That Hot Night: A Firefighter Romance

by Piper Sullivan

  Like a damn fool.

  “Completely sure. Now put on your best smile, unless I can convince you to pop a few buttons?” His glare told me I’d hit my mark. “Didn’t think so.”

  “Is this about a guy?” Jase was a good, if reluctant subject. Life leapt out of his pores and he had a smile that reeled you right in. “It’s usually about a guy.”

  “What guy Jase? Every guy in my life I’ve known my entire life.”

  He shrugged. “Sometimes you just have to look at someone a little different than how you always looked at them.” It didn’t take a genius to figure out he was talking about him and Bo.

  “Or maybe you’re seeing them as who they are, finally. Some people are deep down, exactly who they are on the surface.” And there was nothing wrong with Rafe, he was just a man who preferred to keep his relationships short. And shallow. “No harm in that either.”

  “Agree to disagree.”

  “I’m glad to hear that,” I told him and popped behind my camera once again. “Very glad.” Another half an hour of photography combined with sixteen minutes of daydreaming about things and people I shouldn’t, and Jase and I had wrapped our photo shoot. “Thanks for being a good sport.”

  “Anything for Tulip. But hey, you think I can get a few of those prints? I’ll pay for them.”

  I froze and peeked around the camera, happy to capture that smile so filled with love on his face. “Bo is a very lucky girl.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said quickly and I was happy to let him have his delusions, as long as he let me have mine.

  “Thanks again, Jase.” I shook off his offer of help and took my time packing up my equipment, enjoying the feel of the sunlight on my skin. It was nice and quiet, allowing me to get lost in thoughts that never strayed too far from Rafe these days.

  Unfortunately.

  Despite the erotic film replaying in my mind, I managed to make it back to what the locals considered downtown Tulip without any accidents or injuries.

  “I’m taking the win,” I grumbled as I stepped from my plain old blue sedan.

  “What are you winning, girly?” Eddy’s voice pulled me out of my own thoughts.

  “Nothing, it was just a hint of sarcasm after a long day Eddy.” She flashed a look over at Elizabeth Vargas, who rolled her eyes.

  “Sarcasm Janey, really? That’s beneath you.”

  “Yeah, but when it’s just me it’s all right. Right?” I was too tired to verbally spar with these sharp old ladies, but I knew better than to be rude. “Where are you gals headed?”

  “We were looking for you, actually. Who’s next up for the calendar?”

  “Why?” I folded my arms and stared at them suspiciously. “This whole matchmaking thing, as fun as it is, has gotten out of hand don’t you think?”

  “Not at all,” Elizabeth said easily. “You’re doing your part to help Tulip in your way, and so are we. Now, give us the goods on that delicious ER doctor and the Henderson boys.”

  “No way. I’m happy to be helpful where I can, but that’s it. Sorry girls.”

  Eddy grumbled and rolled her eyes at me, leaving no doubt that she was unhappy with my answer. “If you’re so sorry, just get some intel for us.”

  “Low blow, Eddy.”

  Elizabeth sighed and put her hands on my shoulders to make sure she had my full attention. “If we start asking questions they’ll clam up and listen, we haven’t forced anyone together. Just a little helping out.”

  “Meddling,” I corrected her.

  “Ask the coupled up Hometown Heroes if they mind.”

  She had a point. Everyone from Preston and Nina to Ry and Penny were as happy as could be. “Even if they don’t mind, all this meddling has the potential to go bad and I’d like to minimize the blowback on me. Please.” I had a business to run and couldn’t afford to alienate potential clients.

  “Okay fine, but if you find out anything just pass it along.”

  I spotted Rafe leaving Big Mama’s Diner with a few of the other firefighters, and the last thing I wanted was for him to see me when I looked like I’d spent the afternoon crawling in dirt. Mostly because that’s exactly what I’d been doing.

  “Sure. I’ll pass info along, but I’m not interrogating anyone for you.”

