Desperado Dad
Desperado Dad
Linda Conrad
The leather-jacketed stranger was clearly as dangerous as any man Randi Cullen had ever set eyes on.But she couldn't abandon him - or the defenseless baby with him - to the rainswept Texas night. She offered them both a refuge on her isolated ranch. And when she learned that Manuel Sanchez was an undercover federal agent hunting a ruthless killer, she even agreed to marriage - in name only - to protect his cover.But having this man in her life was touching off a storm of desire in an untouched woman's heart - a storm from which she feared she would never find shelter.
“A Diamond Engagement Ring?” Randi Stared At The Gold-Banded Gem Manuel Had Given Her. What Was He Telling Her?
“Not a diamond.” He narrowed his eyes. “A fake ring, for a fake engagement.”
A scarlet flush of embarrassment rushed up her throat and covered her face. Of course. Despite the kiss they’d shared last night, this was just part of his job.
But it could also be a chance to keep Manuel and the child on the ranch. Close by her. Maybe, with a little more time, she could find out for once in her life what having a man and a family of her own would be like—even if it was only a temporary situation.
At the thought, an ache of longing thudded in her heart, so strong it nearly knocked her down.
Dear God. Could she really pull this off—and not be destroyed in the process…?
Dear Reader,
Dog days of summer got you down? Chill out and relax with six brand-new love stories from Silhouette Desire!
August’s MAN OF THE MONTH is the first book in the exciting family-based saga BECKETT’S FORTUNE by Dixie Browning. Beckett’s Cinderella features a hero honor-bound to repay a generations-old debt and a poor-but-proud heroine leery of love and money she can’t believe is offered unconditionally. His E-Mail Order Wife by Kristi Gold, in which matchmaking relatives use the Internet to find a high-powered exec a bride, is the latest title in the powerful DYNASTIES: THE CONNELLYS series.
A daughter seeking revenge discovers love instead in Falling for the Enemy by Shawna Delacorte. Then, in Millionaire Cop & Mom-To-Be by Charlotte Hughes, a jilted, pregnant bride is rescued by her childhood sweetheart.
Passion flares between a family-minded rancher and a marriage-shy divorcée in Kathie DeNosky’s Cowboy Boss. And a pretend marriage leads to undeniable passion in Desperado Dad by Linda Conrad.
So find some shade, grab a cold one…and read all six passionate, powerful and provocative new love stories from Silhouette Desire this month.
Enjoy!
Joan Marlow Golan
Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire
Desperado Dad
Linda Conrad
LINDA CONRAD
was born in Brazil to a commercial pilot dad and a mother whose first gift was a passion for stories. She was raised in South Florida and has been a dreamer and a storyteller for as long as she can remember. Linda claims her earliest memories are of sitting in her mother’s lap listening to a beloved storybook or searching through the picture books in the library to find that special one.
When Linda met and married her own dream-come-true hero, he fostered another of her other inherited vices—being a vagabond. They moved to seven different states in seven years, finally becoming enchanted with and settling down in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas.
Reality anchored Linda to their Texas home long enough to raise a daughter and become a stockbroker and certified financial planner. Her whole world suddenly changed when her widowed mother suffered a disabling stroke and Linda spent a year as her caretaker. Before her mother’s second and fatal stroke, she begged Linda to go back to her dreams—to finally tell the stories buried within her heart.
Linda’s hobbies are reading, growing roses and experiencing new things. However, her real passion is “passion”—reading about it, writing about it and living it. She believes that true passion and intensity for life and love are seductive—they consume the soul and make life’s trials and tribulations worth all the effort.
“I am extremely grateful that today I can live my dreams by being able to share the passionate stories and lovable characters that have lived deep within me for so long,” Linda declares.
Linda loves to hear from her readers and invites them to visit her Web site at http://www.lindaconrad.com.
To both my darling husband and sister, because Manny’s story is your favorite. To Dana Rae Link, because you started all this years ago. And especially for Emily, because I couldn’t do any of them without you.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Epilogue
One
Manny Sanchez decided the pounding rain did have one advantage—it helped to hide his stealthy nighttime chase. He rode his Harley through the bitter, biting and brutal sleet, torn between cursing the storm and being grateful for the added cover.
In the next instant the minivan he’d been following slowed. When its brake lights glowed red, memories of devastating car wrecks flashed before his eyes. He’d seen plenty of twisted metal in his thirty-four years, and a flashback of his own agony clutched at his chest.
Damn. Not this time. A baby boy was riding inside that van. Life had always been cruel as far as Manny was concerned, but the baby’s short, tragic life simply must not end this way. Manny couldn’t let that happen—not again.
Through his rain-distorted visor, he watched horrified as the minivan carrying the coyote and his cargo came to a low-water bridge. They hit a patch of icy highway and slid sideways. Manny winced.
¡Ay, Dios mio! No one will get out alive!
Suddenly his bike hit another frozen spot and he lost control. He cut the power, laying the bike down into the gravel covering the side of the road. His leather-clad, left shoulder took the entire brunt of the roadway collision, but a combination of adrenaline and freezing cold numbed him to the effects he knew were sure to follow.
Luckily the bike slid across the asphalt, scattering sparks and landing in a field, while he sprawled down the gravel in the other direction. His heavy jeans protected him from the rocks and wet pavement.
When his forward momentum finally eased, he jumped to his feet, relieved he was still able to walk. But there wasn’t time to check for broken bones or bleeding. He ripped off his helmet, flung it aside and ran toward the bridge.
In terrifying slow motion, Manny watched the minivan lose contact with the asphalt as it hit the rushing water. Within the space of a heartbeat, the boxy little vehicle turned on its side and was swept into the furious torrent.
A breath hitched in his throat as he stood paralyzed, seeing the scene unfold before him. Shock and a fleeting sense of sorrow and guilt overtook him. Why hadn’t he found a way to end this assignment earlier today—or yesterday? Or, hell, last week before things had gotten so out of hand?
He clearly heard the eerie shriek of twisting metal over the sounds of howling water as torrents assaulted the minivan with a devastating rampage. The incessant beating of the rain competed with the hammering of his heart.
Without a moment for recriminations and once again burying his emotions, he reacted to the tragedy the way he’d been trained—don’t hesitate, act.
Just then the minivan snagged itself on a pile of debris clogged against willows at the side of the raging river. It was all the advantage Manny would get, and he ran toward the van before it broke loose and dashed farther downstream.
By the time he reached the car, lying precariously driver’s side down, he’d made an assessment of what he could do, and what the chances were that anyone had survived. The van was submerged a good three feet deep, and the black water still rose against it. Since the roof was all he could see from the bank, he couldn’t be sure, but…
Manny scrambled up the hood and scaled the front window, ignoring the pain in his shoulder. Slick and slippery, the van rocked gently as the cascading water tore at it, making any assent more than hazardous.
After too many precious minutes, he made it to the passenger side and knelt, yanking on the front passenger door. It took a supreme effort, but the door finally opened, revealing the murky interior.
“Hey, can you hear me?” he shouted.
He bent closer and realized no one sat in the passenger seat. For a second the silence from inside was so complete he wondered if the worst had already happened.
He began lowering himself into the front toward the spot where a driver should be, when a child’s cry pulled him up short. The baby was still alive! But Manny couldn’t see him for all the darkness and water.
With another small whimper from the back seat, Manny quickly reached into the murky water where the driver should be and found—nothing. The smuggler that had been driving must have been thrown out as the van went over.
As fast as he could, Manny dragged himself out of the van and wrestled with the sliding back door. The more he pulled the worse his shoulder throbbed.
The door eventually gave way to his efforts. Manny saw the kid, still strapped in his child-carrier and hanging sideways as the water rose to meet him.
Please don’t let him die.
Manny reached for the carrier’s seat belt and gave it a jerk. Nothing happened. The damn thing was stuck, so Manny lowered himself into the car, sliding past the suddenly too-quiet child and landing in the freezing water.
Standing upright in the back, waist deep, with his feet resting on the car’s left side window, he reached into his jeans pocket for his knife. As Manny’s fingers grasped the pocket knife, a small hand reached out to touch his face.
“Hi, baby, are you hurting?” He tried to keep the tension from his voice. “I’ll have you out of here in a minute.”
The dark-haired child, dressed in nothing but a red sweater and diaper, started to sob. It wasn’t a loud cry, but a soft, heart-wrenching sound that tore into Manny’s soul.
“Pa…ba?” The baby patted Manny’s face and reached grasping fingers toward his jacket.
“I’m not your papa, hijo, but there’s no need to be afraid. I won’t let anything else happen to you.”
A flash of memory passed through Manny’s mind, reminding him that this little one had already lost his father and his mother forever. That was enough. Manny vowed to keep him safe from now on—no matter what it took, and no matter who didn’t care for the idea.
With more effort than Manny’s shoulder should handle, the seat belt finally gave way to his sharp blade. The baby grabbed him around the neck and hung on desperately.
Manny flipped the blade closed and jammed it back into his pocket while he experienced the closest thing to sheer panic he’d ever felt. How in the world was he going to lift himself and the boy out of the back seat and onto the car’s side with this injured shoulder?
“Hand the baby to me.”
“What the…?” The woman’s voice coming from above startled the hell out of him.
When he looked up, all he could make out were long slender arms reaching down into the open doorway. Where had she come from? Had she been inside the van and gotten out by herself? Impossible. But then where…and how…?
“Hurry up. I don’t think we’ve got much time.” The woman’s demand shocked him into movement. He lifted the baby up with his good arm. The seemingly disembodied arms from above grabbed hold of the boy securely.
The baby gasped and tightened his grip on Manny and wailed.
“Easy, sweetheart, I’ve got you.” The woman’s voice turned soft and pleading.
Manny pried the boy’s arms from his neck as gently as he possibly could. Meanwhile the woman made soothing noises, pulling the baby upward. Once they had disappeared from view, Manny used his good arm and his legs to drag himself up and out of the car.
When he found a steady perch on the car’s side, he looked over to the woman, who had the little boy wrapped securely in her arms. She looked hesitantly over the slippery roof to the ground just beyond reach.
The rain still pulsated down on them, making every movement difficult. Manny made a quick decision. He slid down the roof and managed to find a fairly solid foothold on top of wet debris and clogged tree branches.
He reached his good arm up toward the woman and child. “Hand him back to me, then slide down. I’ll steady you.”
She hesitated. “Your arm’s hurt. Can you hold him?”
“It’s nothing. Just a bruised shoulder.”
She looked unsure but lowered the baby to him. The boy grabbed a handful of black leather jacket and held on in a death grip. Meanwhile the mysterious woman eased herself down the roof while Manny steadied her with his body.
Within seconds they were standing on muddy ground.
“Is there anyone else in there?” she shouted over the roar of the wind and water.
Manny shook his head.
She turned to the car and then swirled back with an undecided glance. For the first time, Manny noticed what their mysterious savior looked like: about half a foot shorter than his six feet, her long soggy hair hung down her back in wet strands. She wore a neon yellow slicker that looked three sizes too big and hung on her slender frame, making her appear younger than the midtwenties he guessed she must be.
It was her eyes that really grabbed him, though. Wide with questions, Manny couldn’t tell exactly what color they were in the blackness of the night surrounding them. Full of all the emotions that he knew swirled inside her, those eyes made her look sweet and strong, and right this minute, downright scared.
He spent one precious second considering the slim chance that the baby-stealing minivan driver still lived. It seemed like a tough ending for the man who’d obviously panicked back in Del Rio and had appeared to be headed straight for his boss. Mother Nature hadn’t read him his rights.
In all the years Manny had been undercover chasing these baby smugglers for Operation Rock-a-Bye, he’d never followed any of them so far from the border. Usually the actual kidnapping happened in Mexico or in Europe and then was funneled through Mexico. And it was in the big, Texas cities where most of the baby selling took place. The thought of murderers and scum living in a safe, small town troubled him.
It would be impossible to find the body tonight, so he buried his uneasiness. Right now the living needed tending.
With no hesitation he gathered the woman up next to him and forced his bad shoulder to cradle her, while he tightened his grip on the baby with his good arm. “We need to get out of the rain. Now.”
“My…my truck.”
He dragged her toward the roadway. They hadn’t gone more than a few feet when the raging water finally tore the minivan loose and pummeled it farther down the river.
The sickening sounds of scraping metal against rock forced Manny into action. He picked up their pace and moved the little band of survivors up the incline at the riverbank.
Farther up the hill, parked in the middle of the pavement, Manny saw what had to be the woman’s truck. A fifteen-year-old, four-wheel-drive Suburban sat idling with its lights on.
“Are you okay to drive?” he asked.
She nodded and swung into the front seat. Scooting over to open the passenger door for Manny and the baby, she took the boy while Manny climbed into the truck and, closing the door behind him, gathered the child back into his arms.
Manny unzipped his jacket, put the baby on his chest and zipped the jacket back up over both of them, keeping the baby secure and a little warmer. If this truck wrecked on the icy roads, the baby’s position against him might be dangerous, but without Manny’s body heat the little boy was sure to go into shock.
He looked over to the woman and noticed she’d belted herself in, but her hands shook so badly he was afraid she’d never keep hold of the wheel. Manny reached across the baby and jacked up the heater’s fan.
“You sure you can drive?”
“Ye-e-e-s-s,” she stuttered. “The way the water’s rising, we’re about to be cut off by two flooding rivers. Happens every time things get this bad. My ranch is just a ways up the road. It’s the only possible chance we’ve got.”
