The blue eyes searched her face. “Tanner. Price Tanner.”
The fire was getting too low. She needed to put another couple of logs on, but getting up and standing naked in front of him was somehow impossible. She looked around for her pajamas and, in an agony of embarrassment, realized she needed to bathe before putting them on.
He saw where she was looking, and he didn’t suffer any such modesty. Unfolding his long length from the floor, he stepped over to the stack of wood and replenished the fire. Hope did exactly what she had been embarrassed to let him do to her, looked him over good, from head to foot. She liked what she saw, every inch of him. His muscles were delineated in the firelight, revealing the slope and curve of broad shoulders, wide chest, the long bulge of strong thigh muscles. His buttocks were round, firm. Even flaccid, his penis was intriguingly thick, and his testicles swung heavily below them. Price Tanner. She repeated his name in her mind, the syllables strong and brisk.
Tink looked a little grumpy at having had his sleep disturbed. He got up and sniffed at the stranger, and wagged his tail when the man leaned down and patted him. “I remember the dog barking,” Price Tanner said.
“He heard you before I did. His name is Tinkerbell. Tink, for short.”
“Tinkerbell?” He glanced at her, blue eyes incredulous. “He’s gay?”
Hope sputtered with laughter. “No, he’s just an eternally optimistic, goofy dog. He thinks the world is here to pet him.”
“He may be right.” He studied the sodden mass of his clothing, the water puddled on the floor. “How long have I been here?”
She looked at the clock. Two-thirty. “Three and a half hours.” Too much had happened in such a short length of time, and yet she felt as if only an hour or so had passed instead of almost twice that. “I dragged you in and got you out of your clothes. You must have stepped into the lake, because you were wet from the waist down. I dried you off and wrapped you in a blanket.”
“Yeah, I remember going into the water. I knew this place was here, but I couldn’t see a damn thing.”
“I don’t know how you made it this far. Why were you on foot? Did you have an accident? And why were you out in this weather anyway?”
“I was trying to make it down to Boise. The Blazer slid off the road and broke out the windshield, so I couldn’t stay there. Like I said, I knew this place was here, and I had a compass. I didn’t have much choice except try to get here.”
“You’re a walking miracle,” she said frankly. “Logically, you should be dead out in the snow.”
“But I’m not, thanks to you.” He returned to the blanket and stretched out beside her, his gaze somber. He caught a tendril of blond hair, rubbing it between his fingers before smoothing it behind her ear. “I know when you got under the blanket to get me warm, you weren’t expecting me to jump you as soon as I was half conscious. Tell me the truth, Hope: Were you willing?”
She cleared her throat. “I—I was surprised.” She touched his hand. “I wasn’t unwilling. Couldn’t you tell?”
He briefly closed his eyes in relief. “I don’t have a real clear memory of anything that happened until I woke up on top of you. Or rather, I remember what I did and what I felt, but I wasn’t sure you felt the same.” He spread his hand on her belly and lightly stroked upward to cover her breast. “I thought maybe I’d lost my head, waking up with such a pretty, brown-eyed little blonde naked next to me.”
“Strictly speaking, I wasn’t next to you. I was on top of you.” Her face got hot again. Damn those blushes! “It seemed the best way to get you warm.”
“It worked,” he said, and for the first time a smile curved his mouth.
Hope almost lost her breath. He was ruggedly attractive rather than handsome, but when he smiled, her heart did a crazy loop. It must be chemistry, she thought dazedly. She had seen many better-looking men; Dylan had been better looking, in a clean-cut, classical way. But what her eyes saw and her body felt were two different things, and she had never experienced such a strong sexual response to any other man. She wanted to make love again, and before she gave in to the need, she forced herself to remember he had been through a harrowing, physically exhausting ordeal.
