Rock-A-Bye Rescue. Karen Whiddon

She forced starch into her stance and lifted her chin. “Tell me who you are. How do you know my name?”

      He seemed a bit deflated by the notion she didn’t recognize him. “We spent summers together, our families. My parents’ cabin, my cabin now, is on the other side of the ridge.” He motioned to the steep hillside behind him.

      The only other cabin in the area when she was a teenager had belonged to the Hamiltons. She had, indeed, spent summers with the family. With the Hamiltons’ son. A memory tickled her brain. A schoolgirl crush. A boy with a wickedly handsome face and devilish grin. The police showing up at their summer’s-end cookout to arrest the boy.

      Her stomach swooped, and her breath stuck in her throat.

      “Dean?” she rasped.

      He lowered his head in a slight nod, his eyes still vigilant.

      Now she scrutinized him, looking for any resemblance to the troubled and reckless teenager she’d known years ago. The inky hair and dark eyes were the same, but the sinewy body had been transformed. His shoulders were broader, and through the gap in his open coat, she could see the evidence of a tautly muscled torso. Even his hands were large, strong...virile.

      She gave her head a quick shake as if to banish the inappropriate response from her mind. She may have had a youthful crush on him as a teenager, but Dean Hamilton had proven himself the wrong sort of guy. His frequent scrapes with the law had landed him in a juvenile boot camp. She had no interest in getting entangled with another man like her ex, a man with no integrity.

      “So...you do remember me.” He arched one black eyebrow, and Lila’s pulse fluttered.

      “So...you’re still a thief,” she countered.

      Now his brow furrowed in a deep, angry V. “Thief?”

      She indicated the ax with the barrel of the shotgun. That split second of diverted attention was all he needed to surge forward, startling her, and seize her weapon.

      When she skittered back from him, her foot slipped on the ice. Lila gasped as she lost her balance, and just as quickly as he’d disarmed her, he whipped a hand around her back and caught her under her arm, keeping her on her feet. With a firm tug, he hauled her up against his body, anchoring her until she could get her feet under her again.

      The rapid transition from armed defender to vulnerable captive left her breathless. Lila shivered and raised wary eyes. “I-I’m okay. You can let g-go now.”

      The corner of his mouth twitched. “Maybe I’m not ready to let you go.”

      His dark gaze roamed over her face, then down toward her chest. A gleam she could only call predatory shimmered in his eyes. “It’s been a long time since I held a woman this close. Especially one as pretty as you.”

      Pressed against him as she was, she’d bet he could feel the heavy drubbing of her heart against her ribs. “I’d guess not. Not a lot of female company in prison,” she gibed, then immediately regretted it.

      His grip tightened, and his eyes grew even darker and more threatening. “I wouldn’t know, seeing as how I’ve spent the last ten years with the Army’s Special Forces defending our country.”

      She blinked her momentary confusion and doubt. “Defending... You were in the military?”

      “Is that really so hard to believe?”

      “I—” Staring at him, with his solidly muscled body and grim countenance and with her ax in one hand and her shotgun in his other, he did indeed have a bellicose appearance. “No. I just thought—”

      “That I could have only ended up in prison.”

      She huffed defensively. “Well, can you blame me? When I knew you, you were on that track! The last I heard of you, you’d been sentenced to juvenile boot camp for stealing a car.”

      “Borrowing.”

      “What?”

      “I was only borrowing the car. I’d have brought it back if I hadn’t been stopped by the cop and dragged into jail.”

      “Your kind of borrowing was still illegal. You earned your time at the boot camp.” She realized he still held her against his body, and while she appreciated the warmth, having stormed outside without a coat, his proximity did strange things to her ability to think straight and calm her jittery pulse. She planted her hands on his chest and shoved away from him. He released her with such force that she stumbled again, her feet sliding a little before she found her balance.

      “True enough. And in hindsight, I have no regrets about my time at the juvie camp. It set me on the right path.” He held out the shotgun, but when she tried to take it from him, he didn’t let go. “Don’t ever point a gun at someone you aren’t truly willing to shoot, or you might find that you’re the one who ends up dead.”

      She stiffened. Her father had warned the same thing, but from Dean it sounded ominous. “Are you trying to scare me?”

      He lifted an insouciant shoulder. “If that’s what it takes to drill some gun sense into you.”

      “I know how to handle a weapon.” But even she heard a shade of doubt in her tone.

      He slanted a dubious look at her as he released the gun and stepped back. “I need to use your ax. I have a large tree limb about to fall on my cabin. It would also take out my power lines if I don’t remove it before it breaks free.”

      “So you were going to borrow my ax without asking?” She braced a hand on one hip, squeezing the shotgun barrel in her other.

      “I’d rather borrow a saw,” he said, clearly ignoring her sarcasm. “That’d be the proper tool for the job, but your shed was locked, and all I found by your woodpile was the ax.” When she rolled her eyes in frustration, he added, “For what it’s worth, I’d been told no one lived here anymore. I didn’t know there was anyone home to ask. I’d heard your parents were in Florida now or something.”

      “They are. I moved here a couple months ago after—”

      “Shh!” His chin jerked up, his expression shifting abruptly to one of alarm and confusion as he scanned the area and zeroed in on a window of her cabin. “Do you have a baby?”

      “No,” she said automatically before remembering her charge. “I mean, I’m caring for one. I—” Then she heard the shrill cry over the ping of sleet and crackling of icy branches in the woods. “That’s... Eve is awake. I have to—” She pointed toward her front door as she backed away, distracted by the baby’s cries.

      Dean’s face was still tense as he jerked a nod. “Go on.”

      She started toward the cabin, walking as fast as she dared on the slippery ice. She heard the crunch of a second set of footsteps and thought for a moment Dean was leaving. But as she neared her porch, she realized he was right behind her. Wheeling around to face him, she shot him a glare. “What are you doing? Why are you following me?”

      He paused on the bottom step to her porch and angled his head slightly. “I thought I’d wait inside, out of the cold, while you tended to the baby and got the key to the shed.” He gave her a sardonic half grin. “But that seems to be a neighborly kindness you don’t want to offer me.”

      Eve’s crying grew louder, once again dividing her attention. “Fine,” she grumbled, “come in. You can wait in the kitchen while I check on Eve.”

      She turned and hustled inside, leaving him to see himself in. Eve was sitting in the crib, her hand in her mouth, slobber and tears soaking her face as she wailed. “Poor girl. Don’t cry, sweetheart. I know you’re scared.”

      Lifting the infant into her arms, Lila noticed her muscles were tight with stress, and she moved with a jerky stiffness. Eve was sure to pick up on her tension, so she inhaled slowly and blew out a cleansing breath. She found a clean burp cloth and used it to dry Eve’s face.

      Dean