She frowned. “I said my car wouldn’t start. It wasn’t an emergency and I was still at the site of the fire. I was hoping for a ride to the fire station so I didn’t have to walk.”
Well, didn’t he feel like an idiot.
He also looked like an idiot.
“Jesus, I thought you were in trouble.”
She gestured to her car. “Technically I am in trouble. Or at least my car is.”
“Where were you when I got here?” His voice was sharper than he intended.
“Hiding in the shade of the tree hoping you’d show up so I wouldn’t have to stay in Tanger tonight. I need those receipts and serial numbers to finish my report.”
Her words were like a slap. She didn’t want him. She wanted his truck and to escape from his presence before the clock struck midnight. That was a wake-up call he couldn’t ignore. Why had he rushed to her? He didn’t want to know the answer. It was a mistake. That was obvious.
He huffed out a breath. “Then get in the truck and let’s go.” He scooped up his hat and pushed it onto his head so hard he scratched his ears.
She followed him without a word and soon they were buckling their seatbelts. When he started the truck, she put her hand in front of the air vent.
“There’s no A/C, princess.” He was pleased to see her snatch her hand back. “That’s why the windows are down.”
“I can’t believe you’re still driving this piece of shit.” She adjusted the messenger bag she’d put on the seat beside her.
“Language, Miss Evans. Ladies don’t cuss.”
“Women cuss. I’d much rather be a woman than a lady.” She closed her eyes as the air rushed in through the windows. Her hair flew like streamers toward him, not long enough to reach him but enough to distract him.
He didn’t like feeling out of control. Being the fire chief meant he was in charge. Owning a ranch also meant he was in charge. Being investigated by an insurance company, by his ex-girlfriend no less, made him uncomfortable because he had no control. Sophie was in charge.
He didn’t like that. Not even a little.
She pulled out a fancy phone from her bag and started dialing. “I’m going to attempt to arrange for a tow truck to meet me in an hour. After I finish cataloging your paperwork, can you give me a ride back to my car?”
He wanted to say no. He wanted to say no so badly it danced on his tongue like a dark chocolate truffle.
“Fine but I want gas money,” was what came out of his mouth.
She threw up her free hand and snorted. “Of course you do.”
During her conversation with the tow truck driver, he could only hear her side of it. Judging by her expression, it wasn’t going well. He shouldn’t feel satisfied to hear her being annoyed with someone else.
He was anyway.
“You can’t be serious. What happens if someone needs a tow after the sun sets?” She tapped her hand on her knee in a quick staccato. “They call Kyle Blackwood to let him know they’ve abandoned their car. That’s efficient. Then what do they do?”
Dax choked back a laugh. Things were not done the same way in a small town as they were in the big city. She must’ve blocked it out, intentionally or not.
Sophie’s frown deepened. “What? I can’t—Oh hell, fine. It’s parked in front of Cindy’s.” Pause. “Yes, I know it burned. It doesn’t really matter why my car is there, does it?”
Dax shook his head. She must’ve also forgotten her manners in that big city. No doubt Myron, who owned the garage in town, had his back up by now.
“I don’t have a choice then, right?” A dramatic sigh. “Thanks.” She tapped the end call button on her phone.
“Trouble in paradise?” He tried really hard not to sound amused.
He didn’t succeed.
“Don’t be such an asshole, Dax.”
“Darlin’, what makes you think anyone in Tanger is going to hurry? It hasn’t changed a lick since you put us in your rearview mirror.” Dax gestured to the sleepy town passing by as he drove to the fire station.
“I didn’t want him to be in a hurry. I was just hoping for a tow today. He told me he has another tow, a tractor in a ditch down at the MacRae place.” She turned her face. “Apparently Myron is the tow truck driver in Tanger now. I shouldn’t be surprised, he always liked cars. I wasn’t sure if there was a tow truck in town. He did seem to take joy in telling me he gets off work in an hour and if I’d called ten minutes earlier he would’ve made it today.”
