Firefighter Christmas Complete Series Box Set (A Firefighter Holiday Romance Love Story)

by Nella Tyler

  She fought me when I tried to get the dress on her, but once it was on, she was more or less set, with her dark hair clipped up out of her face. I put her in her playpen with a few of her favorite toys and tried not to check the time more than maybe once every five minutes as I waited for Titan to arrive.

  I caught sight of Titan’s mom’s car moving up the driveway with only about five minutes to spare before the time we’d agreed on, and once more something started to relax in me. Whatever else happened, I would have done the right thing by letting Titan have a chance to meet his daughter. Whether he actually followed through and did right by her as her father was up to him.

  I pulled my hair back into a ponytail and carried the playpen out onto the patio. I felt weird about the possibility of inviting Titan into the guest house. I sat down and waited for Titan to park the car, my heart pounding in my chest. I wasn’t sure why; I had long since given up on having anything with him, and I had just about given up on the possibility of him having anything to do with Addie.

  “Hey, babe,” Titan said when he got out of the car, grinning at me. I smiled back, even though his calling me babe made me a little uncomfortable; it was what he’d called me when we were together.

  “Come on over here and meet your daughter,” I called back to him. Titan closed the driver’s side door and walked up to the porch, and I gestured to Addie in her playpen. I watched Titan’s face intently—would he fall in love with her the same way I had, the first time I’d laid eyes on her? Titan bent over the playpen and looked in at our daughter, and I felt a kind of clench in my stomach.

  “She’s just as beautiful as her mama,” he said, glancing at me with a little smile. “Can I pick her up?”

  “She’s a little squirmy,” I told him, “but go ahead.”

  He reached into the playpen and lifted Addie out; she fidgeted in his arms, but she’d never been all that fussy in general, so once she saw that I was okay with her being held, she more or less settled down.

  “I am going to be the best daddy to this little girl,” Titan said, giving her a little hug and sitting down on the bench swing. He looked up at me. “You never did send me many actual pictures of her, you know.” I shrugged.

  “You never seemed all that interested,” I pointed out. “In fact, I seem to recall…” I pressed my lips together. My mom would say that it was in bad grace for me to chastise Titan at a moment like this. “I’m glad you took the time to come and finally meet her.”

  “So am I,” he said, looking from me to Addie with a little smile. For a little while, he played with her, and I managed to scrape up enough decency to offer him some lemonade. I tried to feel good about the fact that Titan seemed to be interested in learning about Addie, but it felt more to me like he was asking the same kind of questions that random people in town always managed to ask, rather than that he was actually interested in her as her father.

  I put her back in the playpen when she was starting to get restless and fidgety, and sat down to talk to Titan. “So what brought on this sudden interest in learning about your daughter?” He shrugged.

  “I just thought—you know, I wanted to do the right thing,” he said, looking at me. I recognized the expression on his face almost immediately. It was the same one he always used to use when he was sweet-talking me, the soft, self-deprecating look.

  “That sounds good, but if I’m going to let you in, I have to believe you’re going to follow through,” I said, keeping my voice firm, even if I tried to stay polite. “I don’t want to break Addie’s heart with having you traipse in and out of her life just as you please. If you want to do the right thing, I want you to mean it, whatever is going on between you and me otherwise.”

  “Whatever’s going on between us?” He grinned slightly.

  “You left me,” I told him flatly. “You ran off to the other end of the country to be with someone else. You broke our engagement and left me to finish a pregnancy as an unwed mom. Do you know how much that hurt?” I crossed my arms over my chest and shook my head.

  “I’m sorry for that,” he said, reaching out uselessly to take my hand. “I want to do right by you, too, babe.” The sound of him saying the word babe was enough to make my stomach lurch inside of me. Did he really think that after all this time I was just going to forget the fact that he’d abandoned me—and abandoned his own daughter?

  “I’m not really interested,” I started to say. I heard a car coming up along the driveway. Titan stood and walked over to the playpen, reaching in to pick Addie up; I wanted to tell him not to, but he had lifted her out of the pen before I even had a chance to say it.

