Slow Burn (Smoke Jumpers)

by Anne Marsh

She gave him a look that said evasions were off tonight’s menu. “Your birth parents,” she said.

  “Don’t count. They didn’t want me. I certainly didn’t want them.” He didn’t remember much of that first place, and he certainly wasn’t calling it home. It had never been that. He had flashes of ugly memories he didn’t like and didn’t want. A pantry tucked under the stairs where he hid when things got real bad. A shed in the yard with barely enough room for a small body between the top shelf and the roof. He’d been big for his age, and he hadn’t fit well, but he’d spent hours lying still there. Waiting for something to be over.

  “Rio and Jack and I met up.” He shrugged. “And it took. After a few months, we were family. We figured that if all those child-welfare workers wanted to reunify a family, they could damn well reunify ours.”

  “I’ll bet that was a hard sell.” Her mouth curved in a grin, and an answering smile spread across his own face. Carefully, he scooted her out of Mack’s way. Dancing wasn’t Mack’s strong point. He and his newest partner were working out an attempt at a tango that had nothing to do with country music and everything to do with too much beer.

  “Almost impossible. County would split us up and farm us out. In a matter of days, we’d have run away, and we’d be back together again. Eventually they got tired of it all and found Nonna, who was crazy enough to take us together.”

  “Nonna loves you.” The look on Faye’s face wasn’t what he expected. Envy? That thought made him uncomfortable. A little sad. Even if it was true. Especially if it was true.

  “Yeah.” He admitted it out loud. “Nonna’s better than I deserve. We were damn lucky to end up here with her. We all knew it.”

  Nonna had been a safe haven he hadn’t known he needed—or wanted. Sometimes, a person needed a pair of warm arms, and Nonna had always made sure he had that. So he’d make damned sure Strong was safe for her.

  “You belong here,” she said quietly, and he had to drop his head right next to her pretty mouth to hear her. “You all do. That’s a special thing, Evan.”

  “Yeah,” he said again, because he’d about used up his words for tonight. He definitely wasn’t winning any poetry prizes here. So maybe he had spent too many years looking, needing a place to fit in. Strong had been that place and maybe that explained why coming back had been so easy, like slipping into a familiar pair of shoes.

  He hadn’t recognized the feeling because he’d never come home before.

  Yet that’s what he’d been doing. All those trips back to Strong when he had leave, and then again during the year when Donovan Brothers could spare him. Jack hadn’t been back, but Evan had. He’d come back every holiday and two weeks in the fall, when the fires wound down and his time freed up.

  He’d driven past his childhood house in Sacramento only once. It had been run-down, with knee-high weeds in the front yard, no grass. Someone had put up a chain-link fence, and even from the street he could see signs of dogs. There hadn’t been dogs when he’d been there, but then, his parents hadn’t been able to take care of him, either. Tax records said they still held the title to the house, but he hadn’t gone any further than that. No way he was knocking on that door. Not now. After him, there had been one more kid. He hadn’t been ready to find out what had happened there. Every instinct he had was hollering for him to keep on driving, so he had.

  “It’s good to have a place like this.” Her fingers bunched the fabric of his T-shirt, then smoothed out the little wrinkles she’d made.

  Maybe she’d get tired of talking soon. None of his current thoughts painted him in a good light. Maybe they could discuss the weather instead of where he’d come from. Too bad she lobbed the conversational ball right back at him.

  “I like Strong,” she added.

  “Maybe you’ll stay,” he said, the idea taking root. Making Strong his permanent home, too. It suddenly seemed right. This was a good place. A real solid place, with doors that stayed open. “You ever think about staying here for more than two weeks?”

  Fuck. Where had that come from? The words had flown out of his mouth, and they were all wrong. She stiffened right up in his arms until the foot of space between them could have been Siberia. He didn’t know why he’d said that—or what he’d wanted her to say.

  “I just came here on an assignment, Evan,” she said lightly. “I certainly can’t stay forever.”

  “Why not?” He exhaled roughly. “Why can’t you stay here, if that’s what you decide you want?”