Jamming the truck into Reverse, she eased it around on the asphalt and slowly drove away from the river.
He suddenly realized he didn’t know her name, or why she’d been there to help them. “I need to thank you for coming to our rescue. It was a very brave but foolhardy thing to do.” She kept her attention on the slick road, continuing to stare out the windshield.
“I’m Manny Sanchez. And you are…”
“Randi.”
“Excuse me?”
“That’s my name. I’m Randi Cullen. And I live on the Running C ranch.”
The Running C? Son of a gun, if that wasn’t the name he’d overheard the smugglers discussing at the café in Del Rio. Was this woman involved with them? All of a sudden it occurred to him that their savior might really be the suspect he’d been seeking. But the only way to find out would be to keep a sharp eye on her.
Manny quickly decided he’d better keep her close—whatever that took and any way he could.
Randi tightened her grip on the steering wheel and slanted a glance at the dark and intimidating man who was scrutinizing her from the passenger seat. The energy emanating from him hummed with tension. Dear Lord, he terrified—and excited—her.
She couldn’t figure out what had possessed her to climb up on that minivan the way she had. There hadn’t been time to consider the ramifications, just like now, when there was no choice but to take this menacing man and his child into her home.
After she’d stopped at the bridge and heard the baby’s cry, all sense of personal danger had deserted her. She could still feel the rush of bravado, sitting here in the front seat with a total stranger. She’d never done anything like this in her entire life. Just thinking about it made her tremble.
Nevertheless, Randi felt more alive in the past half hour than she had in years. Bringing this man home might be a very dangerous thing to do, but she didn’t care. Somehow she felt sure he would be trustworthy. He had an aura about him that reminded her of her old friend, the deputy sheriff.
The stranger had been traveling with his own child. How bad could he be? And what’s more, he and his baby needed help, and she’d been able to do something about it. That frustrating feeling of being unable to do anything to help, the one emotion she’d been so familiar with over the past few years, was slowly washing away as the minutes went by.
“That’s a kind of unusual name for a woman, isn’t it?” he asked.
“Randi? It was my grandmother’s nickname.” At his seemingly confused look, she explained, “Short for Miranda…?”
“I wasn’t questioning it. I think Randi is a beautiful name.”
She could feel the flush stealing over her face. Glancing over at him, she found a smirk of amusement. The smile lit up his entire face, making him the most magnetic man she’d ever laid eyes on.
Oh, not handsome in the standard movie star way, his jaw was too sharp and his nose too long and broad for that. But he was intense, dark and a little rough around the edges, as if a thin veneer of civilized behavior covered a raging beast inside. And he was big—broad. Her breathing faltered when she realized how much of the front seat he really occupied.
“My mother named me,” she managed shakily.
“Well, Randi.” He repeated her name with emphasis. “Far be it from me to question good fortune, but what the heck were you doing out here in this deluge?”
“I…” She had to swallow down the lump in her throat and put aside her jitters. “I was on my way home from town. When I heard about the storm, I stopped at the grocery store after work. That’s why I’m late.” She was babbling and tried to slow down.
She took a deep breath and inhaled the scent of wet leather, sweat and musky man. An odd sensation, one she couldn’t name and had never felt before, coiled inside her.
Randi found herself sneaking a peek at his ring finger.
“I saw a car’s headlights turn at the creek road,” she began. “Everyone who lives around here knows not to take a low-water bridge road in a storm, so I figured it must be strangers. I knew there’d be trouble.”
Empty. No rings on his hands at all. But that didn’t mean much in these modern times. And there was the matter of his baby.
Randi suddenly remembered the child. When she turned her head to check on him, she was surprised to see the shaggy, black-haired desperado of a man gently patting the back of the baby who lay quietly on his chest.
“We can’t make it to the hospital before the highway is flooded out. Is the baby going to be all right? Will you manage?”
“I guess we’ll find out,” he mumbled.
“What’s the baby’s name?”
“Uh, I don’t…Ricardo…Ricky,” he finally stammered.
Maybe Manny was as flustered by the circumstances as she was? Nope. Not the gritty and unswerving male who’d helped her and the baby off the slick minivan in the middle of the storm.
“And I think he’s going to be fine. He stopped shivering a few minutes ago.” Manny glanced down at the top of the toddler’s head, then peered out the window into the dark night. “I would like to get him dried off, though.”
“Right. Looks like we beat the water. We’re almost there.” As a matter of fact, at that moment the rusty gate bearing the Running C brand came into view.
Randi threw the car into Park and jumped out to open the gate—which turned out to be not an easy task with all the mud flowing across the gravel road.
She groaned internally at the thought of how rutted and pocked her road would be after the rain. And she didn’t have enough money to have it graded this time, either.
Gritting her teeth with frustration, Randi shoved at the heavy gate and then plowed her way back to the truck. The darn thing could just stay open. She didn’t care. No way was she getting out of the truck again to close it in this downpour.
Back in the driver’s seat, Randi could feel icy water dripping on her neck. The droplets didn’t stop there, but ran under her collar and slithered down her back. She started to shiver involuntarily but pressed her lips together and kept driving.
Only another half a mile to go.
It seemed like an hour’s drive, but actually within a few minutes she pulled up in the yard. Ignoring her usual parking spot under the tree, Randi drove as close to the back porch as she could manage.
“This is it. Let me put on a light and then I’ll come back out and help with the baby.” She ducked her head as she opened the truck door against the heavy rain and wind.
Just inside the door to the house, Manny stomped his boots and tried to shake the bulk of the water from his body, without much luck. He was soaked clean through.
When Randi had turned on the porch light, he’d caught a glimpse of her ranch house through the pouring rain. It hadn’t made much of an impression. From what Manny could see, the porch stairs leaned precariously to one side and the back door could obviously stand a new coat of paint.
Now he found himself in an old-fashioned mud room, with thirty-year-old linoleum on the floor and yellowing wallpaper on the walls. He clutched the baby to his chest, not wanting him to get a chill. Manny could still see his breath in the air even though they were inside the house.
“That’s all of it.” Randi came back through the door, carrying two bags full of groceries. “Come into the kitchen, while I light the stove. It’ll only take a few minutes to warm up.”
She dragged off her slicker, shaking it as she hung it on a peg. Leading the way through the mud room and into the kitchen, she turned on lights as she went.
Without the raincoat, she looked like a drowned rat. Well, actually, more like a drowned mouse. Thin and pale, her long, straight hair had almost dried, and he noticed only that it was the color of dishwater. She had on a dark pants outfit that appeared to be permanently wrinkled and stained by the rain.
The only memorable things about her were her eyes. In the light he saw their magical color. Hazel, he supposed they’d call them on a rap sheet. But one minute they were pale green ringed by steel blue, the next minute they were a deep gold with bronze flecks. The vulnerability he’d found within them haunted him more than the interesting colors.
Suddenly conscious of what a wet mess he was making, Manny stepped onto one of the braided rugs covering the wooden plank floor. Holding the baby against his shoulder, he silently apologized to the child for having to make up a name and for continuing to drag him along during an investigation. He stayed at the far end of the room and let his eyes adjust to the dim light.
He slowly focused, staring into the wide-open area that served as a kitchen and looked as if it had been furnished in the forties. His gaze took in all the details of the room: the propane-powered icebox with the fan on top, the floor-to-ceiling, free-standing breakfront, used as a pantry, and the two-foot thick, butcher block table in the middle of the room.
The out-of-date feel to the place reminded him of Mexico. Everything here was well-worn but also well cared for and spotless.
Randi busied herself shoving chopped wood into a cast-iron stove, the kind that had become very trendy in some areas of the West. Manny seriously doubted if she’d bought the thing to be fashionable. It looked ancient, but usable.
She lit the fire and fiddled with a damper. “It won’t be long now.” Her gaze caught his and flicked away. “Let me get some towels and a blanket for your baby.”
When she disappeared down a hall, Manny was shocked to realize he’d been studying her with more than just the professional eye of an undercover special agent. He found he’d been sidetracked once again by those amazing hazel-green eyes.
As she spoke, she’d looked like a timid fawn. Her skin was pearly with a dash of freckles across the nose. Only average height and a little too thin, as well, he thought. But her hips did curve rather seductively in the dressy slacks she wore.
All in all there wasn’t a reason in the world for the lick of desire he’d felt when their gazes met. He’d most assuredly felt it, though. And was, in fact, still trying to recover from the jolt.
Randi came back into the room with an armful of linens. “Here, let me have Ricky. You get out of that jacket and start drying off.”
After she set the pile of towels and blankets on the counter, he handed her the little boy and peeled off his soggy leather jacket. Manny was surprised to find the room considerably warmer than it had been just a few minutes earlier. He didn’t bother trying to figure out whether the warmth was related to the temperature or came from the nearness of the woman.
He took a deep breath and smelled a heady combination of mesquite smoke, dried herbs and tangy oranges. Reaching to pull off his boots, he had the weird sensation of being here before, of feeling at home. Maybe it was because the place felt like a safe haven, reminding him of his grandmother’s house in Mexico.
Manny stood transfixed, with a water-filled boot in each hand, watching as Randi undressed the baby and towel dried his hair. She was easy with Ricky, warm and motherly, and she turned Manny’s senses to mush.
Son of a gun. This innocent couldn’t possibly be involved with the baby smugglers. It wouldn’t be fair.
For the first time since he’d taken the oath, he hated what he did for a living. Hated having to pretend to be something he wasn’t. Hated having decent people be afraid of him.
But the truth was, when push came to shove, if Randi was involved with the smuggling ring, he’d do his job and take her down. The ruthless, international baby snatchers deserved no mercy. He just had to pray this guileless young woman was exactly as she seemed.
As soon as humanly possible, Manny needed to banish his emotions once more and get out of her house and her life—with his libido and his soul safely intact.
Two
“The phone’s on the wall behind you.” The sound of Randi’s voice broke into Manny’s daydream.
“Can you dial the operator and ask to speak to the sheriff’s office?” She kept a hand on Ricky while speaking to Manny over her shoulder. “I think we should report your wreck and see what needs to be done.”
Before they contacted any sheriff, Manny needed to contact his boss at Operation Rock-a-Bye. Without saying a word to Randi, he shoved his wet jacket and boots into the washroom and picked up the phone. “The line’s dead.”
“Oh, dear. The storm must be worse. That means the electricity will be next.” She wrapped the lethargic baby in a heavy blanket and handed him over to Manny. “We’d better get a move on. There’s a shower stall off the mud room. You and the baby get under the warm water. I’ll start a fire in the front room.”
When she turned to move away from him, Manny clamped a hand over her arm. Her skin was ice-cold.
“Is there anyone else in the house? Anyone you’re expecting?”
She shook her head and jerked on her arm, but he didn’t release her. Not just yet. “You need to warm up as much as we do. You’re shivering. You take the baby into the shower. I’ll start the fire.”
“No…no.” She eased her arm away from his grasp, and he released her reluctantly. “I know where everything is. You don’t. I’ll light some kerosene lanterns just in case. And I’m pretty sure there’s a trunk in the attic with some baby things—maybe even clothes that’ll fit you.”
She tilted her head, letting her gaze travel up his full length, making him feel naked and taking him in a direction he didn’t want to go.
“Well, maybe at least something that’ll do in an emergency.” With that pronouncement, she swiveled on the balls of her feet and headed to the door. “I’ll get changed while I’m upstairs. I’ll be okay.” She turned her head to look in his direction. “Everything will be okay.”
“Right,” he muttered as she disappeared. “Everything’s going to be just swell.”
Randi almost made it back downstairs before the power went out. Almost. Instead, she wasted time speculating about the dangerous-looking man and child she’d taken into her home.
The lights blinked once, then plunged the house into a familiar darkness. Without missing a step, she reached for the candle and some matches she’d stashed in the attic for emergencies. Lately one problem or another caused a power outage every month, and she simply didn’t have the money to buy a new generator.
Lighting the candle and inching her way to the darkened stairs, Randi’s mind went back to the broad-shouldered man who’d been dressed head to toe in black. When he’d stepped into her kitchen and taken off the leather jacket, she’d caught a glimpse of rippled muscles under his inky-colored T-shirt and jeans.
The man emanated power and excitement. Never in her life had she seen so much macho packed into one person. He was charming and terribly good-looking, in a sexy sort of way. But all that was just window dressing.
He made the words take charge, dynamo, and daring seem inadequate. Did his honey-brown eyes really absorb her every thought, word and deed, especially when she hadn’t said or done anything at all? Did he really manage to discover her wishes and desires without a word? Even his body appeared to vibrate with static energy as he stood perfectly still.
No, Manny Sanchez was nothing like any of the men she’d ever known. Randi had read about such heroes in novels, had seen a couple in movies when she was a girl. She’d even dreamed about them from time to time, but the idea of really meeting one this dynamic had never crossed her mind. And now she’d taken him into her house.
A shiver rippled along her spine as she crept down the stairs. If it hadn’t been an emergency situation, and if it hadn’t been for the baby…
The thought of Ricky made Randi hasten her steps. Precariously balanced, with a basket of clothes in one hand and a candle in the other, she worried about the child. That little one didn’t seem well to her, his eyes were glazed and his cry weak. She fervently hoped that with some warmth and dry clothes he might be okay.
