by Seton, Cora
“Got it.” Ruining Christmas wasn’t Zack’s intention at all.
Chapter Three
‡
After leaving Bree standing on her front porch, Zack headed over to the Strong fire station. Priority number one: get his head on straight and come up with a plan. Tossing her over his shoulder and carrying her off to a bedroom wasn’t really a viable strategy. Even if it would have been fun.
He grinned. Of course, if she proposed that kind of a caveman plan, he’d be on board. Unfortunately, the odds of wild sex tonight were right up there with the odds of him scoring the ten million dollar prize in the California state lottery. He could buy the ticket and play the game, but he’d be denied.
So, the fire station it had been. Ben Cortez, the fire chief, had ponied up one of the empty bunk beds, plus the offer of a ride-along should a call come in. That worked for Zack. Donovan Brothers’ smoke jumping team wouldn’t get really rolling for another two or three months, and he needed to do something besides plot ways to win his way back to Bree. Firefighting sounded damned good and, since Ben was Jack Donovan’s father-in-law, making the arrangements had been simple.
When the fire alarm went off at four a.m., he had to rethink the appeal. All around him, guys rolled out of their bunks, cursing and laughing. Funny how it seemed to be a prerequisite that fires hit crisis stage as soon as a man hit REM sleep.
“You up for this?” River, the EMT on duty, dropped to the floor from the top bunk, swiping his boots from the floor.
“You bet.” Zack grabbed his own boots, jammed his feet into them, and slid down the pole, enjoying the adrenaline rush. The early a.m. fire call didn’t pack quite the same punch as storming a beach or clearing Iraqi neighborhoods one building at a time, but not taking enemy fire was a definite plus. The only bullets he had to worry about in Strong were emotional bullets.
Five minutes later, the fire engine pulled away from the station and barreled down Main Street, sirens blaring. Zack and River followed behind in the ambulance at no less sedate a pace. When they hit the highway, nothing greeted them but pitch black and empty road, a nothingness that reminded Zack of more than one mission with his SEAL team. Zack and the driver were the only two in the ambulance, for which he was relieved. Dealing with Laura’s hostility if she’d been on shift would have been an added layer of complication he didn’t need on his first ride-along. There was also the more-than-slight chance that she’d take the opportunity to push him into the flames.
He leaned forward, searching the shadowy edges of the road. “You know what we’re looking at?”
“The fire?” River hit the brakes as the fire engine ahead of them hung a hard right and slammed onto a dirt road. “The call came in from the MacDougal place. Old man’s got a ranch out here. Runs a herd of beef cows and some of those fancy African chickens. He called in a barn fire.”
Zack had no idea what an African chicken was, but the night’s mission sounded routine enough. The EMTs would ride along as insurance, but they’d likely sit on the sidelines. Zack thought about Afghanistan and the hide sites he’d laid up in. The front seat of the ambulance was a different way of looking at the world. Far less dangerous, but someone needed to stand by to patch up any casualties, and he could do that.
Their target was obvious before they reached the ranch. The flames billowing out of the large wooden barn lit up the night. Jesus. He hoped it was a hay barn or equipment storage rather than livestock. The rancher and his wife were out in the yard, aiming garden hoses at the blazing structure, although the roof had already gone. Sheets of orange flame punched through the roof and out the hayloft, while white smoke seeped out of the doors and the foundation. There’d be no salvaging the building, but he doubted that was why they’d come.
Ben Cortez came over after debriefing with the rancher. “You doing okay?”
“Do we have animals in there?” Zack asked right as the roof caved in. Shit. He really hoped not. Anything inside the barn was dead.
Ben shook his head. “There were two horse stalls, but MacDougal got them out and his wife took them down to another paddock. He’s going to lose the building and a bunch of stuff, but we’ll keep it from spreading elsewhere.”
The fire ate up the old timber, lighting up the framing like an eerie Jack-o-Lantern. Zack could see individual boards outlined by fire and it was as hot as the worst days in Afghanistan. At least there was no sand.
No hostiles either, except for Mother Nature.
