by Lisa Childs
That moan had her stomach muscles clenching in reaction.
“I can heat it up,” she offered.
He shook his head. “It’s perfect just as it is.”
Somehow she didn’t think they were talking about the chicken anymore. But before he could clarify, other boarders entered the kitchen. Mr. Stehouwer hobbled into the room with his walker. With a big grin, he greeted all the young people. Stanley bounded in with Annie—both bustling with energy.
She was going to have a time keeping that dog out of the house. But she loved the kitchen being as full of people as it had been when her grandmother had been alive, when she’d had so much family living there.
She wanted to fill it with family again. She had to find a way to hang on to the house.
She wasn’t going to find the answer in the wicked glint in Cody’s green eyes. Even though the rent he paid for himself and for Stanley would fix the air-conditioning unit, it wasn’t enough. She had to find a way to pay off that lawsuit and keep her family legacy.
4
FOR THE PAST HOUR Cody had watched Serena charm and entertain everyone in her home. Everyone but him. Besides feeding him leftovers, she had pretty much ignored him. He wasn’t used to women ignoring him unless they had fallen for one of his friends instead. But other women—single women—went out of their way to flirt with him and get his attention. Not that he gave them much.
During his couple of years as a Hotshot, he’d learned that significant others didn’t last in this profession. The divorce rate was high among Hotshots because of all the time they spent away from home. So there was no point in his getting involved with anyone. He had to stay single.
Maybe Serena wasn’t single. Sure, she wasn’t wearing a ring, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t involved with someone. But hadn’t Wyatt said something about her being too busy with the boardinghouse to socialize much? Had he been talking about her friendships or romantic relationships?
Cody was curious about her. More than he should be. Sure, Dawson had offered Cody his place. But the US Forest Service cabin didn’t come with the fried chicken he’d just eaten. Or the creamy potato salad or homemade rolls.
Alone now in one of the second-floor bathrooms, he pulled off his shirt and patted his stomach. He had eaten too much. But he was still hungry. Not for food, but for the woman who’d cooked it.
She was beautiful—even more so when she had been so animated with her other boarders and guests. She’d joked and laughed and she’d even flirted a little bit—with everyone but him. He’d gotten a little irritated then, maybe even jealous.
No. He wasn’t the jealous type. That was probably just indigestion from overeating. Although he worked out as strenuously as the other guys on the team, he wasn’t as careful about what he ate. That might have to change if he lived with Serena for very long. He reached for the button on his jeans and pulled it free. His jeans were tight—not because of what he’d eaten, but because he couldn’t stop thinking about Serena.
About that ice cube sliding down her throat to disappear between her full breasts. About what she would look like wearing nothing at all.
His cock was hard and aching for release. Maybe he should have gone into town to find someone who could relieve some of the tension in his body. But, just like thinking about Serena, that also would have been a mistake.
He pulled aside the lacy curtain and vinyl liner. Then he twisted the faucet to cold. If he wanted to sleep, he’d probably have to take a cold shower, so thoughts of her long curtain of black hair didn’t keep him awake.
With the water still running cold, he stepped inside the tub and pulled the curtain closed. But the porcelain was slippery, ridiculously slippery, almost as if… His foot flew across the slick surface and sent him tumbling. His head struck the tile wall. Black spots obscured his vision and something dripped into his eye. It was too thick and sticky to be water.
He was bleeding. He reached up to touch his head, but his limbs were tangled beneath him in the slick tub. As if…as if it was covered in oil. He struggled to move, but his vision blurred more until he couldn’t see at all. And consciousness slipped away.
*
SERENA HAD JUST undressed when she heard the crash. The sound came from the second floor.
But she heard no shout. No movement at all. All she heard was water running.
She pulled on a thin robe and then hurried down the stairwell. Mr. Tremont had left that morning with an overnight bag and Stanley had taken Annie for a walk, so there was no one else on the second floor. Except for Cody.
Her pulse quickened, but her footsteps slowed as she approached the door to the bathroom. She hesitated a long moment before lifting her hand to knock. She couldn’t just walk in on him in the shower.
After that crash she’d heard, she had to make certain that he was all right, though. It was her responsibility as the landlady.
So she knocked again. Louder.
Still no reply.
“Hello?” she called out. “Are you okay?”
No one answered her. Had he fallen and gotten hurt?
“Cody?” she called his name. But she didn’t expect a reply now. She gripped the knob and easily turned it. The door was unlocked. She drew in a deep breath and pushed open the door.
Water sprayed out of the showerhead, flying around the room and across the floor. The rod had been knocked down, the curtain and liner tangled beneath the naked body lying in the tub.
She gasped and hurried forward, but her bare feet slipped on the wet floor. She caught herself on the edge of the tub, so that she didn’t fall on top of him. Hand shaking, she turned off the water, which was running cold.
“Cody!”
He didn’t move. And blood streaked down his handsome face from a cut on his forehead. Calling upon the nursing training she hadn’t quite completed, Serena reached for his wrist and closed her fingers lightly around it. His skin was cold, but his pulse beat steadily beneath her fingers. His chest—so muscular with only a light dusting of golden hair—rose and fell as he breathed. That was good.