When she crept into her front room, she found a massive hulk huddled by the fire. Manny must have found another blanket. This one totally covered him like a tent as he kept his back to her and faced the warmth of the hearth.
Randi accidentally stepped on a creaky floor board and jumped nearly a foot at the noise.
“Did you get a shower before the power went out?” Manny asked. Wincing at the pain from his tender shoulder, he shifted the baby against his chest before turning. He’d known by her light footsteps that he’d be facing the young woman who’d given them shelter.
She’d changed into well-worn jeans and a frayed, navy sweatshirt with a Texas Aggie logo. The sweatshirt was thin with age, and he couldn’t help but notice the way her nipples beaded against it in the cold.
With her wet hair tied up in a towel, she looked so fragile his first impulse was to gather her up in his arms and set her on a shelf somewhere. In his current state of undress that would be more than stupid on his part, even if she would allow it.
Randi set down the basket she’d been carrying by the hearth. “No, no time for a shower. But I’m fairly dry and the fire will warm me up fast enough.” She pulled a kerosene lamp from the mantel and lit it before blowing out her candle. “Did you find everything you needed?”
He suppressed a chuckle. “I didn’t even bother looking. I did find the clothesline in the mud room and hung our soggy stuff over it, but Ricky needs a few things you probably don’t have.”
She dug into the basket and pulled out a square white cloth. “Like this, you mean?”
At his raised eyebrow, she laughed. “Diapers. My mom kept an entire trunk full of my baby things for…later.” She blushed and laughed again. “Mother was an eternal optimist.”
Randi held out her arms, waiting for him to transfer the baby. It was a delicate maneuver, considering the precarious state of the towel he’d wrapped around his own waist and the blanket that kept slipping down his shoulders.
She laid the baby down on the rug in front of the fire and unwrapped the clumsily tied towel he’d used as a diaper. “Well, you didn’t do so badly. With nothing else handy, the towel was actually a good idea.”
“Necessity is the mother of invention,” he murmured, chagrined at his own cliché but too beat to be clever.
Quickly and expertly Randi diapered Ricky and pulled a fuzzy yellow jumpsuit with a hood over his arms and legs. The kid would’ve looked like the Easter Bunny if he’d had floppy ears.
“His skin seems warm enough, but he’s too quiet to suit me,” she said.
“Yeah, I know what you mean. I’ve been thinking about that. I don’t think he’s in shock, his skin isn’t clammy at all. But I’m concerned that he’s dehydrated…or maybe even in the first stages of starvation. His belly looks distended to me.”
She jerked around to face him and arched her brows in disbelief. “You think your own son might be starving?”
“He’s not mine, Randi.” It never occurred to him she might think Ricky was his child. After he’d blurted out the truth, he wondered if maybe he should have lied and spared himself a lot of trouble and explanations later.
“If he’s not yours, what were you doing driving him around the countryside in the middle of a storm, and where’s his mother?”
Yep. Good questions. Ones he wasn’t positive he wanted to answer.
“Can we talk about that later? I’m a lawman, Randi, just trying to do a job. I promise, you’re safe and I’ll tell you everything eventually. But right now we need to find a way to get some liquids into the baby.”
He had to hand it to her—Randi hesitated only a fraction of a second before she dug back into the basket. If he’d been in her shoes, he wasn’t sure he’d have let the subject drop so fast. That fact alone made him wary, putting his instincts on alert.
She held up a glass baby bottle. “I found a few of these, but only one nipple that seems to be usable.” Getting to her feet she said, “I have some distilled drinking water stashed away for emergencies. I suspect Ricky is well over six months and we can get by just washing the bottles instead of sterilizing them. It’ll save a lot of time.”
She handed him the baby and headed for the kitchen, turning back at the doorway for one last word. “But if you think we’re done with the questions about this baby, better think again. I want answers.”
In a few minutes she was back. Gently taking Ricky in her arms, she cradled him to her breast. It took a bit of coaxing to get him to take the bottle of water into his mouth, but soon the baby’s instincts kicked in and he sucked mightily.
Manny breathed a sigh of relief at the tranquil sucking sounds. He’d made a promise to the baby to keep him safe and healthy, and by heaven, he intended to do everything in his power to see it through.
The sight of Randi holding the baby stirred something deep inside him that he had no business feeling. Long ago he’d buried his most basic needs—the need for the softness of a woman—the need for family. It had been several years since he’d contacted his own family, and he suddenly missed them more than he thought possible. He was sure that since he’d last seen them, his nieces and nephews would be nearly all grown up.
Manny positively refused to contemplate how long it had been since he’d felt the comfort of female companionship. But the sight of Randi and the baby seemed overwhelmingly erotic somehow. Man, when this mission was over, he’d better find himself some sweet little senorita. How long had it been, anyway?
“I’ve set a pan of water to boil on the stove,” Randi whispered, trying not to disturb Ricky. “I think I’ve got a box of powdered milk on a shelf somewhere, too. If he can get this down, we can try a little milk.”
Manny’s gut wrenched as Randi concentrated on Ricky. There was an innocence about her that tugged at his conscience. Taking a breath, he systematically closed and locked off the physical and emotional needs that had been assaulting him. He needed to be strong and tough till he discovered her exact involvement in the baby-smuggling ring.
It didn’t add up that she would be living alone. Someone that fragile-looking couldn’t operate a working ranch by herself. So where was everybody?
He had no desire to hurt this ethereal young thing, but he had to do whatever necessary to find out if she was a suspect. It was part of the job.
Randi looked down at Ricky sleeping and felt a twinge of sadness in her heart. She was around children all the time at her nursery school job. Yet having a baby here, sleeping on her hearth and totally dependent on her for his well-being, seemed different. It reminded her too much of things she couldn’t have—of things she’d probably have to bury forever.
Ricky took half the bottle of water and a full ounce of the powdered milk. When she’d placed him into the nest in the basket she’d made, he barely stirred.
His sweet face seemed so peaceful Randi began to relax. He’d lost that scrunched-up frightened look. She stroked his tiny hand, grateful that he no longer clutched it into a fist.
Meanwhile, Manny took her daddy’s old clothes into the mud room to change. When he’d left the fireside, she’d felt a momentary chill, as if his leaving had changed the temperature and the physical forces swirling around her.
Shaking off the strange sensations, she tried to focus on the situation. She had a potentially sick child on her hands. The flooding river had no doubt cut them off from town for the time being. The phone wasn’t working to call for help, and since they had no electricity to run the furnace’s fan, they’d need to stay downstairs here near the fireplace or in the kitchen by the stove. And to top it all off, she still didn’t know what Manny’s relationship to this child might be.
Just who was this dangerous man, really, and why was he in her little town in the middle of a horrific rainstorm and flood? She’d be stuck throughout the emergency with a man who made her body alternate between shivers and hot sweats. What on earth had she gotten herself into?
If he wasn’t Ricky’s father, why was Manny in the car with the baby? What did his being a lawman have to do with Ricky? Randi had seen the way he treated the child, softly petting him and murmuring encouragement. She refused to think that he might have taken Ricky for a bad reason, but she was determined to get to the truth.
He was dangerous looking, what with the shaggy, ebony hair and the stubble darkening his chin and cheeks, but would it be fair to judge a man by appearances? She’d been taught never to jump to snap conclusions based on a person’s looks.
“Is the baby asleep?”
Randi heard Manny’s whispered words before she knew he was in the room and felt his hand on her shoulder. Instead of being startled, she felt heat settle over her in a liquid rush. Sort of like the burning sensation she’d experienced when she’d tried her one and only swallow of whisky but better…less bad tasting and more electric.
She nodded silently and lowered her chin to stare at the floor. Randi knew she couldn’t look at him right now and still think clearly. Nervous tension made her body taut, and her mind fogged with unrealistic panic.
“You sure are handy to have around,” he began in a soft and friendly tone.
Without looking up, she knew he’d eased himself down on the rug next to her. He wasn’t touching her in any way, but she felt his presence tingling along the nerve endings of her skin. He was close enough that she could smell the cedar chips her mother had used to store her dad’s clothes.
“I mean, you saved Ricky and me from drowning in the van and now you’ve taken us in and given us warmth and shelter from the storm. You’ve even come up with diapers and a baby bottle…and you know how to use them.” He chuckled deep in his chest, the sexy rumbling vibrating inside her.
She peeked out from under her lashes to check his expression. When she saw his deep-set, chocolate-colored eyes flare to gold and his devastating features reflecting in the glow of the fire, she quivered with a strange anticipation. Randi felt a tide of color wash over her face, bathing her in a fiery flush and embarrassing her even more.
From the tips of his sock-clad feet to the top of his now-dry hair, the man reeked of power and sex.
Geez, she was way out of her depth here.
Manny watched the young woman sitting next to him while her skin turned from pale and cool to bright pink and heated. And his body reacted with a jolt of heat all its own. He understood about basic survival needs, about adrenaline causing lust and the need to reaffirm life, but that didn’t explain the magnetic pull and his craving to protect her to his last breath.
He felt a bit more in control now that he’d changed and replaced his weapon in its hidden holster at his waist. He set his jaw and swallowed hard. She might be a suspect, and he must uncover her involvement in this international ring before they went any further. What did she know? It was urgent he find out.
He turned up the charm and tried a grin he certainly didn’t feel. “So, what were you really doing out on that lonely road tonight?”
“Hold on, there! I want my questions about you and the baby answered before we talk about anything else.”
“Look,” he growled. “I’m not asking out of idle curiosity, Randi. I’m a federal undercover agent, working on a case. And if I find out you’re withholding information…or that you’re involved in any way, I’ll have you in custody so fast your head will swim.”
Her terrified look should have told him all he needed to know. But his emotions were so raw he ignored his own gut instincts.
He pushed ahead, overpowering the conversation and demanding the truth with mere physical presence. “Now answer my question. Why were you out there alone tonight?” he persisted.
“I told you. I was coming home from work in Willow Springs. I’m a nursery school aide there.” Her voice shook and the look in her eyes grew wilder as she automatically answered his demand.
“A pretty woman like you?” His hand went to her soft shoulder. “You sure you weren’t there to meet someone?” He knew the grin had disappeared, but the longer she carried on this innocent game, the more Manny was positive she knew something she wasn’t telling.
“N-n-n-no. Why are you asking? What kind of agent are you and what are you working on?” The words came pouring out. “It was just as I told you. Who would I be meeting in the middle of a storm?”
Manny groaned inwardly, wishing she didn’t look so naive and young. He had to remain tough in the face of all this supposed innocence. She was either the best actress he’d ever seen or she was too guileless to be believed. His first quick impulse was that she must be one heck of an actress. He decided to force the truth out of her.
“All right. Let’s go back to something else you said.” He ended up having to clear his throat to continue. “You said no one lived here on the ranch with you. I find that hard to imagine.”
“I…I didn’t say that exactly.”
Faster than a blink, Manny shoved the towel off her head. A rich, wet tangle of ash, gold and silver flowed over her shoulders. Grabbing a handful of it, he fisted his fingers into the silky strands. She gasped and her eyes opened to the size of dinner plates with his brash movement.
“Then what did you mean…exactly.” He tugged her head back slowly, exposing the satiny skin on her slender neck to his view. A wayward thought of how much he’d like to place his lips on that expanse of softness flashed in his brain before he banished it and tried to steel his features into a threatening look.
“Let go of me! We…I…there’s a ranch hand, uh, and his wife that live in the foreman’s quarters. But…”
“So you lied to me?” he demanded.
“No! You didn’t ask about the ranch. You asked about the house. Now let go…please.”
Manny saw the tears welling in her eyes and immediately released his grip on her hair. But his hand refused to let the damp tresses go completely. His fingers lingered in the intoxicating texture of the multicolored silk.
He felt like a jerk for hurting her. But it was part of the job, and he had to finish his interrogation. Ricky’s life might depend on finding the answers.
“Why all these questions?” she sobbed. “What’s going on? I haven’t done anything wrong.” Randi sniffed and touched a finger to the corner of her eye.
“I don’t want to hurt you.” His voice sounded raspy, hoarse. “But I’m the one asking the questions here. And I mean to know the truth. All of it.”
She arched her eyebrows and glanced away as if she was barely interested in this whole conversation. Damn her. He wanted her scared—scared and willing to tell him anything she might know. He was finished playing games.
Manny had his Glock out of its holster before he had a chance to think it through. “Who else lives on this ranch? Tell me,” he demanded. “And you’d better make sure I believe you.”
Her eyes widened and her hands jumped to cover that full mouth, probably to keep a scream from escaping her lips. Now he’d done it. He reholstered his weapon instantly. Drawing a weapon was just an ingrained movement whenever he needed an intimidating tactic.
This time he hadn’t really been prepared to shoot, however. The monumental significance of that potentially deadly oversight wasn’t lost on him. Nothing like that had ever happened to him before.
“Please. I’ll tell you anything you want to know. Only…please keep that gun out of sight.”
Randi forced a sob back down her throat. She refused to let him see her panic. Dear Lord, was she going to go to jail because she’d been a Good Samaritan? Lewis Lee always said that no good deed goes unpunished. She prayed she’d be around long enough to tell him he was right.
Manny softened his expression. Funny, but she could swear that this big macho man looked remorseful—guilty even. The gun had disappeared under his shirt at his waist almost as quickly as it had appeared. Randi’s gut told her that he would never have used it on her. Her fears subsided the instant she’d seen his expression. Meanwhile, he silently waited for her to continue.
