Table of Contents
Also by Katherine Garbera from Bell Bridge Books
In the Heat of the Night
Copyright
Dedication
Author’s Note
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Acknowledgments
About the Author
She wanted him. He wanted her. It was simple.
But nothing she wanted had ever come to her easily.
And she really wanted Rory.
Just a summer fling, she thought. No harm, no foul. Tonight, she’d told everyone important to her that she’d be leaving town. So she could have a no-strings affair with Rory. A wild, hot, sex-fueled thing that would ignite quickly . . . and then burn to ashes just as fast.
She pulled down the visor and checked her makeup in the mirror. She glimpsed a wildness in her eyes. That feeling was mirrored in the pit of her stomach.
Everything she wanted was within her grasp. All she had to do was reach out and take it. And for once, she wasn’t scared. She wanted it all and she was going to have it.
Starting with Rory O’Roarke.
Also by Katherine Garbera from Bell Bridge Books
Body Heat
In the Heat of the Night
by
Katherine Garbera
Bell Bridge Books
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead), events or locations is entirely coincidental.
Bell Bridge Books
PO BOX 300921
Memphis, TN 38130
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-61194-439-6
Print ISBN: 978-1-61194-410-5
Bell Bridge Books is an Imprint of BelleBooks, Inc.
Copyright © 2014 by Katherine Garbera
Printed and bound in the United States of America.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.
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Cover design: Debra Dixon
Interior design: Hank Smith
Photo/Art credits:
Man (manipulated) © Konradbak | Dreamstime.com
Backgrounds (manipulated) © Juliasha | Dreamstime.com
:Mhin:01:
Dedication
For Courtney and Lucas. I’m so blessed to be your mom and to have watched you grow up. I love you!
Author’s Note
Dear readers,
Thank you so much for supporting the O’Roarkes. In this book, you’ll notice that I’ve changed settings. I created the fictional town of Twin Palms so I could incorporate a lot more of what I believe represents what rural central Florida is like. I kept the pretty gazebo and the park by the train tracks. But I added a lot of housing developments, some fun Main Street shops and my own big lake.
I hope you enjoy this story!
Chapter One
MEG STARLING had often thought about how she’d return to the small town of Twin Palms, Florida after her big break. She envisioned herself with a police escort—hey, her dad was the police chief so why not? Maybe a parade or two in her honor, and, of course, she’d give talks at the local middle and high schools, sharing her gems of wisdom about life beyond the city limits.
Instead, she was sitting behind the Twin Palms Library booth selling lemonade and iced tea at the annual Memorial Day Weekend volleyball match, wearing the biggest tortoiseshell glasses she could find and a Twin Palms Police Department baseball cap. She’d been back in town a week.
Yeah, instead of a police escort into town, all she’d gotten was this baseball cap. The annual grudge beach volleyball match between the fire station and the police department was being played out on the sandy beach at Lake Aurora’s shores.
Everyone showed their colors, either red for the fire department or classic police department blue. Being home and working the refreshment booth wasn’t exactly part of her plan, but it did offer her a distraction from figuring out her next move.
Nothing ever changed around here. Well, except for maybe that new firefighter.
“Who is that?” Meg asked her older sister Anne, who was just finishing her shift in the booth. Anne was wearing a police department T-shirt. Like Meg, she had reddish hair and favored their mother in looks. But Meg always thought that Anne had their father’s stubborn jaw. Of course, that could have been simply because her older sister was always bossing her around.
Their mom, a librarian with a fierce love of books, had named her and her sister after literary characters. Anne was three years older than Meg and owned the town’s one coffee shop/diner.
“The hunky shirtless firefighter?” Anne asked, pushing her sunglasses up on her head and forcing her straight, shoulder-length hair back.
“Who said he was hunky?” Yeah, like those rippling pectorals and large well-developed biceps hadn’t caught her eye. He was built and definitely worked out. And yes, she’d noticed him. Hadn’t she asked who he was?
She had a strict dating rule. Just one . . . well, okay, two. But to her, “no dating married men” was a given. The other one was no dating any small-town guys. There was only one reason anyone came to Twin Palms, and it wasn’t for the money.
Besides, she’d fallen in love once and had the scars to prove it. That was part of the reason she was back in Twin Palms, hiding out until she could figure out her next big move. Not that lust and love were exclusive, but she’d always had a hard time keeping the two separate.
“Are we pretending to be blind? Is that why you’re wearing dark glasses?” Anne asked, more than a tinge of sarcasm in her voice.