  The music slowed, the cowboy crooning out the final refrain as the song wound down.

  “I just can’t.” Her eyes slid away from his.

  “Okay,” he said, because he needed to back off fast before she ran. If he kept this up, she’d be planting herself in the Corvette before the night was over. “You should think about it some, though, Faye. Maybe Strong’s the right place for you, too.”

  “I don’t think it can be.” Was that a wistful look he saw in those brown eyes? He and his brothers had been determined they wouldn’t stay put. Even now, Jack had itchy feet and needed to move. Evan had gone with him when Jack tore out of Strong ten years ago. They were family first and foremost, and Jack had needed him. It was that simple. Jack was square now, though. He had Lily, and he’d made his peace with Strong. Nonna looked like she might be thinking of taking on Ben—and Rio was busy being Rio.

  So maybe, if Faye needed him now, he’d take care of her.

  He liked that idea a whole lot.

  Damned if he didn’t. It was too soon to jump on this, though, so he settled for pulling her closer. That would have to be enough until he had the future figured out. Until he came up with a plan. “We’ll have ourselves one more dance, Faye, and then I’ll take you home.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Walking Faye back to the firehouse, Evan was fresh out of conversation. He’d given all he had, so now she got silence. Fortunately, she didn’t seem to mind much. She walked along beside him and kept real quiet herself. Could be she was drinking it all in, because the night was a pretty one, full of stars up there in the inky black. Or perhaps she’d gotten enough of an earful back at Ma’s and didn’t feel the need to fill up the silence anymore. That was fine with him. Sometimes no words were okay.

  The firehouse was lit up, waiting for her. The big side porch was bathed in light, with more wattage than a stadium. If he stood there with Faye for too long, he might as well go take care of his business on Nonna’s porch. No way Nonna hadn’t been watching for the two of them to come walking back from Ma’s, even if right now she was making a big show of that paint job she and Ben were doing on her chairs. No, his Nonna was as curious as anyone else living in Strong, and her cheerful wave and call would be just the tip of the social iceberg unless he got inside stat. Faye must have recognized that, too, because she returned Nonna’s wave before she ran up the steps as if her ass was on fire, then paused, fumbling for the key in her bag.

  “May I come in?” He curled his fingers around her wrist, rubbing the soft skin there.

  “Nightcap? I think I’ve got half a pot of coffee left. From this morning.” She wasn’t looking in her bag now. No, she was looking right at him. Asking all sorts of silent questions with her eyes.

  “Coffee’s great.” He took the bag from her, found the key, and got the door open. Any minute now, Faye was going to start talking again. He wanted to be alone and inside before that happened.

  “Or not,” he added, handing the bag back to her. The feminine scrap of pink and beads defied the laws of physics. Faye had crammed enough stuff in there to stock a small store. It was no wonder she couldn’t find the key. “I’m not after coffee.”

  “What are you after, Evan?” She moved in front of him, and he followed her, content to watch her ass moving beneath the filmy material of that skirt.

  “You, of course.” His comment must have surprised her, because her breathing gave a little hitch. He liked that. She was aware of him every bit as much as he was aware of
her. Watching her dance, all alive, laughing and teasing, had been almost as good as holding her. He didn’t know what made her different from other women, but she was, and he loved that about her.

  Love?

  No. He wanted her. That was all, wasn’t it? He’d asked to come in. He’d made that first move. When they hit the bunkroom, though, they both paused. She’d done a little redecorating since he’d been up there last, and it looked good. Almost homey. She’d put stuff on the bed. Pillows and a crazy-colored quilt. In short order she’d made the empty bunkroom hers, just like she’d moved right into his heart and made that run-down place her own.

  Hell.

  He stepped toward her. He would put the question out there. See what she had to say. “May I stay?”

  She eyed the bed doubtfully, and, yeah, he had some doubts of his own. The firehouse’s bunks weren’t made for two. Hell, they barely held one with his kind of build. He’d been a lot younger and smaller the last time he’d slept there. Scooping her up and putting her into his truck was a better plan. He could have them both out at his cabin in under five minutes. He wanted her there, too. He could picture her in his bed, her honeyed hair spread out on his pillow.

