Consumed

by J. R. Ward

After Dave was on a board with a cervical collar around his neck and his lower leg stabilized, Moose and Chavez got him up on the stretcher. Mom arrived just as they were strapping him down, and she was in full scramble, hair a mess, her coat flapping, her purse clapping against her leg as she ran to her son.

  “What the hell is wrong with you, David!”

  Danny muttered, “Not the first time she’s been in this situation.”

  “Yeah.” Anne went over and got her duffel. “Let’s go.”

  This show-off session had been a colossal mistake, and the fact that it was ending with her on the sidelines as Moose and Emilio did the job she’d had to leave behind? She’d been right. God did not like the prideful, and although she had wanted to prove to Danny she was a-okay, she had to cop to some ego being involved.

  As Moose interceded with Mom and brought the woman up to date, Emilio hesitated and then came over. He nodded at Danny, but it was a cursory hello—because hey, those two were going to see each other on next rotation.

  “How are you, Anne?”

  Chavez had always been a good guy, and the gentle way he looked at her was everything she remembered about him. He was also still the tall, dark, and handsome firefighter hero who belonged in a centerfold calendar of men in turnout bottoms holding long hoses—and yet he’d never been her type. Nope, back in the day, she’d never managed to look past Danny Maguire.

  What was the question?

  “I’m good.” She smiled brightly, and then hit the dimmer switch so she didn’t come across as desperate. “I’m great.”

  After the collapse in that warehouse fire, Emilio had come by the rehab hospital once, and the resolute way he’d focused on her face and not her arm had made her rush through the visit. He’d seemed relieved at the excuse she’d given him to leave, and she hadn’t faulted him. As he’d stood awkwardly next to her hospital bed, no doubt he’d been glad that he hadn’t been hurt—and he was decent enough of a guy to feel bad about that understandable relief.

  “How’s you?’ she asked. Because she had to.

  “Ah, great. I’m great. Yeah, thanks.”

  He smiled, but then lost the expression. When he resolutely put the lift back on his lips, she wanted to tell him not to bother.

  Anne rubbed her sweaty palm on the seat of her leggings again. “I’m glad. That’s good.”

  “Yeah, it’s . . . it’s good.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Looks like we’re moving. Good to see you, Anne—later, Dannyboy.”

  “Great to see you,” she said too loudly. “Really great.”

  Chris came over. “I didn’t know you’re friends with the EMT guys.”

  “I’m not. I mean, I was. I used to be—” She shook her head. “Listen, I’ve got to say it again. I feel really badly about all this. I shouldn’t have been showboating.”

  “That kid’s been trouble since he joined. At least now we have an excuse to cancel his membership. And he signed the standard release, so hopefully we won’t get sued.”

  Danny stepped in. “If you need us to make statements, you know where to find us.”

  “You have my number,” she corrected. “Let me know if I can help. I feel responsible.”

  Chris smiled. “You’re the best, Anne. Chilli and I appreciate you.”

  “Nice to meet you,” Danny said as he barged in and stuck his hand out like it was a sword pointed at the other man’s gut.

  There was an awkward pause before Chris shook what was put out there, and then Anne headed for the door before Danny broke the poor guy over his knee and threw the two halves into the street.

  Outside, it was dark as midnight, and Moose was closing up the rear of the ambulance. The flashing red bubbler on the cab took her back to the job again, the rhythmic pulses of light so familiar and yet so foreign, now.

  Sadness, insidious and castrating, stole her breath.

  “So,” Moose said as he looked back and forth between them.

  His smile was slow and suggested Danny was going to get a boatload of shit back at the firehouse. And all she knew was that if Maguire tried to put his arm around her shoulder or insinuate anything, he was going to learn firsthand what it was like to be in her situation.

  ’Cuz she’d rip his damn limb off.

  “Don’t you have a patient to take care of,” Danny muttered.

  Moose shrugged. “Chavez is taking a medical history.”