Her voice had softened, losing the edge. She almost sounded sad. Impossible. Sophie Evans was too hard to have any soft left in her.
“You didn’t know that.”
“I called you.” She turned back, her gaze confused. “Instead of calling for a tow to get my car fixed, I called you.”
“Oh.”
The silence stretched between them the rest of the way to the fire station. He couldn’t explain why she’d called him, except perhaps if she’d never gotten over him. That was a tantalizing thought he wouldn’t allow himself to own. He pushed it away.
When he pulled up to the firehouse, his best friend Lucas and his cousin Clint were washing the pumper. Both men turned to give him dirty looks until they caught sight of Sophie.
Clint’s brows went up and Lucas’s mouth dropped open. No doubt Dax would get an earful from both of them. When Sophie had crushed his heart, both men had kept him sane and helped him get over her. Dax would be lucky not to get punched for even talking to her.
It didn’t occur to him until they climbed out of the truck that things were worse than he realized. Sophie was stranded and it was past six o’clock in the evening.
What else could go wrong?
Sophie was surprised she hadn’t caught on fire as soon as Clint and Lucas spotted her. The anger and dislike pulsed through the air, slapping her hard enough to make her flinch. The boys always stuck together. Bros before hos. Ridiculous behavior for grown men. It had been five years since she left Tanger. Did they never grow up?
She hefted the messenger bag on her shoulder and ignored the two men scowling at her. Stepping back into her childhood hometown fit like a dress that was two sizes too small. Both of them blamed her for the bad break-up between she and Dax. Not that it was any of their business, but everybody knew everybody’s secrets in Tanger. Sophie needed to ignore them as she did when they’d tried to scam her Twinkie in third grade. If she were lucky she wouldn’t be in town long enough to have a conversation with them.
“Is the boardinghouse still open?” she blurted.
Dax tucked the truck keys into his pocket, pulling the fabric across his manly bits. Damn but the man was definitely still packing. She had a flash of what his skin tasted like and a shiver raced up her spine. Her nipples pebbled and she hoped like hell her arms would cover the telltale signs of arousal.
“No. The Fosters divorced and the boardinghouse had to be sold, but nobody bought it. Been empty at least six months.” He nodded at Lucas and Clint and they turned their ire on him. “I’m showing the insurance investigator the receipts for the kitchen equipment that Hannah dropped off.”
“You dropped this chore on us and then you show up with her?” Clint was the grumpy Blackwood. He had a permanent frown and rarely had a female willing to put up with him for more than a few months.
“And why is Miss Priss investigating the fire?” Lucas smirked and she wanted to kick him in the balls. He had always teased her to the point she could happily strangle him. The stupid nickname was leftover from middle school, for pity’s sake.
“Miss Evans works for the insurance company. It’s her job.” Dax turned and entered the fire station.
“You need a new insurance company.” Clint’s snarky comment stung.
“I don’t plan on doing anything but my job.” She turned to follow Dax. “And I’m very good at my job, for your information.”
Her cheeks burned with embarrassment and anger at herself. The men had reminded her of how low her sel
f-confidence had been when she was younger. Ridiculous to let them get to her at all, much less in under two minutes.
The fire station was cooler than the sun-soaked outside. The building had been constructed eighty years earlier of cinder blocks so it remained relatively cool during the summer. It was still damn sticky though. Maybe somebody ought to turn up the AC a bit more. Her shirt stuck to her skin while her under-boob sweat dampened the fabric. Fun times.
She walked past the wall of pictures, certificates and such. One photo caught her eye and she stopped. Stared.
Holy shit.
Dax in his turnout suit with other firefighters at what appeared to be a fundraiser for the volunteer fire department. He also wore his helmet, boots and no shirt.
No. Shirt.
Sweet God in heaven, the man was perfectly formed. Golden brown hair decorated the slabs of muscle. The man was in substantial physical shape. He was much bigger than he’d been at twenty-two.
