Lone Star Baby. Cathy Thacker Gillen

then he heard what sounded like a small, furious scream. What the...?

      Gavin took the steps up to the wagon two at a time. He threw back the flap that hid the interior from view.

      Violet lay facedown on the bed, her head burrowed in the pillow, one arm tucked awkwardly between the mattress and the end table next to it.

      “What the heck are you doing?”

      She moaned and lifted her head slightly. “I’m stuck.”

      * * *

      “STUCK,” GAVIN REPEATED STUPIDLY.

      “I had a box of pens and pencils and I knocked them behind the nightstand. I was trying to reach it without moving all my suitcases, storage boxes and garment bags.”

      Of which, Gavin noted, there were many. All crammed together in the available space between the mattress and the high wooden sides of the wagon.

      He tracked the silky dark mane over her face and shoulders. “You’re really stuck?”

      She groaned again and pounded her forehead lightly against the mattress beneath her. “No. I’m just lying here for the fun of it.”

      He grinned. A sensually indisposed Violet was a sight to behold. Her temper only added to the allure. “Hang on.” He sprang into action. “I’ll move some of these suitcases.”

      A feat that was easier said than done, he quickly discovered. Some boxes were wedged in there pretty tight. Plus, the stack was two and three high on all sides. “What did you pack in these, anyway?” He succeeded in freeing a storage box from the stack, only to have the snapped lid fly off in the process and a whole array of sexy undies come spilling out. About half of which landed on her shoulders and head.

      Another string of muffled, surprisingly unladylike profanities filled the silence. She turned her face to his. “Did you do that on purpose?”

      “Ah, no.” The last thing he needed to see was what kind of undergarments she wore. Now he’d be imagining how she looked in all that sexy satin and lace. “Sorry.” He rescued the rest of her undies and stuffed them all back in the box, snapping the lid on.

      “Are these all clothes?”

      “Yes. It’s everything I might need for the next three months and then some.”

      “Sounds like a woman.” His sisters were notorious clothes-hounds, too.

      “And spoken like a man. Are you hurrying?”

      Gavin lifted another box of undies and a half-open suitcase of what appeared to be silk pajamas and nightgowns. Who knew she dressed so sexily when she wasn’t at the hospital? Except, in the past five years, she had almost always been at the hospital.

      “Gavin?”

      “Almost there.”

      She moaned.

      He shifted the suitcase wedged against the side of the queen-size mattress and the wagon.

      She tried to pull free. Groaned again, in what seemed to be real pain this time. “Still stuck...”

      No kidding. Her arm remained clamped tight between the nightstand and the bed.

      Deftly, Gavin slid one arm between her and the mattress, simultaneously pushing down on the bed while supporting the weight of her chest. Then, still supporting her weight and keeping her trapped arm in place, he used his free hand to shove the mattress several inches away from the nightstand, toward the other side of the wagon.

      That gave her just enough wiggle room.

      Her breasts pearling tautly against his forearm, she pulled her trapped limb free and rolled onto her back. Rubbing from shoulder to elbow to wrist, she tested the flexibility of her fingers with a beleaguered sigh. “Wow, that hurt!”

      “Are you sure you’re okay?”

      She sat up, still rubbing the affected limb. Beneath her shirt, he couldn’t help but note her breasts were still taut.

      Oblivious to his wicked thoughts, she scoffed playfully. “You mean aside from my wounded pride?”

      Glad she hadn’t lost her sense of humor, he grinned and sank down on the bed. He felt the drumbeat of arousal as he faced her. “I kind of like you as a damsel in distress.”

      She crossed her arms over her breasts, her delicate hands resting on opposite shoulders, at the nape of her neck. “You are so funny.”

      Suddenly sensing she needed more comforting than her self-imposed hug could give, he shifted closer. “I’m serious, Violet,” he said softly.

      And then he did what he’d been wanting to do since forever. He took her into his arms, tilted her face up to his and kissed her.

Chapter Four

      Violet wanted to say she was surprised. That she hadn’t expected Gavin to ever kiss her. But that would not be true.

      She could tell by the way he had been looking at her the past day or so that he had been considering doing just that.

      What was worse, she had been feeling the exact same urge.

      She didn’t know whether it was the fact they suddenly both found themselves responsible for baby Ava’s future, or the fact that Gavin was just so damn sexy. All she knew for sure was that when he’d come to her rescue and slid his brawny arm beneath her, her body had responded with a lightning bolt of desire that had started in her breasts and exploded like a thundercloud inside her. And now that he was kissing her, a second, even more powerful wave had started to surge. Driven, this time, by the hot, ardent press of his lips and the evocative sweep of his tongue.

      He tasted so incredibly good, she realized as her eyes fluttered shut. Like mint and man, desire and determination. And it wasn’t just physical need he was conjuring up. There was a sudden riptide of long-suppressed feelings, too. The fact she had been alone, too long. An aching awareness of just how lost she had been and a deep, bolstering need for more...

      And still Gavin kissed her, tangling her tongue with his, arousing even more passion and need. With a sound that was half whimper of protest, half sigh of submission, she allowed him to unwind her hands from her shoulders and drape them over the broad width of his. She let him fit his chest to hers and then, the next thing she knew, he altered her center of balance. She was sliding sideways on the bed. He was shifting her onto her back, moving over her, his hands cupping her breasts, his thumbs moving erotically across the crests. And, dear heaven, that felt so...darn...good, too.

      Violet groaned again.

      If they kept this up, they would make love.

      And she knew—for so many reasons, baby Ava among the most important of them—she could not let that happen.

      The situation was confused enough as it was.

      With a soft whimper she put both hands on his shoulders, broke the kiss and pushed him away.

      * * *

      GAVIN OPENED HIS EYES and shifted onto his side, unsure whether Violet looked relieved or disappointed he had stopped.

      He knew he was both.

      For as much as he wanted to make love to her right here and now, the more pragmatic part of him knew that doing so would have been a colossal mistake.

      Violet was the most idealistic woman he had ever met.

      She believed in love with all her heart and soul.

      Not hookups.

      Not tawdry one-night stands.

      When she made love with a man again—and he was determined now, after kissing her, that it would be with him—she would want it to mean something.

      The