  “Are you really going to deny our little girl the chance to have a two-parent home?” I felt my face go hot and then cold.

  “Actually, I’m not doing that at all,” I started to say. I had been trying to find a way to explain to Titan that I’d moved on since it started to become apparent to me that he was looking for a way to reconcile—something that was far from what I wanted.

  I heard the car coming to a stop and turned to look; in an instant, I recognized it as Cade’s truck. My heart and stomach both felt as though they’d fallen to my knees. Cade leaped out of the truck and I saw the flowers in his hands, the brief, hopeful look on his face.

  Then he glanced at Titan, saw him holding my daughter, and just stared for a long moment. I saw the expression on his face changing, the hope completely dissolving, anger and sadness taking its place. He threw the flowers in his hands down on the ground and shook his head, stalking back towards his truck. He didn’t look back, not even when I called out and started to half-run towards him. Cade climbed into the driver’s seat and turned the truck around and hurried up the driveway, and all I could do was just stare at his taillights.

  “Who the hell was that?” I turned to look at Titan; he’d put our daughter back down and looked annoyed.

  “That’s the guy I’m seeing now,” I told him matter-of-factly.

  “You’re seeing someone?” He looked me up and down as if he couldn’t believe it.

  “You’re damn right I am,” I said. “You abandoned me, Titan. You abandoned our daughter. Didn’t you think I would move on? Especially after that message you sent about how you had no interest at all in having anything to do with me or our daughter?” I was furious—at Titan and at myself. He rolled his eyes.

  “He’s probably just got some MILF fetish,” he said. I stared at him, staggered at what I was hearing.

  “Why did you even come here, Titan?” I shook my head, torn between anger and grief. “Do you really have any interest in being an actual father to Adelyn?” He shrugged.

  “I figured I’d give you a chance,” he said. “Figured you probably weren’t getting much action since you had a kid—not many guys want to stick it in a mom.” If my eyes popped out of my head I wouldn’t have been surprised.

  “You came here to hook up with me?” I shook my head. “I haven’t been interested in you ever since you left me, you asshole.” I laughed. “Besides, I thought you were just so all about that girl you left me for.” He briefly looked shamed, then angry.

  “She dropped me,” he said. “So yeah, I figured we could pick things up and see where they went. You’re not in a position to be choosy.” I laughed bitterly and walked across the porch, snatching up my daughter.

  “You and I are never, ever going to have anything between us again,” I told him. “As far as I’m concerned, you’re nothing but a sperm donor. You aren’t ever coming near my daughter again. And if you don’t leave in the next two minutes, I’m calling the police, my father, and my brother to make you leave.” He snorted and rolled his eyes but started to move towards his mom’s car.

  “You’ll be missing me eventually, especially now that your side man is dropping you,” he told me. I tried to keep myself from grabbing Adelyn too hard. I was so furious that it was hard to hold onto my temper, even with my baby in my arms.

  I watched Titan turn his car around and
then blast up the driveway, following in Cade’s exit. I was shaking, adrenaline surging through my body, and Addie started to whine in my arms, catching onto my mood.

  I needed to do something. I needed to go somewhere else. I walked from my front porch across my parents’ backyard to the house, looking for someone to tell—my mother preferably, though I was pretty sure Dad would lend a sympathetic ear, as well.

  Instead, I found Tuck, seated in the living room, watching TV and eating popcorn. “Where are Mom and Dad?” I tried to keep control of my voice, but it cracked and wavered anyway.

  “They’re in town; what’s up?” He frowned at the sight of me, and I wondered just how well I was even holding myself together.

  “I don’t want to tell you about it,” I said, shaking my head. “I’ll just go into the kitchen and wait for Mom and Dad to get home.” Tuck stood and before I could even process what he was doing, he took Addie from my arms. I hadn’t even realized I’d been about to drop her.

