The Firefighter's Family Secret

by Shirley Jump

  “Sounds good.” Colton feigned coolness, but he was secretly pretty pleased the other Barlow boys had welcomed him so easily. He didn’t expect the road ahead would always be smooth, but he was glad they’d started off so well. His brothers had brought him into the fold as easily as inserting a card into the deck. Maybe if he started with the brotherly relationship, he’d be able to ease into the one with his father. “Hey, where’s the best place to get a fishing pole around here?”

  Luke grinned. “Let me guess. Did Harry invite you? That man would be a professional fisherman if he could get paid for it. Go on over to Ernie’s across the street. They have pretty much everything.”

  “Thanks.” It didn’t seem like enough to say to Luke, because it didn’t capture all that Colton really wanted to say, but he was a guy, and thanks was pretty much the extent of what he was capable of. “See you.”

  Luke nodded. “See you tomorrow.”

  Tomorrow. Breakfast with his brothers. The word still sounded weird in his head, even weirder when he spoke it aloud. All the things he had lacked all his life, right here in this tiny little town. Yeah, maybe staying a while was a good idea.

  He ducked into Ernie’s Hardware & Sundries, which sported a hand-drawn sign advertising a special on night crawlers. Colton waited a second for his eyes to adjust to the dim interior, the rows of shelves and the bins of garden tools.

  “Good morning. Can I help you?”

  He turned toward the lilting sound of a woman’s voice. That was what hit Colton first—her voice, which, even in those few syllables, seemed to have a sweet, happy tone to it, as if his coming into the store was the best thing that had happened to her all day.

  Then he saw her, and decided maybe seeing her was the best thing that happened to him all day—because the woman behind the counter was stunning.

  His grandmother would have called her willowy. She was tall and thin, with long, straight, light blond hair that was so pale it seemed ethereal. Her dark green eyes were wide and deep, and matched by a welcoming smile that made him feel warm inside. She wore a white button-down shirt with big silver buttons with the sleeves rolled up, tucked into a pair of dark jeans that hugged her curves.

  “Uh...yeah, good morning,” Colton said, wondering when he’d become a guy who stammered. “I’m looking for fishing rods?”

  “Right this way.” She crooked her finger, beckoning to him, and made her way down one of the aisles. He would have followed her to Timbuktu with just that one gesture. Not to mention the view he had from behind.

  She stopped in the middle of the aisle and waved toward a display of tackle and fishing poles. “I don’t know what you’re looking for, but if you were to ask my dad, he’ll tell you the best one is this graphite bait caster right here. Lot of folks go for this spinning combo—” she pointed to another, fancier pole “—but my dad always says that the right pole sits in your hand like it was made for your palm. Not too heavy, not too light, and when you go to pull up on the hook, the pole does the work.”

  It was all pretty much Greek to him. “Okay, let me see one of the graphic things.”

  “Graphite.” She grinned at his mistake then handed him the pole. “It also matters where you’re fishing and what you’re fishing for.”

  “Well, I don’t really know the second answer. I’m meeting Harry Washington over at Ray Prescott’s place. It’s a job interview. Sort of.”

  She laughed. “I know Harry. He’s not much on formalities. Ray’s place is right on the water, so chances are you’re doing a little surf fishing. That’s a different animal from fishing in the lake. You might want to try this pole instead.” She pulled yet another from the seemingly endless rack. “It’s got a heavier reel. That will help you if you’re going for some striped bass or red drum. And the gear is heavy enough, in case you accidentally hook a shark.”

  He took the new pole she handed him and hefted it in his palm. It seemed strong, solid. “Sounds like you know what you’re talking about.”

  She turned and gave him a grin. “Well, when you’re daddy’s girl, and the only kid at that, you play soccer and catch fish and learn how to shoot a rifle. At the same time you’re learning how to curl your eyelashes and pick out lipstick and wear high heels.”

  He chuckled then put out his hand. “I think with a line like that, we should be formally introduced. I’m Colton. Colton...Barlow.” The name sounded strange still, but it was beginning to grow on him.

  Confusion muddied her eyes. “One of the Barlows? With Jack, Luke and Mac?”

  Small-town living, Colton thought and grinned. “Sort of. I’m their half brother. From Atlanta. Firefighter, novice fisherman and decent first baseman.”

  He didn’t know what made him give her that minirésumé, but then she laughed, and it made his day.

  “Pleased to meet you, Colton Barlow from Atlanta. I’m Rachel Morris, daughter of the famous Ernie. Expert fisherwoman and not-bad shortstop.”

  “Maybe you could teach me a thing or two about catching the right one.”

  Her smile reached into her eyes, lighting up her entire face. A flirty, teasing look in those green depths toyed with the edges of her lips. “Is that what you’re here for? Because we don’t sell matches made in heaven. Just fishing poles and garden rakes.”

  “I’m just talking trout and bass.” He picked up another pole from the ones she’d pointed out to him, hefted it for weight, put it back and reselected the one she’d given him. From feel at least, it seemed like Rachel’s choice was the best. “Definitely not long-term commitments.”

