by Amie Denman
Her stomach growled. The car fiasco had robbed her appetite for lunch, but she was starving now. She deserved saturated fat after all she’d been through, and she had a feeling she’d be on her feet working hard in the art gallery. Life in a sunny beach town where she’d be likely to walk everywhere now that she was without a car was a far cry from the sedentary office job she’d left several states behind.
“Thanks for letting me stay with you until I find a place,” Nicole said. “I looked at some rental houses and condos online, but I was afraid to commit before I actually saw the properties.”
“Someone’s looking for a place to live?”
A man with a face straight out of a magazine slid into the booth next to Jane. He had blue eyes, rugged cheekbones, a day’s growth of beard and dark hair that was just a little too long. He wore a T-shirt with Cape Pursuit Fire Department screen-printed over the left side of his chest.
“Charlie Zimmerman,” he said, extending his hand across the table. “I can help you buy or rent a place if you’re interested. I’m a part-time Realtor here.”
“And a full-time pain in the butt,” Jane added.
“Keeps me busy,” Charlie agreed, smiling.
“This is Nicole Wheeler,” Jane said. “My best friend from college. We both went to Michigan State, but she majored in something far more practical than I did.”
Charlie turned his seaglass-blue eyes toward Nicole. “Horseshoeing? Latin?”
Nicole studied their guest and wondered what the heck he was talking about. Did she look like a horseshoer?
“Anything’s more practical than what my flaky artist friend here does,” Charlie explained jovially.
“Hey,” Jane said. “I helped personalize gifts for your last three girlfriends, not that it did you much good.”
Charlie’s smile faded for a moment and he drummed his fingers on the table. “Can’t blame a guy for trying,” he commented. “And there’s no doubt your paintings will easily outlast any of my relationships.”
Jane stacked up the menus and folded her napkin into neat triangles, creasing them mercilessly with one finger. “I hope so,” she said.
“So you’re not an artist?” Charlie asked, looking at Nicole.
Nicole leaned back in her seat. “I majored in business. I just finished my MBA and I’m trying to figure out what to do with it.”
“And you’re new in town.”
Five or six men, all big, all loud, burst through the door and headed straight for the bar.
“Yes,” Nicole said, raising her voice over the noise. “I’m going to be Jane’s business manager.”
Charlie exchanged a look with Jane, one eyebrow raised just enough to imply a question.
“Lucky me,” Jane said. “You know I’m lousy at spreadsheets and paperwork. And Nicole’s a great photographer—”
“Hey, Charlie,” one of the new arrivals, a big buzz-cut blond at the bar, shouted. “Get over here. You gotta hear this one.”
The man next to him on the bar stool turned around and locked eyes with Nicole. From a short distance away, his green eyes reminded her of a stormy sea. His dark hair and shoulders as wide as a truck combined with those stormy eyes mesmerized her. The blond buzz-cut guy slapped stormy-sea man on the shoulder.
“Kevin here has a peach of a story.” He paused to laugh. “He took the door off some stupid tourist’s car with the squad this afternoon.”
Nicole felt her face fall, all the warm blood draining away to be replaced by ice water.
“Those double-parking sons of guns,” one of the other guys added.
Charlie laughed and Jane elbowed him in the ribs.
“What?” he said. “I’m joining the cool kids at the bar.” He nodded to Nicole. “Nice meeting you. Jane can give you my number if you’re serious about finding a place.”
“Thank you,” Nicole said coldly. She made brief eye contact with him and then turned back to the group at the bar. So Kevin of the stormy green eyes was the man who welcomed her to Cape Pursuit by slicing off her car’s door?
“Maybe this wasn’t a good idea,” Jane said. “I forgot Thursday night was Testosterone Night.”
A waitress appeared at their table, blocking off the bar stool crowd and asking for their drink orders.
“I’m not sure we’re staying,” Jane said, raising a questioning glance to Nicole.
“Sure we’re staying. They have fried everything on the menu, and we’re already here,” Nicole replied, her tone like that of a lion handler assuring the terrified crowd that everything is just fine. “I’ll have wine. Moscato, if you have it.”
“Still having your love affair with Italy?” Jane asked. A smile lit her eyes. She turned to the waitress. “Orange soda for me. I’m the driver for the night.”
“Rub it in that you still have a car,” Nicole said after the waitress left. “After I have that wine, I may just go over there and tell—what was his name? Kevin?—just how much I appreciated the special welcome he gave me this afternoon.”
Jane’s smile disappeared. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Why? Will he accuse me of being one of those double-parking sons of guns?”
“Kevin didn’t say that. Rick did.”
“Rick of the blond buzz cut?”
“Affectionately known by several unflattering names,” Jane confirmed.
Loud laughter echoed from the bar. It wasn’t much of a mystery what they were all laughing about. Nicole’s cheeks heated. She swallowed. Maybe Jane was right. They should leave.
The waitress placed a wine glass on a paper coaster in front of Nicole. Little bubbles rose from the stem to the top. It smelled like heaven. Fermented heaven.
Maybe they could stay.
