The Complete Firehouse 56 Series

by Chase Jackson

  The sliding glass door eased open behind me, and I quickly blinked open my eyes and released the breath that I was holding in my lungs.

  “Charlie is out like a light!” Rory announced as he stepped out onto the balcony and slid the glass door shut behind him. “I had to carry her to bed. I can’t even remember the last time she zonked out before 8 p.m.”

  “Well, it has been a pretty eventful night!” I grinned. “Making pancakes for dinner, introducing me to her entire Barbie collection, singing Frozen karaoke… and then there was that impromptu Wii Sports Resort showdown!”

  “Yeah, it got pretty intense towards the end…”

  “Pretty intense?” I chuckled. “Your daughter plays Wii table tennis like she’s training for the Olympics!”

  “Charlie can get a little competitive,” Rory conceded with a proud grin. “I’m just glad she finally found someone who can give her a run for her money in the Speed Slice competition. My sword skills aren’t what they used to be, and I think she was starting to get a big head from always beating her old man…”

  “Wait… were you actually trying to win?” I raised my eyebrows in amusement. “I thought you were just going easy on her!”

  “Hey now,” Rory made a playful tut. “Slicing food objects with a giant sword is a very specific skill…”

  “A skill you need to improve, apparently,” I teased, nudging my shoulder gently into his.

  My shoulder barely grazed him, but that contact was enough to ignite a spark; a bolt of white, sizzling electricity that tingled through my veins and jolted down my spine.

  I shivered awkwardly and leaned forward on the balcony railing again, redirecting my eyes out towards the setting sun.

  “You’ve got a great view out here,” I said, trying to make smalltalk. Rory didn’t respond. He remained silent as he eased beside me, leaning forward on the railing so that our elbows were inches apart.

  “This is a really cool apartment,” I tried again. “You did a good job, finding this place.”

  Rory ignored my second attempt at smalltalk. I could feel his eyes shift towards me, and the heat radiating from his giant, Wrestlemania-worthy bicep felt hotter than the sun.

  “Hey,” he said softly.

  “Hey,” I whispered back, turning my head so I could gaze up at him.

  Those eyes… those lips… my heart was beating itself to a pulp.

  “I think I owe you an explanation,” he said.

  “About your Wii Sports Resort performance?” I tried to tease, but the joke fell flat.

  “About Charlie,” he said. “I should have told you that I had a daughter. I didn’t plan on you finding out like this…”

  ‘Like this.’

  My brain raced backwards, retracing the events of the last few hours like a VHS tape slowly rewinding until I found myself back at the very beginning.

  When I had knocked on Rory’s front door hours earlier, I had no idea what would be waiting for me on the other side.

  I had no idea that a little girl in a pink dress would greet me by name. I had no idea that our dinner date for two would become a party of three.

  I had no idea that we would spend the night cooking homemade pancakes, or playing with Barbie dolls, or singing Frozen karaoke, or getting embroiled in a dramatic Wii battle…

  I had no idea that Rory McAlister had a daughter…

  That revelation was crazy mind-blowing all on its own. It should have hit my brain like an atomic bomb, exploding in a mushroom cloud of questions and feelings and emotions… but the night had flown by so quickly that I hadn’t had a spare second to stop and stand still. Between the pancakes and karaoke, I hadn’t had a chance to let the reality sink in.

  Now we were alone for the first time, and there was nothing but silence and time standing still.

  I closed my eyes and leaned into the silence, expecting the dam to break and flood my brain with all of those feelings and emotions, or an onslaught of urgent questions that needed urgent answers...

  But when I closed my eyes, I didn’t find my head spinning with any of those thoughts or questions. Instead, I just saw Rory.

  I saw the way Rory’s entire demeanor changed when he was around his daughter. His face lit up, his voice raised three octaves, and his eyes sparkled… he was crazy about her.

  I flicked open my eyes, then glanced up at Rory.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked. “Did you think you’d scare me off? Did you think I’d run for the hills if I found out you have a daughter?”

