Rescued By Mr. Wrong

CHAPTER TWENTY (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE (#litres_trial_promo)

EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)

Extract (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

PROLOGUE (#u861a2cb0-c641-5159-86c9-5966aca6771c)

“WHITEOUT CONDITIONS.” Those had been the radio forecaster’s words just a few minutes ago as Carrie slowly navigated the lakeshore route to her home in Fox Creek, Ohio. She couldn’t recall ever driving on such treacherous roads before, but now she knew exactly what was meant by “whiteout.” The paleness of the snow-covered asphalt seemed to blend with the white of the air around her as flurries mounted in intensity. The horizon had been obliterated, making the lanes of the highway indistinct and the sun only a gray, hazy memory. Her surroundings were muddled together, a vacuum of white, starkness and cold.

The sudden blizzard wasn’t the only frosty aspect of this holiday season. Her chilly conversation with her father last night was still fresh in her mind.

“I’m very disappointed, Carrie,” her father had said. “This is the first time you’ve missed Christmas, and I can’t imagine what is more important than being with your family.”

Once again her father had used the guilt factor to persuade her to do what he thought was best. Carrie was tired of explaining all her decisions. Besides, no one in the Foster family understood Carrie’s devotion to trees, especially the shoreline birches of central Michigan lakes that were showing serious effects of pesticide treatment.

Even worse, her father had followed up by announcing, “I’ve made you an appointment with a brilliant new allergist, Dr. Hower, for December 26. I don’t want to cancel.”

“Not another allergist, Dad,” she’d said. “We all know what I’m allergic to—nearly everything. I won’t be prodded and poked anymore!”

“Fine. Have it your way.” He’d been angry, but after a moment his tone had leveled. “Honey, I am the doctor in this family, and I’m only thinking of you.”

That statement had calmed her since it was true. Unfortunately, her father’s concern and medical expertise had left her longing for independence her entire life and a lot less mothering from her caring father. This time she was determined to chart her own course, which meant monitoring the experiments with her trees and refusing more asthma treatments.

Dr. Martin Foster had ended their uncomfortable conversation with a warning. “If you change your mind...”

“Daddy, I won’t.”

“If you do, don’t set out in the morning. Bad weather is predicted for Christmas Day.” As if he didn’t trust her to do anything he told her, he’d added, “I mean it, Carrie. Don’t drive if the forecast is unfavorable.”

When would he ever stop treating her like the baby of the family? Even babies grew up, and she was thirty years old. However, by that evening, Christmas Eve, she’d mellowed. With promises from her crew to continue her work, she’d decided to tackle the five-hour drive in the morning and arrive at her father’s estate, Dancing Falls, in time for Christmas dinner. She’d loaded her car with gifts and headed south for the normally easy drive. Hopefully she’d miss the worst of the weather.

But typical of Ohio winters, a freak blizzard, worse than predicted, had blown in off Lake Erie. The turnpike closed almost immediately, but the traffic app on her iPhone showed that the local two-lane roads were being cleared, leaving her route along the lake passable. That was a few hours ago. Now, in midafternoon, she still had more than two hours to drive in rapidly deteriorating conditions.

Carrie slowed her small foreign car, impractical for blizzard conditions, to a crawl, and was still unable to determine where the road ended and the shoulder began. She hadn’t seen another pair of headlights in miles, so she wasn’t worried about hitting another car. She gripped her steering wheel and plowed ahead. This storm couldn’t last forever. She pictured her father sitting in his chair by the fireplace, secure in the knowledge that his daughter wouldn’t dare ignore his warning and be foolish enough to set out in a storm. He would be furious if he knew she was out in this weather.

Vapor collected on the inside of her windshield, so Carrie lowered her window a few inches to let in fresh air. Just in case, she reached inside the pocket of her purse where she always kept her inhaler. Sometimes, thank goodness not often, a sudden blast of frigid air could bring on an asthma attack.

This was obviously not her lucky day. The wind rushed around the knit stocking cap over her head and seemed to flow downward and settle directly in her lungs. She felt her airways constrict with a tingling pain that signaled a problem. She put the inhaler between her lips, depressed the button and breathed in the lifesaving medicine.

Several seconds later she found herself staring into a pair of bright gold eyes. She braked suddenly, and her heart raced as she realized she was sliding toward a deer, a beautiful fawn-colored creature who stood in the road and was probably as shocked to find herself out on a day like this as Carrie was. Carrie swerved. The deer took flight.

Before she could contemplate the miracle that the deer’s life had been spared, Carrie’s car skidded on a patch of ice. She braked with a slow and steady pressure as she’d been taught by a driver’s education instructor. The car began to fishtail. Turn the steering wheel in the direction of the skid or away from it? She couldn’t remember. She lost control. The car veered off the road as if it had a mind of its own and spun in a complete circle before plowing into a bank of snow and hitting something solid.