  “Deal!” Eddy agreed a little too quickly, and scurried off before I could regret making a deal with the devil. I shrugged off those thoughts and headed back to my car, no longer in the mood to brave the crowd at the diner for a hot dinner.

  A cold deli sandwich and a can of soup was enough. It had to be for now. Maybe tomorrow I would go shopping and complete my cowardly act.

  Rafe

  “Rafe. Just the man we wanted to see.” Helen Landon stood up from my steps and swiped the porch debris from her backside, taking her time sizing me up.

  “I should hope so, since you’re camped out in front of my house.” Sweat poured off my shirtless body, and I really just wanted to shower, but I knew there was no way I could deter Betty and Helen from whatever was on their agenda today. “Do I need to guess why you’re here?”

  “No,” Betty Kemp said with a sneaky smile. “But you can give us a moment of silence to enjoy just how pretty you are.”

  “They always ruin it by talking, don’t they?” Helen’s look dared me to say another word. “Now that we have your attention, we need your help.”

  My shoulders relaxed a little, but not completely, because these women were crafty if you weren’t careful. “I’m listening.” I wouldn’t agree to a thing until I got the details. All of them.

  “It’s nothing all that difficult. Janey needs help scouting a spot for one of the Hometown Heroes shoots. It’s for charity,” she added unnecessarily. “That girl is so darn stubborn she’d rather struggle than ask for help.”

  That sounded just like Janey, but I kept those words to myself. “Maybe she doesn’t want or need help, did that ever occur to you?” These women heard hooves and they didn’t think horses or zebras, they thought unicorns.

  Helen waved my words off. “We all need some help now and again, Chief.”

  “Annnnd,” Betty added with a wicked smile, “if you help Janey with this small task, I’ll do my best to make sure your photo shoot is simple. Easy even.” She let those words hang in the air, knowing they were a bait I could not resist.

  “Can I trust you?”

  Betty folded her arms. “Do you have a better option?”

  I could say no, but this was the perfect chance for some alone time with the only woman to flee my bed before I woke up for a proper goodbye.

  “No, I guess I don’t. Let me get myself together and I’ll go look Janey up,” I promised and climbed the stairs, unsure which was more exhausting, these women, or my five-mile run.

  “You might get her to agree easier if you went just as you are,” Helen added.

  Betty smacked her lips in disapproval. “Come on Helen, we talked about this. Rafe is pretty to look at, but he’s not for Janey. We’ll find someone else for her.” Betty grabbed her friend’s arm and the two women walked away, arm in arm, heads bent together like they were exchanging state secrets.

  They stopped at the end of the block and turned back to me. “I hear she’s at home!” Helen called out before they turned and disappeared from view.

  I frowned at them, sure they were up to something, then again, they were always up to something, which made it pretty difficult to tell when I needed to be worried. For now, I was hot and sweaty and desperately in need of a shower.

  But why did Betty say I wasn’t for Janey? That they would find someone else for her?

  Someone else! Who?

  Twenty minutes later I found Janey exactly where Helen said I would. What Helen hadn’t mentioned, what she couldn’t have known, was that I’d find Janey in a tight pair of cut-off jeans that hugged her ass and showed off the lines of muscle in her legs as she lay flat on the grass, taking a photo.

  “Well now I’d
say I have the best view in Tulip.”

  She froze at my voice, and I kept my gaze on her butt while she decided the best way to get off the ground gracefully. “Rafe,” she jumped up onto her knees, a position that gave me all kinds of dirty thoughts, before she pushed up to standing. “What brings you by?”

  Damn she was cute as she blew a thick strand of hair out of her face, one small hand fisted at her hip just to make sure I knew how displeased she was at being interrupted.

  “A couple of little birdies told me you needed help scouting a location.” She would know right away who told me, the only question was, how long would she fight me on it, because Janey loved to fight.

  “You got some bad intel, because I don’t need any help, and even if I did…”

  “You wouldn’t want it from me,” I finished the sentence for her.

