Slow Burn (Smoke Jumpers)

by Anne Marsh

  And wasn’t he all Mr. Altruistic? Because his desire to offer up the bunkhouse to Faye wasn’t a neighborly gesture on his part. No, truth was, he wanted to keep her real close. In his cabin would have been best, but he was enough of a gentleman not to push that one. He’d brought her home last night, but that had been an emergency—and it had already been pointed out to him that he hadn’t been thinking. Not clearly enough.

  Faye did that to him, though. She was one of the prettiest women he’d seen, but that wasn’t all. At least, he didn’t think so. There was something about her. He wanted more, then still more, when he was with her.

  He’d be a gentleman tonight.

  Even if it killed him.

  “Thanks,” she said, her eyes sweeping the room.

  It wasn’t fancy, but he wanted her to like it. He’d spent years living in this kind of place, waiting for the next fire, the next call, or the next ride out.

  She turned and headed back down the stairs. Hopefully, she was going in search of a toothbrush, not a Motel 6. “Point me toward your bag,” he offered, “and I’ll carry it in for you. Get you settled.”

  “That’s going to be a challenge.” A rueful grin lit up her face when she reached the car and popped the trunk—and it became clear that the space was doubling as a closet. A very messy closet. Clothes were heaped inside in one enormous, jumbled pile. He had no idea how she could find anything. Or how much time it had taken to load the car up.

  “I was in too much of a hurry to get going to stop and pack,” she admitted.

  “I can see that.”

  Was he supposed to offer to let her talk about it? Coax the truth out of her? Hell, he was no good in this kind of situation. All he knew was that he was damned angry at Mike for letting Faye come out here alone. What was she thinking, buying a Corvette when she didn’t even have enough money for a hotel room? Still, Mike should have known, should have concerned himself about his former wife. How hard was it to pick up the phone and make a reservation and fork over a credit card?

  Mike had simply cut her loose. Evan couldn’t imagine anyone doing that to Faye. Goddamn it, he’d met her less than twenty-four hours ago, and he already knew she was special. She was the kind of woman you got your arms around and hung on to, for as long as she’d let you.

  “Okay.” He eyeballed the trunk-load of clothes. “You got hangers?”

  Of course she didn’t.

  Twenty minutes later, he’d hit Mimi up for supplies and hauled an impossibly large collection of clothes inside. He’d have to make a run into the city tomorrow, and stop at the Walmart for more plastic hangers, but he’d done what he could for now. He eyed the bursting closet. For a woman planning on spending one or two days in Strong, she’d packed a lot of gear. She must have one hell of a road trip planned for afterward.

  From the corner of his eye, he watched her pick out a bunk and crack open a new package of sheets.

  “You want a hand with that?” he asked, moving closer.

  “That might be a good idea.” She eyed the bare mattress cautiously, and that was permission enough to take over. There was a trick to fitting the sheets on the bunks, and showing her the way of it meant he got to stand close and drink in her laughter. The military would have busted her for her corners, and she was no Martha Stewart, but eventually she had the bed made up.

  “The sky looks different out here,” she said, moving toward the window while he finished up. A quick shove, and the sash shot up.

  Yeah. He agreed with her there. The night sky here was pretty without the city lights to cover up the stars. Even the air smelled warm and inviting.

  “No lights up here to run interference.” Coming up behind her, Evan lightly dropped his hands onto her shoulders, his thumbs finding and stroking her collarbone. He had the rough fingers of a man who worked with his hands every day of the week and outdoors more often than not. Those were good hands.

  She stood there, tingling with anticipation. It felt good, too, to just wait. To let go of the frenetic pace of driving up from Los Angeles and the demanding beat of life in that city. Strong was someplace simpler and slower, and Evan fit in here perfectly. She was the one who didn’t quite belong, but for this one moment she wanted to try.

  When he breathed lightly on her neck, goose bumps found her, and her belly came alive with nerve endings. Who knew that little connection could feel so good? For a long minute, his mouth rested against her throat. She tilted her head.