She managed to swallow and walk on, leaving the delicious, tempting, staggering image behind her.
It had been over a year since she’d had sex. That was the only explanation for her foolishness over a picture of a man who had been her first lover, and her first love. She would not, could not, get into bed with him for any reason. Ever.
Her resolve restored, she stepped farther into the building. When she’d left Tanger, Dax had been a new firefighter. Something to challenge him outside of running a ranch. He’d taken over for his father, who’d developed lung cancer after a lifetime of smoking. Both as ranch owner and firefighter, which was tradition of Blackwoods that stretched back over a hundred years.
It was something they’d argued about. More than a few times. Dax was what everyone expected—smart, funny, good-looking, athletic. Yet he chose to work with cattle, hard work for little reward. And as a volunteer firefighter, he received nothing but gratitude for his service.
He wasted who he could have been, in Sophie’s opinion. She chose to go to college and their relationship deteriorated over the four years she was in school until that final summer after she graduated.
That’s when the sweet, wonderful romance turned into poison in her heart. Vicious words flew and deep wounds received. The day they parted was still fresh in her mind, even after five years. She didn’t hate him, but she refused to contemplate what life would have been like if they hadn’t broken up.
She found him in the back where the desk that had been his father’s sat. It was covered with haphazard piles of paper, a half-eaten sandwich on a paper plate, a broken helmet and a chair with cracks across the leather like a road atlas.
Dax’s foot was propped up on an open drawer. A large folder sat on top of the corner of the desk. “This is all the receipts and such. Hannah put them all together by date. There’s a flash drive with pictures of the layout and equipment with serial numbers. She’s more organized than I am.”
His sister Hannah had been Sophie’s best friend growing up. When the big breakup happened, Hannah sided with Dax and hadn’t spoken with Sophie since. It was another hole in her life that had yet to be filled.
Sophie straightened her shoulders, unwilling to let herself slide into self-pity. She had a good life in Houston, which included friends, occasional dates, and swimming in the pool of her condo complex. Nothing to make a movie about, but it provided her with stability and contentment.
Now there was a greeting card statement that wouldn’t make a single sale.
Sophie told herself to stop acting like an idiot and get on with it. Coming back to Tanger had brought up memories she had buried deep within the vault in her heart. Ones she wished she could burn as easily as all the mementos from her time with Dax.
“Sophie?” He was standing in front of her with the file folder, a puzzled expression on his face. “You okay?”
She managed a weak smile. “Yeah, just hot. Thanks.” She took the folder, noting it was at least an inch thick. “I need to scan all of these.”
He raised his brow. “I don’t have a scanner.”
“I’ve got an app on my tablet I can use. I just need space to do it.” She tucked the folder into her bag.
“Here’s the flash drive with the pictures.” He held a flash drive in the shape of a red chili pepper.
“She still likes her spicy food, hmm?” Sophie’s grin was more natural this time.
“Like she was eating buttered toast.” He shook his head “I swear that girl has a stomach made of cast iron.”
She remembered where she was and whom she was with. Her smile faded. “I need to find a hotel. Let me check Google maps.” When she discovered she had two bars of extended service, she knew using any app that required a connection would be impossible. She glanced around. “Yellow pages?” When in Rome and all that.
“There is no hotel, Soph.” He leaned against the wall covered with curling bits of paper and posters.
“Taxi?”
“Nope.”
“Bus?”
“Nope.”
“Shit.” She sat down in the chair. “Then I’d better use my time wisely and get all these scanned.”
The silence in the room was only broken by the turning of paper and the snap of the app as she worked. Dax left the room and she was once again alone. She didn’t know how much time had passed but her stomach howled. She’d scarfed down a protein bar in the car on the way to Tanger. Her mouth was also dry as cotton.
