Cowboys In Her Pocket Read Online Free Page B

someone to come running up. Uneasiness slithered through her as she expected someone to rush up the stairs and attack her.
    Nothing.
    Damn, JJ, but you have one hell of an imagination. She'd been reading about anxiety and panic on the Internet and had discovered many of the people with this problem did have a very creative imagination. Little comfort when she sometimes couldn't control the panic or anxiety attacks.
    She knew she needed to change her way of thinking. Knew too that medication could help her.
    But she'd never liked the idea of popping pills. So far she'd managed to get away without the meds except for taking a prescribed pill to calm her nerves a couple of times since arriving here.
    Okay, so she might have imagined someone lurking around earlier. Maybe the house had been settling and had made weird noises?
    JJ grabbed her rifle tighter and descended the stairs. Immediately, she checked the doors. They were locked. She closed the windows she'd opened and lifted the receiver to the phone.
    Dial tone.
    Thank God !
    Just then, a low groan from somewhere outside had her bringing up the rifle. The sound grew louder. No, not a groan. An engine.
    Dan!
    She moved fast now, rushing down the hallway and into the mudroom. JJ expected to see Dan enter the yard on his all-terrain vehicle.
    He didn't appear. Her hopes deflated.
    Where are you, Dan?
    Excitement shifted through her as she spied a bright blue floatplane skimming over the waves out on the lake. It was heading toward the ranch dock.
    North Country Air was scrawled in white lettering on the side of the plane. It had to be Blue.
    She was one of the female bush pilots.
    JJ sent up a prayer of thanks as her anxiety eased a bit. She placed the loaded rifle behind the mudroom door and went outside to meet her guest.

    Brady knew something was wrong the instant he spied JJ pacing on the dock while she waited for the plane. She appeared pale and wild-eyed as if she might be having another anxiety attack.
    He was glad that Rafe had voiced his intuition that something was wrong back home and Brady had eventually decided it was best to return early.
    As luck would have it, when they'd called North Country Air for a flight, Blue had been in town and come to their rescue. They'd met her within the hour at the airport and they had been airborne.
    "What's wrong?" Brady asked as he tossed JJ the rope so she could help secure the plane to the dock. In a flash, he was on the dock and the instant she secured the rope, he gathered her into his arms.
    She shivered against Brady as she buried her face into his shoulder and his protective instincts went haywire.
    "JJ, what's happened? Where's Dan?" Rafe asked as he joined them. Concern etched Rafe’s voice and it slithered through him as well.
    She shook her head, lifted her face and grimaced. Huge tears sparkled in her eyes.
    Shit .
    "He hasn't come back. He's been gone all day and there was this bad storm…and I’m worried something might have happened to him." It looked as if she might want to say something else but then she wiggled out of his embrace when she spied Blue in the doorway of her plane, watching them.
    "I’m sure he’s fine," Brady said as he reluctantly moved away from JJ and took a cardboard box from Blue. It was one of several boxes of dry goods that Rafe and he had purchased during their stay in Thunder Bay.
    JJ shook her head. “I just have a bad feeling.”
    “JJ is our mother hen,” Rafe chuckled as he accepted another box from Blue.
    A low growl of thunder ripped through the warm night air. Lightning blinked out over the lake.
    “Storm is getting closer. You’re more than welcome to spend the night, Blue. And JJ could use some female company,” Rafe said as Blue tossed him another box.
    “I was hoping you’d ask. I’m not much for flying through storms.” Blue’s voice was edged with nervousness. They all knew she had issues with flying in storms. It was why Rafe had asked her to hang around. And