“Do you think we should move?” she asked, her voice trembling.
“I don’t see any place safer. We’ll have to ride it out here.”
He didn’t have to see her to know she was terrified. She had the baby’s tiny head tucked beneath her chin, her hand covering its downy blond hair. With his arms curved around her shoulders, her slender body angled against his left side, he could feel her trembling from neck to thigh.
A blinding flash of lightning turned the space pure white. Thunder cracked. He felt her whole body go taut as a spring an instant before she buried her head against his chest.
“It’s okay,” he murmured, hoping to heaven it would be. He cupped the back of her head the way she did her child’s, protecting it, tightening his hold. “Just hang on. These things don’t last that long, do they?”
“I don’t know, Mr.…I don’t know, “ she repeated, apparently realizing she didn’t know his name. “One’s never come this close before.”
She shifted a little, her thigh slipping along his. Given the intimacy of their positions, he found her formality a tad incongruous. “It’s Sloan. Justin,” he added, thinking she might appreciate a first name, too.
“Justin Sloan. Thank you.”
He wasn’t sure what she was thanking him for. It didn’t seem important anyway. The breath he drew brought her scent with it, something clean and fresh and far too innocent to seem so erotic.
He cleared his throat, training his focus on the wide planks above them while dust swirled and the apocalypse raged overhead. Wondering if those boards would stay put seemed wiser than wondering if that scent was in the silken hair braided and draped over his arm or if it was clinging to her skin.
He glanced back down. “And you’re…?”
“Emily Miller. My daughter is Anna,” she added, then jumped again at the crash of ripping timber.
A huge tree limb arrowed through the open doorway above them. The projectile crashed into the crates of potatoes and onions, splintering itself and the shelves and sending vegetables rolling over the packed dirt floor. Another crash reverberated above them, this one echoing with the sound of shattering glass.
With his back to the melee, his head ducked and his neck exposed, Justin held his breath. He was pretty sure the woman in his arms held hers, too. Only the baby moved. He could feel it wriggling in protest to her mother’s tight hold, but he doubted there was any power on earth, including the fury being unleashed overhead, that could make the woman ease her grasp.
“Justin Sloan?” The sound of his name was faint, muffled by their positions and the cacophony overhead. “May I ask you something?”
He thought for sure she wanted reassurance. It sounded like the end of the world up there. At the very least, it was the end of her house. But if she wanted to know if he thought they’d be all right, her guess would be as good as his.
“Sure,” he said, thinking he’d do the decent thing and lie if it would make her feel better.
“Who are Dorothy and Toto?”
“What?”
“Who are Dorothy and Toto?” she repeated. “And what did you mean when you said you had no intention of playing them?”
He had to sound as puzzled as she did. “You know. From The Wizard of Oz. The movie?” he prompted, thinking she must be trying to distract herself. “The tornado hits Kansas and the girl and her dog get sucked up?”
“Did they survive?”
He would have thought she was joking, except her concern when she looked up at him was too real, the fear in her eyes too tangible.
“Yeah. They did.”
“That’s good. I don’t know of this Oz,” she admitted, the fullness of her bottom lip drawing his glance as she spoke. Her mouth looked soft, inviting. Provocative. With her clear blue eyes locked on his, it also looked enormously tempting. “I’ve heard of Kansas, though. I’ve read that it’s very flat.”
The woman wasn’t making a lick of sense to him, but she was definitely taunting his nervous system. The fact that she was reminding him of just how long he’d gone without the comfort of a woman’s body wasn’t something he cared to consider at the moment. Given their proximity, it seemed best to concentrate on something—anything—else.
Ruthlessly reining in his libido, he focused on the sound of her voice, her accent. She didn’t have much of one, just enough to broaden the sound of her vowels. It was more the pattern of her speech that told him she wasn’t a native—which could easily explain why she hadn’t heard of the movie nearly every kid in America had seen by the time he was six years old.
“I take it you’re not from here.”
“No,” she admitted, putting his very logical mind at ease. “I’m from Ohio.”
Emily had no idea why her response made the big stranger frown. With the swiftness of the lightning arcing above them, the dark slashes of his eyebrows bolted over his pewter-gray eyes. His lean, chiseled features sharpened. The dark expression intensified the sense of command surrounding him, an aura she imagined to be possessed by men like kings and warriors in the library books she devoured. Or like the powerful men who stole women’s hearts on Mrs. Clancy’s soap operas. But she really didn’t care that she confused him. All she cared about was that Anna was safe—and that his deep voice held the power to distract her from thoughts of what would have happened had he not come along.
Shaking deep inside, she glanced from the little red polo player embroidered above the pocket of his navy-blue shirt to her baby, soothing Anna’s fussing by rubbing her back. If not for this Justin Sloan, she never would have been able to get inside the cellar with the wind blowing so hard. While she’d struggled with the door, the wind would surely have blown her little girl away, sucked Anna up as he said the wind had done with Dorothy and her dog. It might have blown her away, too, or caused her to be injured so she couldn’t help her child.
The thoughts drew a shudder to the surface. They were too close to the nightmares she battled every day. Only this time her fears had nearly become reality.
But nothing had happened, she reminded herself. They were safe. For now. Safe and protected by this man who had come out of nowhere and was using his own, very solid body to shield them both.
He must have felt her trembling. His big broad hand slipped along her shoulder, drawing her closer. She sought that contact willingly, too overwhelmed by what she felt at that moment to do anything else. She knew there would be damage to face. She knew that very soon she would have to start rebuilding with whatever nature had left her. But for now, for these precious seconds, she wasn’t having to cope all alone.
The need to absorb that feeling was so acute that it bordered on physical pain. She didn’t know if it was right or wrong to want something so badly. She just knew that she was desperate for what she felt just then. He made her feel secure—and security was something she hadn’t felt in a very long time. The desire to stay in the safe haven of his arms was the strongest yearning she’d experienced since long before her husband had died.
The thought of leaving that shelter was unbearable. But she wasn’t given a choice. She was keenly aware of how solid his body felt, how strong. She was also aware of the tension tightening his muscles and a tingling warmth where her breast and hip crushed his side.
In the pale light, she looked up to find his glance fixed on her mouth.
Her heart gave an odd little