Heat Exchange

by Shannon Stacey

  Aidan watched her, hoping she wouldn’t lose her temper or simply walk out the door. That wouldn’t do anybody any good, and he knew for a fact Scotty being at odds with his sister upset him. If he heard her yelling and rushed out to defend Danny, it would get ugly and Scotty would be almost impossible to work with until it was resolved.

  But Lydia’s expression softened and she crossed the kitchen to wrap her arms around his neck. “Hi, Danny.”

  They embraced for a moment and then, when they broke apart, Danny gave her a half smile. “I wasn’t sure if you were going to hug me or kick me in the balls.”

  “Neither was I,” she said, and they all laughed. “I’m kidding. It’s good to see you.”

  “I hear it makes you unhappy that I’m staying here. Because of Ashley.” He gave a little shrug of his shoulders. “I can find a couch to crash on at somebody else’s place if you think this is too hard for her.”

  Since Aidan had overheard Lydia’s feelings on the matter when she expressed them in no uncertain terms to Scotty the day before, he was surprised when she shook her head. “I might have overreacted. A little.”

  Danny’s mouth quirked into a smile. “A little?”

  “I was so focused on Ashley and being a good sister and making sure somebody stood up for her that, until I saw your face, I forgot we like you, too.”

  “A little?”

  She grinned. “A little.”

  “Are you sure? Because I don’t want to cause problems between you and your brother, or your old man.”

  “I’m sure. And I know Ashley wouldn’t want you couch-surfing, either.”

  “How’s she doing?”

  Aidan watched Lydia struggle with an answer, even taking a sip of her orange juice before answering. “She’s okay, I guess. Maybe you should call her.”

  “Yeah, maybe.” He slapped his hand on the counter and forced a smile. “I’m running to the corner market for a few things before we head out. You guys need anything?”

  Scotty walked in at that moment, a towel wrapped around his waist while he scrubbed at his hair with another. “What’s going on?”

  “I’m heading to the market. You need something?”

  They were all good, and as soon as Danny was gone, Scotty gave his sister a look. “I didn’t hear any yelling.”

  “It’s all good,” she said. “And I’m supposed to apologize for causing a scene yesterday.”

  “I guess I’m supposed to accept it, then.”

  Aidan shook his head at the strangeness of the Kincaid family dynamics and went into the living room space. The apartment was too open concept to give them any real privacy to make their half-assed apologies, but he didn’t need to stand at the island and watch. He knew it wouldn’t take long. Scott and Lydia both had tempers with a low flash point, but they also burned out almost as quickly.

  Sure enough, in less than two minutes, the siblings were laughing and Aidan exhaled a deep sigh of relief. The storm had passed. This one, anyway.

  “Why do you have a ceramic bear on your back deck with dead flowers in it?” Lydia was asking.

  Aidan could see Scott shrug from where he sat on the couch. “It was a gift from a woman I dated a while back.”

  “Interesting gift.”

  “Black bear. Yellow flowers in it. It was supposed to be a Bruins thing.”

  “That’s sweet,” she said. “How come you broke up?”

  “She just wasn’t the one.”

  Aidan laughed. “She wasn’t the one whose name he said in his sleep is what he means.”

  “Screw you,” Scotty shot back. “I’m going to get dressed. Try not to spill all my secrets, Hunt.”

  “I’m heading out,” Lydia told him. “But I’ll talk to you later.”

  Scotty waved goodbye before disappearing into his room, and Aidan stood as Lydia walked toward him. “Feel better now?”

  “Yeah, I do. I don’t like fighting with my brother, believe it or not. And I love Ashley, but I can’t kick Danny while he’s down.” She shrugged. “I guess I should mind the bar and my own business.”

  It was close enough to what Scott had said so he had to fight not to grin. “I don’t think minding your family’s business is a bad thing. I wouldn’t mind mine interfering now and again.”

  “It’s their loss,” she said in a quiet voice rich with sincerity.

