“Why’d he move you off the truck?” Dare demanded sensing sexism and not liking it.
“Lock’s all about stats and safety, and he’d read that there’s a higher rate of miscarriage for firefighters. No proof why, but he thought maybe all the smoke and chemicals we can’t help inhaling a bit so he offered to rotate me to communications. It wasn’t bad. Bit dull. But Lock’s all about safety. Got to respect that.”
Dare nodded curtly. Lock kept getting better and that made her feel itchy. And more than a little guilty for ditching out on him without a goodbye. He’d treated her with kindness, tenderness, and respect, and she’d panicked.
She blew out a tense breath.
Mim dropped her towel on a bed. “You’re lucky to get sent here. No one works harder than Lock does at the station, in the field out in the community, and definitely in the gym, but he’s no yes-man.” Mim continued to look at Dare hard, but definitely speculating. “Almost all the single women in the Metropolitan complain about that aspect of his personality daily as do the women who see him on the very rare occasion he hits the pub with some of us.”
She was telling Dare that Lock was not a player. That should fill her with dismay that he’d burned up the sheets with her the night they met. The night she hadn’t been able to dismiss like the other times she’d let herself cut loose. Instead, her heart seemed to skip before kicking up a few notches and warmth infused her body. No. She would not place any more significance on that night. It had been sex. Awesome, mind and body blowing sex.
Mim opened one of the long, narrow metal doors of a locker that lined one of the walls of the small sleeping area that had four narrow beds and not much else.
“I’ll see you later,” Dare said, stepping around her duffle to reach for the door. “Sorry about intruding.”
“No worries.” Mim pulled out a pressed navy uniform. “I’m not shy, and you get used to being so close to men and women in a tight space so privacy is not such a big deal.” Mim slid on bright red knickers. “And you don’t need to worry about the blokes here. I’m sure you’ve had more than your share of men acting like mouth-breathing, knuckle-dragging savages at work, but Lock runs a tight station.” She tugged on a black sports bra. Her face lit with pride. “We have more women working out of here than any station in Melbourne, and we’re one of the smaller ones.”
Dare wasn’t sure what to do with all that information. Lock seemed to get better and better. A keeper. Only she wouldn’t keep him.
Ryan had been her soul mate. And she couldn’t let go of him or else he would fade away. Be forgotten as if his time on earth hadn’t mattered. She would be his keeper. Forever.
“Good to meet you,” Dare said, grasping the handle of the door and partially opening it, making sure to give Mim privacy even if she didn’t want it. “See you in a bit; I’m going to check out the rest of the station.”
And then figure out what the hell to do next because if it was one thing the last week had shown her, she didn’t belong in Australia. No one seemed to welcome her. She hadn’t felt comfortable with all the aunts and uncles and cousins she hadn’t seen since she’d been a teen even though she knew they had been trying, but the quiet, shy, gawky teen they remembered was gone, replaced with an impulsive, brash six-foot-tall woman with edgy, shorn hair, a tat, opinions and a disconcerting stare.
Brisbane Metropolitan stations hadn’t been enthused either.
Screw it. She was here now. And she was going to stay. Learn something. Accomplish something. Show her new captain at Glacier Creek that she was tough. She would fight on now that her best friend and teammates Alicia and Diaz had fallen.
Dare closed the door firmly behind her and ran up another set of stairs to what looked like the command center and main room. She was not going to give Lock the time to push her aside to another station. This was an opportunity for something, what she had no idea, but she was going to seize this opportunity and kick it in its bony ass!
Chapter Six
“Hey,” Dare called out as she ran up the set of stairs.
Lock was at the top talking to two men, one who was leaning against a counter, arms crossed, expression incredulous, another who was scrambling eggs with veggies at the stove.
