Text copyright ©2015 Lani Lynn Vale
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Acknowledgements
I’d like to once again thank FuriousFotog for taking this beautiful photo of Shawn Dawson. And Shawn Dawson for allowing this photo to be taken. I freakin’ LOVE it! You two made magic together.
To Asli, my editor. Thank you again for all that you do for me. You’re the best.
Dedication
To my husband. I love the hell out of you. :)
Other Titles by Lani Lynn Vale:
The Freebirds
Boomtown
Highway Don’t Care
Another One Bites the Dust
Last Day of My Life
Texas Tornado
I Don’t Dance
The Heroes of The Dixie Wardens MC
Lights To My Siren
Halligan To My Axe
Kevlar To My Vest
Keys To My Cuffs
Life To My Flight
Charge To My Line
Code 11-KPD Series
Center Mass (May 2015)
You’re the Charge…
Bad Boy. Screw-up. Good for nothing. Hero. Angel. These were all words Grayson ‘Torren’ Trammel had heard whispered behind his back over his lifetime. What he hadn’t heard was ‘quitter,’ and he’d be damned if some little rehab chick, with her beautiful brown hair, and hot, sassy little mouth was going to label him as such.
To My…
Tru knows Grayson’s not for her. He’s too bad. Too hot. Too demanding. Too taken.
She tells herself that almost daily as she helps Grayson get back into fighting shape after a horrific accident nearly ripped his life away from him. That had taken the life of one of the men in his MC.
Grayson is everything her father warned her about, but there’s just something about him that intrigues her. That makes her want more.
The man’s a firefighter. How bad could he be?
Line…
Apparently, he could be way worse than bad, but he could also be so very, very good. Something Tru realizes, rather quickly, when the two can no longer fight the pull that’s between them.
Now there’s only one word she wants to hear when it comes to him: his.
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Epilogue
What’s Next?
Prologue
It’s all fun and games until your jeans don’t button anymore.
-Life Lesson
Tru
Three months prior
“I dare you to go up and hug that fireman. Wrap your legs around his waist,” Iliana challenged me.
I looked to where she was gesturing and rolled my eyes. “No.”
I was trying to have a relaxing drink at the newest restaurant and bar in town, Halligans and Handcuffs. What I wasn’t trying to do was draw attention to myself; especially, in a room filled with my mother’s colleagues.
“Oh, come on, you big chicken. Balk. Balk. Balk,” she clucked.
I shook my head again. “All you’re doing is making yourself sound like a dork.”
Seriously, why did the woman have to embarrass me? I averted my eyes as the tables around us started to turn and study Iliana.
Just pour a few drinks in the woman, and she became the queen of obnoxious.
She smiled widely. “Oh, come on. Do it.”
I took a pull of my beer and looked at the man she was wanting me to hug.
He was tall. He’d dwarf my five and a half feet easily.
“What will you give me if I do?” I asked as I took another sip of beer, keeping my eye on the man with the shaved dark hair, dressed in his fire department blues.
Large, mouthwatering biceps. Arms that were covered from wrist to where his sleeve stopped in tattoos. Strong, angular chin. Slightly crooked nose. Deep toe curling laugh.
“Whatever you want,” Iliana promised holding up her pinky finger in the air with a dare.
Knowing exactly what I’d take if she actually held up her end of the bargain, I smiled.
I took her pinky finger, and we kissed our hands one by one.
“Deal,” I said and stood.
“What are you going to take?” She asked warily, knowing I’d given up too easily.
Iliana was my best friend and roommate.
We’d moved in together when we’d started occupational therapy school, and had been living together ever since.
She was two years younger than my twenty eight, but acted like she was fifty, that is, unless she was drinking, like she was doing right now.
In real life, she was that boring person who never did anything because she was too scared her boyfriend would find out that she actually had fun without him.
And the way she acted didn’t say twenty six. It screamed old.
For instance, she had a Tempur-Pedic bed that sat up like a hospital bed…and it was about to become mine.
“Your bed. For two weeks,” I said with an evil grin.
She glared at me. “If you do it, it’s yours for a month. His name’s Torren.”
Downing the remainder of my beer, I started walking off purposefully in the man’s direction. Torren, she’d said his name was. That was a weird name. Who named their kid Torren?
Why not Paul, or Brian? Those were normal names. Then again, my name was different, too.
Once I got to within a straight shot of him, I started jogging. Then, when I was close enough, I jumped into his arms and wrapped my hands around his neck, and my legs around his hips.
