Forensic pathologist Patience Forbes is a whiz with the dead- it's flesh-and-blood men who wreck her equilibrium. And cowboy Forest Stevens isn't fooled by the guarded beauty's icy facade. So when she's attacked, he appoints himself her personal bodyguard. Her very personal bodyguard. Patience is determined to investigate mysterious bones on the Holiday Ranch- not fall into bed with her sexy protector. But Forest is too masculine, too willing to lay down his life for hers and too set on living a different life from the one she's built. With danger closing in, can Forest tame the shrew before it's too late?