I felt the blood rush up under my skin to heat my cheeks, but my hands were like ice.
“Jace, you have no idea how glad I am that you’re here,” Randy said, refilling his mug from our second pot of coffee. He blinked and swallowed. “I mean… it saves me the trouble of tracking you down,” he added quickly. “And I don’t have a hell of a lot of time before I have to get back, myself.” He glanced at me, and down at his cup. “Cap wants me to pull a crew together, mostly just for thinning the trees right now. He thinks we can cut the fires off at the western border, if we can clear enough land.”
“But you just got here,” I said, standing up to put the pot back on the stove. “You need food and a shower…” I gave his shoulder a little shove. And saw him wince.
“What?” I demanded. “What the hell was that?” I pulled at the collar of his jacket until I could see skin. Ugly, red blisters lined the side of his neck.
“You’re hurt, for god’s sake,” I cried. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It’s nothing, Sis,” he said calmly. “Embers fall from the treetops… and they stick in the crevices.” He took my hand and kissed my knuckles. “You’re so much like Mom when you worry,” he teased.
“And you’re as reckless as Dad was,” I shot back. “I don’t know how the hell Connie puts up with you.”
At the mention of his wife’s name, his face lit up. “She loves me,” he said. “Why the hell else?”
“Maybe because she’s two kids deep already and doesn’t have any choice,” I shot back, turning back to the stove. I could feel my neck hairs bristling, their eyes on my back. The almost-orgasm that was still humming under the surface of my skin wasn’t doing a damned thing to improve my disposition. I felt overheated, irritable, frustrated as hell.
“She’s got plenty of choices,” he said, looking pleased with himself. “I’m what she wanted.
You two are obviously back together, and nobody told me…” he ventured. “How long have you…?”
“Just because Jason’s here doesn’t mean we’re together,” I said, cutting him off, spinning around to face them both. I turned on Jason, my temper suddenly seething. I was angry and sick at the idea I’d be losing them both, not a day after they were both finally home where they belonged. “So you two have to leave?
“Then go. You’re grown men. You don’t need my permission. You don’t need me at all. Neither one of you… You never did…”
Half an hour later, I heard Jason’s footsteps on the other side of the bedroom door. I sat up, brushing the mess of hair out of my face, sweeping the tears off my lashes.
“Randy took Rye out for a walk,” he said, pushing the door open. “Or maybe the other way around…
“Em, I need you to talk to me…”
“What is there to talk about?” I asked. “We got carried away, that’s all… after not seeing each other in so long.” I wiped my nose. “We love each other, but what does that change? Nothing.”
He sat down on the edge of the bed and took both my hands in his. “How we feel changes everything, babygirl,” he said softly. “Or at least it has the power to, if we let it…”
I sniffled impatiently and lifted my chin. Swollen eyes or not, I was strong enough to face him, to face this. “When are you leaving?”
“In the morning,” he replied. “We should be back in two or three weeks, Em,” he said reassuringly. “This isn’t active firefighting, where we’re headed. They just need a team to clear the path, so that if the fires can’t be stopped altogether, at least they can be controlled. Nothing’s reached Colorado yet, sweetheart. And if we clear the tinder now, it never will.”
He pulled me against him and as my mind continued to argue, my body relaxed and responded. This was the power he had over me, to tease my body, to make me give in because I couldn’t resist the magnetic pull between us. But he’d always sugar-coated the truth and he was doing it now.
“I’ll be safe, Ember. Randy too,” he crooned, kissing my neck… the curve of my ear… “It’s hard fucking work, clearing. But it’s not dangerous. I’ll be back before you even know I was gone,” he said. He took my face in his hands and cradled it. The waterworks were starting up again… and not just tears…
“You promise me,” I said as forcefully as I could. But all the will in my body seemed to be draining downwards and pooling low in my belly. My core was turning hot and liquid, like the hot spring where he’d turned my whole world upside down. It was happening again, like a wildfire gone out of control.
“I promise you,” he said, pulling me down onto the bed along with him. Our bed… where he’d loved me so long, so hard, so many, many times before…
“And I’ll keep on promising you… for the rest of my life.”
14
Jason
“You promise me that neither of you will be in any danger?” she asked. Her eyes were dark velvet, her mouth slightly swollen…
For a split second, I hesitated. “We’ll both come home starved, dirty, exhausted,” I answered, smiling down at her. “I can promise you all that and more.” I kissed her, sensing the delicious energy that was stirring in her again. “Neither Randy nor I will ever want to pick up an axe again, and we’ll probably sleep for days straight… but we’ll both come home safe and sound.”
She looked away. “Every day that we’ve been apart, I thought nothing could hurt any worse than that,” she said. “But I was wrong. How can I watch you leave again now? I can’t live through another goodbye…”
“Neither can I, babygirl,” I shot back, crushing her to me. “No fucking goodbyes. Not for us, not ever again.” I ran my hands over her, slipping her shirt down, baring her skin to me. “I won’t ever say that word again… and neither will you.” I curved my hands around her perfect, taut breasts and felt my cock stiffening.
