strange
life. We are talking about you. And for the moment, I’d say we haven’t much
time to do even that. If I know Julia, and believe me I do like the back of my
hand, she’ll be coming back into this room, lickety-split, supervising the both
of us from saying too much about her. So start talking, Mr. Patterson,” she
warned, “unless you feel the urgent desire coming on to tell my dearest friend
in the whole world the truth of what you’re trying hard not to.”

She cocked an eyebrow upward suggestively, giving him
barely little alternative.

“What’s there to talk about?” He smiled politely. “The
weather’s been pretty good as of late. I did hear there might be some heavy
rains headed this way for the coming weekend. I do like the rain. Don’t you,
Mrs. Giotti? A good storm can wash away even the dirtiest of things, the
ugliest truths; give everything and everyone a fresh start. Hell, it can make a
well-earned lie go away—permanently. Or so I’m told.”

“Oh!” was all she could utter before he cut her off.

“There’s no ‘oh’ about it, Mrs. Giotti,” he promised
“I’m not hiding myself in a low-budget rodeo incognito. Everyone knows me and
why I’m here. I don’t use a false identity. I ride bulls. It’s what I do. I
never lie about my name, or compromise an easy situation. What you may or may
not have heard about me has been washed away. So please, let’s just leave it at
that.”

His words had turned to barely above a whisper as he’d
kept his eyes glued to the kitchen door. They could hear Julia moving about,
pulling cups from the cupboard. The last sound she’d made was of her setting
the cups on a tray. In another second or two, she would be back to give them
the third degree.

“Are you going to hurt her?” Liddy asked. “Cause if
you are, you’ll have to step through me to do it.”

Saber moved to her sofa and actually glared down at
her.

“Not on your life! That is perhaps the easiest
question anyone has ever asked of me—or to answer.” He hardened his eyes to
make certain she’d gotten the message. “Ms. Hillard isn’t someone who should be
hurt…by anyone.”

“That’s good to hear, Mr. Patterson. Truly, it is.
She’s been through enough. So why don’t you come clean and tell her the truth
while you still can? Once she finds out, she might not forgive as easily as you
expect her to.” She eyed him up and down, daring the gorgeous man to concede.

“It’s complicated,” Saber offered, turning his head
toward the window.

He shoved his hands again into his front pockets and
glanced out at nothing in particular. Other than a sleepy old town, on a sleepy
Sunday morning, slowly coming to life, life was what it was around here.

“What’s complicated?” Julia had returned to the living
room with three freshly brewed cups of coffee. A growing frown then made as two
heads whipped toward her unexpected entrance, more so her question.

“Riding bulls,” Liddy quickly supplied. She’d taken
her cue to drop it when Saber pleaded with his silver-blue eyes for her to do just
that.

Julia handed the first cup of coffee to Liddy, moving toward
Saber to give him his.

“That’s right.” His thoughts spilled out. “You never
know if you’re going to get a real mean one that will turn on you in a matter
of seconds. Or, if and when you do, you spend the next few hours of your life
going around in circles, second-guessing your every reason for living.”

He thanked Julia for the coffee with a tilted grin.

But Liddy quickly understood the words. He was telling
her, without telling her, something terrible happened to him down in Miami, something
with his being a brilliant doctor. If she dug hard enough she would’ve been
able to discover the buried skeletons of his past. However, she had much better
things to do with her life; like dealing with her own. Not some stranger’s life,
which happened to have dropped into theirs’ quite unexpectedly.

Jake and she had ten years of incredible waste to
catch up on. She did not have time to deal with this newcomer. Nor, deal with
any of Julia’s problems. As long as the man could promise her he would not hurt
Julia while he was here, Liddy would be able to leave well enough alone—for
now.

More than anyone else, she knew a man with a conscious
only needed time to confess his sins. It was a lawyer’s astute reasoning
trapped in her brain that made her feel this way. After all, take a good hard
look at Jake. It took him a full ten years to confess his stupidity. Now they
were getting remarried.

If Julia was being left in the dark, it was on
purpose. Until Saber Patterson was ready and truly wanted to change this fact
for her friend, it would have to be the way things remained. But Liddy wasn’t
happy about it. Somehow, someway, Mr. Patterson’s secrecy might come back to
haunt him.

**

No one would ever expect to be blind-sighted so early
in the morning. Saber didn’t know what to make of it. First the kiss? Then the
punch to his face? Now this?