  And Evan’s lips found her collarbone.

  A soft, damp trail of kisses moved slowly, deliberately up her neck. Oh, God, God, God, she hadn’t known she could get so turned on by a simple kiss. Pinned between him and the windowsill, she felt heat tear right through her, even though she knew this was a game. She could move left or right, and he’d let her go. If she wanted this, this touch of his, she had to stay still.

  And Evan made it very hard to do so.

  There was no way to kiss him back in this position. There was no place to put her hands other than in front of her, so she gripped the windowsill. Right now, Evan was in the driver’s seat, giving her pleasure. Taking control. His mouth covered her skin, and her own moan, husky and needy, shocked her. Evan made her want.

  His hands slid her hair to one side, rubbing away the tension in the back of her neck and scalp in a way that was pure bliss. His mouth brushed against the nape of her neck again, and the spark low in her belly kicked up into inferno territory.

  “You think someone could see us up here?” The possibility was a naughty thrill that also brought a quick adrenaline rush.

  “Maybe.” His voice rumbled against her ear, making her want to squirm. Did the man have any idea how hot he was? “Sure,” he added, as thoughtful as if he was figuring out an engineering issue or where the best jump spot was that day. “Someone could see us, if that person wanted to be watching this.”

  When she looked around the darkness spreading out from the firehouse, she easily spotted the lights in the newer fire station that all but guaranteed company close at hand. “Would you?” Her voice sounded breathless, even to her own ears. He’d know she wanted him. Somehow, though, she thought he’d want that honesty. Evan wasn’t the kind of man who played games.

  He saw what he wanted. He asked. And then he took.

  “Sure would,” he agreed. “I like looking at you, darlin’.”

  His mouth brushed the sensitive lobe of her ear again, a soft presence reminding her he was right there as his tongue traced patterns on her skin.

  He wasn’t kissing her, not mouth to mouth, just had his lips touching her skin. And yet that simple touch was the most delicious, toe-curling, erotic thing, and she had no idea why. She stood there, fingers pressed into the old wood of the window ledge, savoring the heat of him at her back, big and solid and so reassuring. The sky wasn’t the only thing different up here in Strong. She was different, too, and she liked that.

  And then he stepped back, leaving her wanting more. More kisses. More Evan.

  “Adventure.” He stroked a finger down her nose, tapping the end before stepping back. She turned around, watching him. This was going to be good. She could feel it. This was more than just sexual arousal. There was something about this man that made her want to get underneath his skin and find out who he was. “Everything the good doctor ordered.”

  Chapter Six

  Evan walked over to Ben’s after leaving Faye tucked up in the firehouse. After holding her, kissing her like that, he was restless, and no way was he going straight back to the cabin where he’d so recently slept with Faye. If he got into that bed now, there’d be no holding back the memories of waking up next to her. Kissing her. Hell, he’d be lucky if he didn’t find himself climbing right back into his truck and begging Faye to take pity on him and let him in.

  She’d enjoyed that moment up there in the bunk room, too.

  She hadn’t moved away from him, had let him pin her between the windowsill and himself. And then she’d let him
touch her. Christ. She felt so good. All that silky, sweet skin and the scent of her—well, he’d never look at that bunk room the same way again.

  She’d liked that, and she hadn’t been shy about letting him know, either.

  He wasn’t surprised to find his Nonna parked on Ben’s porch. Something was brewing between those two. The pair practically sparked when they were together. He kind of liked the idea. Nonna deserved a man like Ben Cortez. Or Ben deserved a woman like his Nonna. Both were equally true.

  It being summer, even at nine o’clock the light was still fading out, more gray than black. Crickets were singing up a storm, and a cheerful noise spilled out of Ma’s whenever someone went in or out. Somewhere not too far away a pickup crunched over gravel. Familiar sounds he’d heard every summer in Strong for years. Home, for better or worse.

  He could have been ten again, too, seeing that look in Nonna’s eye. She wasn’t happy with him, and it didn’t take a genius to figure out why.