How odd that all her fears had melted away. He was still a huge, dangerous man sitting in her front room and wearing a gun that he didn’t seem to mind using. But there was a glint of some emotion in his eyes that comforted her, drew her to him. Made her positive he was really the lawman he professed to be.
“My…” Her voice cracked and she started over. “My stepfather lives on another part of the ranch. On the Cottonwood section. But he won’t be helping us if that’s what you’re thinking. Probably wouldn’t help—even if he could reach us. He’s kind of put out with me these days.” She swallowed and tried to soothe her dry throat. It was no use. “Besides, he hasn’t been around in a couple of months. Not since…my mother’s funeral.”
“Your mother just died?”
She nodded. The emotion in his eyes changed to sympathy, and her head swam with confusion. What kind of man was this? And what did he really want from her?
Three
A multitude of emotions raced through Randi when Manny stood, turned and stretched out a hand to help her stand. She’d seen the guilt in his eyes when he’d fisted his hands in her hair, questioning her.
His look clearly told her he believed his actions had caused her pain. What she’d actually felt was simply fear—not physical discomfort. He hadn’t hurt her, just scared her. That Manny had such a sympathetic and honest streak in him was as clear as if it was painted on his forehead.
And now…
Now that he wanted to take her hand, wanted to touch her again, she hesitated. She’d been so concerned about the baby’s welfare that she’d given in to Manny’s demands too easily. For some reason she’d let him take total control.
All right, so he said he was a lawman and she’d believed him immediately. That might have been part of it. Believing what he said might be stupid of her, but she knew she would eventually get the answers. There was just something about him that made her know he could be trusted in the long run.
But for right now she marveled at how quickly her fear had disappeared. Past the fear, past the consuming questions in her heart about who he really was and what he wanted, Randi had felt alive and sensual. For the first time in her life, she actually wanted a man’s touch. Wanted it bad.
Not just any man, mind you. Randi wanted this man. He was all she’d ever dreamed about—dangerous but sexy. In Randi’s eyes he was a perfect combination of Zorro and some exotic and romantic pirate.
The problem was, she had no idea how to go about getting him. For ten years she’d buried her needs, smothered her desires. First there’d been her mother’s stroke, then her stepfather’s physical abandonment. Finally came the unrelenting pressure of seeing to her mother’s needs while trying to keep the ranch afloat. All of that left precious little time for Randi to have any kind of life.
If it hadn’t been for Lewis Lee and his wife, Hannah, Randi wouldn’t have graduated from high school. And if it hadn’t been for Marian Baker, the librarian, bringing her books every week after graduation, Randi would have withered and blown away. Reading had been her lifeline, her connection to the outside world.
Marian had even arranged for Randi to take care of a couple of toddlers while their mothers worked. The small job meant she could be in the house when her disabled mother needed her. It also meant that temporarily there had been enough cash to keep from having to sell off the land. Despite the puny allowance and doctor’s bills her stepfather had paid, there was never enough money to go around.
“I’m afraid you and I are stuck with each other for the duration of the storm, Randi. I’d appreciate it if we could stick close to each other for the baby’s safety as well as our own.” Manny eyed her with a piercing look when she still hesitated to move. “Come on into the kitchen with us. I think we need something in our stomachs.
“I won’t hurt you ever again. I promise.” He tucked his hand into the pocket of his jeans and bunched up his face with a look of pure helplessness when she still made no move.
“I know I didn’t act very civilized before,” he began again. “But I did apologize. Can’t we make a new start? Maybe we could talk…get to know each other better. Please?”
Oh, yeah. Randi wanted desperately to know him better. Her gaze traveled down the length of him, taking in her daddy’s chambray work shirt stretched tightly across Manny’s broad chest. He’d left the top three buttons open. She doubted they’d cover his muscles, anyway, but open like that they left nearly half of his torso in plain view. She stared at the dark, curly hair covering his bronzed skin and gulped.
Her fingers shook reflexively at the sight of his chest, and she fisted them to keep still. She’d never in her life seen anything quite so compelling. With a supreme effort at controlling her urges, she forced herself not to jump up and test the feel of his body. Her good sense told her to be careful—to go slow.
Talk about uncivilized. What she wanted right now definitely qualified as primal.
When she could pull away from the sight of all that skin, she dropped her gaze down the rest of him—across the leather belt he’d used to draw her father’s jeans tight and on down past the bulging mound of him encased in soft, well-washed blue denim.
Oh, my.
That view finally put her in motion. She turned, while carefully managing to avoid touching Manny.
“Do you like coffee? I can make some. It’s time I added wood to the stove, anyway.” She figured she was babbling, but couldn’t seem to stop.
“Yeah. I could go for coffee,” he murmured, picking up the baby’s basket and following her into the kitchen.
Manny wondered how he could ever make up for behaving like such an idiot. What had gotten into him? The young woman who’d just put coffee on the stove to boil was obviously innocent.
In eight years of undercover work he’d developed a life-saving instinct for detecting lies. He was usually right on target. His gut screamed at him for ever doubting her. Perhaps someone else on the ranch was involved with baby smugglers, but she wasn’t. Of that he was now positive. He doubted she’d ever even heard about such things.
While Randi scrambled some eggs using the same stove that heated the room and warmed their coffee, Manny fought to bring peace into the tension that surrounded the two stranded strangers and baby. “Can I do anything to help?”
She looked at him with amazement shining in her eyes.
“What? You don’t think I can cook?” he asked with a chuckle. “I’ll have you know my abuela insisted that all members of her family, male and female alike, should know how to take care of themselves.”
He found the bread bin and removed two slices of whole wheat. “It’s a real handy talent, and sometimes even fun.”
Manny glanced around the room looking for cooking utensils and supplies. Finally he gave Randi a questioning look. Where did she keep things, anyway?
Obviously mistaking his intentions, Randi shook her head at him. “Do you think you can toast that bread without the electric toaster?” Her lips curled at the corners in an adorable smirk.
“Can I have one egg and a little of Ricky’s milk?”
“Yes, but…”
“Then stand aside, woman, and watch a master at work.”
Manny busied himself, frying the bread over her open-flamed stovetop while Randi set the table. As he worked, he went over in his head the events that had brought him to this point.
What the hell had happened to this mission, anyway? His Operation Rock-a-Bye assignment had been to go undercover in Mexico until he ingratiated himself with a group of undocumented immigrants making their way to the border. He’d picked a group with several small children, and although they’d never fully trusted him, he’d been able to keep track of them through their travels. Even when they’d hooked up with a particularly nasty band of coyotes, dangerous men hired to bring them across the river, the little group of Mexican nationals continued to allow his shadow to fall on their campsites.
Manny had hoped that once they’d crossed the border he could manage to get them to confide in him, give him the critical information he needed to infiltrate the smugglers gang. He’d heard that this particular group of immigrants knew of children taken from their homeland and spirited to the U.S. Around a campfire one night, he’d even overheard a disagreement about one family receiving money in exchange for a baby.
When the illegals he’d befriended crossed the Rio Grande and broke into smaller bands, he followed one family who moved alone into the interior of Texas with their coyote. What Manny hadn’t known, or even guessed, was that the coyotes they’d hired were also members of the baby smuggling ring.
He’d discovered the truth too late.
And that was when this whole assignment had fallen apart. He didn’t know what to do to put it right again. He only knew that some things would forever be wrong, and that the last thing he needed was an innocent civilian like Randi in the middle of the investigation.
He flipped the bread out of the pan and onto the plates she’d already loaded with scrambled eggs. “There you go.”
She sat down at the worn-out looking wooden table next to the stove and took a bite. “Mmm. It’s good.”
Manny thought she looked good enough to eat herself. In the past hour, he’d quit thinking of her as a frail little waif and started appreciating her firm, lithe body and the sexual energy coming from every pore.
“Don’t sound so surprised. If you’d had some cornmeal, I would’ve really made you a treat.”
Randi smiled at him before she took another bite of food. Manny watched as her full, pouty lips covered the fork. She slowly pulled the empty tines back again, moaning in satisfaction as she swallowed.
With her sensual sound of pleasure, his libido went on full alert. Suddenly he could think of nothing but tracing those silken lips with his own, dipping his tongue into that ripe mouth and tasting her, and having her taste him in return.
He could feel the sinew in his muscles tense up. When he saw her flick that rose-tipped tongue over slightly parted lips to clean off any crumbs, it was all he could do not to use his own tongue to follow hers. He had to swallow hard to keep the groan, rumbling deep in his chest, from escaping his throat.
Watching her, being this close to all that femininity was pure torment. Desire had never hit him in the middle of an assignment. Why now?
He spun around to see about Ricky, who still slept in the basket on the kitchen counter. He tried hard to remember that all of this was just another mission.
“Aren’t you going to eat? It’s delicious,” she asked.
“Uh, yeah,” he managed through a clenched jaw. “I just wanted to check the baby. He’s awfully quiet.”
“I plan on changing him and seeing if he’ll take a little more milk as soon as we’re done. I want to let him sleep as long as possible. Please come sit down and eat. I thought you said you wanted to talk.”
Talk? All of a sudden the whole concept seemed beyond his comprehension.
Manny squeezed his eyes shut and drew a steadying breath before he turned around to face her. “Right. While I eat, why don’t you tell me why a pretty young girl is living out here all by herself? Why hasn’t some nice cowpoke swept you off your feet by now?”
Randi must have recognized a sidestepping dodge when she heard one. “Wait a minute. I’ve already been through one interrogation. I’m not saying any more until you tell me about yourself. Who is Ricky to you? And what were you two doing on the low-water bridge road in the middle of a storm?”
Manny’s mind tried to come up with a plausible lie, but he was too wiped out to concentrate. Besides, from some deeply buried spot inside him, a strong voice demanded that he not lie to this woman. But why she caused such a powerful internal command stumped him.
As long as he’d been in this job, his conscience had never once stopped him from fabricating a story. Why did he hesitate now? When he’d been a much younger man, he’d even spun a few stories not in the line of work—for the pretty ladies.
Of course, he hadn’t told white lies like that for quite a number of years. Hadn’t needed to really. Lately, the women with whom he’d had relationships didn’t need to be persuaded. They’d been just as happy as he had to spend a few hours together away from the storms of life and then move on, with no regrets and no looking back.
So what was so different about Randi? Even in his exhausted state, Manny knew what the problem was. The look in her eyes said she wanted forever. Oh, she probably would deny it, and might not even know it about herself, but Randi was not the kind to have a fling or a casual relationship. The truth of that was written all over her.
In his business “forever” could be no more than a heartbeat away.
Manny beat back his budding desires, and decided to fudge with half the truth. “I can’t tell you everything you want to know, Randi.”
When she rolled her eyes and set her chin, he knew he’d have to give up a morsel of the story—something to settle her fears at least. “Really. Just believe that I am a lawman, and I’ve been undercover on assignment. Even telling you that much might jeopardize years’ worth of work, but for your own safety, you must trust me.”
In the flickering glow of the lamplight he saw her eyes had turned pale green. They widened with shock before they quickly narrowed in disbelief. “Trust you? I don’t even know you. First you interrogate me like I’m some kind of criminal, then you put a gun in my face, and now you tell me to believe you’re undercover? You expect me to just quietly let everything slide and accept it?” Randi stood, swept up both their plates and strode to the sink, effectively rejecting him as she turned her back.
Without facing him, she demanded at least one straight answer. “What about Ricky? Why was he in the van with you, and where are his parents?”
Manny sighed and absently rubbed at the ache in his shoulder. She must accept knowing only part of the story. All of it would be too much for her right now. The whole truth might also be very dangerous.
“I wasn’t in the van, Randi. I was chasing it. Ricky had been…taken…by the man driving.”
“Taken? Like in kidnapped, you mean?” She spun to face him, clasping her hands in front of her chest.
He nodded and watched her expression, fascinated by such open emotion. Manny could see her making connections and piecing together the frayed ends of what he’d told her. She was too damn bright, he finally decided.
Being too smart could get her killed. He’d rather keep the nastiness of this whole situation from touching her.
“If you were chasing the van, where was your car? I didn’t see another vehicle on the road.” She only hesitated a fraction of a second. “And what happened to the van’s driver?”
“My bike slid off the side of the road when I stopped to help. I’m not positive about what happened to the driver…except I think he must have been thrown out when the van went over. I doubt he escaped alive, but as soon as the storm subsides we’ll find out.”
Randi made a strangled, hiccupy sound and moved to Ricky’s basket. “Oh, my God.” She bent to pick up the baby and held him closely to her chest.
“Don’t ask me any more,” he mumbled. “Tomorrow, when the storm clears, we’ll notify the sheriff about the accident and the driver. I’ll find my Hog, and Ricky and I will be on our way out of your life.”
Randi closed her eyes and leaned her cheek against Ricky’s hair.
Manny watched closely while Randi changed Ricky. She coaxed the boy into taking a little more milk while Manny rinsed the dishes in cold water and stacked them in the sink. Her ancient, hot-water heater wouldn’t start without electricity. He wondered why she didn’t have an emergency generator like most ranches did these days.