He didn’t need CPR. Then his pulse increased—pounding faster and harder. She glanced at his face to find his green-eyed gaze focused on her.
“Are you okay?” she asked. “What happened?” This was definitely no trick to get her inside the bathroom while he was naked. He was hurt. He was bleeding and his eyes looked dazed.
He just stared at her as if he couldn’t hear. Or couldn’t understand.
“I’m going to call 911,” she said. He needed a doctor. He obviously had a head injury—a concussion or worse. But when she started to move away, he caught her, his hand wrapping tightly around her wrist.
He hadn’t lost his strength, despite being hurt. And the cut and swelling bump on his head didn’t detract from his good looks.
He was so handsome it really wasn’t fair. His blond hair was slick against his head and nearly as dark as the shadow forming on his strong jaw. And his body…
Her mouth dried, and she struggled to swallow the lump of desire filling her throat. He was masculine perfection—every muscle defined in his arms and in his chest and down the rippling washboard of his abdomen. Her gaze dropped lower to his long cock. As she watched, it began to grow even longer as it swelled and hardened.
But he was the one who murmured, “You’re so damn beautiful.”
She was surprised that he could see her at all. He’d obviously been knocked out cold when he’d fallen.
“You need medical attention,” she said as she tried to tug her wrist free.
But he held on tightly, pulling her down so that she dropped to her knees beside the tub. Then he murmured, “I need your attention.”
“Cody,” she said in protest.
But he moved his other hand into her hair, pulling her head down. And his mouth covered hers. He kissed her with a passion she’d never experienced before.
His lips glided across hers. Then his tongue slipped out, swiping acr
oss her bottom lip, tasting her.
She gasped at the delicious sensation. His teeth replaced his tongue as he nipped gently on her bottom lip.
A moan rumbled in her throat. She wanted this—this physical contact. She needed it. It had been so long…
With the house and the lawsuit, she hadn’t had any time for dating. But maybe she didn’t need to date. Maybe she only needed a physical release. Cody could give her that. But then what would happen when he got bored? She would probably lose him and maybe even Stanley as boarders.
Men like Cody Mallehan always got bored.
Unfortunately they were never boring. His kiss ignited a new excitement in her. Her heart raced. Her skin tingled. She wanted him.
His fingers tangled in her hair as he held her head still for his kiss. And he kept kissing her—moving his lips across hers while teasing her with the tip of his tongue.
Just his kiss had her trembling as desire overwhelmed her. Passion heated her blood, had her breasts swelling, her nipples tightening. She felt the pull from their sensitive tips to her core.
One of his hands moved from her hair. His fingers trailed down the side of her neck and then lower—inside the opening of her robe.
“I’ve been so jealous,” he murmured.
“What?” There was no one in her life for him to envy.
His fingers slid down between her breasts. “I’ve been so jealous…of that damn ice cube.”
She shivered as sensations raced through her.
“The ice cube was colder than my touch,” he said, misinterpreting the cause of her shiver.
She was beyond hot for him. But his fingers were cold. And she remembered that he’d been lying under the almost icy spray of water. She reached out and touched the bump on his head. The blood was no longer flowing, but it continued to trickle from the cut.
“You might need stitches,” she said, “and a CT scan.” She’d taken enough nursing courses to know the consequences of a serious concussion. He could develop a bleed and swelling on the brain.
“I need you.” He moved in the tub, as if trying to get out, but he slipped again. “What the hell…”
“Don’t,” she said. “You shouldn’t try to move. You might have broken a bone.”
“It’s not broken,” he said.
She glanced down at his erection. And a wistful gasp escaped from her lips. He was so big. So hard…
She wanted to touch him. “You’re hurt,” she reminded them both.
He groaned. “I’m hurting…”
“Let me call for help—”
But he had her wrist again. When he tugged on it, though, he slipped and inadvertently jerked Serena into the bathtub with him. She tumbled down on top of his naked body. Her silky robe and her skin slid over his.
Her pulse raced. She gripped his arms, trying to steady herself to get up, but instead of pushing away, she held on to him. “Cody…”
He groaned again and touched his fingers to the bump on his head. He was hurting. Really hurting.
And she was thinking only of how amazing his body felt against hers. His cock pushed against her hip, pulsing like her heartbeat. She wanted to touch it, taste it…
But she couldn’t act on her desire—for so many reasons. She reached for the tub instead of him, trying to use the porcelain for leverage. But her hand slipped. The surface wasn’t just slick from the water. There was something on it—something oily.
She understood now why Cody had fallen. He could have been killed.
5
HIS BODY ACHED with desire. Cody had never wanted anyone more than he wanted Serena Beaumont. His head ached, too. Actually it pounded. He grimaced at the pain and tried to pry open his eyes. The light was so bright, though, that he groaned. Then a dark shadow, leaning over him, mercifully blocked the light.
“Serena,” he murmured.
The shadow chuckled—a deep, masculine-sounding chuckle. It definitely wasn’t Serena leaning over his naked body.
Cody shifted against the bathroom floor. His butt slid over the wet porcelain tiles, producing a squeaking noise.
