Riding the storm - By Julie Miller Page 0,53
Double J, Mitch Kannon would need every volunteer he could get to help out. “You don’t think power and communication will be established anytime soon?”
Nate shook his head. “I doubt it. And with power out, roads flooded and communication down, I doubt anyone’s looking for us yet, either.”
Jolene dumped her load. “So it’s just you and me for a while longer, huh?”
“Looks that way.”
Adam and Eve, stranded in a weather-beaten version of Paradise. Only Adam was brooding and distant and Eve didn’t know how to handle a man who wasn’t her father, friend or patient.
Jolene suddenly felt edgy and uncomfortable as she recalled in vivid detail every sweep of Nate’s hands, every claim of his mouth on her body, every delicious word they’d shared on the couch before the hurricane hit. Her breasts beaded into painful nubs, her lips tingled, and the female heart of her grew heavy and damp between her legs.
She braced her hand against the side of the barn and clutched at her belly. Her breath came in ragged gasps. Squeezing her eyes shut, she tried to regain control of her body’s raging hormones. She’d never…No man had ever…And, God, she’d wanted him to finish. She’d wanted…
“Jolene?” Nate’s concerned voice cut through her wanton thoughts.
No teasing voice, no soft seduction.
He’d come up right behind her. She could feel the heat from his body, though he didn’t touch her. She turned, still clutching her stomach, feeling light-headed and pale. Thankfully, Nate was a paramedic, not a mind reader.
“Are you hungry? I know you and the baby need to eat regularly.” Oh, yes. Very practical. Very Nate. “I fired up your propane grill in the garage and I’m cooking some steak and eggs for a late-night snack.”
That would explain the yummy smell she’d detected earlier.
Jolene forced herself to slowly exhale.
Hungry? Yes. Though not necessarily for food. But she could never admit that.
Fixing a smile on her face, she glanced up into those serious brown eyes.
“Are you kidding?” she said. “I’ve been hungry for the past five months.”
JOLENE WANTED TO COVER her ears and scream. The pounding of the rain and wind had been relentless for the past few hours.
Just as her father had told her, the back wall of the hurricane was even more powerful than the outer bands or front wall had been. The rain still fell, insulating them inside the house. And though they had no official report to go by, she suspected the wind could be clocked upwards of one hundred miles per hour. The bathroom was shrouded in darkness, save for the candles she’d lit.
But even candleglow couldn’t dispel the tension gnawing at her. She must have been transmitting her restless energy because Nate leaned down from his seat on the edge of the tub and slid a tray with some of the snacks she brought in earlier across the sleeping bag to where she sat on the floor, leaning against the door.
“Here. You haven’t tried dessert yet. A pudding cup or applesauce?”
Jolene gave a nervous laugh. “It’s hard to think about eating in the middle of a hurricane.”
“My grandpa Nate believed the best thing to do in a crisis was eat. He also loved desserts and thought they should be served at the beginning of the meal.”
She peeled off the pudding container, picked up a spoon and took a bite. “I think your Grandpa Nate was a very wise man. Are you named after him?”
He nodded. “My older brother, Robert, was already named after my dad. Grandpa was our only other living male relative. Family tradition.”
“So you were close?”
“He raised us until I was twelve.” He read the curious question in her arched brows and answered it matter-of-factly. “My parents died in a car crash when I was one. So we went to live on Grandpa Nate’s ranch. He was the only parent I ever really knew. I was twelve when he died. My brother, Kell, was eighteen and legal by then, so he, Jackie and I stayed together and just sort of took care of each other.”
The fact that he’d glossed over the difficult childhood he and his siblings must have had, went a long way toward explaining those life things he kept under such strict control. Jolene’s throat constricted as she worked to control some feelings of her own. Her compassionate heart thumped loudly enough in her chest that she wondered if Nate could hear it over the storm.
“I’m sorry about your folks and your grandpa. That must have been hard on