  The affection she clearly had for him shone in her eyes and it kicked his heart rate up, even though he knew it only came from having known each other for so long. “Thanks.”

  “I should head out and let you guys get ready for your pedicures.”

  Aidan chuckled. “Not quite that glamorous. We’re helping Rick Gullotti build a wheelchair ramp for his landlords.”

  “Hot day for it.”

  “Yeah, but we’ve all got the time off. Maybe I’ll stop by the bar later for a beer. And to say hi.”

  He said it casually because, as far as he knew, they were friends and it seemed like something a friend could say without deeper meaning, but she cocked an eyebrow at him. “Maybe I’ll see you around, then, kid.”

  “Definitely,” he said as she opened the glass slider and stepped out onto the deck.

  And the first chance he got, he was going to get to the bottom of this kid thing.

  Chapter Six

  AN HOUR BEFORE closing time, Lydia gave up on seeing Aidan walk through the door. It was late enough so if he hadn’t stopped in by now, he probably wasn’t going to.

  She figured he wasn’t doing the night shift at the station or he wouldn’t come in and have a beer beforehand. And if he had to be in at eight tomorrow morning, ten o’clock at night was a little late to head out for a drink.

  It had probably just been a throwaway line anyway. Hey, maybe I’ll stop in and say hi. She’d heard it many times before. Sometimes people popped in to say hello and sometimes they found better things to do.

  Hoarse laughter caught her attention and she looked to the back corner of the bar where her dad and his buddy Fitz were perched on stools, one on each side of the polished wood. Besides that pair, there were a couple of firefighters she didn’t really know sitting at the bar, and three guys she pegged as not from around there sitting at one of the tables.

  “Hey, Dad,” she called. “Are you going to be here awhile longer?”

  “Yeah, I got another half an hour or so in me.”

  He shouldn’t, she thought. He should be home in bed already. “I’m going to go check the other room, then.”

  When her dad waved her away, Lydia grabbed an empty bus pan from under the bar, along with a rag and the spray bottle of cleaner. The more she did now, the closer she was to being able to go home once she’d locked the door. The kitchen closed at nine, so all she had to do was cash out the register, clean up the last few mugs and wash the floor.

  The room wasn’t too bad, most of their patrons knowing enough to bring their empties to the bar when they were done, but she found a couple of bottles on the floor next to the leg of the pool table. And there was a half-full bottle balanced precariously on top of the rack of pool cues. Shaking her head, she dropped it into the bus pan.

  Movement at the door caught her eye, and she turned to watch Aidan walk through the door. Heat suffused her body and she moved away from the opening before he saw her. While she could see the door from the alcove, she couldn’t see the bar. She imagined him going over and shaking her dad’s hand, though. Maybe accepting a beer.

  “Kinda late,” she heard her father say. The place was quiet enough so his loud voice seemed to echo through the bar. “We’ll be closing up soon.”

  “I was going by and figured I’d say hi for a few minutes. See if anybody was around.”

  “Lydia’s in the pool table room. If they made a mess,
that bus pan might be heavy. And she’s gotta put the chairs up. Go give her a hand, would ya?”

  Great. Thanks a lot, Dad.

  Lydia grabbed the spray bottle and spritzed the nearest table before wiping it down. And when Aidan stepped into the alcove, she gave him a welcoming smile. He was wearing a Boston Fire T-shirt with a pair of faded jeans, and his hair looked freshly washed. She wanted to run her fingers through it and see if it felt as soft as it looked, but she curled them in the cleaning rag instead.

  “Hey, kinda late to start the night, isn’t it?” she asked.

  He held up the open bottle of beer. “Told you I’d stop by. But it took forever to build that damn ramp and then Gullotti’s landlady insisted on making supper for us. After that, we went upstairs to his place because he needed a hand moving some furniture. Next thing you know the night’s gone and we’ve all got to work tomorrow.”

  “But you still came here? Just because you said you might stop by.”