  “Which can be done in transit.”

  “Mom asked us to wait so she could bring her car around. She wants to follow.”

  Anne was tempted to walk off, but then Danny wouldn’t have a ride, and no doubt that would come up in conversation.

  “So.” Moose rocked on the heels of his boots. “Nice weather we’re having—”

  Danny glanced at her. “Come on, let’s go.”

  Damn it.

  “Hey,” Moose said, “we should do dinner this Saturday. Come to our place—Deandra is taking a cooking class and she loves to show off.”

  As a tense silence bloomed like a bad smell, Anne threw some words out to fill the void. “I thought she was going to be a hairdresser.”

  “Well, that’s just the first tier of her lifestyle business. She wants to be into hair, makeup, skin care, fashion, home decor, healthy eating. She’s going all the way. I’m very proud of my wife.”

  When the guy gave Danny a look, Anne lost her patience—and was rescued by Mom tooling up in a minivan that had led a very hard life. The thing had a ding on the front bumper, scratches down the side, and a side-view mirror that was hanging by its proverbial optic nerve.

  Made you wonder whether the apple didn’t fall far from the tree—either that or maybe it just stole the car keys a lot.

  Moose clapped his hands. “Gotta go! See you Saturday—Anne, I’ll give Deandra your number so she can text you with instructions.”

  Instructions? And how the hell did she yell out, Please don’t, without being offensive? The last person she wanted to get to know better was that wife of his. She’d been through the wedding from hell, and that had been more than enough contact.

  The ambulance left sweet diesel fumes in its wake as Moose piloted it off in the direction of the University of New Brunswick Hospital, the beaten-up minivan a sad-sack wind sock following behind.

  Anne looked at Danny. “I’m not going to have dinner with them. Or you. It’s not appropriate.”

  “Not worth the time, is more like it. These two are a mess.”

  They stepped off the curb at the same moment, and the fact that they fell into stride together as they headed for her car was the kind of thing she deliberately messed up with a hop and a skip. The good news was that as they got in, he seemed uncharacteristically quiet.

  At least he wasn’t spewing a bunch of it’ll-be-great rhetoric about the never-happening, in-Moose’s-dreams Saturday dinner from hell.

  Out on the road, as Anne went through a series of stoplights and bunch of turns that she could do in her sleep, she found her palm getting sweaty again. Matter of fact, her body felt like it was under a heat lamp. As she came up to a red light, she peeled her fleece off over her head and tossed it into the back.

  “How did you get to my house?” she asked. “I didn’t see your car.”

  “I walked.”

  She glanced over. “Five miles?”

  “I needed to clear my head.” As his hand dipped into his windbreaker, he cursed and took it back out. “Yes, I know. No smoking in your car.”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “Already said I know,” he shot back.

  At the next light, she noted the way his knee was bouncing up and down like the left half of him was running a hypothetical sprint.

  Just as when they’d fallen into step across the parking lot, she knew how he was feeling. Her heart was beating about as fast as that foot of his was tapping in that wheel well, and she wasn’t stupid. They were both rattled, the past and present colliding and leaving shattered pieces of “normal,” “forever,
” and “never going to happen to me” in the street.

  That was the thing about life. Habit and routine made things feel permanent, but that was all an illusion based on the very flimsy foundation of repetition. Change and chaos was a far better bet to put your faith in.

  At least you would never be surprised when things went tits up.

  “I’ll take you home then,” she announced.

  “I can walk.”

  “I know you can.”

  “It’s fine—”

  “It’s cold—”

  “Thanks, Mom.”

  Anne locked her molars. It was either that, or this—whatever it was—was going to escalate into a whole lot of yelling over nothing.

  And meanwhile, the pressure was still building. In her. In him. Until she was damn sure they were within two psi of blowing the safety glass out of her Subaru’s doors and windshield.