  “Tell me about it,” he told me firmly. “I’m your brother. I know I’ve been shitty lately, but you’re obviously upset, and not in a way that can wait for Mom and Dad.”

  I hesitated for a moment longer, but then everything sort of built up inside of me and I heard myself telling him about everything: about lying to Cade, about agreeing to meet with Titan, about the meeting itself and how Cade had interrupted it, and finding out that Titan was just interested in a rebound with me, since his situation with the girl he’d left me for had dried up on him.

  “And now I’ve screwed everything up with Cade, and Titan’s an ass, and I’m never going to find anyone to be a good father to Addie, and I’m-I’m a terrible mom,” I finished, burying my face in one of Mom’s throw pillows to cry. Tuck let me get it all out of my system, jostling Addie on his knee, keeping her calm.

  “Do you really love him?” I looked up, wiping at my face.

  “What?” Tuck held my gaze and gave me a cracked, crooked kind of smile.

  “Do you really love him, and do you really want to be with him?” I nodded.

  “I’ve known that for months,” I told my brother. “And, I’ve gone and screwed it up because I wanted to do the right thing, but didn’t know how.” Tuck took a deep breath.

  “Here,” he said. “Take her back.” I frowned in confusion but did as I was told, gathering Adelyn to my body and cuddling her close. I watched as my brother stood and found his phone, plugged in next to the TV. He unlocked the screen and I wondered what it was he was doing. Who he was calling. Maybe Dad?

  I dried my face off and tried to get Addie to smile at me, and tried not to feel hopeless at what a mess I had made of things. I looked up when I heard Tuck beginning to talk again.

  “Hey, Cade. Listen, there’s been an emergency in the fields and Dad’s not here to help me contain it. I need you to come by and help me out.” Tuck paused and I felt my heart pounding in my chest in a mixture of hope, excitement, and dread. “Yeah, yeah, it’s not a fire or anything, but I definitely need your help.” There was another pause. “See you in fifteen, then.” Tuck ended the call and looked at me. “Go wash your face and get you composure back,” he said with a wry little smile.

  Chapter Forty

  Cade

  The last thing I’d expected, halfway into my drive back to town, was to get a call from Tuck. At first, I’d thought that he was going to chew me out for something—maybe for hurting his sister, even if I was pretty sure I was justified in just walking away after seeing her with Titan—but instead as soon as he’d told me there was an emergency, that he needed me to help out, I’d taken an illegal U-turn and headed back to the farm.

  Since Tuck had told me that there wasn’t a fire, I’d assumed it was an issue maybe of animals getting into the grain silo or something like that—something I could help him with while Bob was away.

  I hauled ass back to the farm I’d only just left, and the only thing I had in mind was making sure that I didn’t have to see Autumn and Addie in the process. If Tuck had found out about the situation that had happened between me and his sister, I hoped that he’d just keep his mouth shut about it; it was obvious to me that she’d made her choice, and that it wasn’t me.

  I told myself that I couldn’t completely blame her for choosing Titan. He was the father of her child, and they had that in common, something that I couldn’t, for the moment at least, put any claim of my own on. But the fact that she’d lied to me about it, that she’d apparently wanted to keep me on the hook while she explored things with her ex, had hurt me. I’d realized as soon as I’d driven up and seen both of them together and realized that it was Titan that he was the reason that she’d been jumpy so much, that it must have been a text message from him that had made her so distracted during our last date together.

  I got to the farm and parked in front of the Nelson house, looking around to make sure that Autumn wasn’t anywhere to be seen. I hopped out of my truck and called out for Tuck, wondering where the emergency was happening.

  “Cade! Good to see you, man,” Tuck said, emerging from the sheds and walking towards me. “There’s something out in the fields I need your help with— one of the irrigator pipes blew and it’s flooding.” It was an emergency, but since we’d just about finished the harvest, it wasn’t the sort of thing that would ruin a whole lot. But all the water I could picture in my head spewing into the field would be a problem, both from the perspective of flooding the ground and the issue of the cost of wasting so much water.