“Do you want some coffee?” she asked hurriedly, getting to her feet. She carefully didn’t look at him as she gathered up her pajamas. “Or something to eat? I made a big pot of stew yesterday. Or how about a hot bath? The water heater is wired to the generator, so there’s plenty of hot water.”
“That sounds good,” he said, also standing. “All of it.” He reached out and caught her arms, turning her so she faced him. Bending his head, he gave her another of those sweet, tender kisses. “I also want to make love to you again, if you’ll let me.”
Nothing like this had ever happened to her before. Hope looked up at him. Her heart did another crazy loop, and she knew she wasn’t going to call a halt to this now. For as long as the blizzard lasted, she and Price Tanner were together, and she might never have another chance like this.
“I’d like that too,” she managed to say.
“Maybe on a bed instead of the floor?” He circled her nipple with his thumb, making it harden and stand erect.
“Upstairs.” She swallowed. “It’s warm up there, because all the heat rises. I couldn’t get you up the stairs, though, so I put you in front of the fireplace.”
“I’m not complaining.” He tugged the pajamas from her arms and let them drop to the floor. “On second thought, let’s forget the coffee and the stew. The bath too, unless you planned to be in the tub with me.”
She hadn’t, but it was a darn good idea. She went into his arms, forgetting everything except the earthy magic their bodies made together.
4
Hope woke beside him in the morning and lay watching him sleep, her body more deeply contented than she could remember it ever being before. She didn’t wonder how or why she responded so strongly to a man about whom she knew little more than his name; she simply accepted the joy this chance encounter had brought her. The warmth of his body made the bed a cozy nest she didn’t want to leave, especially since the chill in the room told her the fire in the fireplace had burned out.
It had been so long since she had been able to enjoy such a simple pleasure as lying beside a sleeping man, listening to the slow, deep rhythm of his breathing. She wanted to cuddle close to him, but was reluctant to wake him. He was sleeping deeply, evidence of his exhaustion. After nearly freezing to death, he hadn’t exactly spent a restful night.
One muscled arm lay draped over the pillow, and she could see the dark bruises on his wrist. On top of everything else, he had been in a car accident. The wonder wasn’t that he slept now, but that he had been so energetic during the night.
She surveyed the other details available to her. He had beautiful hair, dark and thick, with streaks of bronze glinting through it as if he spent a lot of time in the sun. His face was turned toward her in his sleep, and she smiled, wanting to trace her finger along the bridge of his nose, which was high and a little crooked, maybe as the result of a fight. His mouth was wide and well-shaped, his lips soft. His jaw was angular, his chin nothing less than stubborn. Good-looking, rugged, attractive; definitely not handsome, as she had noticed before. Just looking at him made her breasts tighten.
She felt almost dizzy from the force of her attraction to him. She had forgotten how heady infatuation could be, and how powerful. If she had met him under normal circumstances, no doubt she would still have been attracted to him; but without the overwhelming physical intimacy that had been forced between them, she might not even have encouraged him. The necessary contact of their nude bodies, however, had established a link even before he had regained consciousness. She had stroked him, knew the textures of his skin, from the roughness of his beard-stubbled cheeks to the sleekness of his muscular shoulders. Her nipples had been tight from rubbing against his chest, her legs had tangled with his, and though she hadn’t touched him sexually, she had inesc
apably felt his genitals against her own. She hadn’t let herself think about it, but nevertheless she had been almost unbearably aroused.
Her sexual attraction wasn’t due to simple deprivation. If she had thought it was, before, now she knew differently, because she was certainly no longer deprived and she still felt the same. Their sexual fit was devastating in its perfection. It was as if he had been born knowing exactly how to touch her, as if his body had been crafted specifically to bring her maximum pleasure.
She thought it must be the same, at least sexually, for him. As exhausted and drained as he had to have been, still he had turned to her time and again, his hands literally shaking with need as he drew her under him.
Her breath sighed gently, rapidly between her lips.
