Summer’s arrived with a vengeance this year. It’s early June and feels like August, the sun merciless in a pale blue sky. It’s going to be a scorcher of a day.

My little girl, Sophie, is sleeping peacefully in her car seat, but it’s only a little after eight in the morning and I’m already sweating. I’m not convinced the shades over my rear windows will be enough to protect her with my A/C barely working.

When Gilda, my trusty car, starts overheating, I take it as a sign from the universe that I should stop for the day. I slow to a crawl just as we reach a town at the base of some mountains. It’s pretty, and clean, and there are trees everywhere.

My mood picks up. I should be able to find a park somewhere, let Sophie play in the shade, and maybe even get a nap. Tonight, when it’s cool – or at least less hot – I can push on.

Not that I have any idea where I’m going. I only know I haven’t run nearly far enough.

First things first. I need to find a gas station where I can get some water for Gilda, and maybe a quart of oil. We’re on what looks like the main drag in town, coming into the business district, but I don’t see any stations. Then, on the right, a sign comes into view: Revved Garage / Parts / Café.

The café (which is weird — since when does a garage have a café?) is close to the street, while the garage and parts store are set back behind a decent-sized parking lot. I make the turn into the lot and ease toward the parts store. They’ll have oil there, and if I’m lucky, water too.

When I nose into a parking slot and shut off the ignition, Gilda’s engine shudders to a halt with an ominous clanking sound, and steam rises from the hood. Damn. I can’t afford repairs. “Please, Gilda,” I whisper. “Hang in there a little longer.”

Climbing out, I open up the back door to get Sophie from her car seat. She’s still asleep, her skin flushed from the heat, and guilt stabs me. I’m definitely going to find a park with some nice big shade trees.

“Hey, darling girl,” I croon softly, unhooking her car seat. “Let’s go inside and get some water for Gilda, okay? And maybe some for us, too.”

Sophie comes awake as I check her diaper. By the time I set her on my hip, her big brown eyes are taking in everything around us. I carry her to the parts store and push through the door, a jangling bell announcing my arrival.

It’s blissfully cool inside, and I wonder if maybe they’d let me help out for the day, just so Sophie and I could enjoy the air conditioning. There’s a long counter with no one behind it, just rows of shelves covered with every imaginable car-related thingie in the world, or so it seems to me.

“Hello?” I call. There’s no reply, but I sense more than hear movement. A moment later, a man appears from between two sets of shelves. I can’t help staring, because he’s one of the biggest specimens of manhood I’ve ever encountered.

He stands well over six feet, broad-shouldered, deep-chested, clad in jeans that stretch across his massive thighs and a black t-shirt that clings to his enormous biceps. His hair is thick and dark, and his eyes are like molten sable.

Rough-hewn features make him more rugged than handsome, but his charisma more than compensates for any lack of conventional good looks. He’s not my type … but he’s the most impressive man I’ve ever seen.

His gaze sharpens when he takes in me and Sophie, and I have the strange, uncomfortable feeling that, like Sherlock Holmes, he can somehow deduce everything about me at a glance. But his words are ordinary enough. ”Help you?”

His voice is deep and resonant, sliding over my senses like warm velvet. Something stirs in me, an awareness I can’t put words to. It disturbs me on a primeval level, and I shove it away to focus on the moment.

“Hi. My car’s heating up. I need to let her cool off a little bit, and then put some water in the radiator and check the oil. Is there someplace my daughter and I could wait?”

To my alarm, he comes around the counter toward me. “Let’s take a look,” he says, heading toward the door.

“No, that’s all right. I can take care of it. I just need a waiting room, and maybe somewhere to get a glass of water?”

He halted at my words, and now he’s standing less than a foot away. Up close, I can see the silver threads in his hair and the lines around his eyes. He must be forty-something, a lot older than me.

It doesn’t lessen his impact one bit.

“You know cars?” he asks.

My eyes narrow. “I know how to put water in a radiator and add oil.”

“I’m guessin’ that means no.”

Infuriating man. “Never mind. I’ll go somewhere else.”

He blocks my way. “You’re not goin’ anywhere.”

I glare at him. “Excuse me?”

“Is the car overheating or not?” He says it slowly, like I’ve been knocked on the head. Odious man.

“I just said it was.”

“Then you ain’t leaving.”