“All right,” he said. “There’s quite a few tall guys around.”

“True,” she said.

“Tall, smart, decent. Laz, from the bar.”

Immediately, he imagined Sammy in the arms of the other man, and suddenly his stomach turned sour and he didn’t much want his bacon. But he did his best to remain stoic and not to demonstrate any of the feelings that were swirling around inside him.

“He would be good,” she said. “Good-looking, kind. Makes a good cocktail, which would help me not at all during my pregnancy, but maybe he’d give me free drinks after. I mean, I guess I would have to ask him if he would be comfortable having a baby that he doesn’t have a lot of involvement with.” She frowned. “You know, it would be okay if the guy saw the baby sometimes. Like a favorite uncle.”

“Sure,” Ryder said.

“Or, you know we can have your cousins ask around amongst the rodeo guys. Maybe they wouldn’t mind.”

“Right,” Ryder said, gritting his teeth.

He’d agreed to do this. He’d offered. He had no call getting annoyed now.

But he couldn’t even imagine just how an offer like that might go. Offer a guy the chance to have unprotected sex with a gorgeous blonde who didn’t want you to hang around and deal with the consequences.

The problem was most guys that were super on board with that probably weren’t actually all that decent.

But he suspected that what Sammy really meant when she said she wanted a good guy was one who wasn’t violent.

Sammy’s father had lived as long as he had only because there had been no way that Ryder would take the chance on getting sent to jail. He’d had too many responsibilities. And if he hadn’t...

The night that he had discovered Sammy wounded like he had... Well, her father had been arrested, but he had barely served any jail time because her mother had failed to press charges.

It was a sad story, and it was all too common. And unforgivable when it came to his friend.

That was when she had come to Hope Springs on a permanent basis.

He had made vows in his heart about the way he would take care of her.

This was no different, not really.

Sammy was hell-bent on this, and when Sammy was hell-bent on something there was no stopping her.

There was only standing there to catch her if she fell.

Or in this case, making sure that the fall wouldn’t hurt badly.

“This is killing you,” Sammy said.

“Look, I don’t love it,” he said. “Would you like to help me find a woman to knock up?”

She laughed. The little minx laughed.

“I would definitely ask you if you had taken to the bottle, Ryder, because you and I both know that you would never do that. It’s not in you. Honestly, I think the only reason this really bothers you is that it’s so unconventional.” She wiggled her eyebrows and took a bite of bacon.