Lock, his voice low and tense, stopped mid-word. All three men turned and looked at Dare, expressions neutral. She’d experienced way worse being the new girl, too tall and startling thin, and then later in the US military and as a smokejumper, still her shoulders squared, and she sauntered in the room. She was tempted to say something vulgar to break the ice, but something about the tension in Lock’s shoulders changed her mind. Usually, she preferred to be aggressive starting out and that was how she’d continue, but she found herself considering Lock. The boss. The man who’d been inside her like he’d been desperate and couldn’t get enough.
“I saw a ping-pong table folded up downstairs,” she said breezily, trying to soften her words so they’d sound teasing, but with enough edge so he would know she wasn’t going to be pushed aside. “You got paddles too? You think I’m a little white ball you can smack about with a paddle Senior Station Officer Lachlan Ryker?”
She said each word like it was in capital letters. So much for playing it low-key.
“Thinking about it,” Lock muttered.
And why the thought of him with a paddle should shoot a bolt of lightning straight at her clit was a mystery she’d rather not explore.
“Darington Knight,” Lock said. “Jess Lee and Reese McElroy.” The two men nodded at her. Reese ambled forward and shook her hand. Jess followed.
“Heard you’re going to slum with us.” Reese grinned at her, his gaze clearly appreciative. “Jump out of trucks, not planes. Damn, girl. Knight, huh? Hell, yeah, you got balls jumping into an Aussie crew at a time like this.”
“I met your grandfather a few times,” Jess said, his smile just as friendly as Reese’s. “Hella man. Sorry for your loss. He’s a legend and will be missed.” Jess shot Reese a look that left the grinning blonde, unfazed.
“Thank you.”
“Walk with me,” Lock said, stepping forward into her space and taking the stairs down quickly.
Dare hustled to catch up.
“Where’s the fire?” She joked.
“You wanted a paddle you only needed to let me know,” Lock said.
He was pissed. And that turned her on. Made her want to crank him up higher, but another smaller part of her understood. And wanted him to... what... win? It wasn’t a competition. But it wasn’t her fault she’d been dumped on him. He didn’t need to act like a kid whose toy had been taken away.
“Hey, Lock.” She sped up.
Lock hit the ground floor and smacked the door leading to the truck bays with both hands. It swung open fast and Dare followed him, her mouth tight. Was he really going to play it pissed with her? He left through a side door and, for a moment, Dare blinked helplessly, the sun’s glare off the light pavement blinding her, and the swish of the traffic seemed deafening.
“What crawled up your butt?” she demanded, but Lock’s ground-eating strides were already moving away from her down the street.
The logical thing to do would be to say to hell with him and to hell with this. So, what. No one wanted her. Again. Big surprise. She was a big girl. But she also was rarely logical. She took off after Lock, following him as he turned left.
“We going for a jog?” She demanded, her work boots pounded hard on the pavement as she caught up with him.
“Something like that.” He looked at her sideways and despite her aggravation, Dare felt like the restless energy came off him in waves that crashed over her, heating her up far more than the summer afternoon.
Lock rounded the next corner and Dare drew back in surprise. She could see the river, but Lock wasn’t going there. Instead he walked through the rolled up garage style doors of a very large, very serious looking gym.
“Catch.” Lock threw an awkwardly shaped black ball with round red discs
that had illustrations on each of the discs. “Three times through this circuit. Then we talk.”
What circuit? Dare stared at the pictures on the ball, her eyes finally adjusting to the dimmer light in the gym. The pictures were different weight bearing exercises.
“What dumb ass thing is this, a medicine ball for dummies?” Her lip lifted in scorn. “So sorry I forgot my Lululemon butt-sculpting yoga pants. You testing me, Lock?”
“Yes.”
“Really?” Her temper flared, even as her sex remained on a slow boil.
He was definitely hot when he was tense. His jaw looked like it could crack granite. And Dare loved edgy. She’d lived on the edge since she’d been seventeen. Didn’t know any other way. Lock radiated pheromones and bad ass and she just wanted to pull his chain tighter.