“The sun is a little bright today, in case you hadn’t noticed,” Meg said.
Sarcasm ran rampant in their family. Her mom had always been a master, but years of being married to a stoic cop like Butch Starling had honed it to legendary proportions. It was something she’d passed on to her daughters.
In Meg’s opinion, her sister was a big pain in the ass. Why did she put up with her? She could have waited until the men were done playing and asked her friend Paul, one of the firefighters.
“Ha. Just tell me who he is. Or maybe you don’t know. Would it kill you to say you don’t know?”
“It would. In this case, I do know.”
“Anne, I love you. But you kno
w, you’re not all that important, really. Mom and Dad already have me and I’m beginning to think they might not miss you,” Meg said.
“Dad’s the police chief. I think he’d be able to figure out you did me in,” Anne said.
“Just tell me who he is,” Meg said. She and her sister could go on like this for days. As the oldest, Anne liked to be right and tended to dole out information as if it were gold bars from the treasury department.
While waiting for Anne to respond, Meg poured herself a glass of sweet tea. She took a sip and let the liquid cool her mouth and felt the iciness move through her body. She took another sip. Maybe it would be better not to know his name. Because there wasn’t enough iced tea in Twin Palms to put out the kind of fire he could ignite.
“I’m just saying you should be honest about what’s going on,” Anne said.
“You’re not talking about the firefighter, are you?” Meg asked.
Anne just stared at her.
She sighed. Her family didn’t know why she’d come back. It had been humiliating and the last thing she wanted to do was talk about it. “I just need to start over.”
Anne put her arm around Meg’s shoulder and hugged her close.
“His name is Rory O’Roarke. Parents could have been a little more creative, don’t you think? Or maybe it’s a nickname. He comes from South Florida where he’s part of a dynastic firefighting family,” Anne said. “He has only been in town for a couple of weeks and he eats at the diner just about every night.”
Meg almost sighed out loud with regret. A Florida firefighter. Not exactly the kind of man she should be interested in. Maybe if he was a carpenter or a construction company owner . . .
Anne reached over and picked up Meg’s iPhone off the table.
“What are you doing?”
“Something you’ll thank me for later,” Anne said, accessing the camera app on the phone and then zooming in on the firefighter. She clicked a quick picture of him and handed it back to her. “You’re welcome.”
“I don’t remember asking you to do that,” Meg said. But she glanced at the picture and wondered why she always wanted what she couldn’t have.
“I’ve got to get back to the diner. I’ll see you for brunch on Sunday at Mom and Dad’s,” Anne said, giving her a quick hug before leaving.
Every Sunday, they had a standing date with their parents for brunch. Meg tried not to dwell on the fact that it had been five years since she’d been to one. Or that when she’d left, she’d sort of been a bit arrogant about her plans to leave the dust of this small town behind.
“Who’s winning? Paul said that this year they were going to sweep the floor with the PD,” Jenny O’Shea asked as she walked over to the booth.
She and Meg had gone to high school together. And while they hadn’t been close—Meg had been too focused on getting out of town—they had been friends.
“Fire department,” Meg said, handing Jenny a sweet tea and taking the dollar bill from her. “Since it’s for charity, I’d like to say Dad won’t care. But you know how competitive he is.”
“How competitive you all are,” Jenny said.
“Nothing wrong with wanting to win,” Meg said.
The firefighter—Rory—spiked the ball, finally giving his team the victory. He high-fived the other firefighters including Paul and then shook hands with her dad’s team. She noticed he seemed to really fit in with the crew, even though he was still new to the area. Then again, Anne had mentioned that he came from a firefighting family.
She’d noticed that on the police force, people who came from a similar background tended to fit in better. It was as if they all knew the score. Everyone understood that the brotherhood—and she meant that to include the women on the force and on the fire truck—came first. They had a bond that nothing could break.
It was something she’d do well to remember. She tried not to let it bother her, but this stranger who’d spent barely ten days in Twin Palms seemed to fit in better than she did. And she’d lived her all her life!
Shake it off, baby. You’re only back here to regroup and move on. But moving on at thirty wasn’t as easy as it had been at twenty-five.
RORY O’ROARKE had been in Twin Palms for exactly three weeks. He’d worked twenty four hours on and forty-eight hours off and still hadn’t been called out to anything more dangerous than rescuing a cat that had gotten stuck under an old woman’s house. In fact, playing volleyball today was the most dangerous thing he’d done so far, if getting sunscreen in his eyes counted.
