Texas Bride. Kate Thomas

than you are.” Smoothing her hand over her baby’s current address comforted Dani, as usual. “I don’t know how we’ll manage, but we will,” she promised the son or daughter who was kicking merrily against her rib cage. “Because no matter what—I won’t give you up.”

      While the storm grew in intensity, Dani kept herself busy mixing up corn bread and doctoring black-eyed peas to make Texas caviar.

      

      Biting back a swearword, Josh fought to keep the car on the road as downdrafts from the thunderstorm buffeted it. Then the rain hit—the fat, individual drops splatting on his windshield quickly became a deluge his wipers could barely handle.

      Josh pressed on the gas pedal, eager to drive out of the storm, find a town and check into a motel. He was tired. He’d had enough of the desert. Enough of being lost.

      When the rain thickened into a solid curtain, he slowed a little.

      An inch or so of water covered the road in a few spots. The car hydroplaned across them, but the tires regained their traction almost immediately. He relaxed against the leather upholstery.

      Suddenly a dark shape loomed in front of him and Josh swerved just in time to avoid sideswiping it. A truck, he realized as it disappeared into the grayness again. Some damn fool hadn’t pulled completely off the pavement.

      Just ahead, another shallow layer of water stretched from one side of the pavement to the other.

      At least he wasn’t the only person ever to drive down this road. Which meant it went somewhere, too. With a sense of relief he refused to acknowledge, Josh increased his speed.

      And drove right into hell.

      The nose of Josh’s car hit the edge of the water, forward momentum carried the rest of the vehicle into the torrent before his foot could hit the brakes. Like a greedy child snatching up a toy, the angry current grabbed the car, pulled it off the side of the road, then spun it—once, twice, three times—slamming Josh’s head against the doorpost with each furious revolution.

      One more shuddering impact with something and the car came to a halt.

      Josh managed to unfasten the seat belt, but the churning torrent held the door shut against his dazed efforts to open it. The electric window controls didn’t work. He tried the passenger door, but it was jammed shut, too.

      Before his head cleared enough to think straight, a large piece of debris smashed into the car. The impact sent Josh bouncing off the steering wheel into the doorpost again, then rammed his head into the dash. Stars exploded behind his eyes.

      Through the haze of pain disorienting him, Josh noted water seeping into the car, filling the floorboards, rising.

      He was going to drown here. In this gritty, muddy water. As consciousness faded despite his efforts to stay alert, Josh tasted real regret. Maybe my life is empty, he thought, but...I don’t want to die!

      

      The oven baking the corn bread threatened to toast Dani, too, so she went out on the porch to breathe some raincooled air.

      She was about to step back inside when an odd sound came thinly through the storm. It took her a moment to recognize... Then she was struggling into a jacket and scrambling for the flashlight and turning back for the length of old rope she wouldn’t trust to hold a cat’s weight. It was all she had.

      “That sounded like metal, baby. Like a car being hit! If someone’s in trouble, we can’t turn our back on them, so hang on,” she said, finding a way, despite her loaded-down arms, to pat her stomach encouragingly. “Hang on!” she yelled into the misty gloom. Thank heaven, the rain seemed to be slowing.

      As carefully but as quickly as possible, Dani slid down the path to the big boulder, then scrambled past it to peer at—Oh, God. It was a car. In the creek. Caught for the moment against her boulder’s twin out in midstream.

      The furious, foaming runoff was trying to pull it away from the rock and drag it downstream. If she was going to rescue the passengers, she’d have to act quickly.

      Maybe there isn’t anyone inside. Dani grasped at the possibility. Maybe they’d gotten out. Maybe the car had broken down—like her truck—and been abandoned. Maybe she didn’t have to risk the baby....

      Biting her lip, Dani aimed the flashlight beam at the vehicle. A dark human shape slumped over the steering wheel.

      “Well, that makes it simple,” she muttered, tucking the flashlight into her windbreaker. She tied one end of the rope around the yucca tree and the other end under her breasts, took a deep breath and waded into the torrent.

      Letting the rough current push her toward and around the rear of the car, Dani grabbed for and found a handhold on the midstream boulder. After crawling awkwardly to its top, she inched along it, wiping the now-occasional raindrop from her eyes. And babbling, she realized as she reached a spot near the front of the car. That idiot pleading and praying aloud was her.

      Okay. God probably has the idea. Now do your part.

      Pulling out the flashlight, Dani pointed it at the still figure in the car. The ray of light showed only a few details clearly: the gleam of dark gold hair, a firm jaw, and broad, unmistakably male shoulders. His eyes were closed, but... Dani steadied the shaking beam and peered through the raindrops beading the windshield. Yes, the man’s chest moved. He was unconscious, but alive.

      Dani’s sigh of thanksgiving became a groan as the flashlight revealed another problem. There was water inside the vehicle, already lapping over the console. Clamping her jaws together, Dani put away the flashlight. The man in the car was going to die unless she did something. Now.

      The top of the boulder was littered with loose rocks. Picking up the biggest one, Dani lifted it over her head, aimed it at the windshield and let fly. She repeated the process until the glass starred, then heaved the rock one more time. As the spray of safety-glass nuggets subsided, Dani leaned down and peered through the opening she’d created to get a better look at the man she was trying to rescue.

      Heat coiled deep inside her. Completely inappropriate reaction, she told herself. But just as completely undeniable.

      Okay, so cope with it. And get back to work.

      Despite her urgency, Dani couldn’t help studying the man for a few long seconds. He was unrelentingly male. Exceedingly handsome. Even unconscious, he exuded a sense of leashed power, like a sleeping cougar.

      And she had to get him out of the car before he drowned.

      But how? The man looked to be a muscular six-footer, she was a very pregnant five-three. She couldn’t even get her hand far enough inside the car to touch him.

      Dani tugged on her lower lip for a second.

      Then, taking a deep breath, she did the only thing she could think of. She started shouting.

      

      Regret was still there as a thought slowly emerged from the blackness. So this... is...being dead.

      Josh struggled to form another thought, but—What was that infernal noise?

      “Dam it, wake up! Come on, mister. Open your eyes!”

      With a groan, he obeyed. Where—Was he in a car? The windshield looked like a silvery net—except for a hole on the right side.

      Through the opening, he could see a light. He’d heard about that. He was supposed to go toward it, wasn’t he?

      A face appeared, floating in the light. A beautiful face. Soft glowing skin, a wide luscious mouth, huge greenish eyes. Surrounded by a fuzzy, burnished halo. An angel. Straight out of della Robbia.

      “That’s it. Wake up.”

      Josh blinked. One or two angels. He couldn’t tell for sure. Their edges blurred and melded as they gestured frantically. He closed his eyes. Better.

      “Are you hurt?”

      Sensation