She threw the ball at him hard. The slap it made hitting his hands as he caught it sounded good on a primal level, and Dare enjoyed pushing her luck.
He tossed it back with less force.
“Going easy on me because I’m a girl?” She taunted palming the ball. She couldn’t spin it on her finger like she and her sisters had done growing up because the ball wasn’t round.
“No.” His mouth quirked a little but by the steel in his eye, he was not amused. “You’re supposed to use it. Basic warm up,” he said. “Not the workout.”
“You’ve already experienced how in shape I am.” She let her voice go sultry and, by the tick in his jaw and the way his blue eyes darkened to near black, she’d finally scored.
She threw the ball back. Harder. Didn’t even rock him. But immediately it was back in her hands, and she had to use both of them to stop it from hitting her dead center in her chest.
“Not fuckin’ around Dare. I want the truth.”
That threw her as much as his barely leashed tension and glimpse of aggression. “The truth?”
There were a million ways to interpret that and, even then, she wasn’t at all sure it would be pure. Truth. She felt a tug at her heart.
The truth.
Ryan had always wanted the truth. Like it was a static thing. Knowable. An archaeological relic steeped in legend and mystic powers just sitting there waiting for him to discover it and bring it into the light.
“Yeah, why are you here in Australia? On an exchange program.” The way he said exchange made is sound dirty. “During the investigation. At my firehouse. Why did you sleep with me?”
He’d picked up another medicine ball from a vertical rack of them. It was the same shape, and size, but a different color. She couldn’t tell if the cheerful graphic cheesy demonstration pictures were the same or not.
Lock began doing deep, perfectly balanced squats while twisting his upper body back and forth, arms out straight angling in the opposite direction, while holding the ball.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” Dare rolled her eyes. “Conspiracy much? No one has it out for you. Me, yeah maybe. But you’re golden. And I slept with you because I wanted to. You are total package and I am not blind or stupid or prudish.”
“You didn’t ask to come here? You knew where I worked.”
“Oh. Yeah. That’s why I left before you woke up because I wanted to see you again, my conquering hero.”
They glared at each other. Lock turned away first and started back running through the listed exercises. If the ball hadn’t been made of some incredibly hard material and weighted she’d have been tempted to throw it at the back of his head. Instead she swore under her breath and then followed suit. She hadn’t done such lame things in a gym since never.
Lock switched exercises, this time doing lunges while holding the ball above his head in his palms and then lowering it behind his head working his triceps. She followed.
“You have perfect form. You could be a physical trainer.” She sniped.
“So one of your uncles didn’t send you here? Stephen?”
“Stephen?” She echoed. “Why the hell would I listen to him about anything? Don’t flatter yourself.” She stood up, ball at her hip. “I’m not stalking you. Not desperate.”
She’d felt like they’d had a connection beyond sex. That was why she’d run. Clearly, she was wrong. Just animal lust and, even though she’d told herself that was all she wanted, the fact that he didn’t trust her hurt. Where the hell was all that suspicion coming from?
Confusion was not good. Hurt was even worse.
She couldn’t hurt anymore.
So she struck back. “You’re not that interesting,” she said. “And not so fabulous in bed that I’d follow you begging for more.”
Total lie about the fabulous part. Fabulous didn’t come within spitting distance of Lock’s skills, and the current state of her damp panties was a testimony to the fact that, yes, please, another round with Lock between the sheets would be more than welcome.
“Really?” He didn’t break his motion of lunges, but he did change direction so that when he stood up, he was in her space, his mouth inches from hers, his blue eyes intense, searching. “Not interesting, I’ll buy. Not good in bed?”
She could smell him—cedar or pine, sandalwood, and something fresh with a hint of tang like the ocean, and her mouth went dry. Swallowing was impossible and she felt lightheaded.
“So bad you wouldn’t want a repeat performance,” his voice whispered down her spine, and she realized that his broader accent, something she associated with family, took on an entirely different and darker meaning. “Wouldn’t crave it?”