She finished the last paper and returned everything to the folder. One more thing to do. She pulled her laptop from the messenger bag and plugged the flash drive into the USB port. After a few keystrokes the photos were copying to her hard drive. She plugged the tablet into the other USB port and started downloading the scanned documents. It would take a while so she sat back in the creaky leather and folded her arms.
What she’d do tonight for food and a place to lay her head was a mystery. Her options were limited, even though she grew up in Tanger. The truth was she had no one to call and nowhere to go.
“I have an idea.” Dax reappeared in the office doorway. “Why don’t you come home to the Triple B with me for tonight?”
Oh, bad, bad, bad idea. So very bad.
Then why was she considering it?
Chapter Three
Dax didn’t stop to consider what came out of his mouth. That was not unusual sometimes, but this time it was purely suicidal. What could he possibly have been thinking?
She might say no.
“I couldn’t possibly.”
“You’ve nowhere else to go, do you?” Jesus, hell and damnation, he was out of control.
Her mouth tightened. “You know I don’t. You of all people know.” Her eyes grew moist and she looked away.
Guilt twisted his gut. He shouldn’t have said that. Sophie’s parents had been killed when she was eighteen, a freshman in college. As their only child, she had inherited their house, which she sold to the family who’d been renting it when she left town five years later.
To his knowledge, she’d never even visited their graves since then. The Blackwoods might be a large, boisterous bunch of redneck Texans, but family was the most important thing in his life. They gave him the love, support and occasional kick in the ass he needed.
He couldn’t imagine life with no family. Unless she was married or in a relationship. His gut tightened.
“I’m sorry I said that. It was a dick moment.” He hoped he sounded as contrite as he felt.
She shrugged.
“I meant what I said though. Come back to the Triple B tonight. I’ve got high-speed Internet and the guest room has fresh sheets.” He was stupidly desperate to have her say yes. Must be he wanted to stab himself in the eye with a rusty nail too. “Your only other option is to sleep in the black hole upstairs. I can give you the key so you can lock it and be safe here in the firehouse.”
No one was usually at the firehouse overnight. There was a room upstairs with a couple cots they jokingly called the black hole. There were no
windows in the room. Once in a while one of the firefighters had to crash there, but it wasn’t used much. It probably didn’t smell good either.
She stared off, not meeting his gaze.
“I promise I’ll make sure Myron tows your car first thing and gets it running so you can get back home to…whoever is waiting for you.” He didn’t want her to fill in the blank. Not really.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea.”
“No, but it’s the only option. My mom would be happy to see you.” He put his hands on his hips. “She moved into the guest house after my father passed but she still cooks supper every night.”
Sophie frowned. “I was sorry to hear about your father. He fought a good fight.”
A pinch of grief passed over his heart. It had been more than four years, but he still missed Pops. The man had taught Dax how to be a person he could be proud of. He liked to think his father still watched out for him in some way.
“Thanks. You and me both know grief, Soph. We don’t have to give each other any more. This is an offer from one old friend to a stranded friend. Nothing more.” Dax wasn’t one to hold a grudge or seek revenge for wrongs, real or imagined. Life was too short to get caught up in bullshit.
His father had always said, “Don’t sweat the small stuff. It ain’t worth a hole in your gut to worry about none of it. Ride a horse you enjoy, eat the food you like and hold onto the woman you love.”
Dax hadn’t yet found the woman he loved. Or at least he had found her, but lost her too long ago to get her back. At least now he wouldn’t have a dark ball of regret in his gut over his last conversation with Sophie.
“I don’t think I should.”
“It’s up to you. I’ll go wait out in the truck for you. When you get out there, let me know where you want me to take you.” He knew she didn’t have any choice, but giving her the choice was important. Sophie was smart enough to use her rational side.
Dax walked out to find Clint and Lucas waiting for him. They leaned against the now-shiny, clean pumper.
“What the hell are you doing?” Clint was never one to be shy about letting his opinion fly. Someday it was going to bite him in the ass. His cousin was younger by one year, but they could have been brothers.
His Firefly Cowgirl Page 2