Carrie felt the impact in every bone. A sharp pain sliced up her right leg as the car’s air bag exploded around her chest. Her forehead connected with a bone-rattling jolt against the top of the steering wheel. Carrie thought of her family snug and safe at Dancing Falls. Images of her two sisters, her niece and nephew, her dad, swirled in her mind before she lost consciousness.

CHAPTER ONE (#u861a2cb0-c641-5159-86c9-5966aca6771c)

LATELY, KEEGAN BREEN was the last person anyone should count on to run an errand of mercy. And he was just fine with that. He didn’t ask anyone to do anything for him, and he appreciated the return consideration. However, this Christmas Day was something of an emergency. His neighbor Duke struggling to cope with memory loss associated with his eighty-six years, had forgotten to order his heart medication, and he needed to take it every day, or... Well, even Keegan didn’t want to be responsible for that.

So Keegan had called Duke’s doctor and discovered that the MD had some samples of Duke’s meds in his home. Keegan then ventured out in the snow to pick up a couple of pills. What had started out as a short twelve-mile journey to town in light snowfall had now become an hour’s pain-in-the-neck trek in blizzard conditions.

“Lake-effect snow,” Keegan muttered to himself. A person never knew when it would do its worst, but that was the chance he took living on the shore of Lake Erie. Thank goodness his seven-year-old Chevy Tahoe—with its 350 horses, V-8 engine and two tons of steel on a truck chassis—could barrel through almost anything.

He slowed for the curve about a mile from the abandoned Cedar Woods Campground where Keegan lived in the old camp store and Duke lived in a small trailer. Through the whiteout conditions, Keegan managed to see a pair of red taillights glowing faintly from a mound of snow left by an earlier plow. He braked to a crawl and stopped behind the motorist who’d obviously lost his mind to be out in this weather on a holiday. Especially without a “blizzard beast” like the Tahoe.

Getting out of his vehicle, Keegan walked around to the driver’s side of the compact car. A few more minutes and the ridiculous little two-seater might have been buried in a mini avalanche, leaving the driver to become a human popsicle.

Pulling his jacket collar around his ears where his ball cap stopped short of providing protection, Keegan approached the driver’s window. Snow had accumulated, but it was light and dusty, not the kind that sticks the moment it lands. He brushed off the snow with his heavily gloved hand and peered inside.

Besides a mound of wrapped packages, only one person was in the automobile—a woman, slumped over the limp remains of an air bag, and one who apparently didn’t have the sense to listen to a weather forecast before venturing out on a day like this. Even more astounding, the gal had left her window partially opened and snow was settling on her shoulders and head.

“Lady!” Keegan called. “Lady, are you okay?”

She wasn’t. Keegan saw a faint stream of red coming from her forehead. He’d seen enough head injuries in his day to know the possibility of serious complications. He tried the door. Locked. With about four inches of opening to work with, he slipped off his glove and stuck his hand in the window, wiggling his arm downward to the door lock. Thank goodness he was able to reach the button and pull it up.

He opened the car door. The woman didn’t move. Her breathing seemed labored. “Darned air bag must have knocked the wind out of her,” Keegan said aloud. He’d never thought they were a good idea. He wasn’t crazy about seat belts either, especially now when he had to work his fingers through deflated nylon to free the woman.

The seat belt latch clicked, and the woman moaned and tried to sit upright. She managed to turn her head and stared with partially closed eyes at Keegan. Those eyes popped wide open instantly. Visibility was poor, but he figured she’d seen enough to be freaked out by his appearance, so he backed up a step. Meticulous grooming wasn’t at the top of his list of priorities these days.

She stuck out her hand and pounded his chest with a weak fist. “Leave me alone,” she said.

Keegan leaned in the car door. “If I do, you’ll freeze to death out here. And you have a head injury.”

She struggled to take a breath. “I do?”

“Yes, and who knows what else is wrong. You’ve driven your car into a snowbank and hit one of our scenic telephone poles.”

She continued staring at him as if he were her worst nightmare. “Call an ambulance,” she said.

“You don’t want me to do that. If I call for an ambulance, it would take forever in this weather for it to reach us. Plus, we’d be putting the drivers at risk. Your best bet is to go with me.”

“Go with you? I don’t even know you.”

“I don’t know you either, but I’m willing to take the risk,” the man said. “Now, let’s get you out of that car, so we can get you medical help. You could have serious injuries.”

“I do,” she said through gritted teeth. “I think I broke my leg.”

* * *

CARRIE FELT LIKE a knife had sliced into her calf. She touched her head and stared at the sticky red mess on her fingers. Definitely bleeding, but the cold was slowing it down some. What was she going to do now? Miles from nowhere, a broken leg, a damaged head, an asthma attack, and no one but this large, grisly-looking man to help her. His hair reached his shoulders, and he looked like he hadn’t shaved in a month.