He caught me, reflexively.
One hand going around my ass as the other went up to protect his beer.
“Uhhh,” he said as I stayed there for another couple of seconds. “Do I know you?”
I barely contained the urge to giggle.
He sounded so lost.
Then I became aware of the other men surrounding us.
I’d been so focused on the man, Torren, that I hadn’t even taken into account the circle of badass I’d broken with my entrance.
With that, I turned around and left, trying my hardest to forget what it felt like to be wrapped in his arms.
Iliana was grinning like a fool as I walked toward her.
By the time I sat down at the table, this time purposefully facing in the opposite direction of the bar, she was practically crying in hilarity.
“Oh, God,” she wheezed. “You should’ve seen his face!”
“He’s not still looking at me, is he?” I worried.
Jesus, the man was hot.
Up close, I could tell his eyes were the color of a stormy day.
And the sheer size of the muscles of his arm were mouthwatering. The colors of his tattoos were even more magnificent up close.
“He’s gesturing towards us with his head, talking to a waitress. I wonder what he’s saying,” Iliana whispered loudly.
I tried my hardest not to turn around and look.
It was a close call, but I managed it.
“Uh, oh. Here she comes,” she whispered.
The young girl stopped at the table with a beer in her hand. “Hi,” she chirped. “I was sent over here to give this to you.”
When she placed the beer on the table, I waved it off. “No thank you, I don’t drink.”
She eyed the empty beer bottle that she’d brought me earlier, but wisely didn’t comment.
“Dude, what the fuck?” Iliana gasped once the waitress left.
My eyes widened. “I don’t know! It just came out of my mouth! I don’t know!”
I was seriously freaking out.
I was such a dork.
I was literally a homebody.
I didn’t do this sort of shit.
I’d never even had a boyfriend!
I was still a virgin! I didn’t know how to flirt!
I didn’t even know what the hell had gotten into me earlier.
“He’s not looking at me, is he?” I was starting to freak out. “We should go.”
I stood and threw my backpack over my shoulders. “Come on, quick.”
I started pulling her, and she grabbed her own beer long enough to chug the remnants, and slammed it down onto a table as we poured into the parking lot.
“Hurry,” I demanded as we started walking quickly to my truck.
“Oh, my God. He’s in the doorway,” Iliana said as she looked over her shoulder.
I yanked her arm hard. “Turn around. Eyes straight ahead. Get to the truck before he starts trying to talk to me.”
I’d just made it to my truck when Torren’s voice yelled out over the nearly empty parking lot. “I don’t bite!”
I turned around, and, swear to God, I said, “I do!”
My hand went over my mouth and I looked at Iliana, wide eyed. “Did you slip me a roofie?”
She laughed. “Oh, my God. He’s walking this way.”
Wasting no time, I backed out of the spot and spun my wheels in my haste to get out of the parking lot.
“He’s laughing,” she said as she watched until she could see no more. “I do believe, Tru, that you now have yourself a sexy firefighter admirer.”
Chapter 1
Fuck going to my happy place. I’m going to my naughty place.
-E-card
Torren
“Just drop me off right here. I can walk inside,” I snarled at the orderly that had insisted she bring me down here.
The woman, Bianca, I think she said her name was, smiled tightly at me. “It’s hospital protocol.”
I rolled my eyes and stayed in the chair even though I didn’t need it.
“Here we are, Mr. Trammel. Tru will be with you in just a moment,” Bianca stammered, before practically running away.
I guess I could’ve been a little hard on the poor girl, but I wasn’t in the best of moods.
For one, I wasn’t even in the hospital anymore, so why the fuck did I need to ride in a wheelchair?
Two, my shoulder hurt.
I hadn’t been able to work in over a month, and I missed my friend.
Tunnel, the man I’d suggested join The Dixie Wardens MC, had died of smoke inhalation a little over a month ago, and I’d just seen his widow on the way down here.
He’d died in the same fire where I’d hurt my shoulder, tearing my rotator cuff in my quest to save another biker’s woman, Rue.
Only, I’d been lucky and he hadn’t.
Tunnel had been married. Had a young daughter. He’d been a police officer.
What was I?
Nothing.
I’d had to break down the thin wall between Rue’s apartment and the one next door with a computer chair and, in the process, had fucked my shoulder up pretty good.
A week later, I’d had surgery, and now I was in therapy after a two week break to get the inflammation to settle down before starting to build my strength back.