  She went right on the offensive, reading him the riot act. Too bad that horse was already out of the barn, because she was all fired up, and clearly leaving a message on his cell earlier that day hadn’t covered everything she had to say. “If you needed a bed, Evan, there are plenty in my house. You don’t bring a girl home without asking her first, then pop her into bed with you. Not you, Evan. Rio, sure.”

  “Got it.” He couldn’t explain why he’d done it. He’d known bringing Faye Duncan back to his cabin was a mistake. Hell, even Mimi had offered up her couch. Instead, he’d reacted instinctively. “I wasn’t thinking,” he offered.

  “No.” Nonna’s eyes searched his face. “I don’t suppose you were, Evan. She’s not a puppy you can bring home and keep. These things have consequences. You want her to stick around, you have to think it through.”

  He knew that, and he knew the whole town knew. And they knew that he knew they knew. It was like a goddamn television show. Problem was, he didn’t care. He’d always done his own thing. The only opinions that mattered to him were Rio’s and Jack’s—and Nonna’s.

  “I put her in the old firehouse for the rest of her stay,” he offered. “The bunk room’s empty, and she needed a place. That okay with you?”

  Ben snorted, but he clearly wasn’t going to put himself in the middle of this conversation. Evan didn’t blame him one bit.

  “That’s not my call,” Nonna said. “It’s not my firehouse, not my business.” Like hell, it wasn’t. She was as much a part of that firehouse as any of them. Even if she didn’t ride out on the truck or jump out of the plane, none of them would have been fighting fires without her. They all knew that, so he looked at her and waited. Sure enough, Nonna leaned forward, wrapping her arms around him. “I know you’re all grown up. I do. I simply want everything to work out for you, Evan.”

  Apparently, she didn’t see last night’s sleepover ending well for him. Part of him wanted to ask why, but he was done talking about this. He didn’t have anything to add to this conversation. Before she could bring up Faye again, he turned to Ben.

  “I want to run the rosters with you.” As Donovan Brothers’ safety and security man, this was his baby. Jack handled the day-to-day business, and Rio crunched data, but Evan kept everyone safe. Every time.

  Ben nodded, and ten minutes later Nonna had said her good-nights, and they were ass-deep in rosters and lists.

  Evan got the ball rolling. “Give me the names of the first responders. Which firefighters hit the scene first?” If they did have a firefighter arsonist on the Strong team, that man was probably first on the scene or as near to it as he could manage.

  Ben drew a finger down the lists, running through some kind of mental checklist. He probably wanted to go through those rosters with a fine-tooth comb every bit as badly as Evan did. There were answers hiding in here, waiting for them to connect the dots. To find their guy’s pattern. He’d have one, too. Arsonists always did.

  “We can rule out these.” Ben drew thick lines through a handful of names with a black Sharpie. “They check out. We know where they were when Faye’s brush fire got started. Everyone else, though, is still in.”

  “Jump team was on the ground, too.” Evan hated to say it, but facts were facts. His gut said none of the men he jumped with would do such a thing, but until he proved their whereabouts yesterday afternoon, they stayed on Ben’s list. Fair was fair.

  He couldn’t take his eyes off all that damning black and white. Forty names and too few crossed off. It had been a slow afternoon, and most of the guys had had a freebie, leaving only a skeleton crew on call. He needed proof of their whereabouts when what he wanted to do was look them in the eye and take their word on it. He didn’t like getting all up in any man’s business, but now he had a problem, and he didn’t have a choice.

  Someone had already lied.

  Someone had struck out on his own and started a fire. Or three.

  And that someone was likely just getting started. After what had happened to Jack’s Lily last month, they were all focused on fire patterns. When you had an inside job, you typically got a series of fires lighting up the same area. Fires that started small but got bigger. Like a roadside fire. There had been no building fires. Not yet. Their boy wasn’t going to be allowed to escalate on Evan’s watch, either.