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Linda Conrad
The leather-jacketed stranger was clearly as dangerous as any man Randi Cullen had ever set eyes on.But she couldn't abandon him - or the defenseless baby with him - to the rainswept Texas night. She offered them both a refuge on her isolated ranch. And when she learned that Manuel Sanchez was an undercover federal agent hunting a ruthless killer, she even agreed to marriage - in name only - to protect his cover.But having this man in her life was touching off a storm of desire in an untouched woman's heart - a storm from which she feared she would never find shelter.
“A Diamond Engagement Ring?” Randi Stared At The Gold-Banded Gem Manuel Had Given Her. What Was He Telling Her?
“Not a diamond.” He narrowed his eyes. “A fake ring, for a fake engagement.”
A scarlet flush of embarrassment rushed up her throat and covered her face. Of course. Despite the kiss they’d shared last night, this was just part of his job.
But it could also be a chance to keep Manuel and the child on the ranch. Close by her. Maybe, with a little more time, she could find out for once in her life what having a man and a family of her own would be like—even if it was only a temporary situation.
At the thought, an ache of longing thudded in her heart, so strong it nearly knocked her down.
Dear God. Could she really pull this off—and not be destroyed in the process…?
Dear Reader,
Dog days of summer got you down? Chill out and relax with six brand-new love stories from Silhouette Desire!
August’s MAN OF THE MONTH is the first book in the exciting family-based saga BECKETT’S FORTUNE by Dixie Browning. Beckett’s Cinderella features a hero honor-bound to repay a generations-old debt and a poor-but-proud heroine leery of love and money she can’t believe is offered unconditionally. His E-Mail Order Wife by Kristi Gold, in which matchmaking relatives use the Internet to find a high-powered exec a bride, is the latest title in the powerful DYNASTIES: THE CONNELLYS series.
A daughter seeking revenge discovers love instead in Falling for the Enemy by Shawna Delacorte. Then, in Millionaire Cop & Mom-To-Be by Charlotte Hughes, a jilted, pregnant bride is rescued by her childhood sweetheart.
Passion flares between a family-minded rancher and a marriage-shy divorcée in Kathie DeNosky’s Cowboy Boss. And a pretend marriage leads to undeniable passion in Desperado Dad by Linda Conrad.
So find some shade, grab a cold one…and read all six passionate, powerful and provocative new love stories from Silhouette Desire this month.
Enjoy!
Joan Marlow Golan
Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire
Desperado Dad
Linda Conrad
LINDA CONRAD
was born in Brazil to a commercial pilot dad and a mother whose first gift was a passion for stories. She was raised in South Florida and has been a dreamer and a storyteller for as long as she can remember. Linda claims her earliest memories are of sitting in her mother’s lap listening to a beloved storybook or searching through the picture books in the library to find that special one.
When Linda met and married her own dream-come-true hero, he fostered another of her other inherited vices—being a vagabond. They moved to seven different states in seven years, finally becoming enchanted with and settling down in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas.
Reality anchored Linda to their Texas home long enough to raise a daughter and become a stockbroker and certified financial planner. Her whole world suddenly changed when her widowed mother suffered a disabling stroke and Linda spent a year as her caretaker. Before her mother’s second and fatal stroke, she begged Linda to go back to her dreams—to finally tell the stories buried within her heart.
Linda’s hobbies are reading, growing roses and experiencing new things. However, her real passion is “passion”—reading about it, writing about it and living it. She believes that true passion and intensity for life and love are seductive—they consume the soul and make life’s trials and tribulations worth all the effort.
“I am extremely grateful that today I can live my dreams by being able to share the passionate stories and lovable characters that have lived deep within me for so long,” Linda declares.
Linda loves to hear from her readers and invites them to visit her Web site at http://www.lindaconrad.com.
To both my darling husband and sister, because Manny’s story is your favorite. To Dana Rae Link, because you started all this years ago. And especially for Emily, because I couldn’t do any of them without you.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Epilogue
One
Manny Sanchez decided the pounding rain did have one advantage—it helped to hide his stealthy nighttime chase. He rode his Harley through the bitter, biting and brutal sleet, torn between cursing the storm and being grateful for the added cover.
In the next instant the minivan he’d been following slowed. When its brake lights glowed red, memories of devastating car wrecks flashed before his eyes. He’d seen plenty of twisted metal in his thirty-four years, and a flashback of his own agony clutched at his chest.
Damn. Not this time. A baby boy was riding inside that van. Life had always been cruel as far as Manny was concerned, but the baby’s short, tragic life simply must not end this way. Manny couldn’t let that happen—not again.
Through his rain-distorted visor, he watched horrified as the minivan carrying the coyote and his cargo came to a low-water bridge. They hit a patch of icy highway and slid sideways. Manny winced.
¡Ay, Dios mio! No one will get out alive!
Suddenly his bike hit another frozen spot and he lost control. He cut the power, laying the bike down into the gravel covering the side of the road. His leather-clad, left shoulder took the entire brunt of the roadway collision, but a combination of adrenaline and freezing cold numbed him to the effects he knew were sure to follow.
Luckily the bike slid across the asphalt, scattering sparks and landing in a field, while he sprawled down the gravel in the other direction. His heavy jeans protected him from the rocks and wet pavement.
When his forward momentum finally eased, he jumped to his feet, relieved he was still able to walk. But there wasn’t time to check for broken bones or bleeding. He ripped off his helmet, flung it aside and ran toward the bridge.
In terrifying slow motion, Manny watched the minivan lose contact with the asphalt as it hit the rushing water. Within the space of a heartbeat, the boxy little vehicle turned on its side and was swept into the furious torrent.
A breath hitched in his throat as he stood paralyzed, seeing the scene unfold before him. Shock and a fleeting sense of sorrow and guilt overtook him. Why hadn’t he found a way to end this assignment earlier today—or yesterday? Or, hell, last week before things had gotten so out of hand?
He clearly heard the eerie shriek of twisting metal over the sounds of howling water as torrents assaulted the minivan with a devastating rampage. The incessant beating of the rain competed with the hammering of his heart.
Without a moment for recriminations and once again burying his emotions, he reacted to the tragedy the way he’d been trained—don’t hesitate, act.
Just then the minivan snagged itself on a pile of debris clogged against willows at the side of the raging river. It was all the advantage Manny would get, and he ran toward the van before it broke loose and dashed farther downstream.
By the time he reached the car, lying precariously driver’s side down, he’d made an assessment of what he could do, and what the chances were that anyone had survived. The van was submerged a good three feet deep, and the black water still rose against it. Since the roof was all he could see from the bank, he couldn’t be sure, but…
Manny scrambled up the hood and scaled the front window, ignoring the pain in his shoulder. Slick and slippery, the van rocked gently as the cascading water tore at it, making any assent more than hazardous.
After too many precious minutes, he made it to the passenger side and knelt, yanking on the front passenger door. It took a supreme effort, but the door finally opened, revealing the murky interior.
“Hey, can you hear me?” he shouted.
He bent closer and realized no one sat in the passenger seat. For a second the silence from inside was so complete he wondered if the worst had already happened.
He began lowering himself into the front toward the spot where a driver should be, when a child’s cry pulled him up short. The baby was still alive! But Manny couldn’t see him for all the darkness and water.
With another small whimper from the back seat, Manny quickly reached into the murky water where the driver should be and found—nothing. The smuggler that had been driving must have been thrown out as the van went over.
As fast as he could, Manny dragged himself out of the van and wrestled with the sliding back door. The more he pulled the worse his shoulder throbbed.
The door eventually gave way to his efforts. Manny saw the kid, still strapped in his child-carrier and hanging sideways as the water rose to meet him.
Please don’t let him die.
Manny reached for the carrier’s seat belt and gave it a jerk. Nothing happened. The damn thing was stuck, so Manny lowered himself into the car, sliding past the suddenly too-quiet child and landing in the freezing water.
Standing upright in the back, waist deep, with his feet resting on the car’s left side window, he reached into his jeans pocket for his knife. As Manny’s fingers grasped the pocket knife, a small hand reached out to touch his face.
“Hi, baby, are you hurting?” He tried to keep the tension from his voice. “I’ll have you out of here in a minute.”
The dark-haired child, dressed in nothing but a red sweater and diaper, started to sob. It wasn’t a loud cry, but a soft, heart-wrenching sound that tore into Manny’s soul.
“Pa…ba?” The baby patted Manny’s face and reached grasping fingers toward his jacket.
“I’m not your papa, hijo, but there’s no need to be afraid. I won’t let anything else happen to you.”
A flash of memory passed through Manny’s mind, reminding him that this little one had already lost his father and his mother forever. That was enough. Manny vowed to keep him safe from now on—no matter what it took, and no matter who didn’t care for the idea.
With more effort than Manny’s shoulder should handle, the seat belt finally gave way to his sharp blade. The baby grabbed him around the neck and hung on desperately.
Manny flipped the blade closed and jammed it back into his pocket while he experienced the closest thing to sheer panic he’d ever felt. How in the world was he going to lift himself and the boy out of the back seat and onto the car’s side with this injured shoulder?
“Hand the baby to me.”
“What the…?” The woman’s voice coming from above startled the hell out of him.
When he looked up, all he could make out were long slender arms reaching down into the open doorway. Where had she come from? Had she been inside the van and gotten out by herself? Impossible. But then where…and how…?
“Hurry up. I don’t think we’ve got much time.” The woman’s demand shocked him into movement. He lifted the baby up with his good arm. The seemingly disembodied arms from above grabbed hold of the boy securely.
The baby gasped and tightened his grip on Manny and wailed.
“Easy, sweetheart, I’ve got you.” The woman’s voice turned soft and pleading.
Manny pried the boy’s arms from his neck as gently as he possibly could. Meanwhile the woman made soothing noises, pulling the baby upward. Once they had disappeared from view, Manny used his good arm and his legs to drag himself up and out of the car.
When he found a steady perch on the car’s side, he looked over to the woman, who had the little boy wrapped securely in her arms. She looked hesitantly over the slippery roof to the ground just beyond reach.
The rain still pulsated down on them, making every movement difficult. Manny made a quick decision. He slid down the roof and managed to find a fairly solid foothold on top of wet debris and clogged tree branches.
He reached his good arm up toward the woman and child. “Hand him back to me, then slide down. I’ll steady you.”
She hesitated. “Your arm’s hurt. Can you hold him?”
“It’s nothing. Just a bruised shoulder.”
She looked unsure but lowered the baby to him. The boy grabbed a handful of black leather jacket and held on in a death grip. Meanwhile the mysterious woman eased herself down the roof while Manny steadied her with his body.
Within seconds they were standing on muddy ground.
“Is there anyone else in there?” she shouted over the roar of the wind and water.
Manny shook his head.
She turned to the car and then swirled back with an undecided glance. For the first time, Manny noticed what their mysterious savior looked like: about half a foot shorter than his six feet, her long soggy hair hung down her back in wet strands. She wore a neon yellow slicker that looked three sizes too big and hung on her slender frame, making her appear younger than the midtwenties he guessed she must be.
It was her eyes that really grabbed him, though. Wide with questions, Manny couldn’t tell exactly what color they were in the blackness of the night surrounding them. Full of all the emotions that he knew swirled inside her, those eyes made her look sweet and strong, and right this minute, downright scared.
He spent one precious second considering the slim chance that the baby-stealing minivan driver still lived. It seemed like a tough ending for the man who’d obviously panicked back in Del Rio and had appeared to be headed straight for his boss. Mother Nature hadn’t read him his rights.
In all the years Manny had been undercover chasing these baby smugglers for Operation Rock-a-Bye, he’d never followed any of them so far from the border. Usually the actual kidnapping happened in Mexico or in Europe and then was funneled through Mexico. And it was in the big, Texas cities where most of the baby selling took place. The thought of murderers and scum living in a safe, small town troubled him.
It would be impossible to find the body tonight, so he buried his uneasiness. Right now the living needed tending.
With no hesitation he gathered the woman up next to him and forced his bad shoulder to cradle her, while he tightened his grip on the baby with his good arm. “We need to get out of the rain. Now.”
“My…my truck.”
He dragged her toward the roadway. They hadn’t gone more than a few feet when the raging water finally tore the minivan loose and pummeled it farther down the river.
The sickening sounds of scraping metal against rock forced Manny into action. He picked up their pace and moved the little band of survivors up the incline at the riverbank.
Farther up the hill, parked in the middle of the pavement, Manny saw what had to be the woman’s truck. A fifteen-year-old, four-wheel-drive Suburban sat idling with its lights on.
“Are you okay to drive?” he asked.
She nodded and swung into the front seat. Scooting over to open the passenger door for Manny and the baby, she took the boy while Manny climbed into the truck and, closing the door behind him, gathered the child back into his arms.
Manny unzipped his jacket, put the baby on his chest and zipped the jacket back up over both of them, keeping the baby secure and a little warmer. If this truck wrecked on the icy roads, the baby’s position against him might be dangerous, but without Manny’s body heat the little boy was sure to go into shock.
He looked over to the woman and noticed she’d belted herself in, but her hands shook so badly he was afraid she’d never keep hold of the wheel. Manny reached across the baby and jacked up the heater’s fan.
“You sure you can drive?”
“Ye-e-e-s-s,” she stuttered. “The way the water’s rising, we’re about to be cut off by two flooding rivers. Happens every time things get this bad. My ranch is just a ways up the road. It’s the only possible chance we’ve got.”
Jamming the truck into Reverse, she eased it around on the asphalt and slowly drove away from the river.
