A Sweetheart For The Single Dad (The Camdens Of Colorado Book 8) by Victoria Pade Page A

wrong with the women in his life that kept leading him to disasters in his relationships.
    Even if Lindie wasn’t a Camden, he shouldn’t be cultivating anything with her.
    He certainly needed not to be touching her or kissing her—however innocently or briefly.
    “It’s not going to happen again,” he told his reflection in the most threatening tone he could muster, as if the guy in the mirror was someone else.
    But he meant it.
    He wasn’t going to touch her. He sure as hell wasn’t going to kiss her.
    He was going to make sure she understood all the harm her family had done and then he was going to walk away, deal with his own problems and go on being Camden Incorporated’s worst nightmare.
    There was no question. That was how this thing with her had to go.
    In the meantime he was also going to ignore how stinking excited he was when he walked out of the bathroom, out of his bedroom, out of his house, knowing that he was on his way to her again.
    * * *
    “I am so-oo sorry!” Lindie apologized for what was probably the tenth time. “Really, you don’t have to stay here with me. This is all incredibly embarrassing.”
    It was after six on Saturday evening and Sawyer had been sitting with her in a hospital emergency room for more than four hours.
    What had seemed to be a hay fever reaction to the weeds they were clearing at the community center’s park—a reaction Lindie was just trying to endure with aplomb—had turned serious when they’d reached some mold-laden sedentary water.
    Because streets had been rerouted to accommodate the Camden Superstore, emergency response times to the east side of Wheatley were longer and Sawyer had decided they couldn’t risk waiting for an ambulance. He’d put her in his SUV and raced for the hospital himself. She’d been struggling for breath by the time they’d arrived and the ER staff had rushed her in.
    The initial treatment had gotten her out of immediate danger. But they’d wanted to give her oxygen for a while and to keep an eye on her to make sure she was stable. Since the place was busy, there were long gaps between visits from the doctor or the nurses. The whole thing had resulted in hours and hours of sitting. With Sawyer by her side. And her trying to convince him that he didn’t have to be.
    “I’m not going anywhere,” he said, also for about the tenth time.
    Ordinarily, Lindie would have called someone in her family and the entire group would have rallied. But her cousin Seth and his wife had a week-old baby boy that everyone except her brother Lang had gone to Northbridge, Montana, to see. Lang and his wife weren’t going until Sunday because they were in Vail for a wedding today, making him also too far away to get there. When a nurse had asked if there was anyone she wanted contacted and she’d explained the situation—with Sawyer there to hear it, too—he’d settled in and refused to leave.
    But she was still trying.
    “Really, when they release me I can call a cab to get me back to my car and—”
    “You can’t drive—they’ve pumped you so full of antihistamines and antianxiety drugs that you keep dozing off in the middle of sentences and you weave when you walk. I’m staying until they release you, then driving you home. I already called the Wheatley police during your last nap and explained that your car would have to stay in the community center’s parking lot overnight. Tomorrow I’ll pick you up and take you back to get it. That’s the way it’s going to be, and that’s all there is to it.”
    He was all the more attractive when he took charge—it was something Lindie had noticed through the work at the park. But she had mixed feelings about his stubborn refusal to leave her on her own at the hospital.
    On the one hand, she was grateful to him for getting her there, for keeping her company and looking out for her during a frightening situation.
    On the other hand, she hated having him see her this way. She was certainly not