Gabe groaned. Lauren really was like a big sister: sharp and admirable and infuriating. But he couldn’t keep his irritation alive for long. In any normal situation, even if he and Veronica were only dating casually, he’d get to know her friends. They’d hang out together. And he wouldn’t mind that at all. He liked Lauren, and he certainly liked Veronica enough to get to know the people in her life.
The problem was that this wasn’t a normal situation. He didn’t want to disrupt her world. He didn’t want to find himself woven into it, knowing he was going to leave so many loose ends when he moved back to New York.
On the other hand, she’d already become a new passion, and she was the perfect addition to the perfect year in Jackson he had planned. Getting to know everything about her, teaching her everything he knew about sex, finding out what made her tick.
He rolled his shoulders and told himself it was too early to matter. They’d just started dating. They hadn’t discussed how serious it was or even agreed to be exclusive. He could watch her show, hang out with her friends. It wasn’t a big deal. It didn’t have to be.
He checked to be sure Lauren hadn’t reappeared in the doorway to drop another bomb, then set back to work on the spreadsheet. The library was fully staffed today, so unless it got busier than expected, he could devote himself to the project. Good news, because it was the only thing that could keep his mind from steadily straying back to Veronica. She’d already staked out an alarming amount of space inside his mind.
After working halfway through his lunch hour without realizing it, Gabe was just about to rush out the door to grab a sandwich when Jake Davis walked into the library, looking as if he was ready for a fight. Gabe had the completely irrational thought that Jake had somehow discovered that nice Veronica Chandler had been a virgin...until last night.
Adrenaline poured into Gabe’s bloodstream and he stood straighter when Jake’s eyes locked on him, but it turned out that Gabe had misidentified the threat.
“MacKenzie,” Jake barked. “We’ve got a river guide and four rafters trapped in a narrow offshoot of the Snake River. Two injuries, as far as we can gather. Quickest way in is from the top. You want to assist?”
Gabe’s thinking slid from self-defense to rescue in half a second. “I’ll tell Jean-Marie.”
“Meet us in the station in two minutes.”
Gabe had informed his new boss that he’d be serving with the rescue squad during the summer months, though he hadn’t expected to be called up during training. Still, if five people needed to be lifted out of a canyon, they’d need as many hands as they could get. Jean-Marie gave her immediate okay for him to go, and Gabe grabbed his bag and rushed to the fire station. He was tugging on his workout shirt when William walked into the locker room and tossed him a pair of canvas work pants. “See if these fit and grab a sweatshirt out of one of the lockers. We roll in one minute.”
Gabe’s phone rang as he buttoned the pants. He saw his sister’s name and ignored it to grab a fire department hoodie and jog toward the garage bays, his heart still thumping with the rush. He couldn’t talk to his sister right now, but he’d have to text Veronica and cancel their dinner plans tonight. He couldn’t imagine he’d be back in town anytime soon. Even with all the excitement of the shouting firefighters and gathering volunteers, Gabe still winced in regret.
Gabe piled into a Search and Rescue SUV with three other guys, and it was just pulling out when Benton jogged up. “Hey,” he huffed as he jumped in next to Gabe. “What’s the word?”
The guy in the driver’s seat offered what little information they had.
“You guys got extra gear?” Benton asked.
“It’s all in the back,” the driver answered, and Gabe breathed a sigh of relief. He was new to this and hadn’t even considered he might need his own gear.
Benton slapped his thigh. “Ready for a baptism by fire?” he asked Gabe. “Or white water, I guess.”
“Hell, yeah,” he muttered. His heart beat hard with anticipation. If he hadn’t gotten his MLIS, he might have ended up being a firefighter. He’d had the same fireman dreams so many kids had, but they’d come too late. He’d already been head over heels in love with the New York Public Library. With its white columns and stone lions, he’d always felt as though he was Indiana Jones going in to explore a long-lost temple.
He hadn’t actively dreamed about becoming a librarian, but when he’d been in his IT program at college and heard about the library science master’s program, the name had triggered memories of those long days of exploring the giant library. Library science... It almost sounded like a form of archeology, and wasn’t that what Indiana Jones had practiced?
He’d been intrigued enough to check it out. And he’d liked it enough to take a class. And then he’d loved it. And hell, a degree in library science might not be the perfect tool for running a chain of restaurants, but he’d already had all those skills. He’d been free to get whatever degree he wanted.
It had been a perfect fit. His first love hadn’t betrayed him. He loved words and books and being around people. Hell, he even liked the organization of it all.
“That Dog in the Night-Time book’s pretty good,” Benton said. “Maybe I will come by the library sometime and try something else.”
“Sure,” Gabe said. “I’ll do some research. See what else I can find for you.”
“Thanks.”
Everyone was quiet the rest of the way. It was nearly forty-five minutes to the site, and it felt so long for Gabe that he couldn’t imagine what it was like for the people trapped on the rocks below.
The SUV finally pulled into a rocky clearing that sat between pine trees and a steep drop-off. As soon as the vehicle stopped, they all jumped out. Captain Davis had been in the truck in front of them, and he was ready.
