The Maverick's Christmas Baby. Victoria Pade

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      Nina even managed to smile weakly. “Be careful,” she said, thinking of his safety, too.

      “I will.”

      He let go of her hand and Nina was surprised to find herself sorry to lose his touch. Which was what she was thinking when he opened the door, ducked under the rope and got out, leaving her alone. And sorry to lose his company, too. His comforting presence.

      The touch, the company, the presence of a Traub.

      She closed her eyes and breathed deeply again, willing herself to settle down for the sake of her baby, willing her baby to rest, to stay put, not to be born today....

      Then another cramp struck.

      “Please, no, not yet,” she begged her unborn child and the fates, as if that could stop things if she really was going into labor.

      How long had Dallas Traub been gone? It seemed like forever and Nina looked across the front seat through the windshield, hoping to spot him. But all she could see was snow.

      She caught sight of herself in the rearview mirror then and realized that the stocking cap she had on was askew. For some odd reason she regretted that Dallas had seen her looking so disheveled, so she straightened the cap. She also gave in to the urge to fluff her hair a bit where the long brown locks cascaded from beneath the cap past her shoulders.

      Her ordinarily pink cheeks were quite pale and she reached up and pinched them to add some color. Her mascara had survived the accident and all that followed it without smudging beneath her very dark brown eyes, but unfortunately her thin, straight nose had a bit of a shine that she didn’t like to see.

      She tried to blot that with the back of her hand, regretting that she’d left her purse in her SUV with her compact in it. And with her lip gloss in it, too.

      Not that, in the midst of possible peril, she was actually thinking about putting on lipstick to accentuate lips she sometimes thought were not full enough. She merely wanted to moisten those lips to keep them from chapping, she told herself. Certainly it wasn’t that she cared at all what she looked like at that moment. Especially to a Traub. When she’d just had a car accident. When she could potentially be going into labor.

      But, oh, she wished this particular Traub would come back....

      She considered yanking on the rope just to get him to, but she didn’t let herself. They needed help and if there was any chance that he might find cell reception she couldn’t cut that short.

      But soon, come back soon....

      Then, as if in answer to her silent plea, the rear passenger door opened and there he was.

      She also didn’t understand why the way he looked registered in that instant, but she was struck by how tall and capable-looking he was. She guessed him to be about six foot three inches of broad-shouldered, Western masculinity.

      But it wasn’t merely his size that impressed her. He was remarkably handsome—something else that she’d never noticed in all the times they must have crossed paths around Rust Creek Falls.

      Nina knew all the Traubs in general, but she’d never really noted much about them in any kind of detail. Now it struck her that Dallas really did have rugged good looks with a squarish forehead, a nose that was a bit hooked, but in a dashing sort of way, lips that were full and almost lush, and striking blue eyes that had enough of a hint of gray to add more depth than she’d ever have attributed to a Traub.

      “Did you get a call out?” she asked as he extracted the end of the rope through the window, tossed the re-coiled mass into the truck bed again and then climbed into the backseat with her, closing the door and the window after himself.

      “No,” he said. “We’re really in a dead zone out here. But don’t worry about it. Somebody will come looking for us. My folks are stuck at home with my three boys—believe me, before too long they’ll start to wonder where I am.” Then he switched gears and asked, “How are you doing?”

      “I’m okay....” Nina answered uncertainly.

      “Any more pains?”

      “One,” she admitted.

      “And how about heat? Think we can turn it off for a little while?”

      “Sure. If you’re warm enough.”

      He stood to lean over the front seat to reach the key, and Nina found herself sneaking a glance at him from that angle.

      He was wearing jeans that hugged an impressive derriere and thick thighs, and she knew she had no business taking note of any of that.

      Then the engine went off and he sat back down, turning toward her and perching on the very edge of the seat so he could pull down the rear cushion as he said, “There should be a blanket in here...”

      He produced a heavy plaid blanket from the compartment hidden behind the seat.

      “You’re probably not going to like this, but we’ll both stay warmer if we share the blanket and some body heat,” he said then.

      “It’s okay,” Nina agreed, knowing he was right.

      And not totally hating the idea of having him close beside her or of sharing the blanket with him. But she didn’t analyze that.

      Opening the heavy emergency blanket, he set it over Nina and reached across her to tuck it in on her other side.

      Then he sat near enough to share the warmth he exuded and laid it across himself, too.

      “You’re sure you feel better sitting up?” he asked.

      “I am.”

      “If something changes and you need to lie down just let me know....”

      “I will,” Nina said.

      She did slump a little more into the blanket, though. And somehow that brought her a bit closer to him, too. But he didn’t seem to mind that she was slightly tucked to his side and it seemed as though it might be insulting if she moved away again, so she pretended that she didn’t notice.

      “So...” he said when she was settled, turning his head toward her and looking down at her. “You’re Nina Crawford, right? You run the General Store in town?”

      Apparently Dallas Traub wasn’t any clearer about the details of his Crawford rivals than Nina was about the Traubs. And since they’d never had any one-on-one, face-to-face contact before this, Nina was even surprised that he knew her name.

      “I’m Nina, right. And yes, I run the store.” The store that the Traubs rarely frequented, making it well-known that they chose to do their shopping in nearby Kalispell rather than give business to the Crawfords.

      “I’m Dallas—in case you didn’t know....”

      “You live on your family’s ranch—the Triple T, right?”

      “I do work on the ranch, but I have my own house on the property. I’m divorced, and with three boys—Ryder, who’s ten, Jake, eight, and Robbie, who just turned six СКАЧАТЬ