“Nothing can ever pull us apart, Em. Years apart never did. We’re together as long as you love me. And god knows… I love you.”
And suddenly there wasn’t any more patience left in either one of us. I held her, drowning in her sweet softness. I ran my hands through her hair and roughly down her to her hips; the air crackled around us. “Christ, sweetheart… I wanted us to take our time…”
“We have time, Jason. We’ll have time,” she panted, lifting her hips as I raked her jeans down her thighs. “But right now I just need you inside me.” She unzipped my jeans and tore at the buttons on my shirt. “I can’t wait any longer… please, Jason… while I can still have you…”
I stripped her first, then removed the last of my own clothes. It was broad daylight and the light streamed in through the window, lighting her to a brilliant copper. Her skin was pale perfection. She was breathtaking.
“Promise me, Ember,” I said, wrapping my arms around her, feeling the heat of her skin burn deep down inside me.
“Promise what?”
“That you’ll be here when I come home, babygirl,” I said. “No more disappearing… no more living without you, without this.”
I covered her body with mine, spreading her sweet thighs with mine. I found her wet, hot center with a single thrust and drove myself in to the hilt. The moan that escaped her hit me like a flashfire; out of control and raging with a will of its own. I drove deep, over and over again, finding her mouth with mine and capturing it. Her nails raked my skin, leaving a burning path down my shoulders, down my back. She met me thrust for thrust, rolling her hips forward so I could penetrate her even deeper. Her breasts were swollen, her nipples hard against my chest. She was soaking the sheets underneath us, and it was all I could do to hold back the hot flood of my own.
I took the curve of her ass in my hands and drove in one last time, possessing every inch of space between us and held her there. I pushed further, stretching her beyond her limits and looked into her eyes, captured by the love and need I saw in them.
“Answer me, Ember,” I demanded, holding still, holding back what she needed most. “Tell me now…”
Her mouth was open… her lips full and dark. I could see the moist, pink flesh of her tongue and knew I was hopelessly lost…
“Yes…” she gasped out, digging in with her nails, her teeth. She raised her legs higher and I caught her knees and pressed them into her shoulders. Her pussy tightened like a vise around my shaft and I felt the first hot burst of seed swelling at its base, waiting to spill…
“I promise.”
It was late in the day, judging from the angle of the light. She stirred beside me and I stroked her hip, her flat little belly. She nestled herself in my arms, and tucked her ass warmly into me. I rested my head in the curve of her shoulder against her hair. It was the first time in hours I could touch her without lighting the flames of need all over again. For the moment at least, we were sated, spent.
“I remember the first night we ever spent in this bed,” I said, letting my lips touch her ear, “like it was yesterday.”
She turned on her back and smiled. “I was clumsy and so inexperienced, even at eighteen…” I watched a rose-colored blush rise up from her breasts to her cheeks.
“You were the loveliest thing I’d ever seen,” I admonished, leaning in to drop a kiss on her nose. “I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw you again. When I left, you were just Randy’s kid sister. One long summer later, and you’d turned into the most beautiful woman in the entire world.”
I watched as she squirmed underneath me and looked away, suddenly shy. “I have a confession to make,” she said in a tone that made my whole body quicken. “Something I never told you…”
“Then tell me now,” I said smiling, enjoying this. I put one big warm hand on her belly and felt her suck in a breath.
“I… I…” her eyes flicked away, then back to mine. “I had such an enormous crush on you… Back when you barely knew I existed,” she breathed out in a rush. “I used to lay in this bed and dream you were here with me…”
“Well, it’s a goddamn good thing I never did know,” I answered, feeling a rush of embarrassment and excitement. “Wouldn’t have said much for my judgment if I’d ever realized…”
She laughed and pulled me close. “No… no. Much to my frustration, you were completely oblivious…”
“Until I came home and found a fully-grown woman waiting,” I said, stroking her flank, and the soft curve of her hip. “I wasn’t sure how your family would feel about us.”
“Even Mom, with all her doubts… she could see we belonged together,” she said. “And I don’t guess we left any doubts in my brother’s mind this morning…” She reddened all over again, deeper this time and laughed. “He and Rye have been gone for hours… I guess he didn’t want to risk a repeat performance of this morning.”
“Hmmm… I don’t think I’d mind one of those…” I said, letting my tongue find her nipple, my cock rising hot and hard along her thigh. So much for spent. “Three years have only made you even more beautiful, Em. Both inside and out.” I ran a finger down her cheek to the point of her chin.
“I know that I was your first, babygirl. And I treasure that gift more than I can even express to you.” I kissed her deeply, slowly, letting myself experience her completely. “I just need you to know that you were my last, Em. You’re so strong, so brave, so passionate in the way you live your life.” I looked into her dark glistening eyes. “There hasn’t been anyone else… I couldn’t even imagine it, after you…”
The wet brilliance of her eyes spilled onto her cheeks and soaked the pillow under her head. “Me too,” she whispered. “Me too.
“There’s never been anyone else for me, Jason. There never could be…”
I shifted my body over hers, shielding her from the fading daylight and the knowledge that I’d be leaving before the sun rose again. And if, at some point, the room ever grew cold on that long winter night,
We never knew.