“We’ve got two casualties. One man with an ankle that’s likely broken and another with a crushed hand. The female rafter is uninjured. None of the injuries are life threatening, but the paramedics are concerned about shock, so let’s not waste any time. Gabe, you head down with the four experienced rescuers.” He tipped his head toward William and Benton, who were already conferring at the edge of the cliff. Gabe could hear water below.
“Follow their lead,” Jake said. “The rest of us will stay up here and provide muscle and backup.”
Gabe got a harness and a helmet on, then waited as one of the team strapped rescue gear to his back. Lines were being anchored and strung. Everybody was ready within ten minutes.
Gabe watched William go down first, then Benton, and then he hooked into the line and headed down toward the small group of people huddled on the boulders below.
His heart was beating almost as hard as it had for Veronica the night before. Almost, but not quite.
* * *
VERONICA HAD KNOWN that her long-awaited sexual afterglow couldn’t last forever, but she hadn’t expected it to end quite so abruptly. First Gabe had texted to say he wouldn’t be able to see her tonight. He’d been called up to help with a white-water canyon rescue, which was really hot, but not as hot as a night with him would have been.
She’d felt guilty for her immediate flash of disappointment. After all, saving people from dying was more important than giving her another orgasm, but...water rescues weren’t even his area of expertise, and her sex life had been a long-term natural disaster for so many years.
She’d nearly slapped her own hand at that. What a selfish thought. She’d decided right then and there to make an anonymous donation to the rescue squad to make up for her awfulness. She wasn’t a terrible person; she was just monstrously horny all of a sudden.
Finally experiencing good sex had changed her brain-wave patterns, it seemed. Everything made her think of it. Stretching under her sheets this morning, she’d noticed how smooth and soft her body was. When she’d gone to the bathr
oom, she’d smiled in secret delight at being tender from sex. Making her breakfast, she’d imagined making it for Gabe and then joining him back in the bedroom. Hell, even sitting at her laptop made her want to look up dirty ideas or at least type a few more sex-positive messages to herself. And then there was the bed right behind her, practically pulsing with memories of getting well and truly fucked.
“Aw, man,” she breathed, squeezing her thighs together.
It had been really hard not to drop any hints in response to Lauren’s texts. You have a lot of explaining to do! Lauren had written that morning.
Lauren’s second text had confirmed Veronica’s suspicions on the subject. About Gabe!
Veronica had laughed in delight and sent a smiley face back to her friend. Lauren’s next text had made Veronica clap a hand over her mouth to stifle her laughter.
The firefighters are gossiping. I heard about it from Jake. ARE YOU DOING GABE? You’d better call me later.
“I don’t kiss and tell,” Veronica had said aloud as she’d typed the same to Lauren, but God, she wanted to. She stared at the rumpled sheets of her bed and thought of all the things she wished she could tell someone.
Veronica paged through her emails, looking for a cheerful Dear Veronica letter to answer. She didn’t want to deal with questions about body odor or infidelity today. She wanted something happy.
Or maybe something obnoxiously fun. Something about yet another man who hated going down. Man, she could really go to town about that now.
Two more Dear Veronica emails arrived, and she immediately rejected the first one. It was a rant about American women and how they didn’t seem to appreciate “real men” anymore. Not an uncommon complaint, and one that always made her shudder.
But it was the second letter that stopped her cold. As soon as she saw it, she realized she’d been waiting. Dreading. Knowing it had to come someday. Her body hummed with a terrible prickling anxiety, a combination of alarm and self-loathing and fear. The email was titled “I Don’t Know How to Keep Going” and just that made Veronica break out in a sweat that chilled her whole body.
Dear Veronica,
I feel totally alone. Nobody in my school likes me and when I try to talk to my parents about it, they tell me to try harder to fit in. But you can’t TRY your way to fitting in, especially when nobody wants you around.
I don’t fit in and I never have. I don’t care about sports or hunting or video games, so I don’t know how to talk to other guys. I get sick just thinking of going to school, and most days I don’t want to live anymore. I don’t think I can get through two more weeks of this, much less two more years, and I don’t think anything will change after high school anyway. Do you have any advice?
—Nobody
Nobody. The screen went blurry and Veronica had to wipe her eyes several times before she could see the words again.
Nobody. She knew exactly how that felt. To be nothing. No one. It had been her life in high school, too. It had been her life in her own family.
Do you have any advice?
Oh, God. She wasn’t qualified for this. She was barely qualified to give advice on wedding etiquette and blow jobs. But this? This kid needed real help from a professional.
She took a deep breath. That was exactly what she’d tell him. As a matter of fact, she could still remember the language used for these kinds of letters at her previous job.
Feeling a tiny bit calmer, she read the letter again, but this time she took note of the email address and her heart fell. It appeared to be a randomly generated series of numbers and letters, and the email provider was one of the largest online sites. A lot of people used a temporary email address to submit questions. It usually wasn’t a problem, because the disclaimer on the paper’s website covered permissions, so she didn’t have to follow up before publishing.
But this was different. She needed to reach out to this boy.
