CHAPTER TWO

      Everything happened so quickly. There were blinding lights, the squeal of brakes and horror surging within her. As if the world had been reduced to slow motion, Mallory saw the headlights dip down from the force of the brakes grabbing the pavement, then, miraculously, the car stopped, inches from the back of her car, not from her.

      She heard the engine throbbing, and the smell of burned rubber was in the air. Relief swelled up inside her as she realized the driver hadn’t been heading for her. The things that had happened in the last twenty-four hours had left her nerves raw.

      Mallory gulped air into her tight lungs and rubbed her trembling hands on her raincoat, almost giddy from relief. As she fumbled with her hood, trying to tug it back over her now-soaked hair, she heard a car door slam and saw movement. A hulking shadow emerged from the idling car, then came toward her.

      The driver cut in front of the headlights, and Mallory could make out a tall man in a dark coat, carrying an umbrella. He strode directly for her. Nerves that were painfully jittery tingled as she was struck by how vulnerable she was on a dark, deserted road, at night, alone, with no protection at all.

      By the time the idea of getting back in her car and locking the door had formed, the man was right in front of her. She pushed her hands into her pockets and curled them into tight fists to stop their trembling, while she carefully watched the stranger silhouetted in the headlights.

      “What in the hell’s going on?” The voice that came out of the stormy night was rough, deep and angry. “I didn’t see you until I was almost on you!”

      “I missed the curve, and the car…it went out of control. That’s where it ended up.”

      “Did you hit something?” he asked, his body partially blocking the lights. The darkness seemed to surround the man, and the driving rain blurred everything.

      “I lost control, and the car fishtailed. It sank in the mud on the shoulder.” She found herself talking quickly, as nervousness grew in her. “It’s stuck, and I thought I might just as well walk for help than sit here in the storm. I didn’t think anyone would be coming this way.”

      “Where did you think you were walking to on this road?”

      “I was looking for Mills Way.”

      He took a step closer to her, and she had to fight the urge to match that step backward to keep what buffer she could between them. “Mills Way?”

      Cold rain found its way under her collar and trickled down her back, sending a chill through her. “Yes, I’m supposed to be meeting someone who lives on that road.”

      “Saxon Mills.” It wasn’t a question, just a statement.

      “How did—?”

      “There’s only one house on that road.” The man shifted, and the headlights shone directly on her once again. Although she couldn’t see his eyes or even his expression, she knew he was staring at her…hard. She had a flashing memory of the man at the theater the night before and how thankful she’d been that she hadn’t met him on a dark, deserted road.

      The chill in her deepened. Her thoughts were going off on tangents that made no sense, and she narrowed her eyes against the glare. “I just want to get to that road.”

      “I could have killed you,” he finally muttered.

      Mallory felt her chest tighten, the memory of Sara lying on the rainy street so vivid that she ached. She’d been through too much, and her imagination was running wild in the most horrible way tonight. She pushed her hands deeper into her pockets and hunched her shoulders a bit as the rain beat down. “It’s my fault. I never thought—”

      “You should have put on your hazard lights. Anyone coming around that curve could plow right into your car.”

      “I didn’t think about that, either.” The temperature felt as if it had dropped ten degrees in the last few minutes. “I just need to get to Saxon Mills’s home. Is there any way you could take me to a pay phone or to a house where I could call from?”

      She didn’t expect him to say, “I can take you all the way to Mills’s estate.”

      As soon as he agreed, Mallory realized it hadn’t been the smartest thing to say to a total stranger—offering to get into his car and drive off into the night. She tried to backtrack a bit. “It might be better if I stay with my car, and you can call a garage to come and pull me out of the mud.”

      “You can do that, but I’m afraid this isn’t the city. There’s no garage that would be open now. But if you want to wait here, I’ll call when I get to a phone and maybe you’ll get lucky. If not, lock the doors and someone will be here in the morning.”

      Mallory had taken care of herself since she was barely a teenager, and maybe she hadn’t made the best decisions in the world, but she had often survived on her instinct. And right now her instinct for survival told her to take the ride, thank the man, get to Mills’s house and try to salvage the job if she could. “I don’t want to wait here all night,” she admitted. “I’ll take the ride.”

      “Then put on your emergency lights and let’s get going.”

      Mallory didn’t have to be told twice. She went to her car, opened the door, reached inside, pushed the button for the emergency lights, and they began to flash brilliant yellow into the rain and night. She closed the door, and as she turned, she stumbled on the slippery ground.

      The man had her by the upper arm in the next second, his strong fingers pressing through the cotton of her soaked raincoat and steadying her. Mallory felt as if one of the bolts of lightning had shot through her at the contact, then he was urging her toward his car. “Let’s get out of here,” he said, close to her side.

      By moving quickly ahead of him, she broke the contact. Keeping her head down to watch her footing on the rain-soaked road, she got to the car and could make out the dark shape of a low sports car with an engine that purred with a throaty idle. An expensive car.

      Mallory circled to the passenger side, but before she could open the door, the man was there, reaching around her to pull the handle up. He was so close that Mallory felt his heat, and she inhaled the mingled scent of rain, mellow after-shave and a certain maleness. Then the door was open, and Mallory quickly got into the brown leather interior lit softly by dome and side lights.

      She saw a dash that glowed with red-and-green gages, and instruments that would make a jet plane look simple. As the door closed, the interior lights went out. Mallory settled in the bucket seat and pushed the hood from her wet hair and swiped at the hair clinging to her face, then turned as the driver’s door opened.

      The interior lights flashed on again as the stranger easily maneuvered his rangy frame behind the leather-covered steering wheel. As he turned to push the umbrella into the area behind the front seats, Mallory got a clear look at him and she felt her breath catch.

      The man from the theater, as dark as the night itself, and as disturbing as the storm that crashed around them outside. “You,” she breathed.

      He looked right at her as he ran a hand over his damp black hair, slicking it back from his roughly handsome face. “The Ghost of Christmas Past,” he murmured, his dark eyes unblinking and intense in their scrutiny.

      “How could…?” She touched her tongue to her lips. She could sense that aura of danger he had exuded last night at the theater, and that sensuality, as well, and she felt uncomfortable in these closed quarters. “How could you be here?”

      The wind caught the door and slammed it shut, cutting off the lights inside, but it did nothing to diminish the impact of finding herself in this man’s car. He turned to settle behind the wheel. “I drove and didn’t go into a ditch.”

      “I’m not in a ditch,” she said, hating the way her breathing tightened