by A. L. Cook
“I’ll let them know,” Cameron told her cautiously, watching her carefully as she began constructing a burger. “Erin,” he began tentatively, “are you okay?”
The care and worry in his tone was too much. She did him the courtesy of meeting his eyes and was grateful she couldn’t see what she looked like when flinched at her expression.
“I have to go,” she told him. “I’m sorry.” She shoved back from the table and rushed out, waving a quick hand to Rufus as he passed her in the hallway.
“What did you do?” she heard him demand of Cam, but she was moving too fast to hear his response.
The near-run home passed in a blur. By the time she had unlocked her door with a hand that trembled too much, Erin could barely breathe. Once inside she slammed the door, threw her keys in the vicinity of the bench and slid to the floor with her back against the wall, her mind going blank. She focussed on her breathing until she felt secure enough to stand, and as she did, someone knocked on the door.
Erin was prepared to ignore it, until she heard Maggie call her name from the other side. She stood and took a moment to collect herself, smoothing her hair back from her face with hands that still held a fine tremor, and hoped she didn’t look as horrendous as she felt.
“Hey Mags,” she said as she swung open the door, deciding not to even try for a smile. “What’s up?”
“Erin, what happened?” Maggie asked, worry deepening the lines on her face as she stepped closer to Erin and drew her into a tight, comforting hug. “Cameron called me and said you weren’t well, and I have to say, girl, you don’t look great.”
“He’s a firefighter, Maggie,” Erin gasped into the other woman’s shoulder, the shock and emotion finally getting the best of her as massive sobs wracked her body. “It’s just too much, and I know I should be over it by now, but…”
“You hold on one second,” Maggie told her sternly, closing the door behind herself and leading Erin to the couch. She made sure the younger woman was seated with a box of tissues before darting into the kitchen for a bottle of water and returning to press it into Erin’s hand. “Now,” she said. “Take a deep breath, and tell me what’s the matter.”
Wiping her eyes, Erin nodded. “When I was twenty-two, I was out one night with some girlfriends. It was my shout, and I was at the bar waiting to be served when the guy beside me was knocked into, and he spilled his drink all over me.” Erin smiled shakily at the memory. “He was so embarrassed,” she recalled. “Couldn’t stop apologising, even as he grabbed a handful of napkins and starting patting my chest trying to mop it all up.”
She could still remember it so clearly. His whisky-brown eyes were wide and mortified, even more so once he realised he was all but groping an utter stranger in a bar.
Erin had laughed and held out her hand.
“I normally introduce myself before I go to second base,” she grinned. “I’m Erin.”
“I’m Daniel,” he of the doe eyes had responded, engulfing her hand in a warm, firm grip. “And I’m going to go crawl into a hole, now.”
“Why?” Erin asked, not letting go of his hand. “It was an accident. But if you want to apologise, you could buy me a drink?”
Daniel had smiled shyly. “I’m not sure that’s such a good idea,” he told her, eyes intent on her face.
“And why’s that?” Erin asked, making sure to flash her dimples again as she flirted with him.
“Because that last one was for you and you ended up wearing it. Who knows what will happen if I buy you another.”
“You bought me a drink?” she smiled.
“I did,” Daniel told her forlornly. “I’ve been with my firehouse buddies trying to work up the nerve to talk to you all night, but you seemed like you were having a good time with your friends, and I didn’t want to interrupt.”
Erin was smitten. “Why don’t you come join us?” she asked. “Your buddies too- did you say you were firefighters?”
And that had been it, really. They had started dating that night, were together for a year before Daniel proposed, and married a year after that.
“Then,” Erin told Maggie, “six weeks before our first wedding anniversary, Daniel and his team responded to a call out to a fire in an abandoned house. There had been a police report earlier in the week of teenagers squatting in the basement of the building, so Daniel and another fighter, Raoul, went in looking for them. The staircase collapsed beneath them, and they died.”
“Oh Erin,” Maggie breathed. “Honey, I am so sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Erin told her, managing a tiny smile as she shredded a tissue in her hands. “That was four years ago, but I couldn’t stay in California after that. I sold the house, sold most of our things and travelled around. This is the longest I’ve stayed anywhere.”
“I’m glad you found your way here,” Maggie told her. “And that you’ve told me this. Trust me when I say it’s not something that should be bottled up inside. But honey, what happened at the station?”
Erin bit her lip. “Have you ever met someone and just felt that pull, that attraction right away?” At Maggie’s nod, Erin shrugged. “I know I only met him this morning,” she said, “but I felt that with Cameron. And this morning when you and he were talking, I was under the impression that he worked with the mountain rescue team. But when I went to take him lunch at work-“
“You realised he was a firefighter,” Maggie suddenly understood.
“And I can’t do that again, Mags,” Erin told her, insistent. “The risk, having to get that knock on the door, watching the news knowing that that massive fire might be the one that takes him away from me? I swore I wouldn’t do that again.”