  “You think we’ll both fit?”

  “Only one way to find out, unless you want to try that coffee instead.” He figured he won either way. Worst-case scenario, she could sleep on top of him.

  She took a step toward him, sliding her hands up his arms, over his shoulders. “Can I tell you a secret, Evan?”

  “Whatever you want, darlin’.”

  She put her mouth right next to his ear, and damned if her tongue didn’t trace a sensual path around the sensitive lobe. “I make really, really bad coffee.”

  Their laughter broke the awkwardness, and then he killed the lights. Nonna was going to know damn well what he was up to, but he wasn’t a boy anymore. He and Faye, well, they were both adults, and no one was getting hurt.

  Getting into that bunk meant more playful laughter and a tight squeeze. He got his boots off first, because even he knew you didn’t lie down with a woman with your boots on. Not unless you were asked to. Rio had tried explaining some complicated Captain Jack fantasy to him once, but Rio played in a league of his own, and he loved his games. Evan? He liked things simple. And there was nothing better or more crystal-clear-simple than Faye in the shadows of the bunkroom. That was pure beauty.

  She giggled again when he got an arm caught underneath her and eased them both down onto the mattress. She was ticklish, and now he knew one more thing about her. That could be fun next time he got her clothes off. Right now, though, he just wanted to lie there next to her and enjoy.

  Her laughter was good, a husky, no-holds-barred snort that had her hand flying up to cover her mouth, as if she wanted to take back the sound, when all he wanted was to tell her how much he loved that laugh of hers. That sound was one hundred percent happiness and all Faye. No one else laughed like she did, and that was one more thing to love. As if he needed more reasons for feeling something that wasn’t reasonable to begin with. It was one hell of an emotional bombshell he’d dropped on himself. Just a few days and he was in love with her. Talk about rushing in. He wasn’t sharing that little revelation with her, though. Not yet.

  “You really love being here,” she said in the darkness.

  That hit his panic button, his stomach dropping as if he’d gone out of the DC-3 and then remembered his parachute was still back in the jump bay. He sucked in a breath and sorted his head out. She meant Strong. She wasn’t talking about her bed or his heart. Which was good. He wasn’t ready to talk about what he might feel for her. Not out loud. He needed to figure out what to say and how to say it. Strong, on the other hand, was kind of an open secret after their dance-floor conversation. Yeah, he loved this town, and he’d made that clear enough.

  “I do.” He shifted his arm underneath her, and she rolled straight into him.

  “You want to play sleepover, I plan on getting comfortable,” she warned. Her fingers got busy on the buttons of her skirt, undoing things with teasing clicks and moving fabric. The bed dipped, and her shimmying had him gritting his teeth and thinking he was anything but comfortable, because his dick was all wake-up-and-play, harder than hard, and then that skirt of hers disappeared over his shoulder. That left her with the tank top and a pair of tiny panties that weren’t doing his good intentions any favors, either.

  “So why’d you leave?” She was back to talking, but her voice was finally sleepy. She kind of sank into him, her feet rubbing against his legs until she got herself comfortable. She was entitled. It was her damn bed, and he was only here because she’d let him in. He inhaled, and her hair smelled like fruity shampoo and Faye. A sweet, clean scent that had him sniffing like some kind of pervert.

  “Jack needed to get out, and I wanted to make sure he had someone to watch his back, because sometimes life sends a shit-storm into a good man’s way. Sometimes it doesn’t.” He pressed his face against her hair.

  “And you knew he’d be okay with you there.” Jack and Faye were alike in some ways, only Jack had been running from Lily and a happily-ever-after in Strong, and Faye was just running, trying to find out what she really wanted.

  “Tell me about Mike.” He’d opened up on the dance floor, so that made this her turn.

  “Are you asking because I made you talk to me on the dance floor?” There was suspicion in her voice, along with a strong note of sleepiness. She’d be out like a light if he didn’t keep her talking. Palming the back of her neck, he rubbed gently.

