by Virna DePaul
He did want it.
In order to have it, however, he’d have to give up things that mattered to him. Including living close to Annie and seeing her whenever he wanted.
Cursing softly, he walked over to the cheerfully decorated Christmas tree in the corner of her living room. He tucked his gift beneath it, right next to the one labeled “To Annie, From Annie.” He needed to get a few more things for her. Maybe a pretty sweater with a lower collar than she normally wore, one that would show off the necklace he’d already gotten her.
“Hey, Annie, mind if I grab a beer?” he called, even though she probably wouldn’t be able to hear him with the water still going. But it wasn’t like he actually needed her permission. They were comfortable in each other’s homes. She was the first person he’d wanted to talk to after getting the text offering him the smoke-jumper job. He knew she’d want the best for him and that she’d reassure him nothing would change between them, but he wanted to be looking into her eyes when she did.
As he walked into the kitchen, he could smell dinner warming in the oven. Opening the refrigerator, he pulled out one of the bottles of beer she always kept on hand for when he came over. He popped off the cap and took a long swig. Then he stared at the front of the fridge, frowning.
It used to be covered with pictures of the two of them, including one of his favorites taken while they’d been hiking in Yosemite last year. The photo was gone. There were still photos of Annie’s family and other friends, but the only picture that had Annie or Ryan in it was the one of them dancing at what should have been his friend Eric’s wedding last week. Even with Eric a no show, his fiancée Brianne had gone forward with the reception. In the picture, Annie was in Ryan’s arms but he could see how awkward things had been between them that day.
Why had she taken the other photos of him down? Why was the only photo she’d left of herself one that showed her after she’d lost weight? He still wasn’t used to seeing his Annie so skinny. As gorgeous as Annie looked in the photo, she didn’t look like herself. He was actually bracing himself for how he’d feel when she walked in the room.
And he couldn’t help feeling that anxiety in his chest again that his best girl was slipping away from him. If he took the smoke jumper job, they’d be even farther apart.
He traced his finger across her face in the photo and managed to knock it to the floor along with several others. Cursing, he placed his beer on the counter then crouched down. He picked up the photos and began sticking them back where they belonged. Only, he’d managed to knock over more than just photos…
He stared at an airline boarding pass, frowning when he saw the departure date. Tomorrow, at 10:30 a.m. He frowned even harder when he saw the destination.
Las Vegas.
Annie was flying to Vegas? Since when? And why hadn’t she told him?
He’d been in Vegas a week ago for Eric’s bachelor party, just before he’d picked up Annie at the airport for Eric’s wedding. The bachelor party had been a wild nightclub scene, and she’d never be comfortable clubbing. Her friend Paige, sure, but not Annie. She was probably going to catch a show or scrapbook convention. Play the slots. Of course, she’d be going with one of her girlfriends. Unless...
Unless she’d met a guy while he was away.
If so, why not tell him she was dating? Even if she wasn’t, why hadn’t she mentioned her Vegas trip?
He frowned, thinking once again of Eric’s wedding. Or rather, what should have been Eric’s wedding. All through the reception and afterwards, he and his other college buddies had tried to get hold of Eric, but he’d dodged their calls. He was still dodging them.
It was obvious at the reception that Annie had been pissed at him for his comments about her sudden weight loss. He’d just been so worried about her. Thankfully, she’d softened as the night went on. Everything had seemed to return to normal between them once they’d arrived back in San Francisco, but now, staring at the airline ticket, he was struck by the awful feeling that something had changed that day and he just hadn’t known it.
It was like Eric all over again. Ryan was being shut out and he didn’t know why.
When you were friends with someone—good friends—you shared your life with them.
Not every single detail, of course, but certainly something as important as canceling a wedding. Or taking an unusual trip to Vegas.
Ryan grabbed his beer and was returning to the living room when another piece of paper on the floor caught his eye. He must’ve knocked it off the refrigerator.