He suddenly realized he didn’t know her name, or why she’d been there to help them. “I need to thank you for coming to our rescue. It was a very brave but foolhardy thing to do.” She kept her attention on the slick road, continuing to stare out the windshield.
“I’m Manny Sanchez. And you are…”
“Randi.”
“Excuse me?”
“That’s my name. I’m Randi Cullen. And I live on the Running C ranch.”
The Running C? Son of a gun, if that wasn’t the name he’d overheard the smugglers discussing at the café in Del Rio. Was this woman involved with them? All of a sudden it occurred to him that their savior might really be the suspect he’d been seeking. But the only way to find out would be to keep a sharp eye on her.
Manny quickly decided he’d better keep her close—whatever that took and any way he could.
Randi tightened her grip on the steering wheel and slanted a glance at the dark and intimidating man who was scrutinizing her from the passenger seat. The energy emanating from him hummed with tension. Dear Lord, he terrified—and excited—her.
She couldn’t figure out what had possessed her to climb up on that minivan the way she had. There hadn’t been time to consider the ramifications, just like now, when there was no choice but to take this menacing man and his child into her home.
After she’d stopped at the bridge and heard the baby’s cry, all sense of personal danger had deserted her. She could still feel the rush of bravado, sitting here in the front seat with a total stranger. She’d never done anything like this in her entire life. Just thinking about it made her tremble.
Nevertheless, Randi felt more alive in the past half hour than she had in years. Bringing this man home might be a very dangerous thing to do, but she didn’t care. Somehow she felt sure he would be trustworthy. He had an aura about him that reminded her of her old friend, the deputy sheriff.
The stranger had been traveling with his own child. How bad could he be? And what’s more, he and his baby needed help, and she’d been able to do something about it. That frustrating feeling of being unable to do anything to help, the one emotion she’d been so familiar with over the past few years, was slowly washing away as the minutes went by.
“That’s a kind of unusual name for a woman, isn’t it?” he asked.
“Randi? It was my grandmother’s nickname.” At his seemingly confused look, she explained, “Short for Miranda…?”
“I wasn’t questioning it. I think Randi is a beautiful name.”
She could feel the flush stealing over her face. Glancing over at him, she found a smirk of amusement. The smile lit up his entire face, making him the most magnetic man she’d ever laid eyes on.
Oh, not handsome in the standard movie star way, his jaw was too sharp and his nose too long and broad for that. But he was intense, dark and a little rough around the edges, as if a thin veneer of civilized behavior covered a raging beast inside. And he was big—broad. Her breathing faltered when she realized how much of the front seat he really occupied.
“My mother named me,” she managed shakily.
“Well, Randi.” He repeated her name with emphasis. “Far be it from me to question good fortune, but what the heck were you doing out here in this deluge?”
“I…” She had to swallow down the lump in her throat and put aside her jitters. “I was on my way home from town. When I heard about the storm, I stopped at the grocery store after work. That’s why I’m late.” She was babbling and tried to slow down.
She took a deep breath and inhaled the scent of wet leather, sweat and musky man. An odd sensation, one she couldn’t name and had never felt before, coiled inside her.
Randi found herself sneaking a peek at his ring finger.
“I saw a car’s headlights turn at the creek road,” she began. “Everyone who lives around here knows not to take a low-water bridge road in a storm, so I figured it must be strangers. I knew there’d be trouble.”
Empty. No rings on his hands at all. But that didn’t mean much in these modern times. And there was the matter of his baby.
Randi suddenly remembered the child. When she turned her head to check on him, she was surprised to see the shaggy, black-haired desperado of a man gently patting the back of the baby who lay quietly on his chest.
“We can’t make it to the hospital before the highway is flooded out. Is the baby going to be all right? Will you manage?”
“I guess we’ll find out,” he mumbled.
“What’s the baby’s name?”
“Uh, I don’t…Ricardo…Ricky,” he finally stammered.
Maybe Manny was as flustered by the circumstances as she was? Nope. Not the gritty and unswerving male who’d helped her and the baby off the slick minivan in the middle of the storm.
“And I think he’s going to be fine. He stopped shivering a few minutes ago.” Manny glanced down at the top of the toddler’s head, then peered out the window into the dark night. “I would like to get him dried off, though.”
“Right. Looks like we beat the water. We’re almost there.” As a matter of fact, at that moment the rusty gate bearing the Running C brand came into view.
Randi threw the car into Park and jumped out to open the gate—which turned out to be not an easy task with all the mud flowing across the gravel road.
She groaned internally at the thought of how rutted and pocked her road would be after the rain. And she didn’t have enough money to have it graded this time, either.
Gritting her teeth with frustration, Randi shoved at the heavy gate and then plowed her way back to the truck. The darn thing could just stay open. She didn’t care. No way was she getting out of the truck again to close it in this downpour.
Back in the driver’s seat, Randi could feel icy water dripping on her neck. The droplets didn’t stop there, but ran under her collar and slithered down her back. She started to shiver involuntarily but pressed her lips together and kept driving.
Only another half a mile to go.
It seemed like an hour’s drive, but actually within a few minutes she pulled up in the yard. Ignoring her usual parking spot under the tree, Randi drove as close to the back porch as she could manage.
“This is it. Let me put on a light and then I’ll come back out and help with the baby.” She ducked her head as she opened the truck door against the heavy rain and wind.
Just inside the door to the house, Manny stomped his boots and tried to shake the bulk of the water from his body, without much luck. He was soaked clean through.
When Randi had turned on the porch light, he’d caught a glimpse of her ranch house through the pouring rain. It hadn’t made much of an impression. From what Manny could see, the porch stairs leaned precariously to one side and the back door could obviously stand a new coat of paint.
Now he found himself in an old-fashioned mud room, with thirty-year-old linoleum on the floor and yellowing wallpaper on the walls. He clutched the baby to his chest, not wanting him to get a chill. Manny could still see his breath in the air even though they were inside the house.
“That’s all of it.” Randi came back through the door, carrying two bags full of groceries. “Come into the kitchen, while I light the stove. It’ll only take a few minutes to warm up.”
She dragged off her slicker, shaking it as she hung it on a peg. Leading the way through the mud room and into the kitchen, she turned on lights as she went.
Without the raincoat, she looked like a drowned rat. Well, actually, more like a drowned mouse. Thin and pale, her long, straight hair had almost dried, and he noticed only that it was the color of dishwater. She had on a dark pants outfit that appeared to be permanently wrinkled and stained by the rain.
The only memorable things about her were her eyes. In the light he saw their magical color. Hazel, he supposed they’d call them on a rap sheet. But one minute they were pale green ringed by steel blue, the next minute they were a deep gold with bronze flecks. The vulnerability he’d found within them haunted him more than the interesting colors.
Suddenly conscious of what a wet mess he was making, Manny stepped onto one of the braided rugs covering the wooden plank floor. Holding the baby against his shoulder, he silently apologized to the child for having to make up a name and for continuing to drag him along during an investigation. He stayed at the far end of the room and let his eyes adjust to the dim light.
He slowly focused, staring into the wide-open area that served as a kitchen and looked as if it had been furnished in the forties. His gaze took in all the details of the room: the propane-powered icebox with the fan on top, the floor-to-ceiling, free-standing breakfront, used as a pantry, and the two-foot thick, butcher block table in the middle of the room.
The out-of-date feel to the place reminded him of Mexico. Everything here was well-worn but also well cared for and spotless.
Randi busied herself shoving chopped wood into a cast-iron stove, the kind that had become very trendy in some areas of the West. Manny seriously doubted if she’d bought the thing to be fashionable. It looked ancient, but usable.
She lit the fire and fiddled with a damper. “It won’t be long now.” Her gaze caught his and flicked away. “Let me get some towels and a blanket for your baby.”
When she disappeared down a hall, Manny was shocked to realize he’d been studying her with more than just the professional eye of an undercover special agent. He found he’d been sidetracked once again by those amazing hazel-green eyes.
As she spoke, she’d looked like a timid fawn. Her skin was pearly with a dash of freckles across the nose. Only average height and a little too thin, as well, he thought. But her hips did curve rather seductively in the dressy slacks she wore.
All in all there wasn’t a reason in the world for the lick of desire he’d felt when their gazes met. He’d most assuredly felt it, though. And was, in fact, still trying to recover from the jolt.
Randi came back into the room with an armful of linens. “Here, let me have Ricky. You get out of that jacket and start drying off.”
After she set the pile of towels and blankets on the counter, he handed her the little boy and peeled off his soggy leather jacket. Manny was surprised to find the room considerably warmer than it had been just a few minutes earlier. He didn’t bother trying to figure out whether the warmth was related to the temperature or came from the nearness of the woman.
He took a deep breath and smelled a heady combination of mesquite smoke, dried herbs and tangy oranges. Reaching to pull off his boots, he had the weird sensation of being here before, of feeling at home. Maybe it was because the place felt like a safe haven, reminding him of his grandmother’s house in Mexico.
Manny stood transfixed, with a water-filled boot in each hand, watching as Randi undressed the baby and towel dried his hair. She was easy with Ricky, warm and motherly, and she turned Manny’s senses to mush.
Son of a gun. This innocent couldn’t possibly be involved with the baby smugglers. It wouldn’t be fair.
For the first time since he’d taken the oath, he hated what he did for a living. Hated having to pretend to be something he wasn’t. Hated having decent people be afraid of him.
But the truth was, when push came to shove, if Randi was involved with the smuggling ring, he’d do his job and take her down. The ruthless, international baby snatchers deserved no mercy. He just had to pray this guileless young woman was exactly as she seemed.
As soon as humanly possible, Manny needed to banish his emotions once more and get out of her house and her life—with his libido and his soul safely intact.
Two
“The phone’s on the wall behind you.” The sound of Randi’s voice broke into Manny’s daydream.
“Can you dial the operator and ask to speak to the sheriff’s office?” She kept a hand on Ricky while speaking to Manny over her shoulder. “I think we should report your wreck and see what needs to be done.”
Before they contacted any sheriff, Manny needed to contact his boss at Operation Rock-a-Bye. Without saying a word to Randi, he shoved his wet jacket and boots into the washroom and picked up the phone. “The line’s dead.”
“Oh, dear. The storm must be worse. That means the electricity will be next.” She wrapped the lethargic baby in a heavy blanket and handed him over to Manny. “We’d better get a move on. There’s a shower stall off the mud room. You and the baby get under the warm water. I’ll start a fire in the front room.”
When she turned to move away from him, Manny clamped a hand over her arm. Her skin was ice-cold.
“Is there anyone else in the house? Anyone you’re expecting?”
She shook her head and jerked on her arm, but he didn’t release her. Not just yet. “You need to warm up as much as we do. You’re shivering. You take the baby into the shower. I’ll start the fire.”
“No…no.” She eased her arm away from his grasp, and he released her reluctantly. “I know where everything is. You don’t. I’ll light some kerosene lanterns just in case. And I’m pretty sure there’s a trunk in the attic with some baby things—maybe even clothes that’ll fit you.”
She tilted her head, letting her gaze travel up his full length, making him feel naked and taking him in a direction he didn’t want to go.
“Well, maybe at least something that’ll do in an emergency.” With that pronouncement, she swiveled on the balls of her feet and headed to the door. “I’ll get changed while I’m upstairs. I’ll be okay.” She turned her head to look in his direction. “Everything will be okay.”
“Right,” he muttered as she disappeared. “Everything’s going to be just swell.”
Randi almost made it back downstairs before the power went out. Almost. Instead, she wasted time speculating about the dangerous-looking man and child she’d taken into her home.
The lights blinked once, then plunged the house into a familiar darkness. Without missing a step, she reached for the candle and some matches she’d stashed in the attic for emergencies. Lately one problem or another caused a power outage every month, and she simply didn’t have the money to buy a new generator.
Lighting the candle and inching her way to the darkened stairs, Randi’s mind went back to the broad-shouldered man who’d been dressed head to toe in black. When he’d stepped into her kitchen and taken off the leather jacket, she’d caught a glimpse of rippled muscles under his inky-colored T-shirt and jeans.
The man emanated power and excitement. Never in her life had she seen so much macho packed into one person. He was charming and terribly good-looking, in a sexy sort of way. But all that was just window dressing.
He made the words take charge, dynamo, and daring seem inadequate. Did his honey-brown eyes really absorb her every thought, word and deed, especially when she hadn’t said or done anything at all? Did he really manage to discover her wishes and desires without a word? Even his body appeared to vibrate with static energy as he stood perfectly still.
No, Manny Sanchez was nothing like any of the men she’d ever known. Randi had read about such heroes in novels, had seen a couple in movies when she was a girl. She’d even dreamed about them from time to time, but the idea of really meeting one this dynamic had never crossed her mind. And now she’d taken him into her house.
A shiver rippled along her spine as she crept down the stairs. If it hadn’t been an emergency situation, and if it hadn’t been for the baby…
The thought of Ricky made Randi hasten her steps. Precariously balanced, with a basket of clothes in one hand and a candle in the other, she worried about the child. That little one didn’t seem well to her, his eyes were glazed and his cry weak. She fervently hoped that with some warmth and dry clothes he might be okay.
When she crept into her front room, she found a massive hulk huddled by the fire. Manny must have found another blanket. This one totally covered him like a tent as he kept his back to her and faced the warmth of the hearth.
Randi accidentally stepped on a creaky floor board and jumped nearly a foot at the noise.
