The Hopechest Bride by Kasey Michaels Page A

to him as she combed her hair, dry now, and a riot of tangled curls. She didn’t know that those curls shone brightly in the firelight, that her head looked topped by fire itself—warm, touchable fire that flowed down onto her shoulders.
    â€œI’ll…check on the horses,” Josh said from behind her, his voice sounding a little strained. Or maybe,Emily thought, it was the sound of the storm raging outside that had put this edge in his voice.
    â€œOkay,” Emily said, pulling back her hair, ruthlessly securing it in a ponytail at the base of her hairline. “I don’t know about you, but I’m exhausted, even if it is only nine o’clock. Besides, I’m hungry and we can’t eat anything else if we want the food to last, and I’m getting cold again and want to get inside the sleeping bag.”
    â€œYeah,” Josh said. “We can do an inventory of your food and mine in the morning, combine what we’ve got. Oh, and about the sleeping bag? I see that you’ve got a ground sheet, and so do I. That’ll keep us dry, but it won’t do much to hold off the cold of the ground in here, because sunless caves don’t exactly collect any heat during the day. Doubling them up will help some, but since we can’t both fit inside your sleeping bag, we’re going to have to unzip it completely and use it as a blanket for the both of us. It’s our shared body heat that’s going to keep us from hypothermia. But you’ve already figured that out, right?”
    Emily watched as Josh went over to the horses, adjusting their blankets, making sure their leads were well-secured beneath the rocks he’d used to keep them at least superficially tied. He checked the bandage on Molly, obviously satisfied with what he’d seen.
    He was so tall, his shoulders so broad, even as she could see that his upper body was in the shape of aT, narrowing to a flat stomach and tight waist, a compact backside and long legs hugged by his tight jeans.
    He was all whipcord muscle and easy grace. When he walked, in those boots of his, his entire body moved with each long stride, carrying his energy with him, his confidence swinging along with his arms. He was the Marlboro man without the dangerous cigarettes, the rugged, solitary hero on the cover of a Louis L’Amour novel, the secret dream of every silly teenage girl who’d ever been to the rodeo.
    And he was going to be sleeping next to her tonight, sharing his body heat with her tonight.
    Would sleep ever claim her?
    Would morning come soon enough?
    Would she wake in his arms, turning toward his heat during the night?
    If she did, what then?
    â€œHe hates you, remember?” Emily muttered under her breath, and then reached for the folded ground cloth, knowing she would have to make the bed she would lie in. “And you’re not all that cracked up about him.”
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    Josh stayed with the horses longer than necessary, fussing over them, checking each of their hooves, quietly talking to them as the storm kept them both skittish. Then he went to the front of the cave, inspecting the makeshift windbreak, looking out into the night sky, watching the rain that showed no sign of letting up.
    They could be here for at least one more day and night, as the hillside was rapidly turning into a mud bath that would make it nearly impossible for the horses to safely get down to flat country.
    Could he do this for another day and night? Hell, could he make it through this one night?
    He hadn’t counted on being in Emily Colton’s company for more than a few hours. He’d wanted to talk to her, tell her about Toby, make her see how gravely she’d injured his brother, injured him.
    And, yes, he’d wanted to hear her side of the story. He figured he owed her that much, if only because Toby had loved her. Maybe there had been some sort of extenuating circumstance, some reason she’d run away, left Toby