  I was half joking, half sincere.

  Rory’s face darkened and he stared silently out into space for several seconds before he answered,

  “When I found you that day at the high school, I felt like I was fifteen years old again. All of the feelings came rushing back, like those eleven years had never happened,” he hesitated, then continued, “Like we could be us again…”

  “But then I called you a ‘stranger’ in the ambulance,” I recalled, grimacing as I remembered the harsh things I had said to Rory.

  He nodded slowly.

  “I couldn’t bring myself to tell you that you were right,” he admitted. “I wanted to be the person you remembered… but I was just a stranger. When I left Hartford, I also left behind the person I used to be.”

  “It’s been eleven years,” I reminded him. “Nobody stays fifteen forever. People grow up and change over time.”

  “I didn’t just change, Des,” Rory shook his head. “I lived a completely different life in Boston.”

  “That doesn’t make you a stranger. I shouldn’t have said that. I was just upset, and--”

  “It was the truth. I have baggage, Des. I have a daughter…”

  “Everyone has baggage!” I said. “Yours happens to be adorable and sweet.”

  We were both silent for several seconds, staring out as the sun set lower and lower over the horizon and the sky slowly darkened.

  “I always knew you’d make a great dad,” I said.

  “Really?” he looked surprised.

  “Yeah,” I nodded. “You see things that most people miss. I used to think that you could read my mind, because you always seemed to know what I was thinking or feeling. You cared… you made me feel so safe when everything else in my life was in a state of total chaos.”

  Rory said nothing, so I continued,

  “You were so protective, too,” I said. “You always guarded the things you cared about. Like me. You protected me from everything… you even tried to protect me from yourself.”

  He swallowed heavily, glaring down at the parking lot below us.

  “You never let me see the pain or the hurt you felt inside,” I continued. “You never told me about what happened inside that house. You never told me about the awful things your mother and stepfather used to do to you. You always tried to hide the cuts and bruises from me…”

  “Des…”

  “You thought I couldn’t handle it,” I said softly. “You thought you’d scare me off…”

  I swayed gently towards Rory, letting my arm nudge against his again. This time, I didn’t sway away. His biceps and forearms were completely covered in a dense jungle of tattoos; vibrant images that were overlapping and interwoven together to conceal the scars of a previous life.

  “I was poisonous, Des,” he muttered softly, his words disappearing into the night air. “I didn’t want to poison you, too.”

  “No…” I shook my head. “You didn’t trust that I could love all of you; the dark pieces and the light.”

  I reached my hand out and let my fingers land gently on his skin, tracing the ink lines. His skin was static to my fingertips; smooth and hot and charged with electricity that flowed out of his body and into mine.

  My fingers wandered along the designs, sliding easily over his smooth skin until I hit a raised spot. Rory immediately tensed, sucking in a breath and tightening his grip on the balcony railing.

  I kept my fingers over the scar, traci
ng it gently. It was round and raised; a tiny circle of wrinkled skin, hidden underneath a tattoo of a rose.

  “You got this scar that night,” I said. “I remember asking you about it at the park… but you wouldn’t tell me what happened.”

  Rory stood perfectly still, head bowed and eyes staring blankly at nothing.

  “How did you get this scar, Rory?”

  His jaw clenched and his breathing grew heavier. He pressed his eyes shut again.

  “I came home late that night. They were already passed out on the couch,” he said, forming each word precisely. “I should have just gone to bed. I should have just kept my head down… but I couldn’t ignore the bruises he had given my mother.”

  A lump swelled in the back of my throat. I eased closer to Rory, pressing myself against him as his shoulders started to sink.

  “She had a black eye,” he said. “I don’t know why, but I snapped. I accused him of hitting her… and then he threw me against the wall and pressed his cigarette into my arm.”

  “Your mother didn’t try to stop him?”

