Page 480 of Conveniently Wed
“I can agree to that.” She leaned into him, and he gave her shoulders a squeeze, but didn’t linger. Everything about her moved him—her kindness, her love for all living things, her joy in giving.
Josiah awoke to a crackling, popping sound coming from outside. He flew out of bed. Something was glowing through the split in the curtains. He ran to the window and swept the drapes open.
Fire. His barn was aflame.
His mind exploded in a thousand directions as he pulled on his pants. His stomach dropped into the boots he was yanking on his feet when he remembered Katherine was helping with the foal.
Had she come in to her room? He crashed through the door separating the rooms to find an empty bed. He turned and bolted into the hall, then took the steps two at a time. The foal’s bed in the kitchen was empty, and Katherine was nowhere around.
He roared into the midnight air. “No. No. No.” This couldn’t be happening.
By the time he reached the barn, the flames were shooting into the sky, and a few of his workers held him back from entering.
“You can’t go in there, boss. It’s too far gone. We got some of the horses out, but not all.”
“Katherine.” He choked out her name. “Where’s Katherine?”
They looked at him blankly. With brute force, he ripped free.
The searing heat intensified as he pressed against the inferno, dodging flaming rafters that crashed to the floor.
“God, if you’re up there, save my Katherine. Save my baby.” Somehow, in that moment, his stubborn heart melted. Of course, the baby was his. Of course, Katherine loved him. She’d been showing him for months.
He checked the first few stalls but came up empty. The roars and squeals from the trapped horses in the other end of the collapsing barn pierced the air. The acrid smell of burning flesh seared his nostrils. The intensity of the heat and his inability to breathe collapsed him to his knees. Two strong sets of hands, one on each side, drug him from the inferno and across the yard.
All he cared about—his child, his horses, his future—burning to the ground in front of him, and he could do nothing more than stare. More than all of that, though…Katherine. He dropped to his knees as a groan ripped from his lips. “Oh God, not Katherine.”
“Josiah. Are you all right? Speak to me, my darling.”
A torturous hallucination swept through his mind. Her sweet words and the touch of her soft hand on his shoulders felt so real. He forced his eyes open, and the sight of a person bending over him made his pulse beat faster.
That was Katherine’s beautiful profile, outlined against the firelight behind her. He worked himself up to sitting.Dear, God. It was her.
He reached out and pulled her into his arms, crushing her to him. “You’re alive. Oh, dear God, I thought you were in the barn. I thought I lost you.”
“I’m right here.” Her words muffled against his neck.
“I tried to save you, but I couldn’t.” He kissed her hair, her face, her lips.
She pulled back. “Josiah, you’re hurt. We need to get you cleaned up and attend to your?—”
“I’m fine, now that I know you’re all right. But where were you?” All he could do was look at her, his hungry eyes feasting on the beautiful planes of the face he loved so much.
“Hank and I were on our way to the barn with the foal when we noticed some men with torches lighting the barn. He told me to call all the ranch hands and then get you, but when I got to the house, you were gone.”
A new anger kindled in his chest. “There were men lighting the barn on fire?”
“Hank screamed at them, and they ran off. But they’d set hay all around, so it lit up fast. He got out as many horses as he could, but, Josiah, we lost a lot.” Her voice quivered. “I’m so sorry.” Ringlets fell around her face, freed from the disheveled bun she had twisted on top of her head. She looked like an angel.
He gathered her in his arms, holding on with all his might. “The rest can be rebuilt, but I thought I lost you…and our baby.” A shudder ran through his body. What would he have done if he lost them both.
“Our baby is fine.” She pulled back, and he laid his hand on the mound between them. “Had it been any later, I would’ve been in there sleeping beside that foal. But God had me in His hands.”
“He saved you when I couldn’t.” He wrapped her in a fierce embrace.
“Yes, He did. But please, come in the house. I want to be sure?—”
“I’m more than fine, now that I know you’re all right.” He kissed her lips again, long and hard, before pulling back. “I’ll come in as soon as I can, but I have to finish out here with my men.”
