A Bride for Dry Creek. Janet Tronstad

could only see the silhouette of Francis, but it was enough. He walked toward her and said the only thing he could think to say. “I told you to keep quiet. That could have been anyone inside.”

      “I didn’t want you to be shot on my account,” Francis whispered airily as she limped toward him. “If you just let me go now, there’ll be no kidnapping.”

      “There never was a kidnapping. This was a rescue.”

      “A rescue?” Francis turned the word over in her mouth and spoke low enough so that whoever was inside the house could not hear. “Don’t you think that’s going a bit far? I don’t think anyone would believe it’s a rescue— I think we better stick with the seduction story.”

      Flint shook his head. No wonder being a hero was so difficult these days.

      “Not that they’ll believe the seduction story, either.” Francis continued to whisper. Her leg was painful, but she found it easier to limp than to stand. “I must look a sight by now.”

      The deep darkness of the night that had gathered around the pine trees lifted as Francis moved toward him. “I wonder which of the men from Dry Creek knew enough to drive out here and wait for us. Pretty quick thinking.”

      Flint held his breath. In the night, he could look at Francis and not worry about the naked desire she would see in his eyes any other time. His jacket had fallen off her shoulders under the tree, and her arms and neck gleamed white even in the midnight darkness. The sequins of that red dress glittered as she moved, showing every curve in her slender body. She was beautiful.

      “It’s not one of the men from Dry Creek,” Flint said softly. “It’s my boss.”

      Francis stopped. She’d never thought—never even considered. And she should have—there’s an order to everything, she reminded herself blindly. One needed to know the place of everything. And a kidnapping, she noted dully, required a motive and, in this case, a boss.

      Francis stared unmoving at the weatherbeaten deserted house that used to belong to Flint’s grandmother. The white paint had peeled off the frame years ago, leaving a chipped grayness that blended into the darkness. Gaping black holes marked where the glass had broken out of the windows.

      “He must think I’m a fool,” Francis whispered stiffly.

      Francis looked so fragile, Flint moved slowly toward her. She looked like a bird, perched for flight even with her sprained leg muscle.

      “No, I’m sure he doesn’t think that at all,” he said softly.

      When he reached Francis, Flint picked her up again. This time he cradled her in his arms properly, as he had wanted to each time he’d picked her up tonight. For the first time, she didn’t resist him. That should thrill his heart, Flint thought. But it didn’t. He knew Francis wasn’t warming toward him. She’d just given up.

      “And that bit about the bed.” Francis continued to fret. “I’m a middle-aged woman. He must think I’m a featherbrain—especially because he knows why you have me out here.”

      “He does, does he?” Flint asked quietly. It came as somewhat of a surprise to him that he’d rather have Francis kicking his shin with her pointed high heels than to have her lying still in his arms feeling foolish after having done something so brave.

      The angle wasn’t perfect for what he needed to do, but Flint found that if he bent his knee and slowly lowered Francis until she was securely perched on the knee, he could crane his neck and do what he needed to do.

      He bent his head down and kissed her. He knew his lips were cold and chapped by now. He knew that the quick indrawn breath he heard from Francis was shock rather than passion. But he also knew that they both needed this kiss more than they needed the air they were breathing.

      Flint took his time. He’d waited twenty years for this kiss and, planned or not, he needed to take his time. He felt the stiffness leave Francis’s lips and he felt them move against him like they used to. He and his Francis were home again.

      “Thank you.” Francis was the first one to breathe after the kiss ended. Her pulse was beating fast, but she willed it to slow. “At least now your boss won’t think I’m delusional—he’ll think you at least tried to seduce me. Middle-aged or not.” Francis stopped speaking to peer into the darkness of the broken windows. “He is watching, isn’t he?”

      For the first time since he’d bent down on one knee, Flint felt the bone-chilling cold of the snow beneath him. He might be home again, but Francis wasn’t. “You think the kiss was for my boss’s benefit?”

      “Of course. And I appreciate it. I really do.”

      Flint only grunted. He must be losing his touch. He went back and picked up his jacket to wrap around Francis.

      Chapter Three

      “There’s trouble in Dry Creek.” The words came out of the other man’s mouth the moment Flint kicked open the door to the abandoned house and, still holding Francis, stepped inside. “Kidnapping.”

      “I know,” Francis said stiffly. She was glad she’d have the chance to show she wasn’t a ninny. “That’s me.”

      “Not unless you got here in the back of a cattle truck, it’s not,” the other man said mildly, a lit cigar in his mouth and a cell phone in his hand. The only light in the room was a small flashlight the man must have laid on the table recently. The flashlight gave a glow to the rather large room and showed some bookcases and a few wooden chairs scattered around the table.

      “Well, surely there’s no point in kidnapping more than me.”

      “It appears they have some woman named Sylvia Bannister and then Garth Elkton.”

      “Oh, no.” Francis half twisted herself out of Flint’s arms. “I’ll need to go help them.”

      “You can’t go.” Flint finished carrying her over to one of the chairs and gently sat her down.

      “That’s right. I’m a prisoner.”

      “You’re not a prisoner,” Flint said impatiently and then turned to the older man. “It better be me that goes. I’ve gotten a little acquainted with the guys responsible for this. Might have picked up a tip or two.”

      While Flint was talking, he was rummaging through a backpack resting on another chair. He pulled out an ammunitions cartridge and put it in the pocket of a dry jacket that was wrapped around the back of the chair. Then he pulled out a pair of leather gloves.

      “Mrs. B called it in.” The older man gestured to his cell phone. “Said to hurry. Some kids are chasing the truck in a bus as we speak. You can use my Jeep. Parked it behind the trees over there.” The older man jerked his head in the opposite direction they had ridden in from. “It’ll get you there faster.”

      “Not faster than Honey,” Flint said with a smile as he walked toward the door. “She can beat a Jeep any day. She makes her own roads.”

      Flint opened the door and was gone in a little less than five seconds. Francis knew it was five seconds because she was counting to ten and had only reached five when the door creaked shut. Her teeth were chattering and she didn’t know if it was because she was near frozen or because she was scared to death. She hoped counting would force her to focus and make it all better. It didn’t.

      “I’ve got one of those emergency blankets in here someplace,” the older man said as he turned to a backpack of his own leaning in the corner of the room. “Prevents heat loss, that sort of thing.”

      “I’m okay.” Francis shivered through the words. She felt helpless to be sitting here when someone had kidnapped Sylvia and Garth.

      “Not much to that dress,” the older man said as he walked over to her and wrapped what looked like a huge foil paper around her. “Especially in ten below weather.”

      The