She snorted and pulled the waiting bread from the toaster.She grabbed a butter look-alike spread and worked it over the crisp toast then made her way to the table with two plates in hand.He followed her and dished out the eggs before returning the skillet to the stovetop.
As he pulled out a chair and sat next to her, the lights flickered.
McKenna froze.“Shit,” she breathed.
The lights snapped off and the energy drained out of the appliances.Silence replaced the hum of electricity.
Pop!Pop!
The sharp bursts of sound had come from outside.
“What the hell was that?”He shot to his feet and caught her arm.
***
McKenna ran tothe front of the cabin and snagged her coat from the hook on the wall.The generator shouldn’t be out of gas—she’d filled it the previous night, before Jaxon arrived.Shoving her arms through the sleeves, she spun around to backtrack through the kitchen to the back door and smacked right into the wall of Jaxon’s chest.He caught her biceps in his palms.
“What are you doing?”The edge to his voice made her drag her gaze from the waffle-knit black material all the way up to his formidable green eyes.Her stomach quaked.His eyes bore into hers, stripping her and leaving her vulnerable.Damn, the dude had the most intense stare.It didn’t kick up fear, oh no.Instead, it made her want to know more about him, made her want to see him as easily as he saw her.Ridiculous.He was injured, scared of the roaming mountain lion, and paranoid about going outside—nothing more.
She reached for the zipper of her coat and yanked it up.In the process, her knuckle swept over the crotch of his jeans.What lay beneath was hard, firm, and...large.She gulped.Warmth tingled up her neck.
“The generator’s out.I have to check it.”
A flare of intrigue lightened the weight on his brow, and his gaze dropped to her fingers, still clutched at the zipper on her chest.A muscle jumped in the center of his cheek.“That’s a bad idea.If anything, the snow’s gotten thicker.I didn’t realize you were living off a generator.”
She rolled her eyes to the ceiling.“Phone lines are out.Where’d you think the power was coming from?”Her grandfather had lived almost entirely off the grid.He had a greenhouse on the property, a garden in the summer months, well water, rain water, and solar panels.When the power went out, as it did a dozen times a year, the generator kicked in.She kept a week’s worth of gas in the shed out back, just as he’d instructed before he passed away and left her with the property.
“So let it be out.We can check it when the storm settles.”
She popped her hip.“It might not settle for another day or two.I have to look in case something needs to be fixed.Don’t worry,” she said, tipping her lips into a smirk.“You can stay inside where it’s warm and safe.”
He dropped his hands from her arms and straightened.Offense wrinkled his brow.“I’m notscared.”
She snorted.“You have every right to be.”
“I’m not.”He sounded like a ten-year-old.“And I sure as hell am not letting you go out alone.”He snatched his coat from behind her.“But if that thing eats one of us, let it be known I tried to warn you.”
A laugh tickled her throat.She shoved her hands into her still-damp mittens.“Noted.”
He muttered something under his breath as he scooped up his shoes in one hand and the gun in the other.Picking up her boots, she led the way to the back door.Once she was bundled, she unlocked the old deadbolt.Jaxon’s hand on the glass in front of her face stopped her from opening the door.
“Let me look first.”
She inched up her eyebrows but opted not to say anything that might get under his skin.His face came close to her temple as he leaned forward.Their warm breath clouded the glass, and a million erotic images flashed in her mind.He wiped his hand over the condensation and stared outside.
“I don’t see anything,” she said, searching the piles of white.Normally, she saw them as a symbol of the beauty of nature, but today, the growing mounds felt increasingly ominous.She had food stocked up in the cold room; water too.Tanks of fuel and everything they’d need to keep warm.Yet the possibility of being snowed in, without means of escape, made fear dance a warning over her neck.
“Looks clear to me too.”
She pushed open the door and a gust of wind swirled inside the smallest crevice of her coat.She tucked her mouth as far into her jacket as she could and brushed over the porch and down the two steps to where the path lay feet beneath the snow.The white powder hit her thighs, but she barreled through.If she slowed, it’d just be harder to walk.Jaxon must have had the same plan because his fast-approaching steps closed in on hers.
She rounded the side of the cabin and advanced on the generator.Other than to fill it with fuel, she never touched the thing.She bent down and looked at the hose.The machine’s usual hum had ceased.
Jaxon moved close and dragged his gloved hand along the cord that disappeared into the utility room, where it fed energy to the fuse box.“The cord’s damaged.”He lifted the orange plastic.Sure enough, the cord was partially severed.
“How’d that happen?”
“Hard to say.It’s badly frayed.Maybe wildlife got to it?”
