Slow Burn

by Jamie Denton

  “Besides,” he murmured, his voice smooth and more enticing than a hot fudge sundae. “We’ve already determined you couldn’t possibly help yourself.”

  “I couldn’t?”

  His hand slid into her hair, lifting the heavy weight from the back of her neck. “No,” he said. “Not with you being a redhead and all.”

  With every single ounce of willpower she possessed, she stepped back, hoping to break the sensual spell Cale so effortlessly wove around her. Her hands trembled as she lifted the stack of plates from the table, the rattle sounding louder than an explosion of dynamite.

  Cale’s all too knowing chuckle instantly brought out the wickedness in her. Yes, he affected her. His touch, his voice, the way his eyes went from sky blue to navy when he looked at her in that certain way. All of it, all of him, left her body humming with awareness and a deep, aching need. Didn’t he deserve to experience a small taste of the same blissful torture himself?

  She shoved the plates toward him, giving him no choice but to take them from her or let them crash to the floor. She spun on her heel and headed toward the kitchen, stopping when she reached the arch separating the two rooms. With a deliberate shake of her hair, she looked over her shoulder and gave him what she hoped was a smoldering look filled with sin.

  “Cale?” she called quietly to him, with just enough of a husky undertone to make him wary.

  Her ploy worked.

  Apprehension and wonderment crossed his handsome face. “Yeah?” The sound was definitely strained.

  Enjoying the game, she deliberately moistened her bottom lip with her tongue. “That’s only the case if I’m a true redhead.”

  Ceramic clattered and rattled as Cale struggled to keep the plates from slipping out of his hands as her meaning penetrated. He clutched the dishes to his chest, then swore when the remnants of their breakfast smeared over his shirt.

  “You cheat, sweetheart.” A definite warning filled with sensual intent lined his tone and ignited her imagination.

  She laughed, knowing without a doubt she was playing with fire, but the slow burn of desire in the pit of her tummy was too intoxicating for her to walk away now.

  “You sure you want to play this game?”

  The wicked grin on his face should have scared her off, but instead of hightailing it to safety, she deliberately crossed the kitchen toward him. “When I play,” she told him, “I play to win.”

  His laughter warmed her as he set the dishes on the counter. He turned and slowly peeled the filthy T-shirt over his head, revealing, inch by delicious inch, his well-tanned, muscular torso.

  She itched to smooth her hands over the texture of his skin, to press her lips to that glorious wall of flesh. As she wrestled with the wisdom of her actions, he tossed the shirt aside and reached for her. With his hands locked firmly on the swell of her hips, he backed her up against the refrigerator and pressed his body into hers.

  “So do I,” he whispered, his breath hot against her ear. “And I won’t lose.”

  The snappy comeback hovering on her lips vanished the second his tongue traced the outline of her ear, and she trembled. “Who’s cheating now?” she managed, her voice a strained whisper. “Ooh, I can’t think when you do that.”

  “I don’t want you to think, Maggie. I want you to feel.”

  His mouth caught hers, stealing her breath and sending her hormones into a messy tangle. This was no soft brush of the lips, but a kiss totally consuming and filled with enough heat to melt her on the spot.

  His hands left her hips, wandering up her sides where his thumbs settled below her breasts. Her nipples beaded, anticipating his touch. The ache between her legs increased, so she pressed her thighs together to quiet the slow, steady throb. Her tongue mated with his and she gave in to the desire to explore the landscape of his body with her good hand.

  A whole lot sooner than she was ready for, he ended the kiss. He rested his forehead against hers, his uneven breaths teasing her tingling lips.

  What on earth was she thinking? Cale Perry was definitely too hot for her to handle. But no way was she about to let on how much he’d just rattled her.

  Needing distance, she eased away from him. “Are you any good at crossword puzzles?” she asked him, determined to end this encounter in her favor. No matter how much of a hero complex he might suffer from, or how chivalrous his nature, she didn’t doubt for a second that she would easily find her heart charred beyond recognition if she wasn’t careful.

