The Beauty, The Beast And The Baby. Dixie Browning

was still coming down like Niagara Falls when Mariah let herself out a few minutes later. Gus took one look at her and then hurried out to unlock the truck.

       Down, boy. Think big, juicy steak. Think pecan pie smothered with ice cream…think anything but what you’re thinking!

      The lady cleaned up real good. She was wearing jeans, a man’s white shirt, vinyl slicker and a pair of cork-soled sandals that towered about three inches off the ground, making those skyscraper legs of hers even more spectacular. She looked like a million bucks. But then, even wet, stained, bruised and swollen, she’d rated well over the top on any man’s gauge.

      Gus figured the sooner they parted ways, the better. “Steak, seafood, waffles or burgers, take your pick. There’s a chicken takeout three miles farther down the road.” He did his best to ignore the way she got into a truck. Mariah was tall enough to edge her hip onto the seat and swing both legs inside in one smooth, flowing motion.

      He closed the door and stalked around the hood. Dammit, it was going on nine and his last meal had been a candy bar a couple of hundred miles ago. “Make up your mind,” he said, his voice rough from an earlier bout of coughing.

      “I’m not real crazy about waffles. Anything else suits me, though. You choose.”

      Following the directions he’d received from the night clerk, Gus drove to the steak house. The waiting line stretched all the way out to the edge of the canopy. Without a word he backe d out and headed for the two closest seafood places, only to discover that the shortest wait at either place would be at least an hour.

      “Goodness, I wonder what it’s like on a week end,” Mariah murmured. Her stomach growled noisily.

      “This is Florida, right? It’s February, so what d’you expect?” He was hungry, too, but it was hard to feel too grim when he was this close to a woman who turned him on big time without even trying. Which was crazy, because he wasn’t even over his last affair! At least, he hadn’t thought he was. But there was something downright disarming about a growling stomach on a woman who looked like the cover of a six-dollar fashion magazine, even in a plastic raincoat.

      They drove a few miles farther, picked up a couple of chicken dinners and headed back to the motel. Gus eased into the parking place, then leaned across and opened her door, trying hard to ignore the mingled smell of fried chicken, lilacs and warm woman. He tucked the boxes under his coat and made a dive for the shelter.

      Mariah was right beside him, her wet face and wet slicker glistening under the security lights. She was laughing, but Gus noticed she was supporting her right hand with her left. He knew from personal experience that two hands were better than one, especially for things like opening chicken boxes and shucking plastic utensils out of their packets.

      And hell, it wasn’t as if he had anything better to do.

      While the rain droned down a few feet away, he watched her struggle to unlock her door left-handed, then impatiently took the key and did the job for her. She wasn’t a whiner, he would give her that much.

      “Thanks,” she murmured. “And, Gus, thank you for supper.” She lifted a box off the stack and stepped inside. “I’ll add it to my account.”

      Gus was going to say “You do that” when his throat betrayed him again. His cough, a remnant of the flu, soun ded a lot worse than it was.

      “That sounds awful! Come inside for a minute, I might have something…” She had that same mother-hen glint in her eye his sister Angel always got when she was trying to cure his sweet tooth. “I know I’ve got something in one of my bags—everybody’s been coughing lately.”

      Nearly strangling, Gus followed her inside. Even with his eyes watering, he couldn’t help but appreciate her rear end as she leaned over to fumble left-handed through the bottles, jars and tubes in her makeup case. “Hey, don’t go to any trouble on my account,” he rasped. “I never take medicine.”

      She pulled out a card of foil-wrapped lozenges and held it out to him. “Yes, you do. I saw you take aspirin earlier, remember?”

      “That’s not medicine, that’s—Ah, hell, give me the thing,” he snapped, and immediately regretted his surliness. “Sorry. It’s been a long day.”

      “It has, hasn’t it?” There was no reproach in her voice, but her quiet Georgia accent made him feel about the size of a small cockroach.“ I expect you’re hungry, too. Why don’t we have supper and make an early night of it? I have a long drive ahead of me tomorrow, and you probably do, too. Where are you going, anyway?”

      As she was making a real mess of trying to open a chicken box one-handed, Gus took it from her and finished the job. With a courtly gesture, he pulled out her chair, partly to make up for being a sorehead.Play it cool, man. This is strictly business. Ships in the night, and all that. “Wait here. I’ll get us something to drink. You want cold from the machine, or coffee?”

      “Cold, please. Diet cola’s fine.”

      “Chemicals are bad for you. Sugar’s real food.”

      She smiled, and it occurred to him as he dug in his pocket for change that if she smiled much more, there was no telling how big a fool he was going to make of himself before he manag ed to get away.

      Awkwardly, she set out the napkins and plastic cutlery. “Don’t go to any trouble,” Gus warned. “I can eat in my own room.”

      “Yes, but if you stay here you can have my biscuit and the wing on my breast quarter. I never eat wings.”

      “Are you trying to bribe me?”

      “Not at all. Call it a down payment on what I owe you. Did you order the potatoes and gravy, or the fries?”

      “There’s one of each, take your choice,” he said, and she smiled again. He wondered if she was coming on to him.

      She wasn’t. He wasn’t quite sure how he knew—he just knew. There was nothing at all flirtatious about the way she picked up her chicken breast in her left hand and bit into it. Hell, she probably, wasn’t any more anxious to get involved than he was, he told himself, wondering why the thought wasn’t more reassuring.

      Gus knew for a fact that some women took one look at his battered face, scarred from one too many foot ball collisions and the usual run of on-the-job accidents, and took a fast hike. But just because this one‘ hadn’t, didn’t mean she was feeling the same pull of sexual attraction he was feeling.

      And he was definitely, undeniably feeling it, all right. It was a good thing they would be splitting pretty soon, or else Gus might just find himself forgetting a few hard-learned lessons from his own recent past.

       Three

      Dinner was devoured quickly, with little conversa tion. Mariah told herself there was nothing at all wrong with finding herself alone in a motel room in a strange town with a strange man. It happened.

      A small inner voice, one she had never quite managed to outgrow, whispered that it might happen to some women; it had certainly never happened to Sara Mariah Brady.

      As a model, Mariah’s social life had been even more limited than it had been back home, if for an entirely differ ent reason. The novelty of beautiful clothes, beautiful people and exotic locations had quickly worn off. After initial training, her days had begun early, and by the time she’d gotten back to the apartment all she’d wanted to do was devour an enormous meal and fall into bed.

      Instead, she usually made do with a quick shower-cool, so as not to dry out her skin—a manicure touch-up, half an hour of yoga and a light supper of fruit, rice and vegetables. Then she would fall into bed.

      Back in Muddy Landing the store had closed at five in the wintertime, six during the summer. By the time she’d cooked supper for whoever happened to be living at