Maggie was silent for a long time, her eyes empathetic, but not pitying. “I’m sorry you got such a shock,” she said slowly. “If I had known, I would have told you right away. But Erin,” she said, reaching over and resting a gentle hand covered in decades of scars and burns on Erin’s own, “there are no certainties in life. You could walk out and get hit by a car tomorrow. Your Daniel could have survived that fire to get cancer the next week. You never know what life will bring, so you should take it with both hands and live it as passionately and fully as you can.”
“There may be no certainties,” Erin agreed, “but there are acceptable risks, and this isn’t one of them.”
*
Despite the fact that Maggie had called him back and let him know that Erin was okay, Really, Cam, she’ll be fine, he had to see for himself. Maggie had also warned him that he needed to take a step back for a little while, and let Erin have some breathing room, but he was too concerned to wait.
As he knocked on the back door of the bakery, having been told by Maggie that that’s where Erin would most likely be, Cam stuck his hands in the pockets of his woollen coat to guard against the chill, and was thankful that he’d gone home to shower and change before coming over.
The door opened and Cameron’s breath caught in his throat. She was so gorgeous. Her red-gold hair tumbled in loose waves down her back and over one shoulder. She was silhouetted from behind by a soft light and dressed in a pair of slim-fitting dark pants and an oversized bottle green knit sweater with the sleeves shoved up to her elbows.
“I’m sorry,” he blurted out, feeling awkward with her for the first time.
“For what?” she asked gently, her expression questioning.
“I know I should give you time,” Cam told her, bothered by the shadows in her eyes. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”
One corner of her mouth quirked up, the shadow of a dimple forming briefly. “Why didn’t you call?” she asked.
Cameron smiled cautiously. “You still haven’t given me your number,” he told her.
“Oh.” She stared at him for a long moment before stepping to one side and gesturing him in. “Come in out of the cold.”
Stepping gratefully into the relative warmth of the kitchen, Cameron removed his scarf and beanie as he drifted over to the
bench where a small lamp glowed. There was a rack with several formed sugar flowers hanging from it, and the makings of several more in various stages of assembly. He inspected the implements she had laid out to be used, and took in the bottles of colour, tubs of coloured sugarpaste, what looked like a stocking filled with flour, several small, sharp knives, foam squares, and florist wire, amongst others.
He straightened and turned, only to find her standing with her back to a large stainless steel fridge, watching him.
“I owe you an explanation,” she told him.
“You really don’t,” Cam disagreed. She looked so troubled, so worried and sad that he wanted nothing more than to take her into his arms and kiss her over and over until she forgot whatever was making her so sad. “So long as it’s not something I did, your business is your own. I’m here if you ever need to talk, but you don’t owe me anything.”
She continued to watch him closely, before she heaved a huge sigh and some of tension seemed to fall from her. “I’m sorry for worrying you,” she told him.
Cam shrugged. “You’re okay now?” At her nod, he smiled. “Then it’s all okay.”
Her watchful eyes were trained squarely on his. Cam’s awareness of her built, along with the tension between them. It was a tangible thing, their mutual attraction, but Cam was determined to wait, to allow Erin to make a decision she was comfortable with. Something had shifted between them, but the sexual awareness they had of each other, the attraction, had only increased.
“Maggie tells me you have a bit of a reputation,” Erin commented, her tone casual but her eyes intent.
Slapping a cocky grin on his face to hide his confusion, Cam eyed her. “I refuse to say anything that may incriminate me,” he told her.
“I have a proposal, with your reputation in mind,” she told him seriously.
Well, that was certainly unexpected. “A proposal?” Cam asked.
“Yes,” Erin nodded. “A mutually beneficial one.”
“And what would this mutual benefit entail?” The tension in the kitchen ratcheted up a notch.
“It’s physical in nature,” Erin told him delicately.
Cam’s low level of arousal began to shoot up. “I’m pretty open,” he told her. “Physically speaking. Shoot.”
Erin took a deep breath, held it, and let it out silently. “I don’t want a relationship,” she told him. “I’m not really in a place in my life where one has any chance of survival.”
It was only because he was watching so closely that Cameron saw the sadness and grief that had covered her entire face at the station that afternoon flit across her face now.
“But us together, the way it was earlier today,” she told him, seemingly a little breathless, “that’s something I do need. And it’s definitely something I want.”
“So, what are you proposing?” Cam asked. “Friends with benefits?”
Erin nodded. “Pretty much. The second you want to date or sleep with someone else, though, you tell me, and we’re done. No hard feelings and no questions asked.”
Cameron felt a surge of lust arrow through him at her words. He wanted her. There was no denying that. But there was a growing part of him clamouring for attention that was telling him that he wanted more. He wanted to settle down with someone, and he was beginning to think that someone could be Erin.
“And if it turns into something more than just physical?” he asked carefully.
“It won’t.” Her tone wasn’t cold, but it was certainly firm and final.