  “I wasn’t going to but I took a shower and I wasn’t tired and...” He set the bottle on one of the tables she hadn’t wiped yet and alarm bells went off in her mind. “There’s something I wanted to talk to you about.”

  He walked slowly toward her as he said it, his voice low. She could almost feel the energy crackling between them, and she tried desperately to remember this was Aidan Hunt. He was Scotty’s best friend. He was a firefighter. He could be an annoying pain in the ass. That was three strikes and he was out.

  “What is it you want to talk about?” she asked, surprised her voice sounded as steady as it did.

  “You keep calling me kid.”

  She tried to ignore the way he moved into her personal space, but it wasn’t easy. He smelled too good and she was eye level with that hollow at the base of his throat.

  “I’m not a kid anymore,” he continued when she didn’t say anything.

  Oh, she knew that. But calling him kid was her way of reminding herself he was her younger brother’s best friend. Or attempting to, anyway. It didn’t seem to be working.

  “You’re younger than I am,” she said, with a new tone in her voice that bordered on husky.

  Touching him would be a mistake. She pressed her hands to the wall behind her, the old brick coarse under her palms.

  When Aidan braced his hands against the wall, too—one on either side of her head—Lydia’s breath caught in her chest. He was close enough so she could smell his shampoo and the slight tang of his aftershave. And he was close enough to kiss her.

  She was not going to touch him.

  “Not by enough years to even count,” he said, “unless you’re scraping the bottom of the barrel looking for reasons why I shouldn’t kiss you.”

  “There are so many reasons you shouldn’t kiss me, I don’t need to scrape the bottom of the barrel.”

  With his hands still braced against the wall, he dipped his head low, so his mouth was close to her ear. “Trust me, I know. But it’s all I think about so unless you tell me you don’t want it, I’m going to kiss you anyway.”

  His breath was hot on her neck, making the soft wisps of her hair tickle her skin. Lydia knew she should tell him she didn’t want him to kiss her, but she couldn’t make herself say the words. “It would be a lie.”

  Aidan’s cheek grazed hers and she sighed at the contact. His lips pressed lightly against the corner of her mouth and then she had a brief moment of staring into his pretty blue eyes before his mouth was on hers.

  Her fingers curled against the wall, the brick rasping her nail tips like an emery board. Their breaths mingled and the desire that had been building in her since he walked into the bar her first night back solidified into a needy ache. He kissed her until she made a hungry sound deep in her throat, and then lifted his right hand from the wall to cup the side of her face.

  “Why do I want you so much?” he whispered against her lips.

  “It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “It doesn’t.” He brushed his thumb over her cheekbone, looking into her eyes. “I don’t care.”

  His mouth closed over hers again, more demanding this time. Giving up on her determination not to touch him, Lydia ran one hand up his chest and buried the other in his hair. It was as soft as it looked, and she moaned against his lips when he put his hands on her hips and pulled her hard up against him.

  The sound of a breaking plate jerked her back to her senses. When he lifted his head, looking in the direction of the noise, she sidestepped so she was no longer between him and the wall. Saved by the jinx. “I should be out there. I need to go.”

  “Or you could stay here and kiss me some more.”

  She laughed, and it sounded a little more high-pitched than usual. “I’ll feel bad if the poor schmuck doesn’t kiss Bobby’s picture and then gets hit by a car or something.”

  Aidan nodded and picked up a chair, turning it upside down in his hands. “Go ahead, then. I’ll put up the chairs and bring the bus pan back.”

  “Thanks.”

  Lydia wasn’t surprised to see that her dad had already taken care of making sure their customer fended off the broken glass jinx, and she also wasn’t surprised when her dad gave her an odd look. It hadn’t occurred to her that she might look like a woman who’d just been kissed and the only guy back there was Aidan Hunt.

  “It’s hot as hell in that alcove,” she said, hoping to fend off any questions.

  As expected, he latched on to the easy answer. “I’ve been thinking about replacing the ceiling fans with something with bigger paddles.”