The next two hours were hard and fast. Zack helped where he could, but mostly he tried to stay out of the way. His job was all watch and wait, because his skills weren’t needed. He did check out the MacDougals when he could convince them to step away from the firefight. Both had a couple of minor burns, but nothing too serious. They’d been damned lucky.
By the time the fire was officially declared out, the sun was coming up fast. Ben’s guys moved through the smoldering remains, mopping up and breaking down the debris to out any hidden hotspots. The last thing anyone wanted was a reburn after the engine had headed back to Strong. The steady thwack of axes punctuated their search.
One of Ben’s guys knocked apart a singed pile of pallets and straightened with a yell. “Got a live one here!”
He sprinted toward Zack, something small and limp cupped in his gloves. “Got your first customer here.”
Zack stared at the gray kitten. “That’s called a cat.”
The firefighter thrust the bundle of fur towards him. “And it’s all yours, Mr. EMT. If you opt for mouth-to-mouth, give me a holler. I want to take pictures.”
The kitten half-cracked a small eye and mewed. Hell. Gingerly, Zack transferred the tiny body from the other guy’s glove to his own.
“Let’s see what we’ve got.” He swung himself into the back of the ambulance and set the baby on the stretcher where it left little smudges of soot. Holding the oxygen mask against the small face, he hit the kitten with fresh O2. The animal felt damned hot too, so he slicked its fur with cold water and then repeated the process.
MacDougal stuck his head in. “You found a kitten?”
“Uh-huh. Yours?” He hit the kitten again with the oxygen, stroking a finger over its side. Take it one breath at a time.
MacDougal shook his head. “Haven’t had a barn cat in years. This one’s a stray.”
“Can I keep it?”
Because he knew someone who would fall head over heels for this fighter.
“Be my guest.”
*
Laura sprawled on Bree’s bed, Katie by her side. The other women had showed up promptly for their monthly girls’ night out, but getting ready wasn’t going so smoothly. Probably because Bree was hoping—stupidly—that Zack and she would meet up. She looked in the mirror, trying to coax mascara over her eyelashes, and the stuff clumped. She swore, jerked and almost stabbed herself in the eye with the tiny wand. Brown hair. Hazel eyes. Two brown freckles on her jaw. There was nothing exotic or out of the ordinary about her.
“Relax.” Laura eyed her from the bed, herself the poster-child for laidback. “You’re going to blind yourself.”
Katie came over and plucked the wand out of Bree’s hand. “Sit.”
She sat. It wasn’t like she really knew what she was doing. She didn’t usually bother with makeup, but just in case tonight turned out to be special, she wanted to be prepared. Or pretty. She’d take both, if the universe was feeling generous.
“Abbie isn’t coming?” She loved Katie and Laura, but they should have been a foursome. Abbie’s absence was a gaping hole and a painful reminder that shit happened. Her husband had been killed when a forest fire had flashed over his hotshot team.
Katie shook her head. “Close your eyes. No. She’s still morning sick.”
“And heart sick,” Laura muttered, saying what they all knew. A few months simply weren’t enough time for Abbie to accept that her husband wasn’t coming home but she had a baby on the way. Bree didn’t know if the being pregnant part of the equation helpe
d or not. There were no easy answers for Abbie.
“So.” Katie deftly fanned the eye shadow brush over Bree’s eyelids. “Tell us all about Zack Medina, Mrs. Medina.”
It was a small miracle that they’d waited this long to ask her.
“I didn’t ask before because I was being nice,” Laura said, because apparently they’d been friends long enough for Laura to acquire mad mind reading skills. “I was hoping you’d pull Zack’s fine ass into the bedroom and show him what he’d been missing.”
Katie made a noise of surprise. “You’re really married?”
“Why does my being married surprise everyone so much?” Keeping her eyes closed emphasized the soft stroke-stroke of the brush over her eyelids. She felt silly going to so much effort. Then she thought about Zack last night and their almost-kiss on her front porch and how badly she’d wanted his hands on her body. Make-up definitely felt like the right opening salvo in whatever game they were playing.
“Open,” Katie said.
Wow. Katie was definitely a miracle worker. Bree’s eyes looked smoky and deep, almost exotic.
