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“The water’s still rising,” she said, and thankfully dragged Liam out of his thoughts. He shifted his gaze to her, standing at the window, looking down. In a few long strides, he joined her there and took in the scene below. The water was up past the wheel wells on the parked cars, and the wind was bending the trees in half. Lightning flashed in the sky and thunder rolled out around them, loud enough to carry through the double-pane windows.
“And,” she said in a mutter as she looked down at the phone in her hand, “cell service is down. Perfect.”
He glanced at her. “Who would we call anyway? Emergency teams have more important things to take care of, and no one could drive through this mess anyway.”
He thought about the Perry Ranch, and hoped that Mike and the hands had gotten everything taken care of. Then his thoughts turned to his own place. It was new, and the most important thing in Liam’s life. But worrying wouldn’t get him anywhere, so he pushed the anxiety away. He held on to the thought that he had good men working for him, and his foreman was smart and knew what to do. “We’re stuck here for a while.”
“How long?”
“How the hell do I know?” He snapped it, then shrugged his shoulders as if sloughing off the rotten mood. “Sorry. I don’t know. But there’s food here. The construction guys keep a refrigerator on the ground floor stocked.” He thought about the fact that water was rushing in downstairs, too. “Why don’t you go and take a shower? Warm up, get out of those wet clothes. They’ve got it stocked with towels and soap and all. I’ll go down and raid that fridge before it’s under water.”
She looked up at him and her pale brown eyes looked like gold. He felt that rush of heat that had swamped him at first glance of her. When she licked her lips, his groin went hard as concrete. He’d be lucky to be able to walk in another minute.
So he tore his gaze away and looked around the room instead. It was set up for VIPs, so there was a small refrigerator at the private wet bar as well as the one in the main room. He hoped it was stocked because he could sure as hell use a beer.
“I’ll be back,” he said tightly, and headed for the door. At the threshold, her voice stopped him.
“Thanks.”
He looked back at her. “For what?”
She shrugged, a simple motion of her shoulders and yet, her dripping wet shirt tightened across her breasts, feeding fires that wouldn’t go out.
“For being there, I guess,” she admitted. “If I were alone when the storm hit, I probably would have tried to drive out of the city.”
“You wouldn’t have gotten far.”
“I know,” she said wryly. “That’s why ‘thanks.’”
“You’re welcome.” She was glad he’d been there. He was wishing he’d been anywhere else. Because now, he was trapped in a luxuriously appointed bedroom with a soaking wet woman with pale brown eyes. Shaking his head, he muttered, “Go take that shower.”
Then he left.
* * *
On the other side of the city, the floodwaters were higher and still rising. Ryder Currin grabbed a fifty-pound sack of flour from the homeless shelter’s pantry and slapped it down in front of the door to keep the water from sliding in.
“This is a darn shame, Mr. Currin,” the shelter manager said. “You just brought us these supplies.”
Ryder turned his head and looked up at the older woman. “Not a problem, Mavis. I’ll replace anything that gets ruined. But this sack of flour should help keep us dry—for a while, anyway.”
He looked around and saw that several of the men had nailed plywood sheets across the windows. Good thing the shelter had their tornado supplies in the back room, too. This way the windows wouldn’t break. Of course, it was dark as a cave now, so all the lights were burning and Mavis and her assistant had gathered up old-fashioned hurricane lamps in case the power went out. Which it would. Just a matter of when.
He’d only stopped by today to drop off a load of provisions, but the storm slamming down onto the city with no warning at all had trapped him here. Along with a handful of workers, a few of the people who regularly looked to this shelter for help, and... Angela Perry.