“Hi, Mr. Trammel, I’m Tru and I’m going to be your COTA,” a woman came in saying as she looked at the chart in her hands. “How are you feeling?”
It didn’t take me long to realize who she was once she looked up.
It was the woman from the bar a couple of months ago.
The one who’d jumped in my arms like she was my lover and hugged me in front of Molly. Which had changed the last two months of my life.
It shouldn’t have felt so good.
Not when I’d wanted Molly.
The woman had been a stranger.
But as I’d held her in my arms for a few long moments, I’d been reluctant to let her go. I’d had to restrain myself from clutching her to me and kissing the hell out of her.
In fact, she’d been the one to let go and look sheepish. Her muttered, “Oh, wrong person,” had followed in her wake.
I couldn’t keep my eyes off her for the rest of the time she was there.
She was around average height for a woman. Five six or so, with long, wavy blonde hair.
It looked like she’d been out in the sun a lot. It had a lot of highlights in it, and looked great against her lime green scrubs.
“You,” I said smartly.
She smiled sheepishly. “Oh…hey. I didn’t realize it was you.”
I tilted my head. “Yeah, it’s me. The random guy you jumped.”
She cracked a smile instead of looking scared.
She had beautiful white, straight teeth.
The kind that probably cost a mint to fix.
“I did not jump you,” she interjected, a smile tipping up the corner of her lips.
I shrugged. “You jumped in my arms. Same thing.”
She laughed. A deep throated, throw your head back, kind of laugh, causing me to smile right along with her.
“It is not the same thing, and you know it,” she giggled. “Are you ready to get started?”
I grinned deviously back at her. “My body is your temple. Do with me as you please.”
It was her turn to look devious. “Remember you told me that in about an hour.”
***
I laid back on the padded table and gritted my teeth.
Pain.
Everywhere.
Everything hurt.
My back hurt. My legs hurt. My head hurt.
“Why do my toes hurt?” I groaned.
She gave me a patient look. “Because every time you lifted your arm up, or I moved it where you didn’t like it, you stood on your tiptoes to get away from the pain. It’ll never get any better if you don’t push yourself past your comfort zone.”
My eyes narrowed. “You don’t think I’m going past my comfort zone?”
She shook her head. “I know you’re not.”
I sat up, wincing as I did, and narrowed my eyes at her.
She wasn’t my favorite person at the moment, and it was hard for me to keep myself from lashing out at her.
Even if she was hot.
The last hour had been intense.
Today was my first day of occup
ational therapy on the road to recovery, and it was frustrating as shit when I couldn’t even hold a goddamned pencil.
I’d practiced putting on my shirt countless times - something that I used to do without thought, now took intense concentration to make sure I didn’t fuck anything up worse.
“What makes you say that?” I asked her.
She pursed her lips, causing the skin around her nose to wrinkle cutely.
Too bad I was too pissed to find it any cuter.
“You’re overly cautious. You stopped before it even started to hurt. You were anticipating the hurt, so you didn’t go as far as you probably could have,” she said frankly.
I blinked.
Had I been doing that?
I’ve always been one to know my limits.
Not knowing your limits was a damn good way to get other people killed.
However, I did know how to push past those limits. For instance, beating a hole in a wall with a computer chair was past my limits, and I was paying for it now.
I would do it again in a heartbeat.
“Okay,” I said as I sat up on the table, letting my feet dangle over the side. “Do me again.”
She looked at me passively, not even rising to the bait, and walked over slowly.
Taking my arm in her hand, she slowly started to lift until it was parallel with my shoulders, then went even further.
My muscles tensed. Adrenaline started shooting through my veins, and my breathing and heart rate sped up.
“You’re already two inches past where you could go last time,” she said slowly, lowering my hand down until it lay limply at my side.
I was trembling.
My hands were shaking, and I was sweating so bad I knew I’d need to go home and change before my, so called, date with Molly later this afternoon.
Molly and I were complicated.
Molly didn’t want to be with a firefighter, but she wanted me, in the meantime, until she could find someone else.
I’d resisted temptation for a very long time.
I’d met her when she was sixteen, but even back then, she’d been fucking beautiful.
Out of respect for Cleo, a fellow member of The Dixie Wardens, I’d stayed away from her, even though every cell in my body called to her.
For four years I’d been dying to have her…and then the woman currently standing in front of me happened, and all of a sudden Molly didn’t even register as a blip on my radar.
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