She immediately hit Reply and crossed her mental fingers as she started typing, but she hit a snag immediately. She wasn’t going to call him Nobody. She refused to. So she just started with “Hello” and went from there.
I’m hoping you’re still at this email address so we can talk. Could you let me know? I’d love to get some more information about what you’re going through, because I truly understand. Please get in touch.
She signed her name and hit Send. When her inbox dinged just a few seconds later, she knew what it meant. Her response had been returned as undeliverable.
Veronica wiped her face again, then blew her nose and closed her eyes to try to stop her tears. If she couldn’t reach him directly, she’d have to post a response on her online column, because she couldn’t wait a week to answer this boy. What if things got worse for him? What if he decided to hurt himself? She knew what the suicide statistics were for teenage boys, and this boy was clearly depressed.
She needed to reach out and she needed to do it the right way. She ticked through her mental list of contacts, but she couldn’t settle on one that satisfied her. There was a psychiatrist she’d been in touch with through the paper once, but she didn’t trust him. He’d seemed arrogant and had even cracked a few jokes about his patients. No, she didn’t trust him at all.
Her social circle wasn’t very large, and it didn’t include any doctors or therapists, but she knew whose would. Ironic that she might have to get in touch with him about this. Her lip curled at the thought. But this wasn’t about her, and she could swallow her pride for this child.
She dialed her father and held her breath.
“Yes?” he answered curtly. He was all business with her and anyone else beneath him. If she’d been a US senator or one of the wealthy people in town, his tone would have been decidedly warmer.
“I need to ask a favor,” she said, hating the words as they left her mouth.
“I hope the favor has to do with Dillon Tettering.”
“It does not.”
“So it’s money?” he barked.
“No, it’s not money. Listen, I just need to know if you have any friends in therapy or psychiatry in town. I have a bit of an emergency regarding a letter writer, and I need a little advice.”
“Isn’t that what you’re paid for?” he said with a cold laugh.
“Dad. Just... Do you know anyone? Surely you’ve dealt with a lot of psychology experts from the bench.” It always helped to remind him that you were aware of his very important job.
“Most of those are brought in by the feds.”
“But not all?” she pressed.
“Sure,” he finally said. She could hear him shuffling papers as he spoke to her. His attention was always on something else, but maybe he was actually looking for something for her this time. “I can give you a name.”
She sighed and slumped into her chair. “Thank you.”
“I assume you’ll return the favor by having a drink with Dillon Tettering.”
Unbelievable. It wasn’t enough that she was his daughter; she still had to bring something to the table. Her tension over the letter snapped to anger. “You know I don’t like him. You know I didn’t like any of Jason’s friends. Why would you ask me to do that?”
“Jesus, Veronica, that was years ago. Grow up. It’s a drink.”
“Yeah? What if he wants a quick lay afterward? You want me to do that, too?”
She expected him to explode. She actually winced, waiting for it, but after a brief moment of silence, he laughed, one deep, hard bark of laughter. “Get over yourself and meet him for a drink. It’s a development deal, not a sex-slave ring. And I don’t know what the hell you’re so uptight about, anyway. You have no trouble embarrassing me with half the columns you write.” He hung up without waiting for her agreement. A few minutes later, her mail dinged again, and she opened it to find an email from her father. It was just the nam
e of a psychologist and a phone number, nothing else.
She called the psychologist’s office immediately and left a message with the receptionist, blatantly dropping her father’s name in the hopes that the therapist would call back quickly.
As soon as she got off the phone, she sent an email to her editor, asking if it would be all right to update the online column early this week. Then she started on the first draft of her letter.
Her father’s name, as bitter as it was on her tongue, was a magic word in this town, and her phone rang just as she finished reviewing her words. Not only was he fast, but the therapist agreed to review Veronica’s letter as soon as she sent it, to make sure she was offering the correct advice.
As she waited for his response, she read the letter from Nobody again, trying to puzzle out details that weren’t there. If he was writing to her, he probably went to her old high school here in town, and she could perfectly imagine him wandering those halls, hoping he didn’t run into anyone who’d draw attention to him.
Veronica’s stepbrother had been one year ahead of her, so the only class they’d ever shared was Spanish. But that hadn’t mattered. He’d been a year older. He’d corrupted everything for her, his disdain trickling down through the lower classes.
She’d hated every single day. She’d hated waking up in the morning and knowing she’d have to see him, share a house with him and then go to a school where he’d made her into a nobody.
Even now it was strange to think that her arrogant, superior stepbrother had been willing to tear her down so completely when she was related to him. She’d have thought he wouldn’t want that association. But the truth was that he couldn’t bear even one atom of approval or admiration being focused on anyone else, and she’d committed the biggest sin of all: she’d lived in his house, and she’d been there before him. Destroying her had been about claiming his territory, like the male lion who killed all the cubs in a pride when he took it over.
He hadn’t wanted his mom to remarry, he hadn’t wanted to leave Southern California and he definitely hadn’t wanted to live in Wyoming. Stepping on Veronica had been his revenge, and he’d enjoyed it.
Taking the Heat Page 18