  “She was just laughing her ass off the whole time,” Rory shook his head. “Meth is one hell of a drug, right?”

  Rory opened his eyes and stared up at the sky. The sun had mostly disappeared, and the sky was fading slowly to purple.

  I traced my fingers around the rose design again, feeling the soft crease of the cigarette burn.

  “Too bad tattoos can only hide so much, right?” he said grimly, glancing down at the scar. “People can tell as soon as they look at me that I’m damaged goods.”

  “No,” I shook my head, circling it with my finger. “You don’t need to hide anything, Rory. These scars don’t mean that you’re broken… they’re proof that you’re strong. They’re proof that you fought back.”

  I held his arms between my two hands and leaned forward, pressing my lips over the raised scar.

  Rory’s body didn’t tense this time. Instead, his shoulders started to ease apart and he released his white-knuckled grip on the balcony railing.

  I didn’t pull back. My lips followed the trail of scars and tattoos that decorated Rory’s arm, kissing every place he’d been hurt before…

  When I reached the sleeve of his black t-shirt, I felt his hands slip around my waist and guide me towards him.

  Electric chills rattled through my body as I felt the firmness of his rock-hard chest press against mine. His heat spread through me like a wildfire, rushing straight between my legs. I felt myself throbbing for him; burning from head to toe with a desire I had never felt before.

  I wanted him. I wanted all of him. Every cell in my body was consumed by an intense, burning need; a need that burned straight through any shyness or inhibition.

  I could tell that he felt it, too. His breathing was strained and his eyes were devouring me… but still, he was holding back; still resisting.

  Why?

  “It’s hot out here,” he said finally. “We should cool down.”

  “Oh… do you want to go back inside?”

  “Not yet,” he shook his head. “Actually… I have a better idea.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN | RORY

  I needed to ‘cool down,’ alright.

  I needed a cold shower. I needed to soak in a bathtub filled with dry ice. I needed a harsh rinse from the firehose. I needed to pour a 10lb bag of ice down the front of my boxer-briefs.

  I needed anything to defuse the bomb that was inching closer and closer to exploding inside my ripped black jeans.

  What I really needed was Des… but that wasn’t an option. Not yet, anyways.

  Des and I both had scars. I wore mine on my arms, buried underneath my tattoos. Des wore her scars on the inside, too deep for me to kiss away. But I knew they were there, and I knew that some of the biggest ones were left by me.

  I had left a nasty gash when I disappeared, and I knew it would take time before that old wound healed entirely. I had to earn her trust again. I had to prove that I wasn’t going anywhere.

  That’s why we had to take things slow. That’s why I had to use restraint. And that’s how I found myself leading Des up the apartment building’s dimly lit cinderblock stairwell.

  “So… any chance you’re going to tell me where we’re going?” Des asked as we rounded the twelfth -- and final -- flight of stairs.

  “Nope,” I winked over my shoulder. “But you’ll see for yourself in about thirty seconds.”

  We climbed up the final steps and found ourselves in a narrow concrete hallway.

  There was a door at the end of the hall, and affixed to the wall directly next to it was a control panel. The digital screen glowed bright yellow, creating an aura of light in the darkness.

  I tapped a button on the panel and it chirped loudly, then prompted me to type in a six-digit clearance code.

  “Rory, are we--” Des lowered her voice to a hiss “--breaking in?!”

  “Technically we’re entering on official fire department business,” I told her as I typed in the clearance code. “The Connecticut state fire code stipulates that certain places must be accessible to fire personnel at all times. This six-digit code is like a digital key to the city…”

  I tapped the ‘enter’ key and the panel chirped again, then we heard the sound of a deadbolt disengaging and the door popping open gently. I grabbed the handle and pulled it open.

  “After you,” I said, ushering Des through the door. She hesitated, narrowing her eyes at me.

  “Can we get in trouble for this?” she asked.

  “Only if we get caught,” I winked.