  When she got to his house, she pulled into the short drive, went around back, and hit the brakes. She could tell he was rank pissed at her reroute, but guess what. She didn’t care.

  She wanted him angry at her.

  It was safer that way: Somewhere along the ride to his apartment, frustration and pain had kindled into energy of a different kind. Heat of a different kind. Urgency . . . of a dangerous kind.

  Abruptly, the confines of the car’s interior shrunk down on her. On them.

  “Put the car in park,” Danny said in a gruff voice.

  Nope, she thought. Not a good call. Reverse was the gear she wanted.

  But her hand had other ideas, not just moving the gear shift into place but turning the engine off. In the sudden silence, she was aware of breathing heavily, and she parted her lips to get some more oxygen into her lungs.

  “We are not doing this.” Her voice was too low. And not in terms of volume. “I am not doing this.”

  “You sure about that.” Danny turned to her. “So tell me to get the fuck out of your car—”

  “Get the fuck out of my car.”

  Except only a part of her meant it—and Danny, who was an idiot savant when it came to emotions, knew that. The bastard knew it.

  Losing her temper and her mind, Anne reached for him, clapping her hand on the side of his neck and yanking him to her mouth. And because she could always rely on Danny Maguire not doing the right thing, he didn’t hesitate.

  He kissed the ever-living shit out of her, his lips grinding on hers, his tongue penetrating her with such an erotic dominance that she was instantly reminded of why he’d given her the sex of her life the one time she’d been with him.

  When they finally came up for air, his hooded eyes were a mirror she didn’t want to look into. She did not need confirmation that all her heavy-handed, holier-than-thou rhetoric was about to get haymakered in favor of Danny’s first-choice coping mechanism.

  Namely, meaningless sex.

  “Are you going to make me ask,” he said. “Because I will.”

  Damn it, there were all kinds of reasons not to do this.

  Too bad each and every one of them was in a foreign language.

  “I don’t want to talk,” she said as she grabbed her keys and got out of her car.

  And what do you know, as Danny came prowling around to her, he didn’t seem to be interested in conversation, either.

  chapter

  21

  No talking. As Danny followed Anne to his back door, she was obviously determined not to think too much about this, and that was fine with him. He wasn’t into talking. He wanted in that woman right now. The delay taking down her pants and fucking off his button fly was going to test the limits of his patience.

  Once they were inside his crappy kitchen, it was on again, their bodies colliding in the darkness, his hands rough, her nails digging into his windbreaker. Backing her up to the counter by the sink, he popped her off the floor and jerked her knees apart.

  He didn’t want this to happen in his bedroom, and not because the place was a mess. He had done a number of women in there, and even though the first thing Anne was going to do was convince herself this didn’t mean shit, he was not confusing her with those one-night stands.

  This was different.

  When Anne braced herself up, he hooked the waistband of her leggings and stripped them off. Then he was running his hands up those smooth muscles of her thighs. She was in great physical shape, nothing like those soft, augmented types he’d been picking up at Timeout, but he wouldn’t have cared what her body was like.

  This was Anne.

  “I used a condom. With the others,” he said as he looked her straight in the eye. “Every one, each time.”

  When she closed her eyes, he figured he’d blown it, but he wanted her to know. And the truth was, in the last ten months, he’d practiced safe sex not because he gave a shit about himself, but because he had hoped, prayed, for this moment with her.

  He had taken care of himself for her.

  “Just kiss me,” she muttered.

  And that was the last thing they said to each other. Beneath his roving hands, she arched, bringing her breasts against his chest. Closer, he wanted to be closer to her, but he also wanted to slow down because he needed to remember every second of this.

  When her hand fumbled at his fly, he was on it, tearing the buttons apart, his cock doing the rest of the job.

  Anne tilted her hips and took a hold on him, the sensation of her hand on his shaft was enough to make him groan. It was awkward, though, their two bodies not quite right at counter height—so he solved the problem by cupping her ass and holding her up.