  “Just what this town needs. Another confirmed bachelor.” But she laughed when she said it, took the fishing pole from him and walked back to the register. She punched in a few keys then recited the price and thanked him when he handed over a credit card.

  While she was finishing the transaction, Colton racked his brain for something else to say. Something to prolong the moment before he had to leave. He liked Rachel. Found her intriguing. And it had been a long, long time since he’d met a woman who interested him like that. “So, have you lived here all your life?”

  Yeah, way to go on the lame question. Clearly, he was out of practice.

  “Pretty much. I was born and bred here.” She printed out the credit card receipt and handed the white slip of paper to him, along with a pen. “Are you thinking about moving here? If you get the job with the fire department?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Still testing us out, huh?” She grinned. “Well, I can tell you this much about Stone Gap. It defines small town. If you sneeze over your Wheaties at breakfast, half the town is lined up for a flu shot by lunchtime. Most everyone here grew up in each other’s pockets, as my dad likes to say. Which means everyone knows pretty much everything about everyone else.”

  “Sounds...suffocating.”

  “It can be.” She shrugged. “But in a small town, someone’s always there if you need help. If you’re down, there’s a neighbor or a friend to pull you back up. Stone Gap has its faults, like any place, but at its core, it’s a great town to live in. And you can’t beat the weather or the fact that we’re right on the water.”

  He chuckled. “Are you with the welcoming committee?”

  She blushed, a soft pink that stole across her cheeks. “No, I just...finally learned to appreciate this place.”

  “I’ve never lived in a place that I loved like that. Atlanta’s fine, but it’s a big city. You can get...lost there pretty easily.” His voice trailed off, and he shook his head.

  “Lost in more ways than one?” she said softly.

  Colton cleared his throat. He wasn’t about to unload his life history in a hardware store with a woman he barely knew. Even if every time she smiled, she made him want to linger for hours on end. “Well, thanks for the tips about Stone Gap. I’ll keep them in mind.”<
br />
  “Sure. Anytime. And if you want the twenty-five-cent tour, you know where I am.”

  “Twenty-five cents? That’s it?”

  She blushed again. “It’s a small town.”

  That made him laugh. “Harry already told me where the best apple pie is.”

  “Then you’re down to the twenty-cent tour. Unless you have already discovered the best place for making out.” The blush intensified. “I meant, for the teenagers.”

  “Of course.” Making out? That made him think about climbing in the backseat of his car with Rachel and seeing where it might lead. Not a good train of thought to follow, but that didn’t stop him from a quick mental image. “Us old people are too mature for that.”

  “Definitely.”

  Yet everything in the undercurrent of their conversation said differently. He might be out of practice in the dating arena, but he sensed some definite attraction in the air. He had the strangest urge to lean across the counter and kiss her right now.

  “Uh, I should sign this.” He bent his head and scrawled his name across the receipt then handed it back to her.

  “Thanks,” she said. She lifted the fishing pole and gave it to him. “Need anything else?”

  Your phone number, his brain whispered. Because he definitely wanted to get to know Rachel Morris, fisherwoman and shortstop, much better. But he was leaving in a few days, so asking her out wouldn’t make any sense.

  But as he headed out of the store, Colton had to wonder if maybe forgoing her number was the thing that didn’t make any sense, because she lingered in his mind long after he cast the first line into the water.

  Chapter Two

  Rachel dusted shelves that didn’t need dusting and tidied displays that were already tidy. It was a Tuesday, one of the least busy days in her dad’s shop. Her only customer had been the tall, good-looking firefighter in a faded blue T-shirt and stonewashed jeans that hugged his legs and told her Colton Barlow was a man who worked out. A lot. Good Lord, his biceps alone were enough to make her mind start fantasizing. Hot and yummy, and a definite change from the older, potbellied retirees who usually came into the store.

  Men who looked like Colton Barlow, and had a killer smile like his, didn’t come to Stone Gap very often. He’d stayed long enough that she almost thought he was going to ask her out. But in the end, he just paid for his purchase and headed out the door. Clearly, she’d read him wrong. Of course, she hadn’t helped things by being such a dork and blushing every five seconds, or making that stupid comment about the best place to make out. It was as if she was back in high school again and crushing on the cute boy in English class.

  She shouldn’t have been disappointed—after all, she was the one who had sworn off men until she had more than five minutes of free time a day—but she was. It would have been nice, really nice, if he’d noticed more than just the type of rod and reel she was selling him.

  At six she locked up, got in her car and drove across town to the three-bedroom bungalow where she’d grown up. The flower beds were overrun with weeds, the trees in desperate need of trimming and the white picket fence out front had faded to a dingy gray. It was as if time had stopped in that house, and now everything else was slowly giving up the fight.

  Rachel sighed, parked her car in the drive then headed inside. Just like the outside, the interior of the house was dark and dingy, coated with a fine layer of dust and despair.

  Before her mother’s death, her father had been at his store day in and day out, clocking in when the shop first opened and staying as long as anyone needed to buy something from him. Her mother had manned the ship at the house, keeping up with the plants and dishes and creating a home with everything she did.