  With his hands braced against the fridge as if he needed the support, he looked over his shoulder. “Why?” he asked with a hefty dose of caution.

  She summoned up a saucy smile in hopes of convincing him of a confidence she was nowhere near feeling. “What’s a three-letter word that starts with W for aroused?”

  He hesitated a moment, then shook his head.

  Deliberately, she slowly moistened her lips. “Wet.” She gave him a last sassy wink and walked away, the echo from his groan of pure agony doing wonders for her ego.

  8

  CALE TWISTED the cold tap to full blast. The icy spray had zero effect on his current state of arousal. Even the scandalous images Maggie’s provocative parting shot evoked in his mind refused to stand down in the face of a freezing shower.

  He’d cleaned up the kitchen, alone, in ten minutes, then beelined it to the shower in hopes of quelling the erotic thoughts, and his body’s rock-hard reaction.

  No such luck.

  The memory of the sexy glint in Maggie’s eyes stubbornly refused banishment from his mind. The seductive tone of her voice as she’d uttered that one fantasy-inducing word still rang in his ears. Not even the reminder that he and Maggie weren’t alone had the power to bring his testosterone down to a manageable level.

  Face it, pal, you’re screwed.

  He muttered a curse, along with a reluctant agreement, then dipped his head beneath the shower nozzle. There were days when he really hated the direct honesty of his conscience. Today was no exception.

  His body ached for her, and no amount of cold water could dispel that fact. He’d kissed her, tasted those honey-sweet lips, had felt her tongue tangle with his and he wanted more. She had him so twisted in knots with wanting her, he was close to ignoring the reasons why he should keep his hands to himself.

  He wanted her in his bed. Just the thought of the soft, sultry moans she’d make when he pleasured her had him cranking the cold water tap to high. The heavy blast failed to cool the need burning in his gut or quell the desire to feel her body beneath his.

  He was a powder keg of need, he thought as he shut off the water and stepped from the shower. Ready to explode. Maggie not only held the match, the woman was setting off dangerous sparks.

  He dried off and dressed quickly, then headed downstairs to join Maggie and his brothers in the room that would become his den if he ever got around to finishing it. As the largest room in the house, it had required the most work. He’d gutted it, hauling away old plaster, replaced the aging studs with new lumber and updated the area with drywall and a coffered ceiling. Over the last two years, room by room, he’d slowly been turning his investment into an attractive piece of beach property. He figured after another couple of years, he’d be ready to put the house on the market, make a decent profit, he hoped, then start the process all over again with another fixer-upper he could purchase for a song.

  The room was empty, but the sliding glass doors leading into the backyard stood open. He followed the sound of voices and stepped through the doors onto the patio slab he’d replaced shortly after the spring rains.

  Like a magnet, he was instantly drawn to Maggie. She sat on the bench at the redwood picnic table near the edge of the covered patio, her injured arm resting on the top. The rich cinnamon of her hair gleamed in the morning sunshine. His fingers itched to lift the reddish strands and let them sift through his fingers.

  Her provocative taunt slammed into him. If only they were alone.

  Drew and Be
n had commandeered the white plastic patio chairs, neither of them in any apparent hurry to leave. Which was probably for the best, Cale thought as he crossed the patio to the picnic table. His ability to maintain a respectable distance from Maggie hovered in the dangerously low to nonexistent category.

  Cale thumbed his nose at his rapidly dwindling self-control and sat down on the bench beside Maggie. Pearl trotted over and dropped her big black head on his knee in a bid for attention. He absently petted the dog’s neck.

  “Weren’t you scheduled to work today?” he asked Ben, not that he was trying to get his brothers to leave or anything.

  “I go on at midnight,” Ben answered with a brief shake of his head. “Trinity’s shorthanded this weekend, so I’m pulling a thirty-six-hour shift.”

  Drew cast a knowing look in Cale’s direction. “I think he’s trying to get rid of us.”

