Read Return to Lone Oak (Harlequin Heartwarming) for Free Online

better care of herself.
    “I want to see the house again.”
    She closed her eyes for a moment. Between that brief look just now and her comment about the leaky ceiling when he’d gone through the house, he was starting to suspect she didn’t want him to buy her dad’s home. He couldn’t worry about that, though. Moving out of his parents’ place was a priority; he had to do it while he still got along with them. If he decided the Salinger house was the best for him, Katie would just have to get used to the idea.
    Noah climbed down onto the path and bent to tie a lace that was loose.
    Katie sent another small smooth stone skipping over the water before jumping from the high end of the boulder down to the dirt—a good four-foot drop. He cringed, thinking about her numerous injuries.
    “You heading back?” she asked, slapping the dust off her hands.
    When he straightened, he took in her tight, flat stomach—revealed between spandex running shorts and a hot pink sports bra—and the piercing of her navel. He struggled to pry his eyes away from it, tried not to think about how that delicate piece of jewelry was capturing his attention as none had before.
    “It’s an amethyst and a heart,” she said.
    “What?”
    “Aren’t you staring at my belly ring?”
    “No.” Yes.
    “So... Coming or not?”
    He considered going another mile, which was what he normally did, but he’d lost momentum sitting here. It’d be dark soon.
    “Why not.” He gestured to the path toward the city park and Katie started running. In front of him. He tried to ignore the way she looked in running shorts that revealed long, muscular legs.
    They jogged for a few minutes without speaking. The only sound was the pounding of their feet on the pavement.
    “How can you stand to run so much? Twice a day?” Katie asked finally, breathing hard.
    “Want to slow down?”
    “No. That’s not what I mean. Just... It’s monotonous and painful and possibly the most boring exercise on the face of the earth.”
    “You adjust to the pain—and running can be meditative. It keeps me from thinking too much.”
    “Ah.” She nodded, hesitated, and he thought she was trying to catch her breath. “Africa?”
    He faltered, lost his footing, jarred by the mere mention of it. Most people didn’t have any notion of what he’d been through. The few who did didn’t have the nerve to bring it up, and that was the way he preferred it. “What do you know about Africa?”
    She’d slowed, too, and now she stared at him. “Not much. I’ve just heard stories floating around.”
    He wished he could tell the women at the clinic not to discuss his past or his personal life without coming off as a pompous jerk. “It’s not much of a feel-good story.”
    “I heard you got shot.”
    His blood turned cold, but he forced himself to pick up his pace. “Yeah.”
    The seconds stretched out and Noah fought to keep his mind blank, using all his mental energy to push away those images before they took over.
    “Just...yeah?” Katie asked.
    He nodded.
    “Is that an ‘I don’t want to talk about it’?”
    “You catch on quickly.” He wished he hadn’t stopped when he’d seen her.
    “I noticed the scar on your leg, when you were sitting next to me. It looks bullet-sized. Or what I would guess is bullet-sized, since I don’t have a lot of experience with bullets making holes in legs. Am I right?”
    “If I answer that question, will you let the whole thing drop?”
    “For now.”
    Now was all that mattered to him, because he had no intention of spending more time with her. “Yes. I was shot in the back of the leg by a group of insurgents. What you saw was an exit wound.”
    “Wow. Did you...”
    “You said you’d drop it.”
    “Sorry. It’s not every day I meet someone who’s been shot.”
    Even that brief exchange put his nerves on edge. The tension in his shoulders and neck increased at least another ten notches and his body moved stiffly.
    A few