  “And, even if I did,” she said with emphasis, “I can find my own help. And finish my own damn thoughts!”

  My lips quirked up at her unnecessary and unwarranted anger. “My bad.” When I held my hands up defensively, she rolled her eyes.

  “Now that you know I don’t need any help, you can get on with your day.”

  “Okay,” I told her and shoved my hands deep into my pockets, ready to wait her out if I needed to. “Sun is so pretty out here, light bouncing off everything.”

  A low growl escaped her, and she snatched a small black bag from the ground. “Come if you must, but if you can’t keep up you will be left behind.”

  “You do know what I do for a living don’t you?”

  Janey whirled around, a look of absolute innocence on her face. “No. What?”

  “Smart ass,” I grumbled and grabbed black bag to sling over my shoulder. “You’re not gonna fight me on carrying the bag?”

  “Nope. I’m letting you prove those muscles aren’t just for show.” She laughed at my scowl and that sound, so rich and full of life, pulled an answering laugh from me.

  We walked in silence for a few minutes while I gathered my thoughts, trying to figure out the best way to ask her why in the hell she ditched me at the hotel that night. It wasn’t ego, it was curiosity. Mostly.

  “Why do you have to scout locations?” It wasn’t the conversation I wanted to have, but maybe if I eased into it, things wouldn’t go totally to hell.

  “So that I know what equipment I need for a specific time of day. Don’t want to drag the wrong lights all the way out here, or anything else for that matter.”

  “Okay, but why do you need all these exotic locations? Don’t photos of half naked men sell themselves?” She sent me a mischievous smile over her shoulder.

  “Does that mean you’re willing to get half naked when it’s time to shoot you?”

  I nearly tripped over my feet at her surprise question. “Ah, no.”

  “Didn’t think so,” she shot back and turned away, again. We continued to walk in silence, but it wasn’t a tension filled kind of silence where one, or both of us, felt compelled to fill it. Instead it was nice. Almost comfortable. I was feeling hopeful all of a sudden.

  “What’s wrong with your studio? The rent on that place can’t be cheap.”

  “It’s not,” she said on a sigh that was half-annoyed and half something else I couldn’t quite make out. “But whenever possible, I prefer to utilize natural lighting with the help of artificial lights. I want my photos to come to life, to suck you right in and make you wish you were living that moment with them. When photos make you feel that way, you buy them. For yourself and for others.”

  Damn. “I get that.”

  “You do?” She sent me another look, a shocked one, over her shoulder. But it was over in a flash, her attention captured by a bird balancing on a branch.

  “Sort of. I mean I know what’s it like to want what you do to matter.”

  She snorted. “Not exactly the same. I’m perfectly aware that you save lives and property Rafe, even memories. It’s not the same.”

  “Not exactly, no,” I told her, and finally when there was a break in the trees, I was able to walk alongside her. “But that doesn’t mean what you do doesn’t matter. You help people remember the best parts of days that usually are more unrealistic expectations than cold hard reality. Weddings and christenings, engagement photos, it’s all crafting a perfect memory.”

  “Right,” she said, almost stunned by my words. Not gonna lie, they stunned me a bit too.

  One fat drop of rain fell on her forehead and then another on her cheek. And another and another until it was raining at a pretty steady clip. “Rain.”

  “Good observation.” She nodded for me to keep following her, as if I could do anything else. “There’s a bird watching shed up ahead, or you can walk the fifteen minutes back to my place. In this rain it’ll feel like sixty minutes.”

  “I know,” I growled, suddenly feeling out of sorts.

  “Good to know,” she snapped back and kept her attention on anything but me until we reached the shed, then she kept her eyes and her focus on the camera.

  I let a minute or two pass, sure she would remember her southern manners and make some attempt at conversation. But in this way Janey surprised me. Who knew she had such steely determination?

  “You’re ignoring me Janey?”

  “Of course not.”