The twentysomething server parked a steaming basket of french fries in the middle of the table. “They’ll keep you company while you decide what to order,” she said. “Kitchen’s a little backed up tonight and we hate seeing people go hungry.”
They were definitely staying.
CHAPTER TWO
NO MATTER HOW much fun the other guys were having, the accident was a dark cloud over Kevin’s day. He had no choice. He knew that. Kid not breathing, life or death. He couldn’t stop, and he couldn’t hit those teenagers on bikes. And who the heck had asked that red car to park right there in the street and leave the door open?
But still. He felt bad about it. The two-year-old lying on the sofa in the house where a panicked father had flagged them down was, technically, breathing. But he was unconscious due to a febrile seizure. It was the kind of thing Kevin had seen a number of times, but the child’s parents had not. And the terror in their eyes made Kevin wonder if he was ever brave enough to have children of his own.
But everything had worked out. The boy would recover once the hospital got his fever down. The damage to the front bumper of the ambulance was minimal. The department’s insurance agent had chalked it up to one more statistic, one more example of the 10 percent of emergency vehicles involved in scrapes and accidents every year. The chief had talked to him, and the write-up in his employee folder declared it not his fault, unavoidable. No disciplinary action assigned. The chief had even congratulated him on following the department’s mantra: life over property. No exceptions. Ever.
But he was never going to hear the end of it from his fellow public servants who were currently buying him drinks. They weren’t impressed by his life-saving defensive driving. They all did that kind of thing every day. The firefighters and cops leaning on the bar were raising their beers over the gritty details.
“Did the door actually get airborne or was it more of a twist-off?” Rick asked. He punctuated his question by twisting the cap off his beer with his bare hand.
Kevin’s cousin Tony slid a basket of fries down the counter to Kevin. “No air,” he declared.
“Saw it all in the side mirror.”
Kevin stuffed a handful of fries in his mouth and hoped desperately for a kitchen fire. A false alarm. Anything to change the subject.
“Kev here had his eyes on the road, so I’m the one you should be asking,” Tony added. “Barely even felt it when the bumper tore off that door and dropped it right in front of the car. Like roadkill. Glass shattered to hell.” He paused and swigged his beer. “Great story for the Wall of Flame. Hope one of the hundreds of tourists who witnessed it got it on video. Maybe they’ll put it on social media.”
Kevin cringed. The Wall of Flame was likely to be misunderstood by normal people. People who were not in the business of responding to accidents, digging through gutted houses for the cause of the fire, and facing some of the truly lousy things that happen to people. Every day. The Wall of Flame was just a bulletin board with an attached shelf. It hung in the bunk room at the station, where they posted newspaper clippings, photographs, thank-you notes and the occasional artifact. It was a daily reminder of what they did, but its goofiness took the edge off the seriousness of the job. Department humor. It meant survival in a tough field.
Currently the wall had a picture of one of the lieutenants swearing in the newest firefighter, but the lower half of the new recruit’s body was a chubby baby wearing a diaper. A picture printed from the internet of Smokey Bear lighting a fat cigar was stapled in the upper corner. A before-and-after photo of the chief as a young recruit with hair, and the current bald version was tacked up next to a colorful photo of a training fire. The house was destroyed by fire on purpose, but the large caption drawn in marker said it all: Oops.
“This is not going on the Wall of Flame,” Kevin grumbled.
“My cousin drives the tow truck,” Ethan said. “He saved the side mirror of the door you took off. We’ll put it in the Stupid Tourist section of the board.”
Kevin groaned and shook his head.
Rick left his bar stool next to Kevin and headed for the restroom in the back of the restaurant. A gorgeous blonde slid onto the stool, an empty glass of wine in her hand. There was something oddly familiar about her.
“Moscato,” she said to the bartender, handing over the empty glass.
She swiveled and faced Kevin, her eyes the color of new plants in spring. He froze. There was definitely something about her.
She had the full attention of the men assembled at the bar, but she was only looking at Kevin.
“I’m Nicole Wheeler,” she said.
Could this be happening? Other guys attracted women, even used their badges and uniforms to negotiate themselves into a night in bed. But Kevin’s last girlfriend took off eighteen months ago, leaving him an ancient dog and no apologies.
Maybe his luck was changing.
“Kevin Ruggles,” he said. “You must be new in town. I’d remember you if we’d met before.”
“I’m definitely new. Just arrived this afternoon, in fact.”
Something in her tone signaled a warning, but Kevin forged ahead. She was sitting next to him at the bar, waiting for a drink. He should offer to buy. She was beautiful. Her fingers tapped on the bar, with no wedding ring in sight. What could go wrong?
“I’d like to personally welcome you to Cape Pursuit,” he said.
Her lips formed a cold line. “You already did.”
“Uh-oh,” Tony said.
Silence replaced the friendly banter at the bar. Kevin’s comrades in arms were sharks, waiting for blood they sensed was coming.
The bartender popped a cork and filled Nicole’s empty glass, taking his time. He stood still, also waiting.
Kevin felt heat rise up his neck and set his ears on fire. He had a better chance escaping a burning building alive than surviving the next thirty seconds.