“Did you get a shower before the power went out?” Manny asked. Wincing at the pain from his tender shoulder, he shifted the baby against his chest before turning. He’d known by her light footsteps that he’d be facing the young woman who’d given them shelter.
She’d changed into well-worn jeans and a frayed, navy sweatshirt with a Texas Aggie logo. The sweatshirt was thin with age, and he couldn’t help but notice the way her nipples beaded against it in the cold.
With her wet hair tied up in a towel, she looked so fragile his first impulse was to gather her up in his arms and set her on a shelf somewhere. In his current state of undress that would be more than stupid on his part, even if she would allow it.
Randi set down the basket she’d been carrying by the hearth. “No, no time for a shower. But I’m fairly dry and the fire will warm me up fast enough.” She pulled a kerosene lamp from the mantel and lit it before blowing out her candle. “Did you find everything you needed?”
He suppressed a chuckle. “I didn’t even bother looking. I did find the clothesline in the mud room and hung our soggy stuff over it, but Ricky needs a few things you probably don’t have.”
She dug into the basket and pulled out a square white cloth. “Like this, you mean?”
At his raised eyebrow, she laughed. “Diapers. My mom kept an entire trunk full of my baby things for…later.” She blushed and laughed again. “Mother was an eternal optimist.”
Randi held out her arms, waiting for him to transfer the baby. It was a delicate maneuver, considering the precarious state of the towel he’d wrapped around his own waist and the blanket that kept slipping down his shoulders.
She laid the baby down on the rug in front of the fire and unwrapped the clumsily tied towel he’d used as a diaper. “Well, you didn’t do so badly. With nothing else handy, the towel was actually a good idea.”
“Necessity is the mother of invention,” he murmured, chagrined at his own cliché but too beat to be clever.
Quickly and expertly Randi diapered Ricky and pulled a fuzzy yellow jumpsuit with a hood over his arms and legs. The kid would’ve looked like the Easter Bunny if he’d had floppy ears.
“His skin seems warm enough, but he’s too quiet to suit me,” she said.
“Yeah, I know what you mean. I’ve been thinking about that. I don’t think he’s in shock, his skin isn’t clammy at all. But I’m concerned that he’s dehydrated…or maybe even in the first stages of starvation. His belly looks distended to me.”
She jerked around to face him and arched her brows in disbelief. “You think your own son might be starving?”
“He’s not mine, Randi.” It never occurred to him she might think Ricky was his child. After he’d blurted out the truth, he wondered if maybe he should have lied and spared himself a lot of trouble and explanations later.
“If he’s not yours, what were you doing driving him around the countryside in the middle of a storm, and where’s his mother?”
Yep. Good questions. Ones he wasn’t positive he wanted to answer.
“Can we talk about that later? I’m a lawman, Randi, just trying to do a job. I promise, you’re safe and I’ll tell you everything eventually. But right now we need to find a way to get some liquids into the baby.”
He had to hand it to her—Randi hesitated only a fraction of a second before she dug back into the basket. If he’d been in her shoes, he wasn’t sure he’d have let the subject drop so fast. That fact alone made him wary, putting his instincts on alert.
She held up a glass baby bottle. “I found a few of these, but only one nipple that seems to be usable.” Getting to her feet she said, “I have some distilled drinking water stashed away for emergencies. I suspect Ricky is well over six months and we can get by just washing the bottles instead of sterilizing them. It’ll save a lot of time.”
She handed him the baby and headed for the kitchen, turning back at the doorway for one last word. “But if you think we’re done with the questions about this baby, better think again. I want answers.”
In a few minutes she was back. Gently taking Ricky in her arms, she cradled him to her breast. It took a bit of coaxing to get him to take the bottle of water into his mouth, but soon the baby’s instincts kicked in and he sucked mightily.
Manny breathed a sigh of relief at the tranquil sucking sounds. He’d made a promise to the baby to keep him safe and healthy, and by heaven, he intended to do everything in his power to see it through.
The sight of Randi holding the baby stirred something deep inside him that he had no business feeling. Long ago he’d buried his most basic needs—the need for the softness of a woman—the need for family. It had been several years since he’d contacted his own family, and he suddenly missed them more than he thought possible. He was sure that since he’d last seen them, his nieces and nephews would be nearly all grown up.
Manny positively refused to contemplate how long it had been since he’d felt the comfort of female companionship. But the sight of Randi and the baby seemed overwhelmingly erotic somehow. Man, when this mission was over, he’d better find himself some sweet little senorita. How long had it been, anyway?
“I’ve set a pan of water to boil on the stove,” Randi whispered, trying not to disturb Ricky. “I think I’ve got a box of powdered milk on a shelf somewhere, too. If he can get this down, we can try a little milk.”
Manny’s gut wrenched as Randi concentrated on Ricky. There was an innocence about her that tugged at his conscience. Taking a breath, he systematically closed and locked off the physical and emotional needs that had been assaulting him. He needed to be strong and tough till he discovered her exact involvement in the baby-smuggling ring.
It didn’t add up that she would be living alone. Someone that fragile-looking couldn’t operate a working ranch by herself. So where was everybody?
He had no desire to hurt this ethereal young thing, but he had to do whatever necessary to find out if she was a suspect. It was part of the job.
Randi looked down at Ricky sleeping and felt a twinge of sadness in her heart. She was around children all the time at her nursery school job. Yet having a baby here, sleeping on her hearth and totally dependent on her for his well-being, seemed different. It reminded her too much of things she couldn’t have—of things she’d probably have to bury forever.
Ricky took half the bottle of water and a full ounce of the powdered milk. When she’d placed him into the nest in the basket she’d made, he barely stirred.
His sweet face seemed so peaceful Randi began to relax. He’d lost that scrunched-up frightened look. She stroked his tiny hand, grateful that he no longer clutched it into a fist.
Meanwhile, Manny took her daddy’s old clothes into the mud room to change. When he’d left the fireside, she’d felt a momentary chill, as if his leaving had changed the temperature and the physical forces swirling around her.
Shaking off the strange sensations, she tried to focus on the situation. She had a potentially sick child on her hands. The flooding river had no doubt cut them off from town for the time being. The phone wasn’t working to call for help, and since they had no electricity to run the furnace’s fan, they’d need to stay downstairs here near the fireplace or in the kitchen by the stove. And to top it all off, she still didn’t know what Manny’s relationship to this child might be.
Just who was this dangerous man, really, and why was he in her little town in the middle of a horrific rainstorm and flood? She’d be stuck throughout the emergency with a man who made her body alternate between shivers and hot sweats. What on earth had she gotten herself into?
If he wasn’t Ricky’s father, why was Manny in the car with the baby? What did his being a lawman have to do with Ricky? Randi had seen the way he treated the child, softly petting him and murmuring encouragement. She refused to think that he might have taken Ricky for a bad reason, but she was determined to get to the truth.
He was dangerous looking, what with the shaggy, ebony hair and the stubble darkening his chin and cheeks, but would it be fair to judge a man by appearances? She’d been taught never to jump to snap conclusions based on a person’s looks.
“Is the baby asleep?”
Randi heard Manny’s whispered words before she knew he was in the room and felt his hand on her shoulder. Instead of being startled, she felt heat settle over her in a liquid rush. Sort of like the burning sensation she’d experienced when she’d tried her one and only swallow of whisky but better…less bad tasting and more electric.
She nodded silently and lowered her chin to stare at the floor. Randi knew she couldn’t look at him right now and still think clearly. Nervous tension made her body taut, and her mind fogged with unrealistic panic.
“You sure are handy to have around,” he began in a soft and friendly tone.
Without looking up, she knew he’d eased himself down on the rug next to her. He wasn’t touching her in any way, but she felt his presence tingling along the nerve endings of her skin. He was close enough that she could smell the cedar chips her mother had used to store her dad’s clothes.
“I mean, you saved Ricky and me from drowning in the van and now you’ve taken us in and given us warmth and shelter from the storm. You’ve even come up with diapers and a baby bottle…and you know how to use them.” He chuckled deep in his chest, the sexy rumbling vibrating inside her.
She peeked out from under her lashes to check his expression. When she saw his deep-set, chocolate-colored eyes flare to gold and his devastating features reflecting in the glow of the fire, she quivered with a strange anticipation. Randi felt a tide of color wash over her face, bathing her in a fiery flush and embarrassing her even more.
From the tips of his sock-clad feet to the top of his now-dry hair, the man reeked of power and sex.
Geez, she was way out of her depth here.
Manny watched the young woman sitting next to him while her skin turned from pale and cool to bright pink and heated. And his body reacted with a jolt of heat all its own. He understood about basic survival needs, about adrenaline causing lust and the need to reaffirm life, but that didn’t explain the magnetic pull and his craving to protect her to his last breath.
He felt a bit more in control now that he’d changed and replaced his weapon in its hidden holster at his waist. He set his jaw and swallowed hard. She might be a suspect, and he must uncover her involvement in this international ring before they went any further. What did she know? It was urgent he find out.
He turned up the charm and tried a grin he certainly didn’t feel. “So, what were you really doing out on that lonely road tonight?”
“Hold on, there! I want my questions about you and the baby answered before we talk about anything else.”
“Look,” he growled. “I’m not asking out of idle curiosity, Randi. I’m a federal undercover agent, working on a case. And if I find out you’re withholding information…or that you’re involved in any way, I’ll have you in custody so fast your head will swim.”
Her terrified look should have told him all he needed to know. But his emotions were so raw he ignored his own gut instincts.
He pushed ahead, overpowering the conversation and demanding the truth with mere physical presence. “Now answer my question. Why were you out there alone tonight?” he persisted.
“I told you. I was coming home from work in Willow Springs. I’m a nursery school aide there.” Her voice shook and the look in her eyes grew wilder as she automatically answered his demand.
“A pretty woman like you?” His hand went to her soft shoulder. “You sure you weren’t there to meet someone?” He knew the grin had disappeared, but the longer she carried on this innocent game, the more Manny was positive she knew something she wasn’t telling.
“N-n-n-no. Why are you asking? What kind of agent are you and what are you working on?” The words came pouring out. “It was just as I told you. Who would I be meeting in the middle of a storm?”
Manny groaned inwardly, wishing she didn’t look so naive and young. He had to remain tough in the face of all this supposed innocence. She was either the best actress he’d ever seen or she was too guileless to be believed. His first quick impulse was that she must be one heck of an actress. He decided to force the truth out of her.
“All right. Let’s go back to something else you said.” He ended up having to clear his throat to continue. “You said no one lived here on the ranch with you. I find that hard to imagine.”
“I…I didn’t say that exactly.”
Faster than a blink, Manny shoved the towel off her head. A rich, wet tangle of ash, gold and silver flowed over her shoulders. Grabbing a handful of it, he fisted his fingers into the silky strands. She gasped and her eyes opened to the size of dinner plates with his brash movement.
“Then what did you mean…exactly.” He tugged her head back slowly, exposing the satiny skin on her slender neck to his view. A wayward thought of how much he’d like to place his lips on that expanse of softness flashed in his brain before he banished it and tried to steel his features into a threatening look.
“Let go of me! We…I…there’s a ranch hand, uh, and his wife that live in the foreman’s quarters. But…”
“So you lied to me?” he demanded.
“No! You didn’t ask about the ranch. You asked about the house. Now let go…please.”
Manny saw the tears welling in her eyes and immediately released his grip on her hair. But his hand refused to let the damp tresses go completely. His fingers lingered in the intoxicating texture of the multicolored silk.
He felt like a jerk for hurting her. But it was part of the job, and he had to finish his interrogation. Ricky’s life might depend on finding the answers.
“Why all these questions?” she sobbed. “What’s going on? I haven’t done anything wrong.” Randi sniffed and touched a finger to the corner of her eye.
“I don’t want to hurt you.” His voice sounded raspy, hoarse. “But I’m the one asking the questions here. And I mean to know the truth. All of it.”
She arched her eyebrows and glanced away as if she was barely interested in this whole conversation. Damn her. He wanted her scared—scared and willing to tell him anything she might know. He was finished playing games.
Manny had his Glock out of its holster before he had a chance to think it through. “Who else lives on this ranch? Tell me,” he demanded. “And you’d better make sure I believe you.”
Her eyes widened and her hands jumped to cover that full mouth, probably to keep a scream from escaping her lips. Now he’d done it. He reholstered his weapon instantly. Drawing a weapon was just an ingrained movement whenever he needed an intimidating tactic.
This time he hadn’t really been prepared to shoot, however. The monumental significance of that potentially deadly oversight wasn’t lost on him. Nothing like that had ever happened to him before.
“Please. I’ll tell you anything you want to know. Only…please keep that gun out of sight.”
Randi forced a sob back down her throat. She refused to let him see her panic. Dear Lord, was she going to go to jail because she’d been a Good Samaritan? Lewis Lee always said that no good deed goes unpunished. She prayed she’d be around long enough to tell him he was right.
Manny softened his expression. Funny, but she could swear that this big macho man looked remorseful—guilty even. The gun had disappeared under his shirt at his waist almost as quickly as it had appeared. Randi’s gut told her that he would never have used it on her. Her fears subsided the instant she’d seen his expression. Meanwhile, he silently waited for her to continue.
How odd that all her fears had melted away. He was still a huge, dangerous man sitting in her front room and wearing a gun that he didn’t seem to mind using. But there was a glint of some emotion in his eyes that comforted her, drew her to him. Made her positive he was really the lawman he professed to be.