  “Let’s see if we can narrow it down any based on height and build,” he said, reaching for the stack of personnel files.

  Two hours later they’d reached another dead end—and a list that still had thirty names on it. Sure, that was ten fewer guys he had to eyeball and ask if they were in the business of lying to him, so that was good. But, Christ, he didn’t want to confront any of them to ask for reassurance. Being a member of Strong’s team should have been enough. More than enough. How had they missed this guy? Where had all the personality tests and psych screenings and background checks gone wrong?

  “That’s it,” he said, standing up.

  “Nothing more to be done here,” Ben agreed. “You want me to share this with Jack and Rio tomorrow? Or do you want to do it?”

  “We’ll hit them together,” Evan decided. “They’ll have the same questions I did. You think there’s something we missed, Ben? Some clue we didn’t get when we were interviewing for the jump team or the ground crew here?”

  Ben straightened the stack of files, lining the edges up with military precision. “I doubt it,” he said finally. “There are always too many unknowns with this kind of shit, and you and I both know those questions got to be asked. We did the background checks; these boys all came to us with references. Maybe some of them are too young, and any kink in their heads wasn’t obvious. Maybe our guy hadn’t had his chance to work out the stupid, and we got unlucky. You ask him when we catch him.”

  “First question out of my mouth,” Evan promised. He was catching this guy, too. “Young and stupid doesn’t excuse this. There’s no room for stupid in a firefight.”

  “You want me to talk to the guys?”

  That was a generous offer, but this wasn’t Ben’s mess. “Jack can do it after we brief him. We brought these guys here. We’ll do it. If someone doesn’t understand his limits, we’ll make them clear.” He’d been running options in his head since he’d pulled up a chair and started going through the rosters. There was a firefighter arson-awareness program in California, but a box of workbooks and a dozen hours in a classroom weren’t going to fix this now. Inviting a psychologist to poke around wasn’t the kind of fix he wanted, either. He wanted to take care of this problem himself.

  “We’ll schedule the heart-to-heart after we walk the fire perimeter,” he decided.

  Over Ben’s shoulder, through the window, he had a clear view of the old firehouse. The whole two hours he’d worked on the files, the upstairs light had stayed on. Faye’s light. He liked knowing that she was there, curled up in the bunk he’d helped her make up. Reading or something. Whatever it was she’d been doing, she was done now, because the light suddenly winked out, and his imag
ination took over. Faye would be lying down in that bed. Right on the other side of that open window.

  He nodded toward the old firehouse. “I gave Faye a key when I let her in. Like I said, she needed a place to stay while we work this out, and the bunk room is empty. No reason she can’t stay there.”

  “That’s fine with me.” The smile on Ben’s face was unfamiliar. “Not back to your place, though?”

  Evan wasn’t sure what the older man was hinting at. “Not tonight. She needs to choose. Figure out for herself what she wants to do.”

  Ben shook his head, his hands sorting through more papers, making tidy little piles. “Don’t give her too much space, boy. You don’t want her too far from you.”

  “Personal experience talking there?” Evan didn’t know what dragged the question out of him. No matter what he suspected might be brewing between the other man and Nonna, that wasn’t somewhere he needed to go. Or that he even wanted to think about in detail. Ben was a good man, and Nonna deserved the best. Enough said.

  “Keep her close,” was all Ben answered. “You want her, you hang on to her good.”

  “Got it.” He’d head back to the cabin, he decided. Time enough tomorrow to plot his next plan of attack. He wasn’t in the market for relationship advice, but the intent look on Ben’s face said the only acceptable answer right now was agreement. So he’d agree. And do his own thing tomorrow.

  Right now his priority was the arsonist.

  Faye Duncan was simply a sweet little bonus.

  The California mountains pushed up into a summer sky that was all pretty blue and cloudless. It was the kind of day weekend visitors loved. Too many hot days, though, and the jump team would have more work on their hands. Hot weather meant thunderstorms and fires, and this month was heating up even before the brush fire two days ago.