He remembered. It was only a glance in the side mirror of the truck. A blonde woman standing in the street staring at the wreckage of her car. The wreckage he had caused.
“You don’t happen to own a small red car,” he said slowly. “Do you?”
“I do.” She sipped her wine, never taking her eyes off his.
“And...I almost hate to ask...but...is it missing a part? Maybe a door?”
“It is.”
The silence was how Kevin pictured people waiting tensely in the eye of a hurricane. Hunkered down, knowing the worst was coming, thinking perhaps they should have evacuated when they’d had the chance.
Where is that kitchen fire?
“I’d also like my mirror back,” she said, directing her words to Ethan. “So don’t bother to add it to your asinine tourist museum.”
She picked up her wine glass and returned to her table, only ten feet from the bar and easily within earshot. Close enough to make everyone uncomfortable.
Kevin sat on his bar stool like someone had soaked his pants in superglue. Even if she’d given him the chance to explain, what would he have said? Sorry, lady, but your car was in the way. Life over property.
But she had no use for him or his explanations. She’d made that clear.
* * *
JANE SMILED AND waved at the firefighters now silently holding on to their beer bottles as if they were lifelines.
She leaned forward and whispered to Nicole. “I think you ruined Testosterone Night.”
“I’ll cry myself to sleep tonight,” Nicole said quietly. “I know they’re your friends, but I just couldn’t sit here and listen to their bravado.”
“Don’t blame you a bit. They’ll live.” Jane grinned. “It’s good for them to get a reminder once in a while that not every female on earth finds them irresistible.”
Nicole regarded her friend, one eyebrow raised. “Have you ever dated any of them?”
“Not officially. I briefly dated a cop who left for the bigger department in Virginia Beach. Also dated a firefighter who was only here for the summer. Somehow I got little sister status with that group, so dating is off the table. Maybe I know too much about them.”
“Nothing going on between you and Charlie?”
Jane blew out a breath and sat back, crossing her arms. “Nothing I want to burden you with tonight. It’s a...well...it’s a story.”
Their burgers arrived, covered in barbecue sauce, cheese and bacon as promised. “To new beginnings,” Nicole said, clinking her nearly empty wine glass against Jane’s orange soda.
“Benvenuto,” Jane said, laughing. “See, I learned something in that Italian class we took when we were juniors.”
While they ate, the firefighters at the bar moved to a corner table closer to a flat-screen television. The baseball game was on, and the noise of the game and the bar patrons covered their conversation. Twice, Nicole’s glance strayed to the table in the corner. Both times Kevin was looking at her.
“I’m hoping you can do something about my computer now that you’re here. I think I need a new system,” Jane said. “Maybe I should put everything in the cloud.”
“I’ll look at it. You mostly place online orders for supplies, track expenses and print receipts for purchases, right?”
“Yes,” Jane said, nodding.
“And you don’t have any employees?”
“Nope. Just you.”
“Are you sure you actually need me?”
“I definitely do.”
When Jane had asked Nicole to move to Cape Pursuit, the timing had seemed too perfect. Just when the top layer of scars from her brother’s accident had scabbed over, the foolish office romance Nicole was involved in bubbled over and fizzled out.
It had been far better when she and her boss, Bryan, at the furniture plant were just flirting. Flirting has the potential for danger, but she told herself it was harmless. She ran his human resources department and online sales accounts, was flattered when he asked her to sit next to him at meetings and enjoyed an occasional lunch on his dime.
It was a nice distraction.
Until they’d traveled for business and she ended up in his hotel room. The match was struck and burned hotly for about a week. Then it fizzled, and they both discovered there was no fuel left. The cold ashes remaining would make it impossible for her future with Bryan as a boss.
Jane happened to call to say hello at just the right time. Nicole told Jane about the big office mistake and the downward career spiral she was now being flushed along. And Jane begged Nicole to leave Indianapolis behind, swearing she needed someone with a head for business. Getting away from her work, Bryan, her memories, was such a tempting offer, Nicole couldn’t refuse.
But she’d worried every day in the weeks since—as she’d finished out her lease, given her notice and packed her things—that Jane was only being nice. Being a friend. That she didn’t need a business manager any more than Nicole needed another pair of shoes.
“I know what you’re thinking, but you’re wrong,” Jane said, scrutinizing Nicole. “I really need your help. I have big plans to take my painting business to the internet. When the tourists are gone—nearly half the year—my sales are so dismal I can hardly pay the rent. I want to set up a website and sell online.”
“Really?” Nicole brightened.
“Yes. That’s where you come in. Since you’re also an excellent photographer, I’m hoping you’ll photograph and post my pieces on my website that doesn’t exist yet.”
Nicole felt a weight lift from her chest. “I could do that,” she said, energy infusing her voice.
“I’ve thought of selling my one-of-a-kind stuff online, but I also need your opinion about doing some stock or custom items. I just have to figure out exactly what people want. Market surveys, you think? You know about that.”
“I do,” Nicole said, thinking of the market research she’d conducted for the furniture company and how excited she’d been to share the results with her former boss. She’d been foolish enough to think that working extra hours for Bryan’s approval was some kind of honor.
Working for Jane would be better.
