Daddy By Accident. Paula Riggs Detmer
door slammed open.
“Call 911!” he shouted to the skinny nine-year-old girl who emerged. Without a word, Heidi Lanier made an abrupt about-face and disappeared inside.
As he sprinted across the grass toward the automobile, Boyd took quick stock of the situation. The vintage Trans Am that had collided with the massive fir was far too dated a model to have air bags. And if the occupants weren’t wearing their belts... Hoping for the best, he prepared himself for the worst.
The car had hit head-on, and the front end had jammed into the massive trunk with such force it had compressed the hood like a flimsy soda can. On impact, the driver had obviously gone through the windshield and lay sprawled facedown amidst shattered glass on the slanted hood. Bigger than most men, the driver appeared to be in his mid-thirties and, from the angle of the neck, not destined to get any older.
Even before Boyd skidded to a stop next to the wreck, he was tugging off one grimy leather work glove. Gasping for air, yet forcing himself to remain calm, he touched two fingers to the man’s carotid artery and prayed to feel even a faint pulse. Just as he’d suspected, the driver was dead or so close to it he doubted that even a fully equipped trauma team could save him.
Cursing the man’s folly at not wearing his seat belt, Boyd peered through the shattered windshield at the female passenger who was slumped forward against the seat belt, masses of curly brown hair obscuring her facial features.
A small woman with slender shoulders, she was dressed in a sloppy man’s shirt and shorts, and from what he could see, she appeared to be in her late twenties. There was a smear of blood on her head and blood on the dash, and she wasn’t moving.
Damn, he thought as he hurried around the rear of the car and reached for the door handle on the passenger side. The shiny chrome was blistering hot against his palm, and the door refused to budge, no matter how hard he jerked. Either the blasted thing was locked or the car’s frame had been sprung in the collision. He was about to make a dash for his truck and the pry bar in the rear tool compartment when he saw the woman in the passenger’s seat stirring.
“Ma‘am? Can you hear me?” he shouted through the glass. “Ma’am?”
Was someone calling her? Stacy turned her head and struggled to see through a haze of throbbing pain. It seemed an effort to blink, more of an effort to breathe. Ahead of her was a wall of greenery from the tree they’d hit.
Fighting off waves of sickness, she slowly swiveled her head back toward the driver’s seat, then wished she hadn’t. From a distance she heard buzzing in her head and felt her skin grow clammy. She’d fainted once during the early days of her pregnancy and recognized the warning signs.
“Ma’am? Listen to me.”
The voice seemed to come from very far away. Stacy blinked, turned back toward the window. For a moment she’d forgotten the man on the other side of the glass. With great effort she managed to bring the man’s form into sharper focus.
She saw his belt buckle first, cinching a low-slung carpenter’s belt over worn and dirty jeans. Above stretched a corded male torso the color of old bronze, which glistened under a tine sheen of sweat. His chest was massive, its obvious strength scarcely softened by a triangle of damp blond chest hair. His brawny arms were corded from the effort he was making to tug open the car door. Numbly she realized that he was trying to help her.
“Please help my ex-husband!” she cried.
He glanced past her, his face tightening for an instant before he returned his gaze to her face. She saw the truth in his eyes and felt a sob rising from her chest, part rage, part grief.
“He’s dead, isn’t he?” Her voice was hollow, a mere whisper.
From the questioning look that flashed in his eyes, she realized he couldn’t hear her through the glass. “Ma’am, can you unlock the door?”
Stacy blinked, tried to focus on her rescuer’s face through the streaked window glass. Though his features were partially shadowed by the brim of a straw cowboy hat, she made out the bold slash of tawny brows over deep-set eyes the color of tempered steel and a not-quite straight nose. His mouth was wide and compressed into a hard line.
“Ma’am? The door?”
Summoning what remained of her wits, she forced herself to focus. “It’s...not locked,” she said through cold lips.
“Jammed,” the man grated. At least that’s what she managed to make out. The thudding in her head was making it difficult to concentrate. After staring down at her for a second, he straightened and pulled something from his belt. A hammer, she realized after a moment of fierce concentration.
“I’m going to have to break the glass. I need you to cover your face,” he yelled.
Break the glass? That made sense, she thought and managed a nod before burying her face in hands that felt icy. She heard a crack, felt pebbles of safety glass showering her side, and cried out. A few seconds later, she lifted her head and saw him butting the remainder of the cracked glass from the window frame with huge, gloved hands. Then, with what looked like tremendous effort, he gripped the doorframe, braced his left foot on the side panel and pulled. Metal ground against metal in an earsplitting screech but refused to yield.
“Damn,” he muttered, easing his grip long enough to wipe the sweat from his eyes with the back of one thick wrist Teeth bared, tendons straining under bronzed skin, he tried again. Just when she was sure he would injure himself, the door yielded. An instant later she felt a blast of hot air hit her with the force of a freshly stoked furnace. She winced, blinked in the harsh glare, then tried to figure out what she was supposed to do next.
As though sensing her disorientation, her rescuer slowly squatted on his haunches, one tanned hand braced on the doorframe while he eased the seat belt from its latch with the other. He had removed his gloves, she noticed, and tucked them under his belt. He had large, rough hands, nicked here and there, and the wide, corded forearms of a working man.
She licked her lips and tried to formulate the words to thank him, only to have her train of thought interrupted by another voice close at hand. “Is she all right?”
Another face appeared in her field of vision. A young girl, waif thin, hovering at the stranger’s side. She looked to be nine or ten at the most—and terrified. Stacy tried to reassure her but found she had no strength.
“She’s going to be fine,” the man answered before asking curtly, “Is the ambulance on the way?”
“Yes, the lady at 911 said five minutes—”
“Which means at least ten because of the sewer work on Fifteenth,” he bit off impatiently.
“And she said to be sure and not move any of the passengers.”
“Right.” He leaned forward, his large body shielding Stacy from the searing sunshine. It hurt to draw the scorching air into her lungs, and yet she’d never felt so chilled. The shivers started inside, like a flood of icy water through her veins. When her teeth started to chatter, he uttered an oath before commanding, “Heidi, run and get a blanket from your house.”
“Be right back,” the girl told him before taking off running.
“I.. shouldn’t be...c-cold,” Stacy breathed between shudders.
“Won’t be long and you’ll be tucked into a nice warm ambulance.” He swept off his hat and dropped it to the ground outside the car. His hair was thick and blond and damp where wisps of lazy curls had been plastered to his forehead by the hatband.
“An h-hour ago I was w-wishing for w-winter.”
His grin flashed, but his dark gray eyes remained probing as he pulled a folded handkerchief from his back pocket and gently blotted her temple. When the folded hnen came away drenched in blood, she stared in bewilderment.
“Are you feeling any pain in your neck or your back?”
“No,” she