Excerpt of Dancing in the Moonlight by RaeAnne Thayne

For a doctor dedicated to healing the human body, he certainly knew how to punish his own. Jake Dalton rotated his shoulders and tried to ignore the aches and pains of the adrenaline crash that always hit him once the thrill of delivering a baby passed. He had been running at full speed for twenty-two hours straight. As he drove the last few miles toward home at 2:00 a.m., he was grimly aware that he had a very narrow window of about four hours to try to sleep, if he wanted to drive back to the hospital in Idaho Falls to check on his brand-new patient and the newborn baby girl's mother and make it back here to Pine Gulch before his clinic opened. The joys of being a rural doctor. He sometimes felt as if he spent more time behind the wheel of his Durango on the forty-minute drive between his hometown and the nearest hospital than he did with patients. He'd driven this road so many times in the past two years since finishing his internship and opening his own practice, he figured his SUV probably knew the way without him. It didn't make for very exciting driving. To keep himself awake, he drove with the window cracked and the Red Hot Chili Peppers blaring at full blast. Cool, moist air washed in as he reached the outskirts of town, and his headlights gleamed off wet asphalt. The rain had stopped sometime before but the air still smelled sweet, fresh, alive with that seductive scent of springtime in the Rockies. It was his favorite kind of night, a night best suited to sitting by the woodstove with a good book and Miles Davis on the stereo. Or better yet, curled up between silk sheets with a soft, warm woman while the rain hissed and seethed against the window. Now there was a particular pleasure he'd been too damn long without. He sighed, driving past the half-dozen darkened shops that comprised the town's bustling downtown. The crazy life that came from being the only doctor in a thirty-mile radius didn't leave him much time for a social life. Most of the time he didn't let it bother him, but sometimes the solitude of his life struck him with depressing force. No, not solitude. He was around people all day long, from his patients to his nurses to his office staff. But at the end of the day, he returned alone to the empty three-bedroom log home he'd bought when he'd moved back to Pine Gulch and taken over the family medicine clinic from Doc Whitaker. On nights like this he wondered what it would be like to have someone to welcome him home, someone sweet and soft and loving. It was a tantalizing thought, a bittersweet one, but he refused to dwell on it for long. He had no right to complain. How many men had the chance to live their dreams? Being a family physician in his hometown had been his aspiration forever, from those days he'd worked the ranch beside his father and brothers when he was a kid. Besides, after helping Jenny Cochran through sixteen hours of back labor, even if he had a woman in his life, right now he wouldn't be good for anything but a PB&J sandwich and the few hours of sleep he could snatch before he would have to climb out of his bed before daybreak and make this drive to Idaho Falls again. He was only a quarter mile from that elusive warm bed when he spotted emergency flashers from a disabled vehicle lighting up the night ahead. He swore under his breath, tempted for half a second to drive on past. Even as the completely selfish urge whispered through his brain, he hit the brakes of his Durango and pulled off the road, his tires spitting mud and gravel on the narrow shoulder. He had to stop. This was Pine Gulch and people just didn't look the other way when someone was in trouble. Besides, this was a quiet ranch road in a box canyon that dead- ended six miles further on — at the gates of the Cold Creek Land & Cattle Company, his family's ranch. The only reason for someone to be on this road was if they'd taken a wrong turn somewhere or they were heading to one of the eight or nine houses and ranch-ettes between his place at the mouth of the canyon and the Cold Creek. Since he knew every single person who lived in those houses, he couldn't drive on past one of his neighbors who might be having trouble. The little silver Subaru didn't look familiar. Arizona plates, he noted as he pulled in behind it. His headlights illuminated why the car was pulled over on the side of the road, at any rate. The rear passenger-side tire was flat as pancake and he could make out someone — a woman, he thought — trying to work a jack in the damp night while holding a flashlight in her mouth. He bade a fond farewell to the dream he had so briefly entertained of sinking into his warm bed anytime soon. No way could he leave a woman in distress alone on a quiet ranch road. Anyway, it was only a flat tire. He could have it changed and send the lost tourist on her way in ten, fifteen minutes and be in that elusive bed ten minutes after that. He climbed out and was grateful for his jacket when the wind whistled down the canyon, rattling his car