The pain hit first. Not surprising. It wasn’t the first time she’d woken up this way, but it had been a while.
Years of practice helped her push back the agony and concentrate on assessing her situation and level of injury. Both would determine what she did next.
Remaining still, she opened her senses. Low light was visible through her closed lids. The air was warm. She was on her side, in a … bed? The subtle scent of wood smoke tickled her nostrils, and the muted crackling of a fire reached her ears, the only sound in an otherwise silent space.
She struggled to make sense of it. The how, the why, the where. The last thing she remembered was losing her balance and falling out of a tree in the middle of the forest.
This was not the middle of the forest.
She slowly opened her eyes to find herself in a dim, unfamiliar room with flickering shadows, covered by a blanket that was not her own.
Neither was the shirt she now wore. Loose and soft and comfortable, it held an unfamiliar scent, one that was clean and male. Her legs were bare. Where were her clothes? Who had undressed her?
Tension coiled in her body, because this was also a situation with which she was familiar.
She quickly performed a self-evaluation. Shoulder, bandaged and painful. Ribs, sore and protesting deep breaths. Ankle, wrapped and pulsing in sync with her now-racing heartbeat.
But nothing else. No sense of shame or violation.
Beside her, one of the shadows shifted. Not a shadow. A man. A big, golden-haired man, sitting in an armchair, watching her with intense amber eyes and an unreadable expression.
Adrenaline coursed through her veins as her eyes flashed to the door, gauging the distance. Could she make it? Would her ankle hold up long enough to escape wherever the hell she was?
“You’re awake,” said a deep, male voice. The shadow rose and moved closer to the bed. “How do you—oof.”
Her good leg shot out before her brain caught up, the kick landing hard and solid in the middle of his chest, knocking him back several feet. White hot pain lanced through her with the action, filling her vision with erratically dancing dots.
Well, that answered at least one of her questions. Making a run for the door was out of the question.
When the white dots faded, the stranger was sitting on the floor, rubbing his chest and trying to catch his breath.
“Nice kick,” he wheezed.
He made a move to get up and she immediately drew back, ready to kick him again if he got too close no matter how much it hurt.
He held up his hands, eased back down to the floor, and spoke in a calm, soothing tone. “Easy. My name is Noah. I work at the ranch, same as you.”
Yes, she thought. He did resemble the doctor she’d seen from afar. Noah Ziegler. He didn’t live at the main house. Had his own place over the hill on the edge of the forest. She’d seen it many times during her nocturnal explorations.
She scanned her surroundings again. Registered the wood and stone simplicity and approximate dimensions.
She was in his cabin. In his bed. Wearing his shirt.
“Mona was worried. She sent me out to look for you after you took off.” Still on the floor, the doc slowly drew his knees toward his chest and casually rested his arms over them. “I found you in the forest and brought you back here.”
Even sitting on the floor as he was, she could see that he was big, his muscles visible even beneath the casual shirt and jeans he wore. His posture was relaxed, his eyes curious and concerned but not threatening.
“It would have been preferable to take you to my office at the house, but Sheriff Jackson’s still hanging around.”
Teagan tensed at the mention of the man who’d come looking for her. The doc put his hands up again. “Relax. He doesn’t know where you are, and Mona wants to keep it that way, at least for now.”
Teagan relaxed but only slightly. Mona was a mama bear for sure, but she couldn’t keep the sheriff at bay for long. And she might not want to, depending on what the sheriff had to say.
“You’re safe here,” the doc said, breaking into her thoughts. “What you need is rest. I can give you something for the pain to help with that.”
Let a man she didn’t know drug her while he kept her in his cabin, far enough from the main house that no one would hear her scream? Yeah, that was a big fat hell no. She needed to keep her wits about her.
He sighed. “Look, if I wanted to hurt you, I would have. Besides, you’ve done a pretty good job of doing it yourself. Your shoulder suffered a nasty dislocation that might or might not include permanent nerve damage, and you’ve got a gash on your back that required stitches—eight, to be exact—not to mention some cracked ribs and a sprained ankle.”
He had a point. If he decided to overpower her, she didn’t have much chance of stopping him in her current state. That kick had taken everything she had and then some.
And Mona did seem to trust him, so that was something.
She wouldn’t let her guard down completely, but for now at least, she’d turn down the fight or flight to a low simmer and conserve her energy.
Copyright © 2025 Abbie Zanders
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