Riding the storm - By Julie Miller Page 0,21

ground cover from either side of the ditch. Meanwhile, Nate flipped his cap around backward so the bill protected his neck, and he hunched down to inspect the tire for himself. The thing wasn’t just flat; it was shredded.

Wes had loosened the bolts, but hadn’t got much further. Ignoring the ache in his bum knee, Nate used the tire iron as a lever to free the jack from the mud. The next step was to lighten the back of the car.

Wading in up to his ankles, he took note that the water in the ditch was deep enough to form an eddy around his boots. The ground was too dry and hard to soak up the rain as quickly as it was falling. This had to be runoff from the flat cattle land. That meant the water would continue to rise—exponentially—in low-lying areas, even if the rain slowed or stopped, which Nate doubted was going to happen any time soon.

He had to work fast to get the honeymooners on their way. Faster, to pick up Lily Browning and get her back to Turning Point for the medical care she and her baby would need.

Nate hauled out two garment bags and a toiletry kit from Wes and Cindy’s trunk and carted them up to the road.

“Those two don’t believe in traveling light, do they,” Jolene joked, cutting through a stubborn weed.

Nate set the items down beside her and headed back to retrieve two large suitcases.

“Joaquin and I never had a honeymoon. He was already sick when we got married. He used to promise that when—”

Her voice stopped abruptly and her wistful gaze sharpened and darted up to Nate’s, as if surprised that she’d said the words out loud. Or maybe just surprised that she’d said them to him.

He looked down at her over the corner of a suitcase. That long strand of hair had worked loose from her ponytail again, and the rain had glued it to her face. “Joaquin was your husband, right?”

She nodded, but offered no more. She pushed to her feet, carrying the pile of weeds with her. “I’ll go see if this is enough.”

He watched her golden ponytail bob out of sight. Taboo subject. Painful one, at least. In the few hours he’d known her, it was the first thing that had come up that she wouldn’t talk about with him.

Which made Nate all the more curious. He wondered what kind of man Joaquin Angel had been. What kind of man would Jolene love? How would she love? Full speed ahead like everything else she did, no doubt. Probably unlike any woman he’d ever known.

Of course, he’d never really been in love himself, so he had nothing to compare. But he’d listened to enough tales of passion rushing couples into mistakes they later regretted. He’d nursed enough family and friends through their heartaches. He had no interest in Lady Disaster.

None whatsoever.

So why was he still standing here, soaking up the rain, trying to figure her out?

“Hell.” Nate set down the suitcases and went back to work.

The rear end of the car teetered upward a couple of inches when he removed the last suitcase. He ignored Cindy’s muffled cries and gesticulations from the cab of the truck. He was making some hard choices here. If she and Wes wanted to get to San Antonio, then their things were going to get wet.

But he couldn’t ignore the water swirling past the top of his brown work boot and soaking the hem of his pantleg. “That’s rising an inch a minute,” he muttered, doing a quick calculation.

The clock was ticking way too fast.

Nate closed the trunk and climbed out of the ditch. Blinking the moisture from his eyelashes, he knelt beside Jolene, tugged the handle of the jack from her grasp and inserted it into the base. “Go back to the truck. I’ll finish up here.”

She tugged back. “I can do this.”

He separated her hand from the jack and held on to both. “Go back to the truck and call this delay in to your father.”

“You call it in.”

“Damn it, lady, I’m not going to argue—” Temper gave way to a bone-deep awareness of danger gushing toward them.

“California?”

With only a splash of sound to alert him, the rear of the car rose and shifted toward them, carried on the current of water like a log on a flume. Time was up. “We’re out of here.”

With nearly a ton of metal sailing their way, Nate picked up Jolene, jack handle and