Chasing Fire (Gilded Knights Series Book 2)

by Emilia Finn

  “Mmhmm.” My ass. Fucker wasn’t as perfect as Idalia would have him remembered. She probably does it out of respect, since he probably wasn’t a total prick. But he sure as shit was mediocre at best, and uninterested at worst. “Okay.”

  “You’re a trained first responder, aren’t you?” She goes back to scratching my hair. “How are you so clueless about this?”

  “I’m not. In fact, a couple skidded into our firehouse only three months ago and had their baby on the concrete in front of Diana.” I grin, knowing I’m flexing here. “I caught that baby like a pro.”

  Idalia gasps. “You did not!”

  “I totally did. She was crowning and not close enough to the hospital, so the daddy-to-be took a sharp right and skidded onto our lot. He dragged her out, I was closest, and like you said… we’re trained.”

  “You’ve delivered a baby?” she says with awe. “Seriously?”

  “Uh huh. Though I didn’t like it one bit. Like you said, there’s no magic there. There’s just blood and fear and worry about fucking it all up.” I turn to my side and glance between the valley of her breasts. “Luckily for that woman, the baby slid out after only a couple pushes. She was too far along and couldn’t stop it, so I just stood guard and caught him when it was time. Dispatch called in the ambulances while it was going down, so I got to toss that baby over to Mitch.”

  I grin. “It was a fun family-bonding moment. But,” I nibble on my bottom lip. “Just because I saw it happen doesn’t mean it was my body hurting. It wasn’t my body being torn apart. That’s why I asked you about your experience.”

  She smiles, gentle and slow. “After the first night in the hospital, things got better for me. I was able to walk late the next day, and the nurses were great. Max the First arrived the day after that, and my mom paid for in-home help for my first two weeks. All in all, it was as magical as it was going to be.”

  “And now? How is it being a mom?”

  “The most rewarding and fulfilling thing I will ever do,” she sighs. “That’s not to say it isn’t hard, or scary, or frustrating. Maximo’s speech delays add an extra layer of stress, and losing my husband certainly changed the direction Maximo and I were heading. But really, when I think of the big picture, I can’t see anything I’ve ever done, or could ever do, being as important as raising my son.”

  “Will you have more children?” My heart thunders as these questions, heavy and unexpected, spew from my mouth. “I mean, ya know, in the future.”

  “I’ve never even thought about it,” she admits quietly. “I’ve been so focused on the two of us that I never looked to the future to see what it may look like.”

  “Would you consider it?” I lick my lips. “If the right guy came along, and you could see a future there, would you be open to more children?”

  “I…” Her cheeks grow warmer. “I don’t know. Perhaps.”

  So it’s not a hard no, I think to myself.

  Why does my heart race with joy at that thought?

  “Do you want children?” she asks. “You’re getting close to thirty, and you haven’t taken that step.”

  “Wow!” I push up and meet her eyes. “Fuckin’ hell. You just go straight for the balls, huh?”

  “No!” Laughing, she reaches up to grab me. “Thirty isn’t old or anything. I was just ask—”

  “I want a bunch of kids.” I lower myself over her, rest my elbows on either side of her face, and press a gentle kiss to her jaw. “Lots and lots of them. Like, at least two.”

  She giggles so her chest hits mine.

  “If the first two go alright, then I might be open to four more.”

  “Four more?” she demands. “Are you insane?”

  “I’m one of six children, Idalia.” I push to my knees, then with subtle movements, place them between her open legs. “Six really cool siblings who are closer than most. I guess we could say I’m a little biased, and totally looking to recreate that bond with my own children.”

  “Six is a lot,” she argues. “Like, a hell of a lot. That’s a lot of contractions. And surgery. And stitches. And ice packs on m— a woman’s vagina.”

  “Maybe I’ll adopt a couple.” I nip her jaw and grin when her legs drop wide open. “Save my future wife a little of the hard work.”

  “Very thoughtful of you,” she breathes out. “And a worthy cause.”

  “Shush now.” I slide my tongue along her lips, then over her tongue. And when she closes her eyes, I slide deep inside her core and groan at how warm she is. How tight. How perfect she is for me.