He picked it up, glanced at it…and…
How to be naughty in Vegas:
1. Buy a sex toy
2. Get a tattoo
3. Kiss a stranger on a dance floor
4. Have a one-night stand
“What the fuck?” he breathed out.
* * *
Annie tossed the towel in the hamper and reached for her baggy sweats and T-shirt, what she usually wore at home, even when Ryan was over, then stopped. No way. Not anymore. Not after stepping on the scale this morning and discovering she’d hit her target weight. No more hiding behind comfy clothes. A confident woman wasn’t afraid to show off her curves.
She whirled around and headed to her closet, where she dug around until she found the skinny jeans with the tag still hanging off the butt. She’d bought them a couple of weeks ago, challenging herself to push harder during her exercise classes and lose the last bit of weight her body had been clinging to.
And she had.
She slipped the jeans on but had to lie on her bed to zip them up. A target weight was just that—a target. She’d hit it. Now she needed to make another target goal. Another five pounds? Seven? She stood, slid a tight-fitting stretch tee on, then finished her hair and makeup before examining herself in the mirror.
Now that her face was leaner, she looked less like a college kid and more like a fashionable woman. Her blond highlights really brought out the blue of her eyes. At certain angles, however, her face looked a little drawn. Severe. She bit her lip, remembering how often Ryan had said he loved her softness and curves. Maybe she wouldn’t try to lose another five pounds after all. She was sick to death of watching what she ate anyways. Sometimes she just wanted to enjoy a cookie or piece of pizza without feeling guilty. But, no, she couldn’t give in to those cravings or it would all be downhill from there. That’s what the diet pills were for. To give her that extra edge of willpower. Although she hated how jittery they sometimes made her feel, it was worth it—every time she was out now, men cast appreciative glances her way. To herself, she might look a little severe, but it was a look men obviously liked.
Deciding she appeared like a sexy, confident woman on the outside, she went out to see Ryan and check on dinner. Annie padded barefoot into the living room, only to find it empty. “Ryan?”
He appeared in the kitchen doorway and raised the bottle in his hand. “I got a beer. Hope you don’t mind.”
“Of course not,” she said, walking over to give him a hug. It seemed like he hesitated for a minute, but then his big arms enfolded her in a way that never failed to make her feel safe, treasured, and…horny.
Immediately, she pictured him in the parking lot with Samantha. She remembered him lifting her shirt, tugging down her bra, and—
“No.” She shuddered, trying to get that awful image out of her mind.
“No, I shouldn’t have gotten the beer? You got them for me, right?”
“No. I mean yes. Of course you should have gotten the beer. But I got them for both of us.”
She almost burst out laughing at the shocked look on Ryan’s face.
“Since when do you drink beer?”
“Since right now,” she said with a smile.
“Okay,” he said, his expression still confused. He took another sip of his drink.
She gave herself a minute to take him in. Ryan was the epitome of big and buff. Just over six feet, broad and muscular all over, he had thick wrists and thighs a
nd hands that were massive yet strangely elegant. His dark brown hair was streaked with lighter strands, the texture full and slightly shaggy. His strong jaw had a perpetual five o’clock shadow, and his gray-green eyes turned dark and penetrating depending on how he was feeling.
She’d seen him stripped down to shorts often enough to know that the hard planes and bulging muscles hinted at beneath his clothes more than lived up to their promise. The guy had the type of six-pack a girl could bounce quarters off of, and Annie had seen women literally swoon as they’d watched Ryan pull himself out of the pool. Who could blame them, with all those rivulets of moisture slowly winding their way down his throat and chest? Mentally, Annie had been right there with them, lapping up all that water like a madwoman.
To Annie, Ryan was the sexiest man on the planet, the perfect combination of manly strength and all-American quarterback charm. But his personality and his heart were just as amazing.
She realized she was staring at him. Then realized he was staring at her. “So…” she began.
“So you really like beer now?” he asked.
