Just Imagine by Susan Elizabeth Phillips Read Free Book Online

and try again another day. She threw herself against the door, and when the lock didn't give, she began pounding it with her fists.
    Tears of fury and frustration choked her. " Let me in ! Let me in, you Yankee son of a bitch!"
    Nothing happened.
    She continued to pound, cursing and kicking.
    A jagged bolt of lightning shot from the sky and struck the maple that had so recently sheltered her. Kit screamed and threw herself inside.
    Directly into the arms of Baron Cain.
    "What in the hell…"
    The heat from his naked, sleep-warmed chest seeped through her cold, wet shirt, and for a moment, all she wanted to do was stay where she was, right there against him, until she could stop shivering.
    "Kit, what's wrong?" He grabbed her shoulders. "Has something happened?"
    She jerked back. Unfortunately, Merlin was behind her. She stumbled over him and sprawled down on the hard kitchen floor.
    Cain studied the tangled heap at his feet. His mouth quirked. "I take it this thunderstorm is a little too much for you."
    She tried to tell him he could go straight to Hades, but her teeth were chattering so hard she couldn't talk. She'd also landed on the revolver tucked in her britches, and a sharp pain shot through her hip.
    Cain stepped over them to shut the door. Unfortunately, Merlin chose that moment to shake himself off. "Ungrateful mutt." Cain grabbed a towel from a hook near the sink and began rubbing it over his chest.
    Kit realized her revolver would be visible under her clothes as soon as she stood up. While Cain was preoccupied drying off, she slipped it out of her britches and hid it behind a basket of apples near the back door.
    "I don't know which of you is more scared," Cain grumbled as he watched Merlin disappear down the hallway that led to Magnus's room. "But I wish you both could have waited till morning."
    "I'm sure not scared of a little damn rain," Kit retorted.
    Just then there was another crash, and she leaped to her feet, her face turning pale.
    "My mistake," he drawled.
    "Just because I—" She broke off and swallowed as she finally got a good look at him.
    He was nearly naked, wearing only a pair of dun-colored trousers slung low on his hips, with the top two buttons left unfastened in his haste to get to the door. She'd been around her share of scantily clad men working in the fields or at the sawmill, but now it was as if she'd never seen a one of them.
    His chest was broad and muscular,, lightly furred. A raised scar slashed one shoulder, and another jutted over his bare abdomen from the open waistband of his trousers. His hips were narrow and his stomach flat, bisected by a thin line of tawny hair. Her eyes inched lower to the point at which the legs of his trousers met. What she saw there fascinated her.
    "Dry yourself off."
    She lifted her head and saw him staring at her,, a towel extended in his hand, his expression puzzled. She grabbed the towel and reached under the collapsed brim of her hat to dab at her cheeks.
    "It might be easier if you'd take your hat off."
    "I don't want to take it off," she snapped, unsettled by her reaction. "I like my hat."
    With a growl of exasperation, he headed into the hallway, only to reappear with a blanket. "Get rid of those wet clothes. You can wrap up in this."
    She stared at the blanket and then at him. "I'm not takin' off my clothes!"
    Cain frowned. "You're cold."
    "I'm not cold!"
    "Your teeth are chattering."
    "Are not!"
    "Damn it, boy, it's three o'clock in the morning, I lost two hundred dollars at poker tonight, and I'm tired as hell. Now get out of those damned clothes so we can both get some sleep. You can use Magnus's room tonight, and I'd better not hear another sound from you till noon."
    "Are you deaf, Yankee? I said I wasn't takin' off any clothes!"
    Cain wasn't used to anybody standing up to him, and the grim set of his jaw told her she should have killed him right away. As he took a step forward, she shot toward the basket of apples where she'd hidden her gun,