“Because you didn’t tell anyone?” Laura bounced on the bed. Unlike Bree, who’d at least broken out a skirt and cowboy boots for tonight’s outing, Laura wore a ratty pair of old Levis, a fire department T-shirt and her steel-toes. She looked supremely comfortable. Bree, on the other hand, had to suck her stomach in to get the damned skirt to button.
“We weren’t planning on getting married.”
“You said I do accidentally?” Katie snorted and reached for the blusher. “Right. Because that happens all the time.”
“Were you sober? You’d be amazed what we see on the ambulance runs when people have been drinking.” Laura shook her head. “Alcohol in, brain cells out. It’s a consistent pattern. Take notes, ladies.”
“I didn’t even know you knew Zack.” Katie feathered a new brush over Bree’s cheekbones. “You’ve got gorgeous skin.”
At least she had that much. She might be twenty (thirty) pounds overweight, but her skin looked good. She’d rather look good naked.
“He was my pity date for the fire department’s Christmas ball three years ago,” she admitted. “I was doing dispatch work for them. Joey set us up so I wouldn’t have to go stag.”
“One date does not a marriage make,” Laura said dryly.
Katie lobbed a tissue at Laura. “You don’t believe in love at first sight?”
“Hell, no,” Laura answered cheerfully. “I drive an ambulance. I work with four hotties. Between their combined good looks and the dumb-dumbs I’ve transported, I’m cured of that.”
What Bree had felt for Zack Medina hadn’t been love at first sight, but it had still been potent. He’d picked her up, opened the truck door for her like she was a real date and not Joey’s little sister, and then he’d talked with her. The eight years he had on her made him seem as unattainable as a vacation house on Mars, but there’d been something else when she looked into his eyes. Her big, tough, borrowed SEAL seemed…a little lonely and more than a little lost. So they’d danced together. She’d teased him into laugh. And then…yeah…she’d jumped his bones in the front seat of his truck.
Hurray! Her girly bits shrieked. And he still has the truck, so we’re absolutely doing it again!
Katie rummaged through the lipstick selection she’d brought with her. Since the last time Bree had bought lip gloss was approximately three years ago, it was good to have friends.
“So Zack took you to the dance and then what?”
“Spill,” Laura urged cheerfully. “You know we’re not leaving you alone until you tell us.”
Bree knew that was true. It made Abbie’s absence all the more painful because, if Katie and Laura had decided to leave the other woman alone, then Abbie really needed the space.
“We went to the dance,” she said.
Katie sighed. “She’s not big on details,” she said to Laura.
“We’ll get the Cliff Notes version first.” Laura flashed a grin that undoubtedly wreaked havoc with her fellow EMT technicians. “Then she can add details. I want to hear about the wedding night.”
“We went to the firehouse Christmas dance. We went for a drive. I may have jumped him, we got married…and he brought me home. We kind of skipped the wedding night part.”
She’d wanted him and she’d gone after him. She refused to regret choosing to live her life that night. Although they’d only had that one night, Zack had let her close. She’d sensed he didn’t let too many people into his heart and, while she hadn’t achieved that degree of closeness, they’d been intimate. He’d been in her body and the sex had been great. It had also been something more.
“You go, girl.”
Katie high-fived her. “So you seduced yourself a SEAL.”
“In the front seat of his truck.” Arguably one of her finer moments.
“Nice.” Laura grinned at her. “Not as comfy as the back of the ambulance, but mad props to you for working with what you had.”
“Don’t give me details,” Katie groaned. “God willing, I’m never taking a ride in your ambulance but, if I do, I don’t want my first thought to be Laura had sex here.”
“So you had sex. He was…swept off his feet and proposed?”
Katie’s version, while nice, was also not true.
“The condom broke,” she admitted. Did it make it better or worse that they’d tried to be responsible—and still failed? It hadn’t been young lust or passion sweeping them off their feet…just two people who liked each other and were lonely. Two people who were alone together in a truck and who hadn’t been hurting anyone else if they hooked up.
“That happens.” Laura nodded sagely.
“You don’t have any kids, so I’m hearing a then what.”
“So he thought we should get married, just to be on the safe side, before he shipped out. We drove to Nevada and stopped at the first roadside wedding chapel we found. We got married. He went back to his unit, and I came back here.”
