Christmas Box Set
Page 36
But I couldn’t get enough of him. I wanted more. I wanted everything. I tugged on his body, encouraging him to keep up that steady motion, to give me every throbbing inch of him.
“Did you get it?” he asked, growling the words, but I couldn’t answer him. That pressure was building again. I dug my nails into his back, urging him to go even harder and deeper. He rose onto his elbows, thrusting deeper, taking one of my legs up with him to open me up to him even further, my sex blooming like a flower. The change in position sent him into me at a different angle, spreading pleasurable warmth rocketing through me.
“I’m coming,” he groaned, working his hips harder, his cock so deep I couldn’t breathe. Those words undid me, releasing that pressure in a gush of tingling warmth. My second orgasm came on so harshly, it bathed my face in heat and made it impossible to think of anything but this moment with Blaze inside me, setting me on fire from the inside out.
He pushed inside me hard and stayed there, drawing a breathy wail from me at how forcefully his muscled body bucked into me, pressing me into the mattress. He growled behind clenched teeth, the sound rumbling from his chest into mine. We were both balancing on that ecstatic precipice together, our bodies tense and shivering, slick with sweat.
And then Blaze’s muscles loosened, his entire body softening on top of mine, the tingling aftereffect of my orgasm seizing my abdomen in a flurry of electric feeling. The air was too hot, but I didn’t want Blaze to slide off of me just yet. I clung to him, so happy in this moment that I never wanted it to end.
Blaze
Mid-March
I plunged into the smoky corridor with the rest of the team behind me, moving with steady care. The fire was spreading rapidly, consuming the top of the building and moving down to where we were faster than the teams outside working the hoses could stop it. We didn’t have much time to check the floor for any residents who hadn’t been able to get out. Above us, the smoke alarms were screaming. We had our self-contained breathing apparatuses on, so the smoke didn’t trouble me as I moved from locked door to locked door, forcing them open with the curved end of my halligan bar to check the small studio apartments for trapped stragglers.
There were at least 50 evacuees outside, but there could still be people stuck in here. Each of the two units had taken a floor, trying to clear the building as quickly as we could before it collapsed on our heads. It wasn’t safe to go into any of the floors above that. The fire was spreading too quickly now. By the time my team and I reached the end of the corridor, my body was bathed in sweat beneath my uniform and turnout jacket and pants. We only had one apartment left to check, and then we needed to evacuate.
I turned in time to see the ceiling come loose all at once in a shower of steaming debris. I acted without thinking, taking hold of Hector’s arm and pulling him out of the way. He stumbled into me, nearly knocking me into the opposite wall as the debris landed right where he’d just been standing. If that had fallen on his head, he would have been killed. I was breathing heavily, my heart hammering in my chest at how close he’d come. Hector looked a little stunned, blinking his dark eyes behind his mask and staring at the pile of shit that had almost taken him away from his wife and kids.
But he snapped out of it quickly. We had a job to do. I nodded at him once — our code to check each other no matter what was going on around us — and he nodded back, ready to roll.
I pried the door open with the halligan, and we flooded inside. Thank God these were all studio apartments. The fire was close to getting out of control, so we didn’t have the time to search through multiple bedrooms. I lifted my mask long enough to shout out, “Is anyone in here?” and then put it back in place. No one answered me. The smoke was getting worse, and now that the floor above us was collapsing, we really didn’t have much time to spare.
Through the thick haze of smoke, I noticed what looked like a pair of feet sticking out from behind a bed positioned in the middle of the room. I rushed around to the other side. A man was lying face down on the ground, his arms splayed out. I knelt to check his vitals, pulling off the glove on one hand so I could press two fingers into his neck, just below his jaw. He still had a strong pulse, which was good, but if we didn’t get him out of here immediately, he might not make it. Who knew how much smoke he’d breathed in.
I put my glove back on and signaled to Hector and Johnny to assist, and we got the man up off the ground and moving towards the door while the rest of the team finished up the search of the small, single room. We rushed from the apartment to the stairs at the end of the corridor, carrying the man easily with the load split between us.
Another huge chunk of the ceiling collapsed at the far end of the hallway, signaling how quickly the fire was spreading above us and weakening the structure of the building. The top floors had already been flaming when we arrived, but we’d managed to get most of the residents to wait at a safe distance away from the action, not wanting them to get hurt or impede the firefighters in any way. We plunged down the stairs, the rest of the team streaming after us. We jogged through the open entrance doors, delivering the unconscious man to waiting paramedics.
I tugged my mask off, the cooler air a blessing on my face. I breathed in deeply, still able to smell the smoke from the fire right behind me, but glad to be out in the open again where it wasn’t so suffocatingly hot. It felt like I was being baked alive in my uniform. The heat in there had been incredible. It’d been quite some time since I’d faced a fire this bad.
The paramedics bundled the man onto a stretcher, lifted him into the back of the ambulance, and strapped an oxygen mask over his face, which revived him. He was groggy and worse for wear, but he would survive the ordeal. That was what mattered. I turned away as they closed the doors to the back of the bus and took off without turning on the sirens.
