Landon. Delores Fossen
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have to help me,” Tessa whispered, her voice barely audible.
Yeah, he did have to help. Just because he didn’t like or trust her, that didn’t mean he wouldn’t save her. Landon didn’t want to move her any farther, though, in case she was injured, so he fired off a text to get an ambulance on the way.
Both the baby and she had no doubt inhaled a lot of smoke, but at least the baby’s face didn’t have any soot on it, which meant maybe the blanket had protected him or her.
“Did you hear me?” he snapped. “Why were you near the burning barn? And whose baby is that?”
He wanted to ask about that dyed hair, too, but it could wait. Though it was likely a dye job to change her appearance.
Landon couldn’t think of a good reason for her to do that. But he could think of a really bad one—she was on the run and didn’t want anyone to recognize her. Well, she’d picked a stupid place to hide.
If that was what she’d been doing.
She stared up at him. Blinked several times. “Who are you?” she asked.
Landon gave her a flat look. “Very funny. I’m not in the mood for games. Answer those questions I asked and then tell me about Emmett.”
“Emmett?” she repeated. She touched her hand to her head, her fingers sliding through her hair. She looked at the ends of the dark strands as if seeing them for the first time. “What did you do to me?”
Landon huffed. “I saved your life. And the baby’s.”
At the mention of the word baby, Landon got a bad feeling.
He quickly did the math, and it’d been seven months, more or less, since he’d landed in bed with Tessa. And he hadn’t laid eyes on her since. Seven months might mean...
“Is that our baby?” he demanded.
As she’d done with her hair, she looked down at the newborn who was squirming in her arms. Tessa didn’t gasp, but it was close. Her gaze flew to his, the accusation all over her face.
“I don’t know,” she said, her breath gusting now.
That wasn’t the right answer. In fact, that wasn’t an acceptable answer at all.
He didn’t hold Tessa in high regard, but she would know who’d fathered her child. If it was indeed Landon, she might also be trying to keep the baby from him. After all, they hadn’t parted on good terms, and those terms had gotten significantly worse with Emmett’s murder.
Damn.
Were Tessa and he parents?
No. They couldn’t be. The kid had to be Joel Mercer’s and hers, and even though Landon had plenty of other reasons for his stomach to knot, just thinking of Joel’s name did it. That night, seven months ago, Tessa had sworn she was through with Joel, but Landon would bet his next two paychecks that she had gone right back to him.
She always did.
In the distance, Landon heard the wail of the sirens from the fire engine. It’d be here soon. The ambulance, too. And then Tessa would be whisked away to the hospital, where she could pull another disappearing act.
“Start talking,” Landon demanded, getting right in her face. “Tell me everything, and I mean everything.”
The baby and the ends of her brown hair weren’t the only thing she looked at as though she’d never seen them before. Tessa gave Landon that same look.
“Who are you?” she repeated, her eyes filling with tears. “Whose baby is this?” Tessa stopped, those teary blue eyes widening. “And who am I?”
She couldn’t catch her breath. Couldn’t slow down her pulse. Nor could she fight back the tears that were stinging her eyes. Her heart seemed to be beating out of her chest, and everything inside her was spiraling out of control.
Where was she?
And who was this man staring at her?
Except it wasn’t only a stare. He was glaring, and she could tell from the tone of his voice that he was furious with her.
But why?
With the panic building, she frantically studied his face. Dark brown hair. Gray eyes. He was dressed like a cowboy, in jeans, a white shirt and that hat. But he also had a gun.
God, he had a gun.
Gasping, she scrambled to get away from him. She was in danger. She didn’t know why or from what, but she had to run.
She clutched the baby closer to her. The baby wasn’t familiar to her, either, but there was one thought that kept repeating in her head.
Protect her.
She knew instinctively that it was a baby girl, and she was in danger. Maybe from this glaring man. Maybe from someone else, but she couldn’t risk staying here to find out. Somehow she managed to get to her feet.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” the man snarled.
She didn’t answer. It felt as if all the muscles in her legs had disappeared, and the world started to spin around, but that didn’t stop her. She took off running.
However, she didn’t get far.
The man caught her almost immediately, and he dragged them to the ground. Not a slam. It was gentle, and he eased his hands around hers to cradle the baby. While she was thankful he was being so careful, that didn’t mean she could trust him.
She heard the sirens getting louder with each passing second. Soon, very soon, there’d be others, and she might not be able to trust them, either.
“I have to go,” she said, struggling again to get away from him.
But the man held on. “Tessa, stop it!”
She froze. Tessa? Was that really her name? She repeated it several times and knew that it was. Finally, something was clear. Her name was Tessa, and she was somewhere on a farm or ranch. Near a burning building. And this man had saved her.
Maybe.
Or maybe he just wanted her to think that so she wouldn’t try to run away from him.
“How do you know me?” she asked.
He gave her that look again. The one that told her the answer was obvious. It wasn’t, not to her, anyway. But he must have known plenty about her, because he’d asked if the baby was theirs.
She didn’t know if it was.
Mercy, she didn’t know.
“You know damn well who I am,” he snapped. “I’m Landon Ryland.”
That felt familiar, too, and it stirred some different feelings inside her. Both good and bad. But Tessa couldn’t latch on to any of the specific memories that went with those feelings. Her head was spinning like an F5 tornado.
“Landon,” she repeated. And she caught on to one of those memories. Or maybe it was pieces of that jumble that were coming together the wrong way. “I was in bed with you. You were naked.”
That didn’t help his glare, and she had no idea if she’d actually seen him without clothes or if her mind was playing tricks on her. If so, it was a pretty clear trick.
A fire engine squealed to a stop, the lights and sirens still going, but Tessa ignored them for the time being, and she gave the man a harder look. She saw the badge then. He was a lawman. But that didn’t put her at ease, and she wasn’t sure why.
“Can I trust you?” she came out and asked.
He grunted, and then he studied her. “Is