  “I have to go home soon.” Idalia yawns and snuggles into my pillow. “Max will wake in an hour or two.”

  “Mmm.” I slide my fingertip over the bridge of her nose and smile when her lashes flutter closed. “How are you supposed to function today on no sleep?”

  “I’ll have a home day and put on a million repeats of Go, Dog. Go! for Max. It’ll work out, and I’ll do some admin work.” She yawns. “The real question is, how are you supposed to function safely on no sleep? You’re in charge of saving lives, not hitting play on a TV remote.”

  “I’m off today.” And knowing that allows me the luxury of lounging with this woman until the world burns down… or her son wakes from his sleep. Whichever comes first. “I’m off till tomorrow, so I’ll probably only have a quick nap today, sleep normal tonight, then I’m reset.”

  “Does it suck working these shifts that mess with your sleep patterns?”

  I think on that for a moment and enjoy this almost asleep space we drift in. “Probably as much as it sucked to wake to a newborn for a year straight.”

  “Mm… that sucked a little,” she murmurs with a grin. “Will you take me home?”

  “Of course. There isn’t a single thing on this planet that would convince me to walk you to the porch and close the door in your face. Come on.”

  Groaning because I don’t want to move, I push up and hate that cold bites at my skin when the blankets fall away. I move away from my bed quickly, before Idalia has to spend too long in the cold, then I toss a pair of sweats toward her. “Max is too young to understand, but you’ll prefer these over a skirt and heels.”

  “Nixon, I—”

  “And this.” I toss a hoodie at her face so she has to fight to free herself of the fabric. She’s getting mad, and though the ice act used to bother me, it’s now become something I’m quite fond of. “Get dressed. Leave your panties here for me.”

  Tugging the hoodie away from her face, Idalia’s glacial eyes stop on mine. “Excuse me?”

  “Price of admission,” I smirk. “You can keep my hoodie. I’ll keep your panties. It’s a fair trade.”

  “No, it’s not!” And yet, she shrugs into my clothes. “I want my panties back.”

  I head into the bathroom, dismissive, since I know it’ll piss her off. “I’ve hidden them, and you’ll never find them.”

  “I’ll cut you,” she shouts from the bed. “And then add arsenic to your next meal.”

  I scoff “I’ve eaten meals made by dudes who have no clue how to butter bread and I ain’t dead yet. I have a gut of iron.” Pulling on a fresh pair of jeans, I step back into my bedroom and pat my bare stomach. “I haven’t had a stomach bug once in my entire life. And food poisoning is nothing but a myth in my world.”

  “I’ll take that as a challenge,” she seethes… but stabs her legs into my sweatpants.

  My clothes are much too big for her, but there’s something delicious about a sexy woman wearing my clothes after a long night of lovemaking.

  “You look better in those than I expected.” I stalk my way toward the bed and press my lips to hers. She stares at me, wide-eyed and stunned, until I pull back. “I know this is new, and I know you’re the queen of ice and not showing emotion—”

  “Hey!”

  “But I like you. I like you so much that it fucking matters to me that I see you again. I like you so much that my heart beats faster when I think of you. And I like yo
u so much that when I take you home in a bit, I need you to tell me you like me too, and after that, I need you not to ice me out and pretend you feel nothing when you look at me.”

  “Nixon, I—”

  “I like you so much that when I talked of futures and kids and shit tonight, I was talking about me and you. And I know that seems forward,” I add when her cheeks pale. “I know it’s fast, but it is what it is. I know how I feel, so I’m gonna hang around and hope that, at some point, you feel it too. After that, I’ll consider giving your panties back.”

  Idalia’s held breath bursts out on a desperate giggle. “You just took a nice night and turned it really serious. Then you end it with an underwear hostage situation.”

  “Whatever it takes.”

  I press a kiss to her lips, but at the same time, take her hands and pull her to her feet on this side of the bed. When she’s standing and her hipbones touch my thighs, I cup her face and pull her up until she has no choice but to stand on her toes.