There were teams of firefighters from multiple departments on the ground battling the spreading blaze, their hoses deployed and spraying founts of water through the broken windows. No amount of water was going to help at this point. The building would be a complete loss, but at least everyone had made it out of there alive. Sometimes, that was the best you could hope for.
I took off my helmet, exposing my sweaty head to the chilly air for a moment, before putting it back on and rushing back into the fray, joining Hector and Johnny on the frontline.
“Someone might still be in there,” Johnny said as I stepped beside him. “On the first floor.”
“Shit,” I said. “Let’s do this then.”
Hector and the rest of the guys put their gear in place again as I fit the mask and breathing apparatus back over my face. We went back into the building, tucking our heads and squaring our shoulders at the intense blast of heat that welcomed us.
Sami
The Same Evening
I was curled up on the couch, a book in my lap and an empty wine glass on the side table next to me — my third one. Classical music was playing and I had a blanket tucked around my bare legs to trap in the warmth. I’d been reading for a few quiet, relaxing hours before my eyelids started to droop.
I hadn’t shown any properties at all today or even left the house, choosing instead to spend the day doing exactly what I wanted: reading and puttering around on the internet, still dressed in my pajamas. A mental health day, as my mother called them when we were growing up. I didn’t allow myself to have them very often, but when I did, I went all the way. I hadn’t even taken any phone calls. It was great. The only thing that could make the day better was to drift gently into a light nap before I threw a few things together for a simple dinner that I planned to eat while reading this book.
The phone rang as soon as my eyes closed. I considered just ignoring it, but what if it was about Mom or someone else I cared about? I knew it wasn’t Blaze. He was on duty until tomorrow morning.
Groaning, I forced myself to sit up and reach for the phone, which I’d left on the coffee table. It was Amy. I picked up immediately. She wouldn’t have calle
d unless it was important. She and Lisa both knew I was setting today aside as a much needed me day.
“Hello?”
“Oh my God, Sami!” she exclaimed, skipping right by any kind of salutation, her voice so loud I had to pull the phone away from my ear to avoid going deaf. “Turn on channel three!”
I furrowed my eyebrows, still a little groggy from the nap I’d been cheated out of. “What?”
“Just do it. Turn on the TV!”
I had to get up to retrieve the remote for the television and cable box, which I’d left sitting on the armchair and well out of reach of where I’d set up camp a few hours ago. I hadn’t been reading as much as I used to and didn’t want the distraction of daytime television to derail my plans to dive into one of the books I’d received for Christmas. I was halfway through it and on track to finish it late tonight or early tomorrow morning.
“Do you have it on yet?”
“Chill, woman. I’m doing it.” I turned on the TV and the cable box, waited for the screen to come to life, and then went to channel three. It was showing scenes from a terrible apartment fire on the other side of town. The entire building was going up in flames, though there were crews of firefighters working to save it.
I stood in front of the television, mesmerized by the activity. This was the kind of shit Blaze saw every day. I wasn’t sure why Amy had felt the need to interrupt me by sharing this, but at least it was interesting. This wasn’t live footage, the reporter said. It had been shot an hour earlier at the scene. Now the reporter was going around interviewing the residents who’d managed to escape with their lives, but had lost everything.
“Why am I watching this?” I asked, a little annoyed to have been pulled out of my nap. Not that it wasn’t interesting, but it definitely wasn’t pressing. Amy knew not to bother me with this kind of shit when I was taking some time for myself. I didn’t do it very often. I didn’t think it was too much to ask to go one full day out of 365 without being pestered.
“Just wait,” she replied, not seeming to sense the bite in my voice. “They’ll show him again. They have to.”
The reporter, a very attractive woman with dark brown hair and wide blue eyes, her face appropriately stern for the desperate situation, bid goodnight to one of the interviewees. “As you can see, there are still quite a few firefighters left on the scene.”
They cut back to the newsroom, a man and a woman I recognized looking extremely concerned, their hands folded on the long desk in front of them.
“Let’s roll a few more seconds of the footage from the earlier today,” the man said, staring directly into the camera, his dark eyes burning into mine.
The screen was filled with footage of the burned out shell of a building as it had looked during the worst of the blaze, with flames dancing up to the sky, smoke billowing out of every blown out window. The camera began to focus more on the firemen on the scene, some working in teams on the hoses while others ran into and out of the building.
“This is the footage they showed earlier!” Amy exclaimed, screaming the words into the phone. I was too enthralled by the burning building to say anything or even take the phone away from my ear this time. “Watch the door!”
I did, squinting to focus, though I didn’t have a problem seeing the action on the screen. A few firemen came rushing out of the building holding what looked like an unconscious man. The one at the front was Blaze.
