“It’s a combination,” she said, giving him the numbers.

“Got it. Be right back.” Slim opened the gate, returned to the truck to drive through and then went to close it again, leaving the lock propped open so he could get out. “It’s awful dark out here at night.”

“The floodlights by the door will come on when we get closer.”

“You ever get scared out here all by yourself?”

“The first week, I slept with the lights on,” she confessed. “But you get used to it.”

“I don’t know if I would.”

“Are you scared of the dark, Slim?”

“You’ll never get me to admit that.” Opening the door to get out, he discovered he quite enjoyed the sound of her laughter. With her hair up in a ponytail and her face devoid of makeup, she was refreshingly pretty. Slim appreciated women who didn’t feel the need to fall into a vat of makeup. He’d always preferred the natural look, which he’d liked about Erin the first time he met her. At the time, he’d meant to ask Alex about her, but he’d never gotten around to it. He was glad to have been given a second chance to get to know her.

Slim opened the passenger door. “How about a lift inside?”

“I think I can walk.”

“You probably shouldn’t put any weight on it until you’re sure it’s not broken. You don’t want to make a bad situation worse.”

“I suppose you’re right.”

“It’s certainly no hardship for me to give you a lift,” he said with a smile and a wink that brought a flush of color to her cheeks. Oh, he liked that. He liked it a lot. “Shall we?”

“Sure, thanks.”

He slid his arms under her legs and behind her shoulders, lifting her effortlessly from the cab.

Her arms came around his shoulders. “This is mortifying.”

“How come?”

“You barely know me and you’re carrying me around.”

“I’m helping a damsel in distress and hoping that maybe she’ll reward me for my troubles by letting me take her to dinner when she’s feeling better.”

“Is ‘she’ in this damsel-in-distress scenario of yours supposed to be me?”

“Pretty and smart. That’s a very attractive combination. So what do you say? Will you thank me for carrying you around by having dinner with me sometime soon?”

“I’ll have to see how you manage the spiral staircase before I decide anything. I mean, if my head is bouncing off the wall or my injured ankle smacks against the railing, you won’t seem quite so heroic to me.”

“Oh wow, you have so little faith. I’ll have you know that I’m an expert at carrying damsels in distress.”

“Where did you get all this expertise?”