door. Here on the backside of the Tetons, April could still sink through the skin like a thousand needles. "Hey, there," he called as he approached. "Need a hand?" The woman shaded her eyes, probably unable to see who was approaching in the glare from his headlights. "I'm almost done," she responded. "Thanks for stopping, though. Your headlights will be a big help." At her first words, his heart gave a sharp little kick and he froze, unable to work his mind around his shock. He instantly forgot all about how tired he was. He knew that voice. Knew her. Suddenly he understood the reason for the Arizona plates and why the Subaru wagon was heading up this quiet road very few had any reason to travel. Magdalena Cruz had come home. She was the last person he would have expected to encounter on one of his regular hospital runs, especially not at 2:00 a.m. on a rainy April Tuesday night, but that didn't make the sight of her any less welcome. A hundred questions jostled through his mind, and he drank in her features — what he could see in the glow from his vehicle's headlights anyway. The thick hair he knew was dark and glossy was pulled back in a ponytail, yanked through the back of the baseball- style cap she wore. Beneath the cap, he knew her features would be fragile and delicate, as hauntingly beautiful as always, except for the stubborn set of her chin. Though he didn't want to, he couldn't prevent his gaze from drifting down. She wore a pair of jeans and scarred boots — for all appearances everything looked completely normal. But he knew it wasn't and he wanted more than anything to fold her into his arms and hold on tight. He couldn't, of course. She'd probably whack him with that tire iron if he tried. Even before she had come to hate him and the rest of his family, they'd never had the kind of relationship that would have been conducive to that sort of thing. The cold reality of all those years of impossible dreams — and the ache in his chest they sparked — sharpened his tone. "Your mama know you're driving in so late?" She sent him a quick, searching look and he saw her hands tremble a little on the tool she suddenly held as a weapon as she tried to figure out his identity. She aimed the flashlight at him and, with an inward sigh, he obliged by giving her a straight-on look at him, even though he knew full well what her reaction would be. Sure enough, he saw the moment she recognized him. She stiffened and her fingers tightened on the tire iron. He could only be grateful he was out of range. "I guess I don't need help after all." That low voice, normally as smoothly sexy as fine-aged scotch, sounded as cold and hard as the Tetons in January. Help from him, she meant. He didn't need her to spell it out. He decided not to let it affect him. He also decided the hour was too damn late for diplomacy. "Tough. Whether you need help or not, you're getting it. Hand over the tire iron." "I'm fine." "Maggie, just give me the damn thing." "Go home, Dalton. I've got everything under control here." She crouched again, though it was actually more a half crouch, with her left leg extended at her side. That position must be agony for her, he thought, and had to keep his hands curled into fists at his side to keep from hauling her up and giving her a good shake before pulling her into his arms. She must be as tired as he was. More, probably. The woman had spent the past five months at Walter Reed Army Hospital. From what he knew secondhand from her mother, Viviana — his mother's best friend — she'd had numerous painful surgeries and had endured months of physical therapy and rehabilitation He seriously doubted she was strong enough — or stable enough on her prosthesis — to be driving at all, forget about rolling around in the mud changing a tire. Yet she would rather endure what must be incredible pain than accept help from one of the hated Daltons. With a weary sigh, he ended the matter by reaching out and yanking the tire iron out of her hand. "I see the years haven't made you any less stubborn," he muttered. "Or you less of an arrogant jackass," she retorted through clenched teeth as she straightened. "Yeah, we jackasses love driving around at 2:00 a.m. looking for people with car trouble so we can stop and harass them. Wait in my car where you can be warm and dry." She was still holding the flashlight, and she looked like she desperately wanted to bean him with it but she restrained herself. So the Army had taught her a little self-discipline, he thought with amusement, then watched her carefully as she leaned against the trunk of a nearby tree, aiming the beam in his direction. He was a doctor with plenty of experience in observing the signs of someone hurting, and Magdalena Cruz's whole posture screamed pain. He thought of a million more questions for her as he quickly put on her spare tire — what medication was she on? What kind of physical therapy had her doctors at Walter Reed ordered? Was she experiencing any phantom pain? — but he knew she wouldn't answer any of them so he kept his mouth shut.