those my car keys?”
“If you let me borrow them, I’ll bring you home a surprise.”
“All right, then, fine. Take my car, but you be careful, young man. My Chevy is older than you are, so show her some respect. And absolutely no speeding.”
“I’m not a teenager, remember?” He kissed her cheek. “I’ll be good. I promise.”
He said hello to Nanna’s friend, pocketed the car keys and escaped out the back door while he had the chance.
The defroster in her pickup couldn’t keep up with the fog. Julie swiped at the windshield with the cuff of her jacket sleeve, watching the endless curtain of gray rain that obscured the road ahead. What was that up ahead? She squinted to make out the faintest red glow flashing in the thick gray mists. Taillights. Someone was in trouble.
Julie braked, easing to a stop in the road behind an old sedan. She hit her flasher as thunder cracked overhead. Her pulse kicked high and fast in fear, and she reached for her purse, feeling for her cell phone.
There was no sign of anyone anywhere. Maybe the driver was hurt. Maybe—
A movement in the shadows caught her attention. The tall, broad-shouldered form became a man, rain drenched and awesome, as the lightning cracked behind him, zagging like a crooked finger from the sky to the top of a nearby knoll.
What was he doing out there? Didn’t he know it was dangerous?
As thunder clapped, Julie bolted into the storm, ignoring the cut of ice through her jacket and the sting of rain on her face. “Hey! Get back in your car—”
Lightning splintered the sky the same second the man turned. The earth began to shake like a hundred earthquakes beneath her feet. As the thunder boomed like cannon fire, Julie saw it all in an instant. The bright streak of light overhead, the man leaping toward her and the spark of fire as a tree beside the road flashed with flames.
All she could feel was the steel-hard impact of his shoulder, the dizzying spin of rain as it knifed from the sky and the drum of cattle racing by. She hit the muddy earth with a breath-stealing thud.
Pain rocketed through her body and her head smacked on the rocky earth. The man’s hand curled around the back of her head, cushioning the shock. Fighting for air, she was only dimly aware of the lightning and thunder, the cold and wet. The man’s face was a blur as he crouched over her. A tree limb crashed to the ground at her side. Fire licked at the leaves, even as the rain made the flames smoke and die.
“Are you all right?” he asked in a voice as deep as night, as powerful as the storm.
She gasped for air but couldn’t draw it into her lungs. Fighting panic, she knew she wasn’t hurt seriously. All she had to do was relax—
“You’ve had the wind knocked out of you. You’re going to be fine.” The rumble of his voice was comforting as he lifted her from the ground and leaned her against his chest.
What a strong chest it was, too. Sitting up, Julie felt a little better. Cold air rushed in as her lungs began to relax.
Thankful, she breathed in and out. She felt nauseated, but she wasn’t going to be sick. Icy rain stung her face, the wind buffeted her and thunder hurt her ears.
“We’d better get you inside your truck.” He took her hand, helping her to her feet. “You’ll be warm there. I don’t want you to drive, just sit and get your bearings, okay?”
Her toe caught the edge of pavement and she stumbled. His iron-strong hand curled around her elbow, catching her before she could fall. “I can make it.”
“Good. I’d help you, but I think someone is in trouble. That’s why I got out of my car.” He let go of her hand. “You’ll be all right?”
“Who’s in trouble? What did you see?”
“All I know is that there’s a horse with an empty saddle in that field. I was going to take a look when you pulled up.”
“I’ll come with you.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Lightning flashed the same moment thunder pealed. “It’s dangerous. I want you safe in your truck so I can go help who’s in trouble.”
“Safe? Well, you’d be safer if you stayed in your car, too.”
“I’m a risk taker,” he told her. “A dangerous sort of guy. I don’t need safety.”
Thunder rattled the ground beneath her feet and seemed to shake her very bones, but it didn’t distract her from the man’s dazzling grin.
Dangerous? Oh, yes. He was handsome and confident and a complete stranger. There would be time later to ask who he was and where he was from. Right now someone might be in trouble. She scanned the field. “Where did you see the horse?”
“There.” He gestured toward the far rise as lightning singed the air around them.
Julie could barely make out the bay pony in the downpour. “I know that horse. That horse wouldn’t run off and leave his rider.”
She took off at a run as the rain turned to hard balls of hail. Ice struck her like boxer’s gloves as she raced across the field and over a knoll to the creek below rapidly swelling with runoff. The bay wheeled with fear as lightning and thunder resounded across the sky.
“Hailey!” Julie called, snaring hold of the gelding’s reins. She couldn’t make out anything in the gray and white storm.
“There.” He spotted the child first, a small dark shadow on the other side of the creek. “That water’s rising fast.”
“We can cross it.” Julie saw the gelding was in good shape and uninjured, but too panicked to ride through the fast-moving current. She tied him quickly to a willow branch, so he wouldn’t injure himself further. He’d be safe, for now.
“Be careful,” she shouted. “The water’s rising and it’s more dangerous than it looks.”
The stranger was already at the steep bank. “Stay here where it’s safe. I’m going in.”
“No, wait!” Julie called, running full out, but the effects of her earlier fall held her back. She wasn’t up to one hundred percent. “The current’s fast—”
As if he didn’t hear her or understand the danger, he plunged off the bank and disappeared beneath the muddy water coursing dark and deep.
Chapter Three
Knowing the flooded creek was powerful enough to knock a man down and keep him there, Julie grabbed the rope from the saddle and ran. She could feel her lungs straining—they were still tight—and air gasped in and out of her throat, but she pushed harder.
She wasn’t about to let him drown.
The water pulled at her shoes as she secured the rope to a fence post. Her fingers felt clumsy as she tested the knot, but it held. The creek licked at the rope, sucking it out of her hands. She wrestled it back, held tight and leaped into the rising
