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"Yeah, I do" Her grip fir on in a way she hadn’t done in a long tiency vehicles squealed to a stop beside theo God, he’d ht

She frowned "JT, I really have to tell you--"

A paraht, et her out faster"

JT backed away "We’ll talk later" He would pro, even one of those conversations she craved "Hang on and we’ll talk all you want soon"

The para through the passengerto sit beside her He placed a C-shaped collar to stabilize her neck, draped her with a protective blanket

Then noise ensued, grinding and groaning of metal as the Jaws of Life pried her free His wife’s every wince sliced through hi the endless extraction

Of course, he already knew just how difficult it was to cut Rena out of anywhere Hell, he’d been trying to cut her out of his life for months without a lick of luck

Christos Price hated whatever dorky unlucky star he’d been born under It totally sucked being dooeekdom

Elbow hooked out the openof his uard’s station leading into Charleston Air Force Base housing At least with his friends Shelby Dawson and John Murdoch he could be hi but cool

Chris accelerated past the never-ending pines and oaks lining the street He could wear double his regular wardrobe of baggy cargo shorts, open button-down shirt over a T-shirt, and the extra layers still wouldn’t be enough to pad his bony body

What guy wanted to be the "spitting ie" of his short, scrawny irls, but it really blew uys Especially when all the other dudes in high school were so freaking big

He was tired of hearing that five foot eight was a respectable height for a sixteen-year-old and that he would hit a growth spurt soon Easy enough for his dad to say from three inches over six feet tall with more muscles than a linebacker

Then his dad would ask hi a few muscles around his spindly ar And that’s exactly what he was

Nothing

Clicking the turn signal, Chris rounded the corner toward Shelby’s house At least he wasn’t getting pounded at school anyuys off hi-band wimp just because he played the trueek Of course he was tall, a senior, tall, a wrestler, tall and had a girlfriend

Shelby

God, she was so hot Nice Totally hung up on Murdoch

And, hey, had he uy was tall?

Except Murdoch was also a friend, which irl Not that she would have noticed a dweeb like him that way

But man, he noticed her

Her corner lot caed on a quilt in the side yard playing with her little brother while Murdoch sprawled asleep She didn’t see him yet, and Murdoch was out for the count, so Chris allowed himself the rare moment to just look at her

Her silky black hair swished over her shoulder in a ponytail And--oh yeah--her bikini bathing-suit top with jean shorts showcased her belly-button ring Suh-weet

He pulled into her driveway Wanted to pull her right to hirow ten inches by the end of the day

"Hey, Chris!" Her greeting floated through the open"We’re gonna order pizza in a minute Can you stay?"

Even her voice was hot

"Yeah, sure Letout my CDs first" And will away the evidence of exactly how hot he found her Layered clothes weren’t helping hie horo hoive his parents time alone Maybe then hisher guts up everyfor the past couple ofout a little and still she didn’t say a thing to anybody about being pregnant

She must think he was a clueless bonehead like his dad

Chris turned off his cell phone so his parents couldn’t razz hi with Shelby and Murdoch for a while, and pretend everything was okay Pretend that his parents weren’t splitting That he didn’t love a girl who belonged to his best friend

Andfrom a threat in his life that even tall John Murdoch couldn’t warn away

"Don’t move, please, ma’am," the parah Rena gripped the edges of the gurney, taking mental inventory of her body as much as her muddled brain would let her while she stared up at the entrancing sway of oak branches overhead

An air splint immobilized her foot Her teeth cut deeper into her lip to bite back the need to cry out She couldn’t have pain meds anyway because of the baby Besides, she welcomed the ache that kept her conscious and reminded her she didn’t hurt anywhere else, like her stohter Love and protectiveness for this new little life surged through her until the pain faded She’d barely allowed herself to think about this baby she and JT had ht he’d returned fronancy soon, but her mind was so woozy She would explain once JT was safely off to the side, rather than risk springing it on hi

Why hadn’t she told hi for a miraculous reunion first She would have to tell him, today, but later in her hospital room, away from the others, when he wasn’t about to crack a crown fro his teeth

If only he would step away, but JT always did his duty, and being by his wife’s side right noould rank right up there as a responsibility

A car door sla!"

A voice Who? Her h… Bo Rokowsky, a member of her husband’s squadron

Bo would make the perfect distraction to keep JT occupied at the moment