  Was he really that transparent? Apparently so, if the smirk on Drew’s face was any indication.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Cale caught sight of the slight blush coloring Maggie’s cheeks. Damn, but she was cute. And one hell of a contradiction that had nothing whatsoever to do with her peculiar past. The mysteries he wanted, no, needed to solve stemmed from discovering which woman was the heart of the real Maggie LaRue: the woman who blushed prettily at a relatively innocent innuendo, or the captivating siren who’d nearly sent him to his knees ready to beg for the privilege of uncovering all of her sensual secrets.

  She adjusted the position of her arm on the table. He didn’t miss the slight wince that briefly tugged her eyebrows into a frown. “Trinity?” she asked Ben. “I thought you guys worked for the Los Angeles County Fire Department.”

  “Trinity Station,” Drew said. “It’s a nickname.”

  Ben leaned back in the chair and laced his fingers over his stomach. Nope. His brothers were definitely not going anywhere anytime soon.

  “The intersection where the firehouse is located is surrounded by three churches,” Ben explained. “Station 43 is on one corner. St. Jude’s Catholic Church and their private school on another, with Santa Monica Methodist and Community Baptist taking the other two.”

  “The patron saint of lost causes,” she murmured. “I think I’ve been praying to the wrong deity.”

  “Either you studied theology or you’re Catholic,” Drew said.

  Maggie frowned, then shrugged. “Maybe,” she said thoughtfully. “Tell me about Trinity.”

  Drew picked up the large red rubber doggy toy lying on the white plastic table between the two chairs. He tossed it up and down, instantly drawing Pearl’s attention. “The house has been called Trinity Station for as long as I can remember.”

  No longer interested in love and affection when there was a warm body around willing to toss her favorite toy, Pearl deserted Cale.

  “How is it all three of you work at the same station together?” Maggie asked.

  Drew chucked the toy across the yard. “Dumb luck,” he said, but there was a hint of pride evident in his voice. “We don’t always work the same shifts though. And I don’t have the squirrelly hours these guys have to put up with half the time. Except for the occasional call when I’m off duty, I’m pretty much a part of the nine-to-five crowd.”

  Cale understood Drew’s reasons for going into arson investigation. He’d been one hell of a firefighter, but after the death of one of their own during a three-alarm blaze a few years ago, Drew quickly put in for a transfer to the arson unit. The truth of the matter was, Drew absolutely detested hospitals, emergency rooms in particular. While an actual firefighter’s trips to emergency rooms were minimal compared to that of a paramedic, working with the arson unit generally kept Drew out of the antiseptic halls. The few occasions when he was required to pay a visit to a hospitalized witness, or worse, the morgue, were more than enough for the youngest Perry brother.

  Cale leaned back and braced his elbows on the table behind him. “That reminds me,” he said, stretching his legs out in front of him. “Were you able to find out anything about the warehouse fire?”

  Drew picked up the toy Pearl dropped at his feet and threw it across the yard again for her. She took off like shot, stirring up dust, grass and leaves as she raced around the avocado tree. The debris fluttered down on Frankie and Johnny who had been napping peacefully beneath the shade of the big tree. Frankie, the more temperamental of the two felines, hissed her displeasure at the disturbance of one of her treasured snoozing sessions.

  “No suspicious circumstances, if that’s what you mean,” Drew said.

  Effectively scolded by her feline roommates, Pearl carefully retrieved her toy and walked away from the cats. She flopped down near Ben’s chair with a loud sigh that sounded more like a disgusted groan now that she’d been chastised. She rested her big square muzzle protectively over her toy.

  “That doesn’t make much sense,” Maggie said to Drew. “If what you’re saying is true, then why was I being grilled by a couple of very unfriendly detectives a few days ago?”

  Drew shrugged. “Probably because you were in a place that wasn’t only closed to the public, but you were there after hours and there was no sign of forced entry. For the company to collect on the insurance, they need to have a full investigation.”

  “What was the cause of the fire?” Ben asked.

  A loud squawk drifted down from the open window in the morning room. “Pucker up, doll.” Gilda squawked again. She let out a very impressive wolf whistle, then belted out a string of curses that had Cale considering going upstairs to close the windows before the neighbors started complaining.