He suspected it was already too late for him, as far as ‘more than physical’ was concerned, but he was a patient man, and had never been known to step back and not go after what he wanted.
“I accept your proposal,” he told her.
“I’m serious, Cameron,” Erin bit out. “I’ve got far too much baggage for someone like you, and I don’t want a relationship. For so many reasons.”
Someone like him? That stung a bit. But he nodded anyway, and tucked it away to mull over later. “Okay,” he told her. “Okay. But if you start thinking about getting more serious, you need to let me know right away.”
He could tell she barely managed to refrain from rolling her eyes. “Deal,” she told him. Then she smiled at him, a slow, sexy smile that brought her dimples out made her eyes glitter. “Feel like sealing that deal with a kiss?”
And just like that, she sent his latent desire burning through him like wildfire. As he crossed the kitchen to take her in his arms, she met him halfway, sealing her mouth against his as she wound her arms around his neck.
“Wait!” Cam exclaimed, tearing away. “We can’t have sex in Maggie’s kitchen. She’ll know!”
Erin stared at him, then nodded. “You’re right,” she agreed. “She absolutely will.” She turned and raced over to the bench she’d been working at, tossing all the balls of sugarpaste into an airtight container before grabbing his hand and leading him out and up the stairs to her apartment.
In a similar manner to their lunchtime tryst, once inside her apartment they shed their clothes in a rush to get to the bedroom, barely able to keep their lips and hands off each other long enough to strip down.
Cam pressed Erin up against the wall next to her bedroom door, bracketing her body with his and ravishing her mouth. She gave as good as she got, one arm around his neck and the other clutching convulsively at his hip, trying to get closer than their nakedness was already allowing.
In a totally dirty move, she dragged her nails lightly over his lower abs, and took advantage of his involuntary ticklish curl to shove him off her and push him into her bedroom.
“We can get to the foreplay later,” she told him, moving around to the bedside table and looking in the top drawer for a condom. Cam took advantage of her distraction to step up behind her and press himself against her, the hard length of him coming to rest perfectly between the cheeks of her ass.
She froze for a second before straightening, reaching over her own head to link her fingers behind his and arching her back so her ass pressed more firmly against him and her breasts were thrust forward.
“Touch me, Cameron,” she commanded, and he was more than happy to oblige. He slid his hands up and over her ribs to cup her breasts, thumbs teasing over the nipples before gently rolling them between his fingers and tugging so carefully Erin nearly went mad. She wriggled back against his groin, gratified to feel his erection pulse.
Cameron was losing control faster than he ever had before. Who was this woman that she could turn him on so totally in a heartbeat? The scent of her enveloped him and he pressed hot kisses against the column of her throat as he ran his hands down over her breasts and back up, pausing only to tug gently at her nipples. The little sighs she was making and the increasingly frantic movements her ass was making against his dick proved he was onto the right track, but nothing was more obvious than Erin reaching up to grab his right hand and slide it down her ribs, over her belly and straight down between her legs.
His left hand still caressing her breast, Cam allowed the index and middle fingers of his right to collect some of the bountiful wetness at the core of her and slide back up to gently circle over her clitoris in a maddeningly slow rhythm until her sighs turned into little whimpers and she was panting for breath.
“I want you inside me when I come,” she told him brokenly, even as he slipped three fingers inside her, nudging her butt forward with his hips so she could grind against the heel of his hand. “Cam, god dammit,” she growled, a noise that went straight to his cock.
“On your knees on the bed, and grab the headboard,” he snarled into her ear, his self control barely hanging on by a thread. It took two tries to sheathe himself, and when he turned back to the bed his mouth went dry and he became harder than he’d ever been in his life.
Erin had done exactly as instructed, but she had canted her ass up and had one hand working lazily between her legs as she waited for him. Cameron couldn’t help himself and leaned forward to sink hi
s teeth into her ass cheek. It was firm enough she could feel it, and if the sudden speed of her fingers over her clit were any indication, she liked it. He pressed a sucking kiss to the bite, soothing it with his tongue, before he shifted and positioned himself behind her, hooking his left arm under her left shoulder and pulling her back against his chest as he slid home, seating himself deep within her in one sharp thrust and tearing a cry from her.
There was no finesse to his technique, and his fingers resumed their rhythmic tease between her folds in an attempt to bring her to climax before he finished. Erin began muttering under her breath, and as he felt her clench around him with her impending orgasm, he managed a short laugh at the litany of expletives falling from her lips.
Then suddenly she stiffened and clutched convulsively at his arm hooked up between her breasts as she came, a long, low groan pushing from her throat that rose in pitch until she sounded on the verge of a quiet scream. And as her orgasm finished she threw herself forward and began shoving back to meet Cameron’s thrusts, the angle causing him to thrust even deeper and forcing his own orgasm down on him before he even knew it was there. His hands grabbed her hips so tightly he was sure he was leaving bruises, but the pulse of his cock within her was all-consuming, and he felt entirely paralysed.