  “I want to hear what you’ve got to say.” He did, too. Even more, he wanted her to tell him. He had a feeling she hadn’t shared much with anyone about her failed marriage. Instead, she’d hopped into her car—her very new, very expensive, fuck-you of a car—and driven up here. To a place she’d never been before. Yeah. He could do that math.

  “Everyone thought we’d get back together. I thought that, too, for a while. I spent weeks waking up each morning, wondering if Mike would call that day and our second chance would start.”

  “He didn’t call.”

  “I didn’t call him, either. There were two of us in that marriage. The funny thing was, I was waiting for him, and yet I was relieved when he didn’t come. I was glad it was over. I didn’t have to try so hard to make the marriage work anymore. I was done. All those years of trying, and I was glad to be done with it all.” She paused. “We weren’t fighting. It wasn’t that.”

  He rubbed her back gently. “What happened?”

  “I found him with another woman.” She stated the ugly truth matter-of-factly, and he wondered precisely how she’d reacted when she’d found her husband wrapped around someone else. “Just friends, he said, who went a little too far one night. A gal from the station. It wouldn’t happen again.”

  “I see,” he said. He wanted to kill Mike. “But that’s his story. What did you do? How did you feel?”

  She was silent for a moment, but he knew she wasn’t asleep or dodging. She was looking for words. “Nothing, and that was the problem. Somehow, nothing happened, and I couldn’t bring myself to care. We sort of drifted apart, and there was nothing left. We lived in the same house, shared a checking account and utility bills, but that was it. He spent more and more time down at the firehouse and yet he couldn’t even tell me about what happened there. The firefighters had this code of silence thing. Whatever happened down there, the good days, the bad, the inside jokes and everything that had gone right or wrong on a particular job . . . that wasn’t my business. It was his and theirs. It was all about his boys. The rides out on the truck and what the fire had done. Then we stopped talking at all because there was so much not to talk about. One morning, I woke up and looked around and asked myself if this was what I wanted for the next ten, twenty years, thirty. And I didn’t.”

  “You filed for divorce.”

  “When he made lieutenant and couldn’t even be bothered to call to tell me.”
Her voice was fierce. “Then, for no reason, I waited for him to realize that we’d made a mistake. I waited for him to come back home anyway and tell me he wanted to try.”

  He didn’t like that mental picture of her waiting. He wanted to tell her that it didn’t matter, that she was worth ten of Mike Thomas, but that truth wasn’t going to make up for how she’d felt. He respected her for being honest. Right or wrong, her breakup had hurt her. “He didn’t come back.”

  “No.” She laughed and smoothed out the edge of the sheet. This set had one of those decorative bands of curlicue embroidery to tell you which end was up. Real feminine sheets for a firehouse of big, tough men, so he was betting the cotton was a Walmart special. “So you know what I did then, Evan? I cashed out my 401K, and I bought that Corvette. Sure, part of it was a fuck-you to Mike. He’d always lusted after a Corvette. But I had, too. And I decided I was done with waiting for life to happen to me. I may end up living in that car when I’m seventy and looking to retire—so it’s good it’s a damn nice car.”

  “Do you love him?”

  “Of course I did.”

  “No.” His hand stroked over her back. “Do you love him, Faye?”

  “Some part of me always will.” Her sigh was a tired little puff of air. He wished he knew what to say to her. But he didn’t, so he held on to her and waited for her to finish saying what she needed to get out. “And that’s okay. It is. Because I have moved on. Our divorce was no one’s fault and both our faults. Fundamentally, though, we weren’t right for each other. We were—are—better off apart.”

  His rumble of amusement filled up the silence. “And you got the car.”

  “Yeah.” She laughed and rolled over, ending up face to chest with him in the darkness. “Yeah, I got the car.”

  There sure wasn’t much room in the bed. Barely enough for the two of them to lie there, side by side, facing each other. It was late, and she was tired. She needed to sleep, and this was crazy, like they were two teenagers sneaking into bed together.