  Maggie giggled and shook her head in dismay. “You really need to do something about her vocabulary,” she whispered to Cale. “It’s embarrassing.”

  No kidding. “She’s a work in progress.” Excruciatingly slow progress, at that.

  “The cause?” Ben prompted Drew once Gilda had settled down to a bits-and-pieces version of a Sinatra medley.

  Drew leaned forward and braced his elbows on his knees. “An electrical short in the air-conditioning system. The place was full of accelerants, considering the product it warehoused.”

  Ben shifted his gaze in Maggie’s direction. “You have no idea why you were there?”

  Maggie let out a sigh before she answered. “No,” she told them. “None whatsoever. I can’t even imagine why I would be in a place like that. Detective Villanueva wasn’t too impressed with my answers, either.”

  “I wouldn’t worry too much about the cops,” Drew said, in an attempt to reassure her. “They’re only doing their job.”

  A shadow passed through Maggie’s eyes. “They still made me feel like I was a suspect. Or worse.” The fingers peeking out from the cast curled tightly. Her knuckles turned white.

  Her distress offered yet another reason Cale had a hard time believing the unusual memories she’d been having. Despite what he’d witnessed of Maggie’s behavior, he still held out hope for a logical explanation. Yet, after the incident on the beach followed by her break-and-enter trick with a credit card, even he’d experienced a few misgivings of his own. She’d learned her B-and-E talent somewhere, but he couldn’t think of a single college course that taught those skills.

  He stood abruptly, eager for a change of subject that would chase away the tension he sensed building inside her again. Her doctor had insisted she rest and try to keep the stress to a minimum. Since he’d brought her home with him from the hospital, they’d both been guilty of ignoring doctor’s orders.

  “Unless we plan to starve ourselves all week,” he said, “maybe we should get the shopping out of the way before I go on duty tonight.”

  Drew, nowhere near his usual deliberately obtuse self, took the hint and stood. “Good idea. Your cabinets are an embarrassment.”

  “You working a twenty-four?” Ben asked, following suit.

  “No, I’ve got the six-to-six graveyard tonight with Scorch, then back to days on Monday.” He offered his hand to Maggie, bu
t she ignored it and stood on her own. “Do you think you’ll be okay by yourself?”

  “Of course I will.” Her glance was sharp and direct. Those gold rims reappeared in her gaze, letting him know he’d slighted her independence…again. “I’m not a child, Cale.”

  A detail he was well aware of, in more ways than one. She was a living, breathing, full-grown woman with curves in all the right places. She held the power to turn him inside out with one sassy, sultry look or a husky, feminine laugh. Oh, yeah. She was all woman.

  “I know that,” he said. “It’s just…what if you remember something. You probably shouldn’t be alone.” The last thing he wanted to do was to go into detail in front of his brothers, but he worried she might suffer another recollection of some unpleasant experience trapped in her mind. Was it wrong of him to not want to leave her alone, especially when she might need him?

  Drew bent down to pat Pearl’s side. “She won’t have to be alone tonight.”

  “I don’t need a baby-sitter, either.”

  “Forget it, Drew,” Cale said to his brother. No way was he going to allow his flirtatious little brother to watch over Maggie. “That’s like asking a hungry kid to guard the candy store.”

  “Not me, you idiot,” Drew laughed. “Deb and Tilly. Deb made me promise to have you bring Maggie to her place before you go on duty tonight. She called it girls’ night. Something about chocolate and old black-and-white movies.”

  Ben pulled the keys to his pickup from the pocket of his khaki trousers.

  “When did you have time to tell Debbie about Maggie?” Cale asked. He’d planned to tell his aunt himself, but wasn’t the least bit surprised one of his brothers had beat him to it. A little thing called privacy simply didn’t exist in the Perry family.

  Drew straightened and retrieved his own set of keys. “Last night. Why?”

  “What’s this?” Ben teased as they walked toward the side gate. “Friday night and Drew Perry without a date? Or two?”