  “I should hope not. It’s not the behavior I expect, especially after you snuck out of my room like a thief in the night.” It wasn’t the most elegant or mature way to bring it up, but there it was. Out there.

  She looked up with a gasp, fire and anger swirling in her deep green eyes. “Jerk,” she said on another strangled gasp.

  “I’m not a jerk, just a man in search of answers.” And she was in no position to run from me now.

  “It’s a little late for that, don’t you think?” Janey didn’t wait for me to respond, shaking her head wildly, she went to one of four windows in the room and stared out.

  “No, I don’t think so. It’s been a month, and I’ve given you plenty of time to act like an adult. To come to me. But you didn’t, so here we are.” That was the honest to goodness truth.

  “There’s nothing to talk about,” she said, her green gaze bouncing from me to the door and back to me.

  “I disagree. And now is as good a time as any, so talk.”

  Janey surprised me again, smoothing down her damp t-shirt she turned on her heels, snatched up her bag and walked out. Right into the rain.

  I laughed. And then I followed her.

  Janey

  Oh, what a jerk!

  What an absolute jerk Rafe Montgomery was! And to think, I’d spent the better part of the past month living and re-living every moment of that night together. Every beautiful, hot moment, while he’d probably had enough women since then that I was little more than a distant memory.

  I marched out of the bird watching shed, grateful that I’d used my waterproof camera bag today. And desperate to put as much distance as possible between me and Rafe. My legs moved faster at the sound of his heavy footfalls and long strides, telling me he was closer than I realized.

  “Come on Janey.” His words were tinged with annoyance, but the amusement in them still rankled and I kept walking.

  “Screw you Rafe!” Did he really feel it necessary to talk about this at all, never mind right now?

  “You already did that. And then you walked away.” There was no more laughter in his voice, bringing me up short. “I just want to know why. Among other things.” It was exactly those other things I was trying to avoid discussing.

  “Why?” Wasn’t it obvious why I left? After handing my virginity over on a silver platter, I had no idea what to say or what to do next, and I couldn’t stand the thought of him brushing me off or telling me he had a good time but, in that dismissive tone I’d seen deflate even the most confident of women. I wouldn’t, couldn’t survive that humiliation, so I left. Fled more like it. “Is your ego so fragile that one woman out of one hundred didn’t stay for another round and it
that bothers you?”

  The way his lips curled up said I shouldn’t have challenged him like that, but I was still learning and being this close to him was frankly unsettling. He barked out a laugh. “One of one hundred? Who in the hell do you think I am? I mean, thanks for the props and all, but you’ve got me all wrong sweetheart.”

  “You’re Rafe Montgomery, man about town.” I smirked and realized that despite the rain and my imminent humiliation, I was having fun verbally sparring with him. Some might even consider this some weird twisted form of flirting. Something about the exchange was firing me up. Exciting me.

  Rafe clutched at his heart with faux anguish and a smile. “You wound me. And for the record, if you would have stayed, it would’ve been round three, Janey. Three.” He shrugged like his words were easy to say and I guess, for him, they were. “I was taking it easy on you, given your uh, delicate situation.”

  I sucked in a gasp. “Rafe.”

  “Yeah,” he nodded slowly. “There it is. That’s the sound you made when I slid into you, when my tongue slid from the bottom to the top of your hot pussy, and I have to tell you Janey, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about that sound for the past month.” His eyes wore a fascinating gleam I found impossible to turn away from, or, maybe it was that sexy smirk that said he knew exactly what his words were doing to me. He was teasing me, on purpose.

  And it was working, damn him.

  “Funny,” I managed to say in a mostly normal sounding voice. “I can hardly remember it at all.” He didn’t need to know the truth, that I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about that night. It would only feed his ego.

  His laughter roared behind me, nearly blotting out the sound of the rain and I walked as fast as I could with the ground softening beneath my feet. I came to an abrupt stop as I took in the small plot of grass that officially separated my backyard from the wooded path beyond. It was mud. All mud.