limped over to the small window and looked out into the gathering darkness. She was splitting kindling, not heading for the horses. He could hear her whistling, which he thought was probably a ploy to make him think she was more accepting of this situation than she was.
“Would you give it a rest?” he asked the baby.
The baby ignored him.
He was not a man used to being ignored. Or used to babies. And certainly not used to a woman like that. When he’d first seen her on the porch, he’d thought she was a boy. Then she had stretched, and not only shown him some very unboyish curves but her face had come out from under the shadow of the brim of her hat, and her thick dark braid had flopped over her slender shoulder. She was more than lovely. Striking. Stunning.
What was a woman like that doing running a rugged business like this by herself? Hiding, he figured, probably every bit as much as he was. Just from something different.
He was willing to bet, from the suspicion in her eyes, it had been a man.
He resented that unknown man, too. Destroying her trust when he needed a trusting woman most.
Giving her one more glance, he went back to his pack and found a little plastic container of green powder that claimed it became peas when water was added. He dumped some into a dish and added water. Instant pond scum.
The baby stopped crying as soon as he picked him up, a reaction that pleased and horrified him at the same time.
“Open up,” he muttered.
The baby opened his mouth, then closed it firmly just before the spoon made it in. Green stuff dribbled down his little blue outfit.
Ben scowled. The baby pouted. Ben glanced around. He listened. He could still hear the ax biting into wood.
“Okay, okay. Chugga-chugga choo-choo. Here comes the train. Open the tunnel. Open the tunnel!”
The baby laughed, the tunnel opened, the green slime went in, was chewed thoughtfully and swallowed. He held out the spoon again. The baby pouted. The kid wouldn’t eat now without the train routine.
Ben felt he had been through just about the toughest week in his career, first losing Noel East, who had become his friend, and then smuggling this baby, Noel’s child, out of Crescada. And now he had to play choo-choo to get the damn kid to eat? It didn’t seem that life could get much more unfair.
The baby got a look of intense concentration on his face. He turned a most unbecoming shade of purple. A horrible aroma drifted up to Ben’s nostrils.
He conceded his fate; it could get more unfair after all.
Chapter Two
Storm felt perspiration popping out on her forehead.
“Give,” her unexpected guest told her quietly. “You can’t win. You’re going to break your arm trying.”
Storm braced her elbow, closed her eyes, tightened her grip on his hand and pushed with everything she had.
Damn. He was holding her. Toying with her. She suspected he could put her down in a second if he chose.
They were arm wrestling over who was going to look after that diaper. Jake and Evan had been arm wrestling with her since she was a tot. They’d shown her a trick, a way to snap her wrist quickly at the very onset of the match, which gave her pretty even odds against superior strength.
And it often told her a great deal about a man, the way he accepted his defeat or his victory. And she needed to know something about this man.
She had never arm wrestled Dorian. A mistake. She probably could have saved herself a great deal of heartache if she’d used her regular measuring stick of character, instead of pretending to be something she was not. She nearly shuddered at the thought of that bright-red lipstick and thick black mascara that she’d hidden behind.
Still, it seemed to have been a terrible mistake to suggest an arm wrestle to this man, too.
Because when his hand had locked around hers, she had felt the strength in it. A pure strength. And she had felt something else.
Pure sizzle.
Right down to the bottom of her belly.
She’d arm wrestled just about every man in Thunder Lake and never, ever felt that sudden “woomph” deep in her stomach.
She glanced into the clear gray of his eyes and felt it again. A pull to him that was unfathomable given their circumstances, given the fact he thought he could make her stay here, and she planned to prove him wrong.
She told herself, sternly, she only needed to know something of him so she knew what to do once she had left here. Give him a few days with the baby to have his vacation? Or go down that mountain as fast as she could and come back with the law?
The very fact that she did not feel free to leave when she wanted should be telling her exactly what she needed to know.
But her intuition was placing her in a position of inner turmoil. Her intuition looked into the clearness of his eyes and saw, lurking just beneath the cool, still surface, strength of spirit.
The facts spoke of something else. The wound, his presence at her cabin not really explained, the baby most likely not his. He wasn’t even comfortable changing a diaper!
Childishly, she decided how the arm-wrestling match finished would make her decision for her. If he won, she would go down the mountain and forget she had ever seen him or that baby. If she won, she was coming back with Constable Jennings from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
She closed her eyes again, focused all her strength, felt her arm begin to tremble with effort and exertion. And nearly fell off her chair when he suddenly released her hand.
“Hey!” she said, miffed.
His eyes weren’t clear now, but deliberately hooded. “A draw,” he said blandly.
“It was not. I was about to take you.” She knew darn well the exact opposite was true.
“You were about to break your arm.”
“Oh, right.”
“I could see the white line of your bone right through your skin. Trust me. It was a draw.”
He had called the match because he thought he was going to harm her. That told her a reassuring little fact she needed to know. It would seem he wasn’t planning to hurt her. It would seem he was—the word noble flitted through her mind. She gave herself a shake.
She got to her feet abruptly, wiping her hand on her jeans as if she could wipe away the sudden feeling that had engulfed her when she had looked into his eyes.
They were the eyes of a dangerous man. Mysterious. Cool. Calm. And yet she could not help but feel the strength in them was linked to her own future.
He nodded at her. “You’re very strong.”
On