  But then cirrhosis had taken Rachel’s mother last year, leaving all of them with a hole too wide to fill. It had hit Ernie especially hard. He’d made himself a hermit in the house, losing interest in the store, in fishing, in his life. For that entire year, Rachel had run the shop single-handedly, putting her own life on hold, leaving her father to grieve while she ordered supplies and paid bills and swept the floors.

  For ten months he hadn’t asked her a single question about how the store was doing. But she’d come by every day nonetheless and given him a recap. Then one day he’d called her in the middle of the day, asked her how it was going. It wasn’t much, but her father’s spark of interest had given Rachel hope that maybe, just maybe, she could get back to her own venture someday soon. Assuming she still had one, given the dent one year of not working had made in her bridal business. Just when Happily Ever After Weddings was getting off the ground, Rachel had to put it all to the side. She’d lost several bookings, and had probably given up all the ground she had worked so hard to gain the year before. But her father had needed her, and that was all that mattered.

  Someday he’d be back in charge, and she’d go back to her life. Someday.

  She found her father sitting at the kitchen table, a crossword puzzle in front of him. He had filled in only a handful of clues since she’d left him this morning in the same place, with the same folded section of newspaper in his hands. The breakfast dishes still sat in the sink, and there was nothing in the stove for dinner. Rachel worried that if she ever stopped coming by, her father would stop eating altogether. It was as if losing his wife had made him lose his motivation to move forward. Move anywhere, period.

  “Good evening, Dad.” She pressed a kiss to his unshaven cheek. She missed the scent of his cologne, the smoothness of his skin after he shaved. “What’s for dinner?”

  “I...uh...haven’t thought about it.” He blinked, his eyes bleary and red, probably from getting a few fitful hours of sleep in the recliner in front of the TV. His white hair stuck up on his head, and his T-shirt looked as though it hadn’t been washed in a month. “The day goes by so fast sometimes. I didn’t even realize it was that time already.”

  “Why don’t I just throw some chicken on the grill?” Rachel pulled open the fridge and pulled out a package of meat, acting like everything was okay. That it didn’t make her heart hurt to see her once robust and busy father sitting here like a lump of clay. “You still have those potatoes?”

  “Potatoes?”

  “I bought them at the store yesterday. Remember?”

  “Oh, yeah. I forgot about them. Well, I haven’t eaten any potatoes, so they’re probably in the bin in the pantry. You know, where Mom always kept them? Never store them with the onions, she’d said, but I can’t remember why.” He shook his head then turned back to the crossword. “What’s a five-letter word for in fashion?”

  “Umm...” She thought about it while she sprinkled some seasoning on the chicken, then dug in the bin in the pantry, unearthed a few potatoes, washed them and pricked their skins. “Try vogue.”

  “Works for me.” He penciled it in. “Been working on this crossword all day. It’s a tough one.”

  It was what he said every day. She wasn’t quite sure how her father spent the hours between breakfast—when she got here at eight and put his coffee on and fixed him some eggs—and six fifteen, when she got back from the store. She didn’t want to think of him sitting at this kitchen table, staring out the window, mourning. But truth be told, that was what she knew her father probably did every day.

  “Have you called Daryl? He was in the other day. Said he wanted to get you up to the lake, see what’s biting.” Her father’s best friend had been in almost every day over the last month, checking to see if Ernie might have come in for the day. Daryl had tried calling and coming by the house, but if Ernie didn’t want to deal with someone, he just ignored them. Rachel hoped that if she kept on mentioning Daryl and her father’s favorite pastime, it might get him out the door.

  Her father waved that off. Again. “Maybe when the weather is better.”

  Rachel glanced out the window at clear skie
s, a sunlit day. “Today was a great day for fishing, Dad.”

  That made her think of the firefighter again. Colton Barlow. Novice fisherman. Decent first baseman. And very hot guy in general. She wondered how his fishing trip had gone, and whether he’d be back to the store. Whether he’d ask her for coffee—

  Then she glanced at her father and realized she probably didn’t have time to date. Heck, she barely had time to take care of herself. There were dishes to do, laundry to process, some weeding to tackle, then she had to go home and take care of her own chores, sleep, get up, work the store and come back to her father’s house again. Rinse and repeat, day after day, until her father got back into his life. “Dad, I’m going to get this on the grill, then I’ll come back in and do the dishes.”

  “You don’t have to. They can keep.” He never even looked up from the crossword. “I’ll do them later.”

  She sighed. It was what he always said, whenever she offered to clean for him, but he never swept or washed or did anything about the mess inside the house or the weeds out front. And all the other thousand little things that had gone undone for months.

  She put the chicken on the grill then came back inside. She fished out the register report from her pocket and smoothed the paper on the table in front of her father. “Here’s today’s tally. Things were a little slow.” She didn’t mention that her only customer had been the firefighter.

  The store had barely been surviving in the last few months, but she never told her father that. If she did, his disappointment—in the store, in her—would likely make him retreat even further. So she tried to keep things upbeat, positive. There were days when even that was a challenge.