Dixie Browning - The Beauty, The Beast And The Baby

Why the hell wasn’t she wearing a coat? “You ought to dress for the weather,” he said gruffly, embarrassed at being caught staring at her body. He’d always had a weakness for her kind of looks, but when a guy was half dead from the flu, when he’d just been dumped by a woman he had actually bought a ring for, when his stomach was growling from hunger and acid was burning a hole in his gut, he had to be some kind of a pervert even to notice things like that.

Especially in a situation like this.

He made up for it by ratcheting up his scowl. “Look, this is Florida, lady, but let’s get real. It’s raining out there. It’s February, it’s cold as a well-digger’s assets, and the overhead pipes have busted big-time. You got a coat somewhere?”

The attendant glanced out the clouded window as two cars pulled in.“ Lady, you’re gonna hafta move your car, okay? You’re blocking the high-test.”

“Shut up,” Gus said without even glancing up. “What about a spare key? You got one stashed out someplace?”

“Under the hood, on the right side, on the thingamabob.”

“The thingamabob. Right. Don’t go away, I’ll be right back.”

And he was gone, leaving Mariah feeling lost and alone. Which wasn’t like her at all. Ever since she’d answered the phone at four-thirty this morning and heard poor Basil’s latest tale of woe, she seemed to have screwed up everything she touched. She was miles away from home and practically all the money she had in the world had been in her billfold, and now it was gone. She was wet, sticky and cold. The jet stream had moved south for the winter, and all her winter clothes were in the attic of her house back in Muddy Landing.

Truly, she’d had better days, she thought. When the bearded stranger came back inside, she tried to force a smile, but evidently it wasn’t very convincing. He walked right up to her and clamped his big square hands on her upper arms and squeezed.

Hard.

“Here, I found this in your back seat. Better put it on before you catch something”. He held out her vinyl slicker, and she slid her arms into the sleeves, wincing as the stiff plastic scraped her injured hand.

At that moment Mariah wanted nothing so much as to lean against the tough-looking stranger with the beard and the worn Western boots, close her eyes and forget everything. At least for a moment. For just a single minute, until she could think of what to do next.

Instead, she tilted her chin and tried to look as if she had everything under control. Which, evidently, was no more convincing than her smile had been.

He moved in closer until she could feel his heat, smell the mingled scent of leather and coffee and something essentially male. Which, oddly enough, was more reassuring than threatening.

“Hey, hey, now,” he rasped. “It’s not so bad. We’ll get you sorted out in no time.”

Mariah made a real effort to pull herself together, if only because her bearded good Samaritan seemed to expect it of her. She never liked to let anyone down, and besides—he was a lot kinder than he looked. Aside from that prison pallor of his and his shaggy beard, and the fact that he had a tendency to scowl a lot, he wasn’t unattractive. Not handsome, certainly, but there was a rugged strength about him that was mighty appealing at the moment.

“I’ll be fine,” she murmured huskily. She fully intended to be, only it was going to take a bit of doing. “I’m just not used to being robbed,” she said with a smile that was part bravado, part an effort at self-deception.

Turning away, she asked the clerk if she could use his telephone to call the police, not that she expected any results.

“Pay phone’s outside next to the compressor,” the attendant told her. She glared at him, and he had the grace to look embarrassed. Grudgingly, he indicated the private phone between the cash register and the jar of pickled eggs.

Dialing was a problem. Just one of several she was about to face, Mariah suspected, hanging up the phone a few minutes later.

The other man had gone outside again. He came in just as she was hanging up the phone, looking concerned under his intimidating scowl.“ You got a name?” he asked.

“Mariah Brady.”

“Gus Wydowski,” he returned. “Look, Miss Brady, what about credit cards? If you had ‘em, you might want to put in a stop call.”

“Oh, Lord, my cards.” She was beginning to tremble. Panic hove red just over the horizon.

“Driver’s license, checkbook, keys…” He frowned, and Mariah wondered if he were capable of another expression.

“At least they headed south. I live north of here.”

He nodded absently, his mind obviously miles away. Probably eager to be shed of her problems and be on his way. She noticed for the first time that his eyes were an unusual shade of dark blue, and that he had two scars on his face, one leading into his hairline, another disappearing under his beard.

“Were you carrying much cash?” he asked, and she was tempted to tell him it was none of his business, but she supposed she owed him a civil answer.

Her hand was beginning to throb painfully.“ Don’t ask,” she said, which was about as civil as she could manage at the moment. She’d been carrying four hundred and seventy-three dollars and odd change. To some people, it might not be much. To Mariah, it was a fortune. Except for a minimum balance in her hometown bank, a five-thousand-dollar CD that wouldn’t mature for several months and a run-down house in a tiny community where property values were a standing joke, it represented her entire life’s savings.

It had been Vic Chin who had told her once that her face—or to be more precise, her bone structure—was her fortune. The trouble was, bone structure wouldn’t pay the bills. Nor would it buy many groceries.

“How far are you going?” Gus Wydowski had a gruff way of speaking, almost as if his throat hurt.

“Muddy Landing,” she said morosely. “It’s in Georgia, near Darien.”

“Near Darien. Right,” he said, and she could tell from his tone that he’d never heard of Darien.

“Between Brunswick and Savannah, on the Little Charlie River,” she elaborated. Actually, the Little Charlie was more of a creek, barely navigable since it had silted up. It was used mostly by trappers and fishing guides. The whole town had been built on a wetland before the Environment Protection Agency had even discovered wetlands, which was why property there was virtually worthless.

Gus was staring down at her swollen hand. Mariah stared, too. She could have cried— would have cried—if crying wouldhave done any good. Some models she knew actually insured certain body parts. She pictured herself moving down the catwalk to the music, concentrating on every cue—smile here, open jacket here, pause here, drop stole and turn.

Great! Her jacket-opening hand was ruined. If she’d needed a sign, maybe this was it.

“You’re going to have the devil of a time driving with that, you know.”

She knew. She was going to have the devil of a time driving on an empty tank, too, but she didn’t think their friend behind the counter would advance her much credit. One cheekbone’s worth of high-test, please?

“I’ll manage,” she said, but Gus had already turned away. During the few moments it took him to stride down one aisle and up another, snatching a roll of paper towels and a box of plastic bags from the shelves, two women came in to use the rest room. Both stared at her curiously, and Mariah had an idea it was not because they recognized her from her brief career as a fashion model.

Gus ripped a plastic bag from the box, filled it at the ice machine, sealed it up and then tore open the roll of paper towels. A few long strides in the cluttered little store brought him back again, so close she could smell the leather of his coat and a hint of some smoky, spicy scent that reminded her of long-ago cookouts in the woods. If he wore a cologne, it wasn’t obvious.