“My…” Her voice cracked and she started over. “My stepfather lives on another part of the ranch. On the Cottonwood section. But he won’t be helping us if that’s what you’re thinking. Probably wouldn’t help—even if he could reach us. He’s kind of put out with me these days.” She swallowed and tried to soothe her dry throat. It was no use. “Besides, he hasn’t been around in a couple of months. Not since…my mother’s funeral.”
“Your mother just died?”
She nodded. The emotion in his eyes changed to sympathy, and her head swam with confusion. What kind of man was this? And what did he really want from her?
Three
A multitude of emotions raced through Randi when Manny stood, turned and stretched out a hand to help her stand. She’d seen the guilt in his eyes when he’d fisted his hands in her hair, questioning her.
His look clearly told her he believed his actions had caused her pain. What she’d actually felt was simply fear—not physical discomfort. He hadn’t hurt her, just scared her. That Manny had such a sympathetic and honest streak in him was as clear as if it was painted on his forehead.
And now…
Now that he wanted to take her hand, wanted to touch her again, she hesitated. She’d been so concerned about the baby’s welfare that she’d given in to Manny’s demands too easily. For some reason she’d let him take total control.
All right, so he said he was a lawman and she’d believed him immediately. That might have been part of it. Believing what he said might be stupid of her, but she knew she would eventually get the answers. There was just something about him that made her know he could be trusted in the long run.
But for right now she marveled at how quickly her fear had disappeared. Past the fear, past the consuming questions in her heart about who he really was and what he wanted, Randi had felt alive and sensual. For the first time in her life, she actually wanted a man’s touch. Wanted it bad.
Not just any man, mind you. Randi wanted this man. He was all she’d ever dreamed about—dangerous but sexy. In Randi’s eyes he was a perfect combination of Zorro and some exotic and romantic pirate.
The problem was, she had no idea how to go about getting him. For ten years she’d buried her needs, smothered her desires. First there’d been her mother’s stroke, then her stepfather’s physical abandonment. Finally came the unrelenting pressure of seeing to her mother’s needs while trying to keep the ranch afloat. All of that left precious little time for Randi to have any kind of life.
If it hadn’t been for Lewis Lee and his wife, Hannah, Randi wouldn’t have graduated from high school. And if it hadn’t been for Marian Baker, the librarian, bringing her books every week after graduation, Randi would have withered and blown away. Reading had been her lifeline, her connection to the outside world.
Marian had even arranged for Randi to take care of a couple of toddlers while their mothers worked. The small job meant she could be in the house when her disabled mother needed her. It also meant that temporarily there had been enough cash to keep from having to sell off the land. Despite the puny allowance and doctor’s bills her stepfather had paid, there was never enough money to go around.
“I’m afraid you and I are stuck with each other for the duration of the storm, Randi. I’d appreciate it if we could stick close to each other for the baby’s safety as well as our own.” Manny eyed her with a piercing look when she still hesitated to move. “Come on into the kitchen with us. I think we need something in our stomachs.
“I won’t hurt you ever again. I promise.” He tucked his hand into the pocket of his jeans and bunched up his face with a look of pure helplessness when she still made no move.
“I know I didn’t act very civilized before,” he began again. “But I did apologize. Can’t we make a new start? Maybe we could talk…get to know each other better. Please?”
Oh, yeah. Randi wanted desperately to know him better. Her gaze traveled down the length of him, taking in her daddy’s chambray work shirt stretched tightly across Manny’s broad chest. He’d left the top three buttons open. She doubted they’d cover his muscles, anyway, but open like that they left nearly half of his torso in plain view. She stared at the dark, curly hair covering his bronzed skin and gulped.
Her fingers shook reflexively at the sight of his chest, and she fisted them to keep still. She’d never in her life seen anything quite so compelling. With a supreme effort at controlling her urges, she forced herself not to jump up and test the feel of his body. Her good sense told her to be careful—to go slow.
Talk about uncivilized. What she wanted right now definitely qualified as primal.
When she could pull away from the sight of all that skin, she dropped her gaze down the rest of him—across the leather belt he’d used to draw her father’s jeans tight and on down past the bulging mound of him encased in soft, well-washed blue denim.
Oh, my.
That view finally put her in motion. She turned, while carefully managing to avoid touching Manny.
“Do you like coffee? I can make some. It’s time I added wood to the stove, anyway.” She figured she was babbling, but couldn’t seem to stop.
“Yeah. I could go for coffee,” he murmured, picking up the baby’s basket and following her into the kitchen.
Manny wondered how he could ever make up for behaving like such an idiot. What had gotten into him? The young woman who’d just put coffee on the stove to boil was obviously innocent.
In eight years of undercover work he’d developed a life-saving instinct for detecting lies. He was usually right on target. His gut screamed at him for ever doubting her. Perhaps someone else on the ranch was involved with baby smugglers, but she wasn’t. Of that he was now positive. He doubted she’d ever even heard about such things.
While Randi scrambled some eggs using the same stove that heated the room and warmed their coffee, Manny fought to bring peace into the tension that surrounded the two stranded strangers and baby. “Can I do anything to help?”
She looked at him with amazement shining in her eyes.
“What? You don’t think I can cook?” he asked with a chuckle. “I’ll have you know my abuela insisted that all members of her family, male and female alike, should know how to take care of themselves.”
He found the bread bin and removed two slices of whole wheat. “It’s a real handy talent, and sometimes even fun.”
Manny glanced around the room looking for cooking utensils and supplies. Finally he gave Randi a questioning look. Where did she keep things, anyway?
Obviously mistaking his intentions, Randi shook her head at him. “Do you think you can toast that bread without the electric toaster?” Her lips curled at the corners in an adorable smirk.
“Can I have one egg and a little of Ricky’s milk?”
“Yes, but…”
“Then stand aside, woman, and watch a master at work.”
Manny busied himself, frying the bread over her open-flamed stovetop while Randi set the table. As he worked, he went over in his head the events that had brought him to this point.
What the hell had happened to this mission, anyway? His Operation Rock-a-Bye assignment had been to go undercover in Mexico until he ingratiated himself with a group of undocumented immigrants making their way to the border. He’d picked a group with several small children, and although they’d never fully trusted him, he’d been able to keep track of them through their travels. Even when they’d hooked up with a particularly nasty band of coyotes, dangerous men hired to bring them across the river, the little group of Mexican nationals continued to allow his shadow to fall on their campsites.
Manny had hoped that once they’d crossed the border he could manage to get them to confide in him, give him the critical information he needed to infiltrate the smugglers gang. He’d heard that this particular group of immigrants knew of children taken from their homeland and spirited to the U.S. Around a campfire one night, he’d even overheard a disagreement about one family receiving money in exchange for a baby.
When the illegals he’d befriended crossed the Rio Grande and broke into smaller bands, he followed one family who moved alone into the interior of Texas with their coyote. What Manny hadn’t known, or even guessed, was that the coyotes they’d hired were also members of the baby smuggling ring.
He’d discovered the truth too late.
And that was when this whole assignment had fallen apart. He didn’t know what to do to put it right again. He only knew that some things would forever be wrong, and that the last thing he needed was an innocent civilian like Randi in the middle of the investigation.
He flipped the bread out of the pan and onto the plates she’d already loaded with scrambled eggs. “There you go.”
She sat down at the worn-out looking wooden table next to the stove and took a bite. “Mmm. It’s good.”
Manny thought she looked good enough to eat herself. In the past hour, he’d quit thinking of her as a frail little waif and started appreciating her firm, lithe body and the sexual energy coming from every pore.
“Don’t sound so surprised. If you’d had some cornmeal, I would’ve really made you a treat.”
Randi smiled at him before she took another bite of food. Manny watched as her full, pouty lips covered the fork. She slowly pulled the empty tines back again, moaning in satisfaction as she swallowed.
With her sensual sound of pleasure, his libido went on full alert. Suddenly he could think of nothing but tracing those silken lips with his own, dipping his tongue into that ripe mouth and tasting her, and having her taste him in return.
He could feel the sinew in his muscles tense up. When he saw her flick that rose-tipped tongue over slightly parted lips to clean off any crumbs, it was all he could do not to use his own tongue to follow hers. He had to swallow hard to keep the groan, rumbling deep in his chest, from escaping his throat.
Watching her, being this close to all that femininity was pure torment. Desire had never hit him in the middle of an assignment. Why now?
He spun around to see about Ricky, who still slept in the basket on the kitchen counter. He tried hard to remember that all of this was just another mission.
“Aren’t you going to eat? It’s delicious,” she asked.
“Uh, yeah,” he managed through a clenched jaw. “I just wanted to check the baby. He’s awfully quiet.”
“I plan on changing him and seeing if he’ll take a little more milk as soon as we’re done. I want to let him sleep as long as possible. Please come sit down and eat. I thought you said you wanted to talk.”
Talk? All of a sudden the whole concept seemed beyond his comprehension.
Manny squeezed his eyes shut and drew a steadying breath before he turned around to face her. “Right. While I eat, why don’t you tell me why a pretty young girl is living out here all by herself? Why hasn’t some nice cowpoke swept you off your feet by now?”
Randi must have recognized a sidestepping dodge when she heard one. “Wait a minute. I’ve already been through one interrogation. I’m not saying any more until you tell me about yourself. Who is Ricky to you? And what were you two doing on the low-water bridge road in the middle of a storm?”
Manny’s mind tried to come up with a plausible lie, but he was too wiped out to concentrate. Besides, from some deeply buried spot inside him, a strong voice demanded that he not lie to this woman. But why she caused such a powerful internal command stumped him.
As long as he’d been in this job, his conscience had never once stopped him from fabricating a story. Why did he hesitate now? When he’d been a much younger man, he’d even spun a few stories not in the line of work—for the pretty ladies.
Of course, he hadn’t told white lies like that for quite a number of years. Hadn’t needed to really. Lately, the women with whom he’d had relationships didn’t need to be persuaded. They’d been just as happy as he had to spend a few hours together away from the storms of life and then move on, with no regrets and no looking back.
So what was so different about Randi? Even in his exhausted state, Manny knew what the problem was. The look in her eyes said she wanted forever. Oh, she probably would deny it, and might not even know it about herself, but Randi was not the kind to have a fling or a casual relationship. The truth of that was written all over her.
In his business “forever” could be no more than a heartbeat away.
Manny beat back his budding desires, and decided to fudge with half the truth. “I can’t tell you everything you want to know, Randi.”
When she rolled her eyes and set her chin, he knew he’d have to give up a morsel of the story—something to settle her fears at least. “Really. Just believe that I am a lawman, and I’ve been undercover on assignment. Even telling you that much might jeopardize years’ worth of work, but for your own safety, you must trust me.”
In the flickering glow of the lamplight he saw her eyes had turned pale green. They widened with shock before they quickly narrowed in disbelief. “Trust you? I don’t even know you. First you interrogate me like I’m some kind of criminal, then you put a gun in my face, and now you tell me to believe you’re undercover? You expect me to just quietly let everything slide and accept it?” Randi stood, swept up both their plates and strode to the sink, effectively rejecting him as she turned her back.
Without facing him, she demanded at least one straight answer. “What about Ricky? Why was he in the van with you, and where are his parents?”
Manny sighed and absently rubbed at the ache in his shoulder. She must accept knowing only part of the story. All of it would be too much for her right now. The whole truth might also be very dangerous.
“I wasn’t in the van, Randi. I was chasing it. Ricky had been…taken…by the man driving.”
“Taken? Like in kidnapped, you mean?” She spun to face him, clasping her hands in front of her chest.
He nodded and watched her expression, fascinated by such open emotion. Manny could see her making connections and piecing together the frayed ends of what he’d told her. She was too damn bright, he finally decided.
Being too smart could get her killed. He’d rather keep the nastiness of this whole situation from touching her.
“If you were chasing the van, where was your car? I didn’t see another vehicle on the road.” She only hesitated a fraction of a second. “And what happened to the van’s driver?”
“My bike slid off the side of the road when I stopped to help. I’m not positive about what happened to the driver…except I think he must have been thrown out when the van went over. I doubt he escaped alive, but as soon as the storm subsides we’ll find out.”
Randi made a strangled, hiccupy sound and moved to Ricky’s basket. “Oh, my God.” She bent to pick up the baby and held him closely to her chest.
“Don’t ask me any more,” he mumbled. “Tomorrow, when the storm clears, we’ll notify the sheriff about the accident and the driver. I’ll find my Hog, and Ricky and I will be on our way out of your life.”
Randi closed her eyes and leaned her cheek against Ricky’s hair.
Manny watched closely while Randi changed Ricky. She coaxed the boy into taking a little more milk while Manny rinsed the dishes in cold water and stacked them in the sink. Her ancient, hot-water heater wouldn’t start without electricity. He wondered why she didn’t have an emergency generator like most ranches did these days.
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Linda Conrad
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: The leather-jacketed stranger was clearly as dangerous as any man Randi Cullen had ever set eyes on.But she couldn′t abandon him – or the defenseless baby with him – to the rainswept Texas night. She offered them both a refuge on her isolated ranch. And when she learned that Manuel Sanchez was an undercover federal agent hunting a ruthless killer, she even agreed to marriage – in name only – to protect his cover.But having this man in her life was touching off a storm of desire in an untouched woman′s heart – a storm from which she feared she would never find shelter.