He didn’t think it did. He knew his dad wouldn’t think it did either. And as he noticed his tall burly brothers walking toward him, he knew they wouldn’t either.
“Rory, good game. Took it a little easy on them there at the end,” Liam said as he clapped him on the back.
“I’m new. Didn’t want to show off,” Rory said.
“Not showing off? You’re an O’Roarke. You can’t help but win. We always do,” Pat said.
The other guy in the group wasn’t technically his brother, but close. He was his brother-in-law. Tucker Fields had married Rory’s only sister and was his closest relative now that he was living in Central Florida.
“That sounds like a challenge that Andi and I would love to accept, Pat. We’ll make you eat those words,” Tucker said.
Tucker knew that Rory’s sister was even more competitive than the rest of them since she’d grown up trying to prove she was just as tough as the boys.
“Not today,” Rory said. “Where is Andi?”
“On duty. But she wanted me to drop by and make sure you were settling in.”
Andi was older than Rory. Ever since their mother died, she’d taken over the role. And he’d given her a lot more to worry about lately, with his divorce and return to the squad.
“I’m good. Come meet my crew,” Rory said. Anything to get the focus back on firefighting and off of him.
“Nice spike,” Paul O’Shea said, clapping him on the shoulder.
Paul was one of the lieutenants at the firehouse whose job it had been to show Rory the ropes when he’d first arrived. He was also the captain of the volleyball team. “You are a great addition. I’m sure the Cap didn’t know that when he hired you, but I’m glad of it.”
“Thanks,” Rory said shaking his hand. “This is my family. Brothers Liam and Pat, brother-in-law Tucker Fields.”
“Fields? Arson Investigator Fields?” Paul asked.
“One and the same,” Tucker said.
“It’s hotter than hell today,” Pat interrupted. “Where can a guy get a beer?”
“Not here,” Paul said. “We keep the charity events dry so that there won’t be any problems. You can get your fill of iced tea and lemonade though.”
“Point me to it.”
Paul gestured to a tent where a pretty little redhead and a blonde were working. There were two lines and the one in front of the redhead was twice as long.
“What’s the deal there?”
“Meg Starling’s the one with the long line. She left town to make it big and now she’s back. No one knows why and the gossips are dying to find out.”
He glanced over at her again. She had thick auburn hair that ended at her shoulders and the big glasses she wore hid her eyes but her skin was creamy and covered in freckles.
They got in the redhead’s line.
“The other is shorter,” Liam said.
“I want to see what’s so special about this girl,” Pat said.
His brother was a flirt and a bit of a charmer. And he was notorious for fixing things. Whether it was fixing problems or people, Pat was a pro. Rory suspected his brother was here today to do just that—fix his life for him.
Finally, they made it to the front of the line.
“Nice playing today, Paulie. Good thing you had this guy on your squad,” the redhead said with a smile.
“Rory O’Roarke,” he said, holding out his hand.
She took it. An electric tingle spread up his arm. It was probably just a muscle spasm from the game, he told himself.
“Meg Starling,” she said. “What’ll it be, boys?”
“Sweet tea all around,” Rory said.
She handed them the cups and he gave her the money, taking a moment to try to see the color of her eyes before he walked away.
“Want to join us over at Kebbler’s?” Paul asked after his brothers had taken their leave. They’d had to head to Auburndale, about twenty miles from Twin Palms, to have dinner with Andi.
“What’s Kebbler’s?” Rory asked.
“Only the best smokehouse BBQ in the county,” Paul said.
“Tempting, but not today. I’m still looking for a permanent place to stay and my realtor might have found just the property for me.”
“Good luck with that. But you are missing out on some good eats.”
Rory got on his Harley Davidson and headed out of town to meet the realtor. There was only one thing on his mind, and it wasn’t food or firefighting. It was the burning need to know what color were Meg Starling’s eyes.
MEG DROVE SLOWLY out of town toward the interstate. She’d had more than enough downtown Twin Palms action for one day. She needed to escape. And luckily, she knew just the place to go. She’d received a call yesterday from a producer friend of hers at HGTV. He’d mentioned that if she could find an old house and do a one-hour segment redoing it, he’d fast track her for her own show.
How many times had she heard that before? She knew she shouldn’t get too excited, but there was something about being back home that reminded her of all her old dreams. Dreams that hadn’t been tarnished by too many years in Manhattan being a production assistant and set dresser to someone else’s vision instead of going after her own.
In The Heat 0f The Night (The O'Roarkes Duet Book 2) Page 1