She stood there toe-to-toe with him, holding that stupid medicine ball that belonged in an elementary school playground, and her eyes drifted shut as his scent and the heat of his body washed over her. His fingers stroked along her neck and she nearly whimpered.
“Then why is your pulse beating so fast? And you can barely draw breath?”
Dare tried to suck in as little air as possible so she didn’t overdose on his scent and heat and whatever pheromones he was pumping out. She pressed her palms against the ball so hard she felt like resisting touching Lock was a workout all on its own.
“And you have a little hint of sweat right here.”
He was so close. Her pulse kicked up another notch, and her breath shuddered in her throat. She pried her eyes open, abandoning the coward’s route.
“It’s hot,” she whispered, feebly defending herself and feeling like her gaze was forever glued to his.
“So that’s your excuse.” His tongue lazily licked the sweat bead, and continued up her neck, and his lips feathered along her jaw.
She gasped as a cascade of delicious sensation stormed through every nerve ending. He heard it too.
“Why are you really here, Dare?”
“To work.” Her legs trembled and her breasts ached, longed for him to cup them.
She could feel her nipples pebble as if they too weren’t above begging. His hands had been so hard and yet gentle. Rough and yet tender. And the responses he had been able to ignite in her body with just his hands had been beyond sinful. She’d always thought she had a high sex drive and craved touch, but Lock had transported sex to a whole new level.
He stepped back from her just as the garage door to the workout area rolled open.
“Then work it is, and Dare....”
The distance between them now felt like a mile. His eyes were glacier blue. His face hard. Unreadable.
“Work is all it is. For me. And you. You are part of my team. That’s it. And you stay the fuck in line. Clear? And run the circuit I told you to.”
If that wasn’t a gauntlet. If it were a hundred years ago they’d be dueling. Only letting herself explore anything with Lock beyond work would be far more dangerous than pistols at dawn.
Okay, it wasn’t a plane or a helicopter, but swinging wide and fast around city streets and watching drivers scuttle out of their path and pedestrians stop and stare was pretty cool. And the siren! Better than primal scream therapy.
The borrowed bunker gear ruined the moment for Dare a littl
e. The jacket was far too bulky and the arms were too short, and the pants were way too big but short. At least the boots, courtesy of someone called Jason who was on three week’s holiday, fit. Lock had said he’d have her fitted for a uniform today, but when the call had come in for an apartment fire and Reese had offered her a spot on the truck as an observer, she’d jumped at it and grabbed the borrowed gear Mim had tossed at her.
Damn, it was hot as hell, but not nearly as hot as Iraq and Afghanistan, and it would be nothing compared to entering the building she reminded herself as she held on to a handle and watched the confidence and determination stamped on the faces of Mim, Jess, and Reese across from her.
Not that she was going to be allowed in the building today. She was supposed to observe. Reese had glared at her and made her repeat the ‘O-Word,’ as he cheekily called it.
The scene was chaotic when they arrived. Two police cars arrived at the same time, from opposite directions. They blocked traffic after letting in the fire truck and then the officers began crowd control. Spectators clogged the sidewalk, some of them clearly residents, judging from the shock on their faces. She could already hear another siren wailing, although the bounce off the building structures made it difficult to tell the unit’s direction. Black smoke billowed, but Dare couldn’t see any flames, nor could she hear the roar or any crackling over the noise of the cars arriving. Daniel, the usual truck driver she learned on the way over, grabbed the front and center spot and everyone piled out, clear on their purpose.
Mim was connecting a hose, while Jess ran around the back of the building to see if he could see a source. Everyone looked full of purpose and efficient—tight, quick moves, choreographed like a working man’s ballet.
Dare stood around feeling stupid. She’d always been a woman of action, not observation.
“Let me go in.” She grabbed Reese’s arm as he strode by and pushed the hydraulics to raise the ladder.
“You’re joking, right?” He shook his head. “Lock would have my nuts.”
Burning Both Ends Page 6