LITMIR.BIZ

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escort dried his feet on a handkerchief, put on his shoes and socks, then restarted the SUV. He parked off the road at a wide point that looked out on a shallow valley and a long range of mountains. The landscape all around them was lit by flashes of lightning.

      She could detect evergreen trees and the ever-present desert sage. Along the edge of the road, Russian thistle and wallflowers formed soft mounds that constantly changed their shapes in the brisk wind. She shivered as if someone was walking on her grave.

      “What do you mean, stuck?” she finally asked.

      “As in, we can’t go on.”

      “Well, let’s go back,” she said, wary of the storm and the dark.

      “Where?” His tone was sardonic.

      “The last town. We can stay in a motel until the storm is past.”

      He shook his head. “Sorry, but the last town was a hole in the wall with one quick-stop market-gas station combo, which, I might add, wasn’t open.”

      “No motel?” she asked. Something akin to panic shot through her. She forced herself to stillness.

      “Nothing.” He slammed his fist on the steering wheel, the perfect picture of male irritation.

      After a couple of minutes of silence, she dared ask, “What now?” The fact that not one car was visible in any direction wasn’t lost on her.

      “There’s a town fifteen or twenty miles down the road. That’s a far piece to walk for help, even if we got across the flood over the road.” He glanced at her. “The current is swift, but I could probably make it.”

      The thought of being left behind caused the near-panic to stir painfully. “Maybe the water will subside soon.”

      “Probably not before morning.”

      He picked up the handset of a police scanner, his manner resigned but not particularly worried. All she heard was the crackle of static with a sharper crack at each flash of lightning on the horizon as he turned the dial. He tried calling several times, but got no answer.

      When the lightning hit close, he turned the radio off. “Too dangerous in this storm,” he muttered.

      “I have my cell phone.” She got it out of her bag. When she tried to reach an operator in order to locate a nearby town and, she hoped, a place to stay, she got mostly static and faintly heard a recording that told her she was out of range. “Out of range.”

      He didn’t appear surprised. “Yeah. There’s nothing open now, anyway.” He yawned and stretched. “We’ll have to wait it out. Luckily the land drains fast. I have a sleeping bag.”

      With that enigmatic statement, he got out, opened the rear door and climbed in. He laid the rear seats flat and spread a puffy bag over the cargo space.

      “I can move our luggage so you can curl up back here and sleep,” he told her.

      Silently she watched while he stacked her three bags and one other against the back of the front seat.

      “Sorry, no pillows,” he said. He twisted and looked at her. “Your bed’s ready.”

      The cold was getting to her now, and shivers racked her. “Where are you going to sleep?”

      “In the front seat.”

      She immediately saw that this wasn’t fair. “You’re taller than I am. You take the back and I’ll stay in the front.”

      He yanked a heavy parka from his bag and pulled it on. “I want to keep an eye on things. Excuse me,” he said, then headed into the trees with a flashlight.

      When he returned, he handed the light to her, got inside and slammed the door. She sat there for a minute, then also headed for the trees.

      The rain had lightened to a fine mist, but the wind was still fierce. Upon returning, she hesitated, then climbed into the back of the vehicle since he already had his legs stretched along the bench-type front seat.

      Even with the sleeping bag, she was aware of the cold seeping into the truck now that the engine was no longer supplying them with heat. The wind rocked the SUV like a dog shaking a bone as it moaned through sparse trees, across the road and over the ledge overlooking the valley. Other than the wind, no sounds disturbed the night.

      She wondered where her brother was and if he was safe in bed somewhere. She thought of her aunt, who hadn’t wanted two extra children to raise, and her cousin, who had tormented her until Adam bloodied his nose one day. She remembered her mother, who used to sing her to sleep with soft lullabies and old church songs.

      Tears pushed upward from that deep place where she’d buried all painful memories. She couldn’t afford to think of home or family or the things she didn’t have.

      Instead, she gazed at the night sky as the storm passed, heading east across the high desert, which appeared desolate to her eyes. A person could die out here and no one would know. Adam might never find out what had happened—

      Stop it! There was no use in growing morbid. So she felt lonelier than a howling coyote, so what? There were worse things—like being dead.

      She forced her eyes closed. Her muscles ached from fatigue, and her feet were slowly turning to ice. She slept, but she woke up cold and whimpering in fear.

      “Honey? Wake up. You’re dreaming,” an oddly familiar voice told her.

      “A nightmare,” she said in a hoarse whisper. “I was in the Arctic or somewhere. It was so cold. I thought I was freezing. My feet still feel like ice cubes,” she said, putting a humorous twist to the words.

      “Do you have a coat or something?”

      She retrieved her old trench coat from her duffel and slipped it on, then pulled the sleeping bag up to her neck.

      “Hand me my bag, will you?” he requested. “I can’t sleep without a pillow.”

      She heard the chain divider rattle, then in the dim light of a pale moon she saw he’d let one side down. She handed his nylon bag to him. He squashed it until he was satisfied with its shape, then snuggled down.

      Zack was aware of his passenger’s unease and wariness. He knew fear could produce a chill and regretted the trip had turned into more of an adventure than he’d expected. “I’ll warm the truck.”

      He cranked the engine and turned the air vents so the warm air would circulate into the back. He flicked on the radio and ran the tuner through the channels. Nothing.

      “Has the water gone down?” she asked.

      “Not yet.”

      After a few minutes he heard her sigh and sensed the relaxing in her vigil. She was asleep.

      A spark shot through him, causing heat to spear through his groin. It had been a while since he’d slept with a woman in a space this small. Not that they were actually sleeping together in a physical sense. But he was aware of her.

      Work had kept him busy. Summers were harried because of tourists getting themselves into some jam or another. Winter heralded hunters who got themselves lost. A spring blizzard had brought its own woes. He hadn’t thought about dating in months, much less more interesting things.

      So here he was, sleeping in the truck with a woman he’d found in the casino capital of the world, bringing her home to possibly become part of his family. He was worried about that. He didn’t want Uncle Nick to be hurt in case they were wrong to trust her.

      He went over the facts. Gone was the shapely, thickly painted waitress. In her place was a slender female who had actually fooled him into thinking she was a boy. Well, only for a short time. Without makeup, she was prettier and softer-looking.

      That was what bothered him. There was something vulnerable about her, as if she needed lots of TLC.

      Huh, he’d always been a sucker

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