“Oh my God,” I whispered. I’d know him anywhere, even with all the equipment on and the mask covering his face. It was in the way he strode across the grass, so confident, his powerful shoulders squared, the figure he cut in his uniform unmistakable. The camera followed him, as enthralled by the sight of him as I was, so I could see him tug the mask off his face right before handing the unconscious man off to the paramedics. He stood watching the fire after that, wiping the sweat from his forehead, cutting an eerily handsome figure with the smoke and flames behind him.
And then, suddenly, he ran back in the direction of the building, just as the camera cut away from him. My heart leapt into my throat, throbbing so hard it hurt. Had he gone back in there? I couldn’t help the flood of pride I felt for him, even as my stomach twisted with fear. My boyfriend was the kind of brave, selfless man who went into burning buildings to save people. He put his life on the line to help others on a daily basis. My heart swelled, even as it beat nearly out of my chest. I’d never loved something so much and hated it at the same time. Was this how it was going to feel to be with him, this mix of exhilaration and terror?
“I can’t believe you are dating that man!” Amy said, her voice rising to a squeal. “You are so lucky. If you don’t hook me up with one of his friends, I’m never speaking to you again.”
I knew exactly the friend she wanted to be hooked up with. Johnny Smith, the blond firefighter with the charming smile I’d met on the night of the ball. He wasn’t as stunningly gorgeous as Blaze, but he was still pretty damned fine.
“I don’t really know many of the other guys,” I said mechanically. I couldn’t beat back the uneasiness that had settled over me at the sight of Blaze on screen, even with the pride I still felt at even knowing such a selfless, incredible man. “But I can try to see what Blaze thinks about hooking you two up.”
I knew his job was dangerous — you could hardly fight fires for a living without putting yourself at risk — but I’d never realized how close to death he hoovered every time he went out on a call. There could be a time when he went out and never came back again. Just the thought of that terrified me. I shifted my focus elsewhere, looking up at the television just as the action of the fire gave way to a calmer scene back in the newsroom.
The solemn man and woman in the studio stared into the camera, seeming to see all the way into my soul, the practiced concern on their faces stirring the anxiety I felt expanding inside me into a frenzy.
“None of the residents were seriously hurt, but one brave firefighter was badly injured in that fire,” the female reporter said, widening eyes deeply shaded with concern that appeared genuine, as though the man in question was her husband or brother. “He’s currently in critical condition in the ICU.”
I gasped and my heart crept even further into my esophagus, making it extremely difficult to breathe. I saw Blaze’s handsome face as he opened the door to the taxi after our date two nights ago before he began another 48 hour shift. What if that was the last time I saw him? He could be fighting for his life right now and I’d have no way of knowing.
“Oh my God, Sami, I’m so sorry,” Amy said, her voice very low all of a sudden, making things worse.
“I have to go,” I said, and hung up without waiting for her to respond. I needed to get in touch with Blaze. I didn’t know what time this fire had been. If he was still out there, he wouldn’t answer his phone. But I had to try. I realized no hospital would give me the time of day if I called looking for him. I was just his girlfriend, not his wife, not family. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t pretend to be his wife. I knew his birthday. I’d could lie if I had to.
I had to sit down, I was shaking so much. I forced myself to breathe deeply in and out, swallowing between breaths to force my rising heart back into my chest where it belonged. I’d suffered a few debilitating panic attacks as a teenager and though they hadn’t happened again since the middle of sophomore year, I lived in terror that I would start having them again. At the time, I’d thought I was having a heart attack. I needed to calm down before I made this call, although I didn’t really care if he chuckled at how silly I was to worry about him. That would mean he wasn’t the fireman fighting for his life in the ICU.
I dialed his number, fidgeting on the couch as I waited through rings that felt interminable, both of my legs shaking up and down as the rest of my body rocked back and forth. He wasn’t answering. After several rings, it went to voicemail, the sudden sound of his voice — so close to what I needed to hear right now yet so far away — brought tears stinging to my eyes.
I swallowed back my heart, pressed my eyes shut to keep the tears from streaming free, and spoke in the calmest voice I could muster. “Blaze, it’s Sami. Please call me back as soon as you get this. I’m worried about you.” I hung up the phone before I lost it and followed up immediately with a text asking him to call me back ASAP. I waited a few minutes, legs shaking as I balanced on the edge of my seat, attempting to convince myself that he was fine, that this was normal, and then I called him again.
Blaze
Early the Following Morning
I came to slowly, the alarm buzzing in my ears. Only it wasn’t the alarm from the apartment building grinding into my head. It was my phone. As I lay there, remembering where I was — not at the station or out on a call, but here, in my apartment at the end of a long, eventful shift — the phone quieted on its own. I let my heavy eyes drift shut, exhaling with relief at being let off the hook, and the damned thing started ringing again.
Groaning, I reached for it, answering it without looking at the face on the screen. My eyes were too fuzzy to focus right now. It was light out, but early. I needed some goddamned curtains, but I hated to block that floor-to-ceiling window. Sami called it a definite crowd pleaser and forbade me from covering it. She seemed like the type of woman I was better never crossing.