The wind still blew, rattling the windows. She couldn’t see anything beyond the glass but an impenetrable white curtain. While the blizzard raged, the world couldn’t intrude, and he was hers.
What a difference one day made. Yesterday she had been panicked by the sense of time passing her by, thinking she had lost all opportunity to get out of life what she had always wanted most—a family. Then Price Tanner had blown in on a snowstorm, and abruptly the future was bright with promise.
He was a deputy. He had said he was heading to Boise, so he could be from there, but he had known the resort was here, which meant he was familiar with the area, so he might be local. She would ask him when he woke.
Despite the heady lovemaking of the night, and more she hoped to enjoy while he was here, she was afraid to automatically assume they were a couple. The circumstances that had brought them together were extreme, and once the weather cleared he might be on his way without a backward look. She had known that from the beginning, and accepted that risk. She, who had never had any lover other than her husband, had gone into this with her eyes open.
If this situation between them grew into something permanent, she would be happy beyond belief. She didn’t let herself think the word “love,” for how could she love someone she didn’t really know? He was a tender, generous lover, and during the night she had seen signs of a sharp sense of humor, both qualities she liked, but she was too cautious to imagine either of them were in love.
The truth was, she had seized the opportunity to have a child.
Even beyond her own powerful attraction to him, the physical pleasure he had given her, she had been acutely aware of the lack of birth control. She hadn’t taken birth control pills in five years, and there wasn’t a condom in the house. She was a healthy, fertile woman, the odds were he was equally fertile, and the time was roughly right. He had climaxed inside her five times during the night, with no barrier—chemical, hormonal, or otherwise—between her and his sperm, and the knowledge was so erotic she trembled with need.
This morning, her head clear and the stresses of the emergency behind her, she felt guilty about what she had done. She didn’t even know if he was married! He didn’t wear a ring, and the thought hadn’t occurred to her the night before. She cringed inside at the thought of sleeping with a married man and didn’t want to think how much it would hurt if he did turn out to be an unfaithful jerk. But even assuming he was unmarried, the hard truth was she hadn’t had any right to take such an enormous step without his consent. He hadn’t asked about birth control, but he had been through quite an ordeal and could be excused for having other things on his mind, such as being alive.
She felt as if she had stolen his free will from him. If she did get pregnant, he might be, justifiably, very angry. If there was such a thing as unauthorized use of sperm, then she had committed the offense.
Being a single mother wouldn’t be easy, assuming she had gotten pregnant. If she had given herself time to think about it, caution would have prevented her from taking the chance. But she hadn’t taken the time, Price hadn’t given her the time, and all she could feel now was a guilty joy that a child might be the result of their lovemaking. Her father wouldn’t like it, but he loved her, and it wasn’t as if she was a teenager unable to support herself or her baby. She would prefer being married, but as she had so sharply realized the day before, time was running out. She had taken the chance.
Hope slid out of bed, careful not to waken him. Her thighs trembled, and she ached deep inside her body. Her first few steps were little more than a hobble, as long unused muscles and flesh protested their treatment during the night. Silently she gathered her clothes and tiptoed out of the room.
Tink trotted from the kitchen as she came downstairs, his eagerness telling her she was late, he was hungry, but he forgave everything for the joy of her company. She poured some food into his bowl, then immediately went to rebuild the fire. It had burned down to embers, and the house was cold. She relaid the fire, the kindling catching immediately from the glowing embers, and carefully stacked three logs on the grate. Then she put on a pot of coffee and, while it was brewing, went into her father’s bathroom and stepped into the shower. Thank God for hot water, because otherwise she couldn’t have tolerated the cold!
The shower went a long way toward relieving her aches and pains. Feeling much better, she pulled on a pair of sweatpants and an oversize flannel shirt, put on two pairs of thick socks, and padded out to have her first cup of coffee.
Cup in hand, she went into the great room to mop up the water she had left puddled on the floor the night before and straighten Price’s clothing.