  A smile twitched at the corners of her mouth, and she sucked in her bottom lip to stop it from spreading to her cheeks. Then she ducked under my arm and slipped through the open door. I followed, ignoring the Louisville Slugger that was taking practice swings inside my jeans.

  When I was trying to sell Charlie on the idea of moving to Hartford, this rooftop pool had been one of my biggest bargaining chips. It looked even better in real life than it had in the glossy brochure photos. The pool was a rectangle of turquoise water, casting a cool blue glow over the rest of the deck. Black pool chairs were arranged in neat rows on either side of the water, and glass bulb string lights were hung in a zig-zag pattern over the entire deck.

  “Oh my God, Rory… this is incredible!” Des said, turning around slowly as she took it all in. “This makes my apartment’s pool look like a garbage dump.”

  “You’d probably feel differently if you saw it during normal pool hours,” I quipped.

  Des was biting her lip again as she turned back around to face me, and her eyes were glistening mischievously.

  “So… are we gonna get in, or what?”

  My eyebrows flung up in surprise.

  “What?” she narrowed her eyes at me playfully. “Don’t tell me we came all the way up here just to get our feet wet?”

  That’s exactly why we came up here, I thought.

  “We don’t have any swimsuits,” I pointed out.

  “Oh well,” she shrugged. She smiled innocently at me, and I felt my dick twitch eagerly in my jeans.

  Fire. This is playing with fire.

  Her hands crawled along her waist, wrapping around the hem of her white t-shirt and rolling it up slowly.

  Fire, fire, fire…

  She slipped the shirt over her shoulders and tossed it aside, and in the soft yellow glow from the sting lights I saw her breasts spilling out of a black lace bra.

  Fuck…

  I didn’t think I could get any harder than I already was, but when I saw those tits I felt all of the hot blood in my body pulse straight to the steel rod in my jeans.

  I gulped, trying to stay in control… but she was making it damn near impossible. Her hands slid down her taut stomach towards the waistband of her denim shorts. She popped the button open easily and shoved down the zipper, then gave her hips a little wiggle until the denim slid down her thighs and pu
ddled on the floor around her ankles.

  FIRE.

  She stood still just long enough for me to confirm that the black lace panties matched the black lace bra… then she took two giant strides and leapt towards the pool, crashing into the turquoise water with a giant SPLASH.

  Tiny droplets of shimmering water pelted the deck, and when her head emerged through a wave of blue she was buried under a curtain of soggy black hair, laughing hysterically.

  She shoved the hair away from her face and glanced up at me.

  “Are you coming?”

  My cock was throbbing through the seams of my jet-black Levis, and I knew there wasn’t a chance in hell of me stripping down to my briefs and jumping into the pool without her catching a glimpse of my unbridled beast.

  “I’ll just put my feet in,” I resolved, waddling awkwardly towards the edge of the pool and bending down to sit on the edge. I rolled up the hems of my black denim pants and thrust my legs into the water.

  It felt cool… but not cool enough to relieve the sweltering heat the was pounding through my veins.

  Des swam up beside me and propped her elbows on the concrete edge of the pool, then she glanced up at me. Her skin was glistening wet, and the water droplets looked like tiny twinkling diamonds in the light.

  Her burning hot eyes rolled down my chest towards my crotch, and they widened when she saw the bulge.

  “I want you to come in,” she said. Her voice was low, husky… almost a purr.

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “You don’t need to protect me, Rory,” she said, flicking her gaze back up to me. “I can handle it… I can handle you.”

  She pushed herself away from the wall and glided closer towards me, planting her hands on my knees and positioning her torso between my legs under the water. Then her hands crept over the tops of my thighs, slowly inching towards my cock.

  “I don’t want to hurt you, Des…”

  “You won’t,” she whispered. “You have to trust me. I want you, Rory. I want all of you…”

  Her fingers wrapped around my shaft, stroking through the thick black denim. I sucked in a breath as my body reacted to her touch.

  “Fuck, Des…”