The SEAL's Baby. Laura Marie Altom

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СКАЧАТЬ called home. After relieving himself, he washed his hands and splashed cold water on his face.

      He took an energy bar from the cabinet alongside the propane stove and a bottled water from the fridge. Stopping only long enough to retrieve his wallet and keys from the metal bucket he stored them in beside the door, he soon sat behind the wheel of the 1960 Ford pickup that his grandpa had bought new.

      The trek down the cabin’s single-lane drive proved daunting, with visibility being a few feet at best. After rolling down both windows, he called periodically out either side.

      By the time he reached the main road, the fog had thinned to the point he could at least make out the double yellow lines on the pavement. Usually, at this time of the morning, he and Sam set out to fish on the Umpqua River. Most weekdays, the road was deserted. Hell, most weekends—unless his hometown of Bent Road was hosting a holiday festival or fishing tourney. Most tourists traveling north from Coos Bay on Oregon Coast Highway 101 blew right by the lonely road leading to the largely forgotten town. With no trendy B and Bs or campgrounds, visitors had no reason beyond curiosity to ever stop by. A fact that suited Heath just fine.

      “Sam! You out there, boy?” Crawling along at the harrowing rate of fifteen miles per hour, Heath continued calling, intermittently scanning the faded blacktop for the potentially gut-wrenching sight of his wounded—or even dead—dog.

      “What the—” He’d driven maybe five miles before pumping his brakes, having damn near hit not his dog, but a woman—a very pregnant woman—standing in the road’s center, waving her arms. “What’s the matter with you?” he hollered, easing the truck onto the weed-choked shoulder. “Got some kind of death wish?”

      Upon killing the engine, he hopped out and slammed the door shut behind him. The dense fog stole the thunder of a gratifying bang, leaving him with a less satisfactory thud.

      “Th-thank you so much for stopping.” The ethereal blonde staggered his direction. Was she drunk? “M-my car broke down yesterday. I tried walking, but—”

      “It’s a good thirty miles to town.”

      She placed her hands protectively over her bulging belly. “If you could just take me to a phone, I’d...” Before finishing her halting sentence, she crumpled before him like a building that had suddenly lost its foundation.

      He rushed to her, checking her pulse and finding it strong.

      Abandoning his worries for Sam, he hefted the woman’s deadweight into his arms and then onto his truck’s passenger seat.

      He then retrieved her giant purse from the road.

      “W-what happened?” she asked, stirring when he buckled her in and set her purse beside her.

      “You fainted. How long has it been since you’ve had a decent meal?”

      “I—I don’t know. I’m saving my cash for gas.”

      The fog had lifted enough to reveal a VW Bug as old as his truck. The backseat was crammed so tightly with the woman’s belongings, daylight couldn’t even be seen through the front window.

      “I’ll run you to my cabin—get you fed and call for a tow.”

      “Thank you—but I don’t have the money for a tow or mechanic.”

      He closed her door. “You prefer I leave you out here for the crows?”

      Groaning, she pressed her fingertips to her forehead. “What I’d prefer is to have never wound up in this position.”

      All too well, he knew the feeling.

      * * *

      LIBBY DEWITT STRUGGLED to stay awake while the stranger drove. Exhaustion—physical and emotional—weighed down her shoulders, making even turning her head an effort.

      “Stay with me...” the man urged. “Sure I shouldn’t take you straight to a doc?”

      “I’m fine,” she assured. It took much of her remaining energy to meet his curiously hollow stare. “Just tired and hungry.”

      “I can help with both of those issues. And since you’re low on cash, I’ll see what I can do with your car. But fair warning, I’m good with a lot of things, but engine repair has never been one of them.”

      From somewhere inside she managed a laugh. “At this point, a cracker and glass of water would be downright gourmet. To expect more would be greedy.”

      His sideways glance spoke volumes, but at the same time, nothing at all. Again, she had the sense that part of him was emotionally missing. What had he been through?

      He turned the truck onto a dirt lane so narrow the weeds grew between twin tire ruts.

      Woods, dark and brooding, surrounded them, yet over a small hill, sunbeams punched through the fog, the soft light promising to end the day’s gloom.

      Over the next hill stood the sweetest log cabin—sun-and weather-faded with rich green moss growing between the logs’ seams. Two smallish paned windows flanked a wooden front door. A wide, covered porch held two rockers and a pair of dead hanging ferns. The Pacific glistened in teasing strips just beyond massive pines.

      “I-it’s beautiful,” she said, not trying to disguise her awe. “How lucky you are.”

      Parking the truck, he shrugged. “It’s okay.”

      Okay? To be jaded about such a view implied he wasn’t really alive at all. Despite the lousy circumstances she found herself in, Libby hoped she’d never lose her ability to be wowed by Mother Nature showing off.

      “You able to walk under your own steam?”

      “I—I think so...” To prove it she opened the door with an echoing creak, then placed her feet firmly on the ground. Her legs wobbled a little at first, but then held strong as the stranger set his arm about her shoulders, assisting her into his home. In another world she may have appraised his warm, strong touch, but for now she was merely grateful for the help. “By the way, I’m Libby.”

      “Nice to meet you. I’m Heath.”

      Inside, it took her eyes a moment to adjust to the dimness.

      “Sorry about the mess.” After leading her to a dilapidated yet comfy brown plaid sofa, he plucked a couple dirty shirts from the back of a wood rocker and a ladder-back kitchen chair. “It’s just me around here, and, well...” He shoved his hands in his pockets. “There’s not much need to clean.”

      She waved off his concern. “Considering I’ve spent the past two years in a tent, the fact that you have an actual roof ranks this place right up there with the Taj Mahal.”

      “A tent, huh?” He’d ducked in the fridge and emerged with milk, cheese and a carton of eggs. “Sounds like a good story.” He set his finds on the butcher-block counter lining the cabin’s front wall, then took an energy bar from a cabinet and tossed it to her. “Eat this, then tell me more about how a woman willingly spends two years sleeping under the stars.”

      Three bites later she’d devoured her snack and drank half the bottled water he’d also СКАЧАТЬ