“And then what?”
“And then nothing.” Thirty-six months of nothing, to be precise.
“You haven’t seen him since you got married?” Katie sounded disbelieving, but maybe that was because, when her fiancé had disappeared, she’d moved heaven and earth to find him. She’d practically been put on their Congressman’s do not call list, she’d called the poor guy so much.
“I wrote him letters. And somewhere along the way…I think we both got the idea it kind of wasn’t real.” Even if those letters had felt real. Don’t blush. Why had she thought channeling her inner porn star was a good idea?
“Uh-huh. So after years of being pen pals, now he’s back?”
“I think so.”
She didn’t really know what Zack’s plans were—or how she fit into them.
“Is this a good thing?” Laura cut straight to the chase. “And is reunion sex fabulous?”
Unfortunately, she had no idea.
And she felt…frustrated.
Angry.
Disappointed.
None of which were emotions that she had any business feeling because she’d been married less than eight hours when Zack had driven off into the sunset to reunion with his SEAL team.
“He didn’t spend the night.”
Katie made a face. “We were kind of hoping he doubled-back after we left.”
“And that you spent the night making up for lost time. One of us needs to be getting some,” Laura added.
“Hey.” Katie chucked a makeup brush at Laura, who caught it one-handed. “I’m getting plenty, thank you very much.”
“Don’t torture us.” Laura swung her legs off the bed. “Come on. Let’s head over to Ma’s. Maybe I’ll meet Mr. Tall, Dark and Perfect-For-Me at the bar.”
Katie grinned. “Tye is amazing.”
“Don’t. Want. To. Know. Unless you’re offering to share, and I never pegged you for that kind of girl. Feel free to surprise me.” Laura grinned.
“Come on. Time’s wasting and I want to get to Ma’s before all the beer’s gone.”
It was line dancing night at the bar. The place would be decorated for Christmas.
“Bree?” Katie looked at her. “Are you ready?”
Not really.
“Five bucks says Husband of the Year makes an appearance. He may have gone home alone last night, but he didn’t want to,” Laura said.
She hadn’t asked him if he’d been faithful—and she didn’t plan to. Undoubtedly, he’d had plenty of opportunities. Joey’s letters hadn’t always been censored when it came to the women and wine department. And yet Zack had made her a promise. He’d promised to be her husband.
So…yeah. She was ready.
*
Ma’s looked like a dozen other bars Zack had drifted into over the years. The asphalt parking lot was full of trucks, the odd beater car, and two motorcycles. Cheerful noise spilled out of the bar whenever someone pushed the door open, making for the smoker’s bench set off to the side. It was California after all. Zack was pretty sure that the bench was the regulation twenty feet from the door and then some. The windows blazed with neon beer signs and someone had decorated for Christmas here too, stringing rainbow-colored twinkle lights around the window.
Was he the only person not counting down the days until the holiday?
Sucking in a breath, Zack followed the crowd of off-duty firefighters inside.
The place was packed and a tall redhead was slinging drinks behind the bar. A waitress wove through the crowd with a load of beer bottles and boots stomped on the wooden floor. Jesus. They still line danced here. The jukebox blared out country music. Laughter hit him in a wave, followed by body heat and the faint scent of popcorn from the freebie bowls on the bar.
Ben Cortez slapped him on the back. “We’re grabbing a booth.”
Ben disappeared, leaving Zack standing there, feeling unexpectedly awkward. These people belonged here. They had roots in Strong. He certainly wasn’t passing through, but he didn’t know if he was staying either. It depended on Bree.
Bree.
When he surveyed the room, she was surprisingly easy to locate. She was out on the dance floor, dancing up a storm. Her happy wriggles and bounces made her boobs do spectacular things. She’d still be voted off Dancing with the Stars in the first round, although only if they judged that contest based on technical merit. The God’s honest truth was that Bree lit up the dance floor. She wore a sexy little jean skirt and a close-fitting T-shirt that hugged her curves. Her pink cowboy boots with rhinestones might get her kicked out of the cowboy club, but her hair bounced around her shoulders as she butt-scooted, clapping her hands.