The chuckle turned into a loud, echoing laugh. “Jeez, Cody…”
He recognized that voice, and heat rushed to his face.
“Owen, what the hell are you doing here?” he asked. The last thing he remembered was stepping into the shower. How had he wound up on the floor? The only images that flashed through his mind were of Serena, in a thin robe.
Her nipples had pushed against the silky fabric, and then the robe had parted, revealing honey-toned curves…
Was that just a dream, like all the others he’d had about her since they’d first met months ago? But her skin and lips had felt so real.
It was almost as if he could taste her still, the sweetness of her mouth.
A light flashed in his eyes—just a small beam, but it felt like it was shining through his pupil and piercing his brain. “Damn it! Damn it!” He batted at the flashlight. “Shut it off!”
“I am trying to check you out,” Owen said.
Since Cody was sprawled naked across the bathroom floor, it shouldn’t have been too difficult. At least he wasn’t hard anymore—not now that he’d realized it was Owen leaning over him and not Serena.
Where was Serena? He peered around the white-and-blue bathroom, but he and Owen were alone. Had she ever been in there?
“Who called you?”
Had Stanley found him? That poor kid.
“Your landlady,” Owen said. “You kept murmuring her name.”
“Serena found me?” he asked. So he hadn’t imagined it. She had been there while he was naked. “And she called you?” She knew Wyatt because she was friends with Fiona. But Owen?
“She called 911,” Owen replied. “Remember, I’m a paramedic, too?”
“Yeah, yeah, I know that,” Cody said. Fortunately Dawson wasn’t working with him tonight; the assistant superintendent was too busy helping Zimmer try to catch the arsonist to go out on medical calls.
Hell, maybe Dawson was in the room too, for all Cody knew. His eyesight was fuzzy, making it hard for him to focus visually and mentally. Owen was still leaning over him with that damn light. The guy was so big—broad-shouldered and tall—he could have been blocking Dawson from Cody’s blurry vision.
“What the hell happened?” he asked.
“Don’t you remember?” Owen asked, and there was concern in his deep voice and blue eyes. He was older than Cody—not just in years but experience. Cody couldn’t imagine what Owen had seen overseas, but the guy had come back with scars—one was visible, running down the left side of his face. He suspected there were more.
Cody shook his head and flinched as pain reverberated throughout his skull. His head was pounding so badly that he was surprised he could remember anything—even his own name. Well, the name the young couple had given him after they’d adopted Baby John Doe.
The last thing he remembered was turning on the water to cold because of her.
“You must have slipped and fallen,” Owen surmised.
He fought through the pain to make a cocky reply. “You think?”
“You don’t remember.”
“No.” But then he recalled the porcelain had been so slippery. Why?
“Where are your clothes?” Owen asked.
“Clothes?” he repeated. He was still struggling to focus. Where had he left them?
“Some of the nurses have probably already seen you naked, but you should still get dressed before I take you in,” Owen said.
“In where?”
“To the hospital,” his friend patiently replied.
He was once again glad Serena hadn’t called Wyatt or Dawson. He doubted either of them would have been nearly as patient with Cody’s befuddled mind.
“Why would I go to the hospital?” he asked as he tried to remember how he’d wound up on the bathroom floor. Had he fallen out of the tub?
Serena wouldn’t have been strong enough to move him
. It must have been Owen; the guy was huge. How long had Cody been unconscious?
“You need to have a CT,” Owen said. “I think you have a concussion.”
That would explain the headache and memory lapse. But what about his fantasies about Serena? He’d had those long before he’d ever hit his head. What was wrong with him that he couldn’t get the black-haired woman off his mind?
*
SERENA STARED OUT the attic window into the darkness. Still no lights appeared in the driveway. Should she have gone to the hospital with him? Cody’s coworker had taken him in hours ago. Seeing Owen James again—in this house—had been hard because it had reminded her of the day she’d lost her mother.
That horrible day when she had felt so helpless…
But, this time, Owen had assured her that Cody wasn’t seriously injured. He only wanted to get him checked out at the hospital—get him the CT she’d suspected he needed and stitches for the laceration on his forehead.
Should she have ridden along with him anyway? Or followed the ambulance as Stanley had?
Was he truly all right?
Head injuries could be dangerous. Not only had he lost consciousness, he’d nearly lost control with her.
What was her excuse?
She hadn’t hit her head. Why had she kissed him back? Why had she wanted him, a self-professed player?
Unable to bear the silence and all the thoughts flitting through her mind any longer, she picked up her cell phone and hit Fiona’s number. It was late, but her friend answered right away.
“Serena?” She must have looked at her caller ID.
“Do you know that Cody got hurt tonight?”
“Yes, Wyatt, Dawson and Braden went up to meet him and Owen at the hospital,” she replied.
It must have been bad for Wyatt and his fellow Hotshots to go to the hospital, too. Owen hadn’t let Cody walk out of the house; he’d had Stanley help carry him out on a stretcher.
She should have gone, too. It would have been better than pacing her apartment.
“Has Wyatt called to let you know how he is?” she anxiously asked.