  “I’ll wait for you to catch up, Idalia. But I’m not gonna be subtle about it, I’m not gonna be quiet about it. Instead, I’m gonna nag you about it.”

  “So my options are to get on board or leave town?”

  “Yup.” I press another kiss to her lips. “Except the leave town one. That’s not an option.”

  “You’re impossible.” But her cheeks flame, and her lips curve into a smile. “I wanted a quiet existence here.”

  “And I can give you that. I love a good movie night. I like Saturday morning cartoons. I love to cook, so we never have to eat out if you don’t wanna. And I want six kids. You’ve already given us a headstart.”

  “You’re insane!”

  “Insanely desperate to keep you looking at me.” I slide the tip of my nose over hers. “I’m not declaring lifelong love and servitude here. We still have a lot of getting to know each other to do. And then there’s your habit of switching languages when you get mad; I have to learn, or I’ll never know when you’re calling me a jackass in Italian.”

  “You’ll know,” she smarts. “Most of the delivery is in the tone I use.”

  “Uh huh. I’m not asking for love or marriage or kids… yet. But how about a promise to say yes to the next few dates I ask you out on, then we’ll see what happens after that?”

  “You make it seem so easy.” Her eyes turn serious. Scared. “You make it sound like this will be as smooth as your swagger.”

  I scoff. “You forget my swagger began with me jizzing on a girl’s prom dress.”

  Idalia laughs.

  “It won’t be easy,” I shake my head. “You have a child and a business to think about. And I have a career I love, a home I don’t want to leave, and a family I have to spend time with too. We both have lives outside of this bedroom. Good lives, busy lives, lives we worked hard for and don’t want to toss away. But perhaps sometimes, we can try to twine a few things together.”

  “Like what?” she asks. “How?”

  “Well,” I tuck dark hair behind her ear. “Maybe in a little while, instead of having dinner for only me and you, we can invite Max too. And a few dinners after that, we can invite my family.”

  “Your whole family?” she breathes. “Max won’t be able to—”

  “One step at a time,” I reiterate. “We can start with Nadia and Arlo, since he knows them well enough, and probably Abby too, since she takes up almost no space at all. Once he’s comfortable with that, we add Mitch and Spencer. Then maybe toss Troy in, if he promises not to make sudden movements. And Corey too, since he’s actually pretty cool with kids.”

  “He is?”

  “Sure. But don’t get any crazy ideas. I’m not sharing you with him or anything.”

  Her eyes sparkle. Fun, emotion, possibly a twinkle of sadness. “What about your other brother? Beckett?”

  “Beckett can fuck himself. He’s an asshole.”

  She bursts out in a laugh. “Okay.”

  “See?” I close my eyes and rest my forehead against hers. “It’ll be okay. Slow steps, one at a time. And maybe at the end, we’ll know if this’ll stick.”

  “If it does?”

  “Then Rosa is a really cool fuckin’ name.”

  “And if it doesn’t,” she rasps. “If it doesn’t stick?”

  “Then I’ll always treat Max the same; as my little friend, who will never know I hate his mom with the fire of a thousand suns because she dumped me.”

  Nodding, she reaches up to swipe a finger under her eye. “One step at a time.”

  “Dinner tonight?”

  She snorts. “Not even a little bit subtle.”

  “It’ll be a quiet one. Home-cooked meal, indoors, early night, since I have to sleep for work tomorrow.”

  “And the radio?”

  “Here.” I pull away from the woman wearing clothes much too baggy for her, but I hold on to her hand and drag her away from my room and down the hall.

  We pass my trophies, my ribbons, then emerge into the living room, where I release her to fetch the box the radio came in.

  I unwrap it as I move, toss packaging to the floor that I’ll have to collect later, then I reveal the device and stop in front of her. “I’ll get it set up for you before I clock on at the station tomorrow. I’ll show you how to listen in, how to turn it up and down. Please, for the love of all things holy, don’t speak. My boss will kill me if he finds out I’ve given you this.”

  She snickers and accepts the radio when I offer it. “I won’t speak.”