He, like everyone, had skeletons in the closet, and
none of them were totally dead as of yet. Until those ghosts turned to ashes,
he was sticking with the rodeo.

His thoughts moved to a time when he hadn’t been happy
with himself. Nor happy with what he’d done.

But, as was said, his past had been washed away like a
summer storm flooding the cornfields. The waters might have muddied for a little
while, exposing some of the more vulnerable roots, but in the end, the corn
still grew tall. Eventually everything had a way of ripening; same as humans to
a certain degree. Hiding out was the best he could do—as Mrs. Giotti had
pointed out.

Even if it came down to where he got himself hurt in
the process, he wasn’t ready to tell anyone the truth. Not until he knew exactly
what that truth was. When he discovers this answer, hopefully it was one he
could live with.

Julia took a sip from her mug and asked generally,
“So? Can I trust the two of you not to rob me blind while I go find a large red
book this man needs to sign? We didn’t quite get to that, did we?”

She moved her sight toward Saber, and for some strange
reason he could barely glance her way.

“No, Little Darlin’. We certainly did not,” he
mumbled.

Liddy interrupted any momentary reminiscing by
clearing her throat. “Is there something that I should know about, something
going on between the two of you?”

“No. Nothing,” Saber responded.

Julia turned beet red. He used this to his advantage,
changing his guilt into something he could accept.

“She promised me a bed, but she says she’s not willing
to share hers. Now I have to wait and see which one she’ll actually let me use
for the week.” His dimples deepened. “Until she shows me a room, yours’ truly
is to remain in limbo.”

It was almost comical to watch Julia’s eyes fill with
shock.

“God! You are absolutely hopeless, Mr. Patterson. Has
anyone ever told you that?” She set her cup on the low table. “But your money
is as good as anyone’s these days; therefore, I guess I’ll just have to put up
with you.”

Saber cocked a brow. “But I had thought…,” he started,
pausing. What had he thought? His luck would change?

Seconds later, she was pointing an accusing finger at
his massive chest. “I can very easily change my mind and charge you double for
that room, Mr. Patterson. Think you can behave for at least ten seconds, and
still get it for free?”

“Oh! Little Darlin’, I can be as good as you want me
to be,” he promised, “and for much longer than the required ten seconds. But we’ve
already discussed this fact while you were on top of me in that bedroom of
yours.”

Liddy gasped to this uncensored admission. Her eyes skipped
hurriedly to Julia. Her best friend had said on the phone that he was knocked
out cold. Had Julia lied?

“He is just pulling your chain, Liddy,” Julia warned
harshly. “Nothing happened in there. And
nothing
will!”

“Ah, come now, Little Darlin’. Don’t go sayin’ nothing
will, when we both know it ain’t the truth. You’ll start to hurt my feelins’
calling me a liar.”

“If you can be this rude and arrogant, and do so in
front of a total stranger, then you don’t
have
any feelings, Mr.
Patterson. So, it is a damn good thing I am generously kindhearted and will
allow you the stay; but I would expect you at least to try to behave yourself
while here. I can always get my father to come back and remind me why I should
lock you out.”

Saber playfully put a hand to his heart. “You wound me
deeply, Little Darlin’.”

“If I am wounding you at all, take an aspirin and get
over it.” She moved hurriedly toward her combination office-den.

“She always this mistrusting of folks?” he asked Liddy.

Liddy grinned from ear to ear. “No. Not usually. But
Julia does like…,” she started, looking to have thought better of telling him
about her friend’s personal life. “She tends only to like men who sport large-than-life
tattoos. If you ain’t got one, then you ain’t worth the time of day to her.”

Saber’s smile increased tenfold. “Is that so?” His
deep dimples formed as he eyed Ms. Hillard, who was coming into the living room
carrying a large red book in her hand. “Then I guess she has no reason
not
to trust me.”

With quick movements, he pulled off his T-shirt right
in front of both women. Each one gasped at his unexpected display of flesh. Not
at what he’d done, per se, nor at
why
, it seemed, but at what covered a
puckering scar that ran across his midsection from a very large gash.

Saber Patterson had a Boa constrictor tattoo on his
stomach; a tattoo that had been recently mangled by a bull getting a little too
close to him with its long horns.

“I have a tattoo,” he admitted. “A damn good one.”