  “Good idea. Aidan’s finishing up the last of the chairs and he’ll bring the bus pan out.”

  “Took you a while.”

  She wasn’t sure if he meant anything by that other than general criticism, but she kept her back to him and focused on the cash register. Hitting the button to pop it open, she took out some ones and started counting. “We got talking about Scotty’s apartment. It came out nice.”

  As she’d hoped, Fitz took over the conversation, wanting to know how the third-floor renovation was going. Leaving them to it, she counted and bundled the bills in the register drawer.

  When she heard Aidan set the bus pan on the bar, she took a deep breath before turning to face him. It was weak to avoid making eye contact, but she could almost feel her father’s presence behind her, so she concentrated on putting the spray bottle back under the bar. “Thanks. I appreciate it.”

  “Not a problem. You want me to take it out back?”

  “I’ll get it for her, son.” Her dad got off his stool, jingling the key ring clipped to his pocket. “Time to lock up, everybody.”

  Aidan slapped his hand on the bar, which startled Lydia into making eye contact with him. He smiled. “I’ll see you around.”

  She nodded and grabbed the bus pan, even though her dad had said he’d take it. It was something to do with her hands. “Thanks again for the help.”

  Her dad walked him and the other customers to the door, talking and laughing with them in that easy way he had with the patrons, and she watched them go. There was a little tension in Aidan’s shoulders, which probably mirrored her own.

  Once he’d locked the doors, her dad sighed and gestured to Fitz. “Help out, old man. Let’s get this place cleaned up so my girl can get home.”

  Not that she was in any hurry, Lydia thought. It wasn’t as if she’d be getting any sleep. With the memory of that kiss to relive and savor, she had a feeling she’d do more sheet-twisting and pillow-punching than sleeping.

  * * *

  YOU’RE AN ASSHOLE, plain and simple. Aidan curled his fingers over the edge of the porcelain sink bowl the next morning, staring at his reflection in the mirror.

  Kissing Lydia Kincaid in the pool room of Kincaid’s Pub with Tommy sitting at the bar made him an asshole. Lo
oking Scotty in the face two hours ago when they’d shown up for the day tour without saying a word about what he’d done made him an asshole. And the real kicker was that he wanted to kiss her again.

  No matter how he tried to justify it in his mind, he couldn’t make those simple facts go away. He wanted Lydia and he shouldn’t. Therefore, he was an asshole.

  “Hey, Hunt, you dead?” Jeff Porter pounded on the bathroom door. “I think Eriksson does the best mouth-to-mouth, if you need a little pick-me-up.”

  “I’m not dead,” Aidan shouted back. “Gimme a freakin’ minute.”

  “You’ve had a lot of minutes. I’m gonna take the Halligan to the door in not too many more minutes.”

  Aidan yanked open the door and glared at the big man as he pushed by. “You ladder guys need to learn some manners. Here, it’s all yours.”

  Porter grinned and slapped him on the shoulder. “I’m good. I was just bustin’ your balls.”

  “Asshole.” Aidan went into the kitchen to see if there were any doughnuts left. There were two cinnamon sugar ones, which were everybody’s least favorite, but they met the definition of junk food, so he grabbed a mug of coffee and sat down in front of the box.

  The last thing Aidan needed was anybody trying to bust his balls. They were on the verge of exploding all on their own, without any help. He’d hoped kissing Lydia would get the need out of his system, but it had backfired on him.

  It might have gotten the overwhelming need to kiss her out of his system, but now he’d been left with an even more overwhelming need for more. More Lydia. More kissing and more touching. More of her voice in his ear when it was low and husky with desire. More of her hands on his body.

  He broke off a chunk of doughnut and shoved it into his mouth. Maybe a sugar high would help.

  After taking a long swallow of coffee to wash it down, he took another bite. Then another. Fifteen minutes later, the doughnuts and coffee were setting up like concrete in his stomach, and he leaned back in his chair and debated on catching a quick nap.