  “I’ll get it charged for you, and tuned in to the frequency we use. It’ll catch chatter all day long, even when I’m not on shift, so you’ll want to know how to switch it on and off.”

  “Okay.”

  “Once it’s set up, you’ll never have to worry about me. You’ll always know where I am and that I’m safe. And if we pick out a codeword just for us, I’ll slip it into conversation while I work, so you know I’m speaking specially to you.”

  “A codeword like what?”

  “Well…” I wrap my arms around her hips and wait while she studies the shiny black radio. “I know of some dudes in town who say ‘Jericho’ to mean some shit. It hasn’t been explained to me, and I don’t really care to ask, but I’ve heard it enough now to connect it to certain types of events. When the shit is hitting the fan and that word is muttered, all hell rains down on whoever is misbehaving.”

  “O-okay,” she stammers. “Are they firefighters too?”

  “Nope. They just have no respect for official channels. And they have the cops in their pocket, so no one does anything about it.”

  She gasps. “Like, crooked cops? Are the police here bad? Because I thought—”

  “No, they’re all good. These dudes use their cops for the common good. And when the cops can’t do something, because of legalities and red tape, the other guys take care of it. It’s a really twisted spin on vigilante justice that helps the entire town. But now you and I need a codeword of our own. Something that won’t stand out and be too obvious.”

  “So it can’t be ‘panty thief’?”

  I snort. “Not sure I can slip that organically into conversation.”

  “What about ‘Italy’?” she suggests. “Like, you could be busy and tired, and maybe you mention wishing you were in Italy.”

  That suggestion grows inside me like the sun emerging after a long winter. “I’m going to push aside my immature needs and not mention the double entendre of wanting to be in Italy.”

  She narrows her eyes. “Pig.”

  “Exactly. I’ll just say you have a deal. ‘Italy’ works. Everyone will know I’m talking about you—”

  “They will?”

  “Absolutely,” I chuckle. “I already told you; I’m not subtle. But them knowing I’m talking about you isn’t the same as knowing I’m talking to you. So that works. And whenever you hear ‘Italy’ come across that radio, you’ll know I’m safe and thinking about you.”

  Idalia’s grin grows—so
ft at first, hesitant. But it blossoms into a full smile that makes her eyes light up. “Deal.”

  “Great. Now let’s get you home before Arlo sends out a search team.”

  “Ugh, merda,” Idalia grumbles. “Arlo is going to be impossible when she finds out I was gone all night.”

  I make sure to grab Idalia’s purse, her cell, her keys—but I conveniently forget the skirt, the heels, and the panties. I slip into a shirt of my own and grab my boots on the way past the door, then I lead her outside and into the darkness.

  The moon shines bright near the horizon. It’ll be gone soon, and this pre-dawn darkness will make way for a brand-new day, but for right now, we race across my crispy lawn amid soft laughter and the kind of happiness one can only experience when they’re in the exact right place with the exact right person.

  I beep my truck open before we reach it, and when the interior lights automatically flick on, I bask in the smugness of seeing Idalia’s messy hair. Her smudged mascara. The knowledge she came here wearing matching underwear, and now dons none at all.

  “Stop looking at me like that.” She climbs into the passenger seat and grabs the seatbelt. “I know what you’re thinking.”

  “What am I thinking?” I surprise her with a quick kiss on the lips, then before she can answer, I slam the truck door and race around to my side. I slide in, buckle up, and hit the button for the ignition. “Huh?” I meet her eyes. “You can’t possibly know I’m thinking about how you taste when you come on my tongue.”

  “Stop!” She presses a hand to her cheek and stares out at the darkness. “See? I knew you were being dirty in your mind.”

  “We’re not children.” I push my truck into drive, since I parked facing the street, and when we start forward and move onto the road, I grab Idalia’s hand and bring it to rest on my thigh. “We’re grown adults. We have sex. There’s no need to be shy about it.”

  “I’m not shy!” she panics. “But I’m also not gonna talk about it all… all…”

  “All what?” I prod. “Smug and shit? Should I be ashamed of the fact I got to lick your bootyhole tonight?”