She shrugged. “I’ve loosened up since you’ve been gone.” Feeling like she needed to prove it, she held her hand out for a drink of his beer. Slowly, he handed it to her. She took a sip, thinking a delighted “my mouth is right where his was,” and barely stopping herself from crinkling her nose. She’d ordered more drinks in the past two months and discovered she liked champagne, red wine, and the occasional cocktail. She was still acquiring a taste for beer, but he didn’t need to know that. She lowered the bottle, handed it back to him, and forced the corners of her mouth upward. “Just what I needed, though the downside to drinking now is the extra calories.”
He stared at her intently, and she braced herself, waiting for him to make yet another comment about her weight. Instead, he cleared his throat and said, “You look great, Annie. Beautiful as always.”
“Thanks.” No criticism there, yet he’d still managed to communicate that he’d found her beautiful even before she’d lost weight. But there was beautiful and there was fuck-me-up-against-a-truck beautiful.
She knew perfectly well the way she looked now was far more in line with what society and Ryan himself considered truly beautiful. Why else would every girl he’d ever dated be thin with big boobs? Annie didn’t have big boobs. At least not yet. But who knew? She’d never thought she’d consider breast augmentation, but lately the idea had been holding greater appeal. Just one more step in her transformation.
Ryan glanced into the kitchen and frowned…and that’s when she remembered the list on her refrigerator. But it had been hidden beneath some other papers and photos. He couldn’t have seen it…
“Is—is something wrong?” she asked, her gaze immediately straining to see past him to the refrigerator door, but everything looked as it should, and she didn’t see any sign of the printed boarding pass or the list that had been tucked behind it.
“Nope. Nothing’s wrong. I just…had a rough day.”
Annie immediately returned her attention back to him. Ryan was a firefighter and liked his job, but sometimes it took its toll. Grabbing his hand, she pulled him over to the couch. “Sit down and tell me about it.”
He sat and said, “It’s just been a really bad week overall. And a surprising one.”
“I’m sure. Starting with the wedding. Have you been able to get in touch with Eric?”
“He replied to our initial calls via e-mail, telling us he was okay and would explain things eventually, but that’s it. Just enough so we’d stop considering foul play.”
“But he’s a businessman, right? There’s no reason anyone would want to hurt him.”
“Not that I know of. But the guy’s obviously got secrets. Secrets he’s not willing to share with his friends.”
“Not yet anyway,” she said softly. She stared at him, and it was right there on the tip of her tongue to tell him about her decision to go to Vegas. About her resolution to transform herself into a bolder, more interesting and confident Annie. But, heck, why stop there? She was afraid if she started talking, she’d blurt out the full truth. How much she loved him. How much she wanted him. Not gonna happen.
“So you said it’s been a bad week. At work, too?”
He nodded.
“What’s going on?”
He swiped a hand over his face. “It’s just different now that I’m back.”
“You mean after working up north?”
“Yeah. I miss the wide-open spaces.”
“Do you ever think about moving up there permanently?”
He hesitated briefly before saying, “I’ve considered it, but there’s stuff I’d miss here, too. You. The guys at the station. The Bay. The nightlife.” He shrugged. “Everything’s a compromise. A risk. Can’t go for something new without giving up what you already have, you know?”
She frowned. Was that really true? Living was all about pursuing growth. Change. But that didn’t mean you had to give up what was really important to you as it happened. Of course, as much as she wanted him to be fulfilled in his job, she’d miss him like crazy if he moved. Sometimes she wondered if Ryan would ever be completely fulfilled at work. He’d done a lot of different things—before he was a firefighter he’d been a personal trainer, and before that a bartender—but he always seemed to get antsy around the two-year mark. He couldn’t seem to commit to a career any more than he could commit to a woman.
“Anyway…well, you know old Bobby finally retired. I’m happy for him. He and his wife are moving to Florida, and he’s going to buy a fishing boat.”
“But…” Annie prompted.
