Wild in the Moment Read Online Free

and pictures and keepsakes. Cluttered or not, Daisy judged it to be potentially the warmest room in the house, which was why she’d set up everything here. It was basic winter storm thinking. Conserve energy. Conserve resources. Not to mention, she didn’t want to intrude on the Cunninghams’ house or stuff any more than she had to.
    All that seemed pretty solid planning—only, she’d been running on fumes for hours now. At least she wasn’t still cold, but she was darn close to falling asleep standing up—and there were still three chores she absolutely had to do.
    One was fill the bathtubs, for an emergency watersource. The second was food. Soup would do, but she simply had to get something in her stomach soon.
    And then there was the other chore.
    The kindling took. She watched the little flames lick around the branches, then catch on a small log, and knew her baby fire was going to make it. So she dusted her hands on her fanny and stood up. With a frown deeper than a crater, she aimed for the kitchen.
    He was her other chore.
    Somehow he had to be moved—but how on earth was she supposed to move a man almost twice as big as she was?
    Hands on hips, she edged closer. Long before she’d started the house preparations, she’d tackled what she could for the stranger. Feeling guiltier than a prowler, she’d opened cupboards and drawers until she’d located the Cunninghams’ first-aid supplies. As quickly as she could, then, she’d put a clean towel under his head and tried to cleanse the head wound. After that, she tugged off his boots. He’d groaned so roughly when she touched his right foot that she’d gingerly explored, pulling off his sock—and found one ankle swollen like a puff ball.
    Great. Another injury. She’d wrapped the ankle with some tape—God knew that might be the wrong thing if he had a broken bone. But doing nothing seemed the worse choice, so she kept moving, packed the ankle in some ice, then covered him with a light blanket for shock. For quite a while she just stayed there with him, hunkered down, worried sick he was going to die on her—until she realized she was acting like a scared goose.
    She wasn’t helping him, staying there and tucking the blanket around him another dozen times. The only thingshe could do was get her butt in gear and do some survival preparation stuff. So she’d done all that, but now…
    Damn. She couldn’t just leave him on the hard kitchen floor. It was drafty, cold, dirty. The couch or carpet in the living room was warmer, safer, more protected.
    But how to move him, without moving his right ankle or his head? How to move his weight at all?
    She thought, then trekked upstairs, thinking Mrs. Cunningham had to have a linen closet somewhere. She found it and pulled a sheet from the bottom shelf, hoping it wasn’t a good one. The plan was to somehow wrestle him onto the sheet, with the hope that she’d be able to pull him across the floor that way.
    If that didn’t work… But she amended that thought. It had to work. She had no other ideas.
    Crouching down, she gently pushed and prodded until she’d maneuvered the sheet under his weight. It took a while, partly because she was so worried about injuring him further, and partly because she kept glancing at his face.
    He took her breath away; she had to admit it. He just had the kind of looks that really rang her chimes. Rugged jaw, dusted with whiskers. The kind of thick, rough hair that never stayed brushed, not too short, not too styled, just…himself. Shoulders that wouldn’t be subdued in an ordinary shirt. Jeans worn soft, the kind that said he didn’t give a damn what they looked like.
    Physical, she thought dispassionately. One look, and she could immediately picture him hot and sweaty, throwing a woman on the bed and diving in after her. The kind of guy who was lusty about sex, lusty about life, lusty