  I followed Tuck out into the field and looked around, trying to find the flooded section. He kept going until we were far enough away that I could barely make out the house itself, and then turned around to look at me. “I gotta be honest with you,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest. “But you should know that if you don’t walk away without hearing me out, I’m going to tell my father about it.” I raised an eyebrow at that.

  “You’re going to tell my father about you lying to me? How is that a threat?” Tuck grinned wryly.

  “I seem to recall that he made a new condition that if you were going to date my sister, you could keep your job—as long as you didn’t break her heart,” Tuck told me. I groaned and rolled my eyes, wanting to walk back to my truck. All the hurry, all the adrenaline pumping in my veins to get back to the farm to help out, and Tuck had been lying to me all along. He’d been trying to get me out in the field alone to talk to me about his sister.

  “You don’t want us together anyway,” I pointed out. “You should be happy right now. Besides, she rejected me.” Tuck shook his head.

  “Nah man,” he said. “Let me tell you what just went down.”

  “I know what just went down,” I insisted. “I drove up to surprise the girl I’m seeing and she surprised me by being with another man—her ex.” Tuck shook his head again.

  “Man, let me tell you what just happened, and if you really think you know the whole thing after that, we’ll return to whether you broke her heart or she broke yours. Deal?” He raised an eyebrow and I thought about Bob Nelson; it was true that Bob had told me, mostly in joking, I’d thought, that I was welcome to both see his daughter and keep working for him, just as long as I didn’t break his daughter’s heart.

  “Fine,” I said, still feeling irritable and set up. “Just tell me so I can get out of here.” Tuck took a deep breath.

  “My sister came to me crying just a little while ago,” Tuck began. “She didn’t even want to talk to me about it because of the issues we’ve got.” His lips twisted in something that wasn’t quite a smile and I thought maybe—maybe—Tucker was regretting some of his part in that. “Titan has been texting her, but you already knew that.”

  He wasn’t wrong; I had just assumed by the fact that Autumn hadn’t mentioned it anymore after our confrontation that Titan had stopped.

  “And, she had him over,” I pointed out. Tuck rolled his eyes.

  “Let me tell the story,” he said. “She thought Titan wanted to be
part of Addie’s life, and since he’s the biological father of her kid, she thought she needed to give him a chance. She didn’t want you thinking she was going to go back to him.” Tuck shrugged. “Obviously she made the wrong choice there because not telling you just made you think there was more to it than there was.”

  “So you’re telling me there wasn’t?” I shook my head in disbelief.

  “She found out that Titan was just interested in a hookup because the girl he left her for dumped him. As soon as she figured that out, she kicked him the hell out and told him that he would never have anything to do with her or her daughter.”

  I took a deep breath. I could just imagine Autumn doing that. It was exactly what I could expect from her, if Tuck’s story was true.

  “So what are you wanting from me now?” I looked at Tucker.

  “Do you love my sister?”

  I pressed my lips together. “Does she love me?”

  Tuck rolled his eyes. “She was just in the living room, bawling her eyes out about how she ruined the one good thing that came from being abandoned by Titan,” he told me. “She loves you.”

  “I can’t stay with her if she’s going to hide shit from me,” I said.

  “There’s nothing else for her to hide,” he pointed out. He sighed. “Look, man, if you love her, go find her in the house.” He pressed his lips together. “You’d be an idiot if you didn’t go for it, by the way.”

  “Why’s that?” Tuck smiled wryly.

  “She’s obviously in love with you. And for that, I’ve been thinking that I can put aside all my stupid jealousy and work with you. But if you’re going to just break her heart like this, I don’t think I can work with you, even if Dad doesn’t fire you.”

  I thought about it; I’d been hurt to see Autumn with her ex, the implication that she had hidden it from me, the fact that I had always kind of thought that if Titan came back into her life, it would be hard for Autumn not to give him a chance. I hadn’t seen any sign of Titan’s car, but then he might have left for another reason. I had to decide whether I trusted Autumn, and her love for me, or not.