“This kid who replaced him is going to kill me, maybe literally.”
“So he’s making an already dangerous job even more dangerous?”
“David’s just so damned cocky. He thinks he already knows everything, and he really doesn’t know shit. He’s been on two fire calls with us. During the first, he froze up, and I physically had to move him out of the way. Fine. Then we go to this second one…”
“It was a bad one?” she asked. She could see it in his eyes. There was pain there, which made her suspect someone must have died.
He grimaced and dragged his hand through his hair. “Children were involved. Their mother got drunk and fell asleep with a cigarette. We got them all out alive, but a couple of the kids were severely injured. So David starts mouthing off about how if we had gotten there two minutes sooner, we could have really saved them. Truckee got pissed. He took it as a personal affront since he was driving. He went after David. I got between them because I didn’t want to see Truckee get in trouble, but now he’s pissed at me, too. He thinks I was taking the kid’s side.”
“Did you talk to Truckee?” she asked. She rubbed his tense shoulders as he talked.
“I tried. He’s too pissed to hear it right now. One of the neighbors heard David, and the drunken mother started mouthing off about it, and now there’s an investigation. It’s all a bunch of bullshit. We did our best. We always do.”
“If you guys hadn’t gotten there when you did, those kids would be dead. And Truckee’s been doing this a long time. The job hasn’t broken him yet, and it won’t break him now.”
He sighed. “Everything always looks better through your eyes. Let’s change the subject, though.” He reached one of his strong arms around her, and pulled her into him. She went willingly, relishing the tingles of pleasure that zipped up her spine.
But she didn’t relish the familiar feeling of longing that flooded her.
I still want him, she thought, and abruptly pulled away.
Ryan frowned. “What’s wrong?”
She shook her head. “Nothing. So, what else do you want to talk about?”
He hesitated briefly before saying, “Tell me what’s been going on with you. Anything exciting?”
Was it just her imagination or was he staring at her a little more intently? “For sure,” she said.
He seemed to re
lax slightly. Weird. She opened her mouth to ask what was up, but before she could, he said, “Tell me.”
She shrugged. “Well, if you think life in a fire station is tough, you should try a shift on the Long-Term Care Unit.”
Weirdly, something like disappointment flashed across his face. But it was gone so fast; she told herself she must have imagined it.
“Long-Term Care? How’d you end up there?”
“Being too nice, as usual,” she said. “Two people called in sick, and we had an extra nurse. They asked for a volunteer, and guess whose hand went up?”
He laughed. “You are kind of a sucker sometimes.”
“You think? So, I get over there, and of course the first thing I do is make the rounds and meet my patients, who, by the way, I had sixteen of. I met two of the sweetest little old ladies you’ve ever seen in the first room. In the second room, there were two older men, playing checkers. I thought that was so cute, right up until one of them, the one in a wheelchair, grabbed a handful of my ass.”
Ryan immediately frowned. “Did you report him?”
“No, he was harmless.”
“How old was he?” Ryan asked.
“Ninety-four,” she said. “It’s a miracle he can remember what it is and where it’s at.”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “Still, I don’t like it. You deserve to be treated with respect.”
She patted his arm. “Thanks, but calm down, Super Man. It wasn’t that big a deal. Anyway, once I disengaged my ass from his old claw, I moved farther into the room. It was filthy, and there were things stacked everywhere. I couldn’t even imagine how a guy in a wheelchair maneuvered around all his stuff. It was a fire hazard, I’m telling you. Anyways, I sent two of my CNAs to clean it up while I prepared the guy’s feeding tube. I had everything hooked up, and I was ready to start the machine when Mr. Grabbed My Ass suddenly rolled up behind me. The guy goosed me, I jumped, and since I had my hand on the knob, the machine came on. It wouldn’t have been a big deal, but the clipboard I had in my hand somehow got caught on the tubing and pulled it loose. I didn’t realize that as I turned, but the tube feeding was pooling around my feet.”