The best way to dry them would be to hang them over the balcony railing, where the heat was. She hung his coat over a chair and set his boots beside the fireplace, because they needed to dry more slowly, but carried the rest of his clothes upstairs. Until Price’s clothes dried, she supposed he would have to sit around naked. He was too tall for her father’s clothes, and all she had left of Dylan’s clothing was a couple of shirts she wore herself.
No—come to think of it, her dad had bought a pair of black sweatpants that had evidently had the wrong tag attached to them, because they were several inches too long for him. Returning them would have cost more in gasoline than the pants were worth, so he had just folded them away in the top of his closet. Buying by size being as iffy as it was, she was fairly certain she could lay her hands on an extra-large sweatshirt too.
She straightened out the uniform to minimize wrinkles and, as she was doing so, noticed a tear in the left pants leg. Lifting the garment for a closer inspection, she saw the faded red stain below the tear, as if whatever had made the tear had also brought blood. But she had undressed Price, and she knew he wasn’t hurt anywhere. She frowned at the stain, then mentally shrugged and draped the pants over the railing.
Something was missing. She stared at the uniform for a moment before it hit her: where was his pistol? Had he lost it somewhere? But he didn’t have a holster, either, so he must have taken the gun off and … left it in the Blazer? That didn’t make sense. He didn’t have a wallet with him, either, but that was easier to understand. It could have fallen out of his pocket at any time during his hazardous trek through the blinding snow; it might even be in the lake.
Even if he had lost the pistol, would he then have removed the gun belt and holster and left them behind? They were part of his uniform. Of course, who knew what shape he had been in when he left the Blazer? He could have hit his head and not realized it, though if he had been addled, it had taken an even bigger miracle than she had thought for him to find his way here.
Well, the missing pistol was only a small mystery, and one that would wait until he woke. The house was warming, the coffee was ready, and she was hungry.
Downstairs again, she picked up the phone just to check it, but the line was dead, not even static coming through. She turned on the radio and picked up the same thing—static. Given the conditions outside, she hadn’t expected anything else, but she always checked periodically during power failures, just in case.
The rifle was where she had left it, propped beside the door. She retrieved it and returned it to the rack in her father’s bedroom
, before Tink knocked it down with an exuberant swish of his tail.
Carrying a cup of hot coffee with her, she then tidied the great room, putting the blankets and towels she had used in the laundry room to be washed whenever power returned. She cleaned up the puddles of melted snow and ice. Tink had been back and forth through the water several times, of course, leaving wet doggy tracks all over the house. She followed his trail, crawling on the floor and blotting up pawprints.
“I thought I smelled coffee.”
Her head jerked up. He was standing at the balcony railing, his hair tousled, his jaw dark with beard stubble, his eyes still heavy-lidded from sleep. His voice was hoarse, and she wondered if he was getting sick.
“I’ll bring a cup up to you,” she said. “It’s too cold down here for you to be walking around without clothes.”
“Then I think I’ll stay right here. I’m not ready to be cold again, just yet.” He gave her a crooked smile, and turned to pet Tink, who had bounded up the stairs as soon as he heard a new voice.
Hope went into her dad’s room and searched until she found the long sweatpants. Then she collected a pair of shorts and some thick hunting socks, but try as she might she couldn’t locate the extra-large sweatshirt she knew was here, somewhere. It was a gray University of Idaho shirt, and she had worn it once with leggings, but the thing had been so big she looked as if she were lost inside it. What had she done with it?
Maybe it was in the closet of the extra bedroom upstairs. She rotated her winter and summer clothing between that closet and the one in her room, but she didn’t necessarily move everything.
With the small stack of clothes in her arms, she detoured to the kitchen and poured a cup of coffee, then carried everything up the stairs.
The roaring fire had rapidly warmed the upstairs. The bathroom door was open, and Price was in the shower. Hope set the cup on the vanity. “Here’s your coffee.”