  It was better than he remembered. The fit. The slick, hot squeeze. The smell of her shampoo, her hair in his face, her grip on his shoulders strong and sure.

  He walked them through to the sitting room, letting his stride do the pumping and the rhythm. And then there was a brief parting as he laid her down.

  That didn’t last.

  Danny was on top of her in a heartbeat, hooking his forearm under her knee and cranking her leg up, his erection going back in on a rush. He didn’t hold back, his pelvis punching in tight and retreating, her body absorbing the pounding, her breath harsh and hoarse.

  He refused to orgasm. Even though his body had been on the brink the instant he’d entered her, he was holding off. But it was getting tough. He was starting to shake, the temptation to let himself go becoming a painful denial.

  Anne solved his problem. With a gasp, she threw her head back, and that was when he stilled. He wanted to feel her come for him, and he closed his eyes concentrating on the way her sex gripped him. And then he was off on his own ride, his hips rocking into her, locking in, his release the kind of thing that made his head spin.

  So good.

  Too good.

  * * *

  Damn it.

  As Anne felt Danny pump into her, she knew what that meant. Also knew that he was the kind of man who wasn’t done even after he finished.

  Opening her eyes, she stared at the ceiling of his sitting room and decided she was way too old for the kind of college hookup this was: guy’s apartment, on the sofa, reckless and regretful.

  Or at least that was what she was telling herself this was.

  Danny lifted his head. Just as she was about to tell him she had to go, he started moving again, deep inside, slower this time. The thrusts were hell and heaven combined, and there was a challenge in his eyes, like he knew she was going to try to downplay how amazing the sex was.

  Which would have been easy to do if it didn’t feel so right.

  Too bad the sensations were the only thing that made any sense.

  Closing her lids, she fell back into the abyss, her body taking over, her brain taking a seat in the waiting room. God knew there was going to be plenty of time to ruminate over the stupids she was rocking. For the moment, she might as well just feel him.

  And God knew there was so much of Danny to feel.

  He was big and heavy, and all that mass and weight was part of t
he appeal. Built as she was, Anne didn’t feel dainty very often—and that little-girl-needing-rescue stuff wasn’t something she was interested in anyway. But there was something erotic about being under a man with the size and power of Danny—

  From out of nowhere, an image of them in the fire together came to her and she vividly recalled their eyes meeting through their air masks, the fire roiling across the ceiling, the danger and isolation so real.

  I love you.

  As the words ricocheted around her head, she pushed at his shoulders, but it was too late. She was orgasming again, the release taking over everything. Tears, unexpected and unwelcomed, pricked her eyes and she blinked to clear them.

  Danny’s tremendous body churned above hers, and a panic that he might see her cry took her out of the sex, trapping her inside her head.

  The truth was, he mattered too much to her just like she mattered too much to him. And this erotic collision was a recipe for disaster . . . that was somehow totally inevitable.

  When he finally went still, she was breathing hard, but not from exertion. And she decided to count to twenty before she tried to get out from under him in the hopes she didn’t look as frantic as she was.

  She made it to fourteen. “I have to go.”

  Danny’s head dropped into her shoulder. “Okay. Yeah. Sure.”

  Just as she was about to push at his shoulders, he moved back. And still she scrambled out from his body, barely giving him time to stand.

  As soon as she was on the vertical, she was reminded that there had been no condom and she moved quickly to the bathroom, shutting herself in. There was a roll of toilet paper on the sink counter and she unraveled some around her fin, wadded it up, and tucked it between her thighs.

  Out in the hall, she walked stiffly into the kitchen. She’d worn a thong with her leggings and put that on quick to hold things in place. She felt better when she was fully dressed, and it was only then that she went back to the sitting room.

  She would rather have left without saying a word.

  Then again, she had expected him to come out. And the fact that he didn’t made her uneasy, although that was just part of the long list of things she didn’t want to examine too closely.