15
Ember
It was the tiniest stream of first light that woke me. Jason was already up, moving quietly around the room.
“I was going to let you sleep a little longer,” he said, coming over to sit on the edge of the bed. I sat up, aware only of him and the sweet, tender bruising of my body. We’d been awake most of the night… coming together over and over. He’d been fiercely demanding… I’d been utterly savage… By the small hours, we’d been patient and tender and loving…
And all of it had led us to this moment. I’d tried to push it further and further out of my thoughts all night, using passion to blind myself to the truth… to ignore the fact that every kiss, every touch had brought us closer… to now.
“Randy took Rye home with him last night so he could be with Connie and the kids,” he said, and the timbre of his voice ran through my body… awakening every tiny cell. “But he’s downstairs now… waiting for me…”
I climbed out of bed to press my naked body against his. His clothes felt rough… out of place like a barrier between us. Daddy’s old clock was on the mantle… ticking…
But Jason wrapped his arms around me and kissed me like we had forever. “When you’re with me, I feel like I’m strong enough to do this, to let you go…” I said against his lips. I felt them curve in a smile. “But I don’t know how to get through the rest of the day… after last night,” I said. My own voice was rough, unfamiliar. “I don’t know how the hell to climb back into this bed without you tonight…”
He took my face in his hands and smiled, so close and so far away all at once. “Everything that matters is still right here, Em. You… and my whole heart…” He grinned. “Besides, I’ll be back in a few weeks at most. And then we’ll have a hundred nights just like last night.” He kissed me soundly again. “Rest up,” he said teasingly, “I’ll be expecting a proper welcome home…”
He took my hand and lifted it to his lips. “You remember what you promised…?”
“I do,” I answered. If there was any common sense left in me after last night, it was in ashes by now. “I’ll be here when you get home… You know damned well I will be.” I smiled back, determined to put on a brave face.
He picked me up and put me back in bed, letting his fingers trail my skin as he pulled the covers up. “This is the picture I want to take with me,” he said. “You… like this…”
He kissed me again and headed for the door. “Randy said Conn and the kids are driving up tonight. They should be here by dinnertime.” He grinned and my heart turned over like a lump in my chest. “He didn’t want them to be alone either.” I could hear the truck engine turning over outside and Reilly barking on the porch.
And I knew there wasn’t any avoiding it anymore. The moment had come…
“I love you.”
No goodbye, no dragging the moment out any longer than it took to say those three words. We said them at the exact same time and he was down the stairs before the smile on my face had a chance to fade. Every old fear had risen up again inside me and my heart was pounding away in my chest. But there was something about Jason… Something that made me willing to believe… and to take one more chance.
“I should have my head examined,” I muttered at the walls, holding my head in my hands. I’d tried to live my life without him but now… now I couldn’t push him away again, no matter what the cost. When I’d handed him back his ring and told him I couldn’t marry him, I’d been angry and reckless… and still too immature to realize the impact of that choice.
But I’d grown up a hell of a lot in the last three years… I knew I could never, ever leave him again… even if he was a firefighter for the rest of our lives.
I sat, alone in our bed, knowing I had to find a way to live with a lifetime of moments like this… and unspoken goodbyes.
“Well, you know men,” Connie said with a lopsided smile. We sat in front of the fire, warming our hands on our mugs.
It had been one of the longest days of my life… and one of the quietest… waiting for Connie and the kids to arrive. Reilly hadn’t been much in the way of company, preferring
to loll on the sofa, his big paws twitching as he dreamed. But he was as excited as I was to hear the pickup come down the driveway. He loved every kid he met, but Randy and Conn’s most of all. He was outside with them now, barking at April, who was keeping the ball away from her little brother, Joey.
“That’s kind of the problem, Conn,” I replied. “I’ve read all the great romances… hell, I’m trying to write one. But I don’t really know men… not the way most women my age do.”
She put her mug on the coffee table and leaned forward, head down… her hands on her knees, her elbows pointing out assertively. My sister-in-law never did shy away from an opportunity to give advice...
“So what if he was your first and only, Ember. In a way, I think that makes it even more romantic.” She put her hand over mine. “I know why you ended it with him, honey. I don’t blame you. And I don’t think he even blames you for it.” She sighed. “Everybody sings the praises of first responders; the police, the paramedics, the firefighters…
“But how many people really get what it means to make a man like that the center of your whole world? To love him, to live with him and have his babies… and then watch him walk straight into the face of god-knows-what kind of danger.” She shifted back and crossed her arms over her chest. “Maybe you don’t have a lot of experience with different men, honey. But you know Jason better than anybody. And he’s cut out of the same cloth Randy is… and your dad, too,” she smiled compassionately. “They’re men with a calling. And they don’t have any more choice in the matter than we do.” She looked out the window where her children were playing. “We don’t have any choice but to keep on loving them. But I swear to god, it takes more fucking bravery to be the one waiting at home. Some days I think I’d rather face a goddamned inferno myself, instead of the feeling I get inside when that phone rings…”
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