Charming the Firefighter

by Beth Andrews

  It hadn’t worked. All she could see was Andrew’s expression when he’d realized what she and Leo had been doing. All she could hear was his voice, ugly and accusing.

  “Are you all right?” She refused to ask him where he’d been or why he’d been gone for so long, wasn’t going to get into a fight over his leaving the house when she specifically told him to stay. This wasn’t the time for any of that. What she needed to do now was to get her son to see her side, to reason with him.

  “I walked in on my mom and my football coach screwing,” he sneered. “What do you think?”

  A chill ran through her. “I think,” she said slowly and carefully, “you need to be careful of how to speak to me.”

  “Or what? You’ll sic Leo on me, let him beat the shit out of me?”

  “Leo would never hurt you.” Though he had become physical with her son, something she couldn’t forget. She cleared her throat. “Sit down. I want to talk to you.”

  “Not interested.” He opened the refrigerator door, stuck his head inside.

  “Andrew Mark, I told you to sit. Down. Now.”

  Her tone brooked no argument, but he was obviously still upset because he slammed the refrigerator door shut. “How could you? Was that why you left Dad? So you could hook up with other guys?”

  “Of course not!” How could he even think such a thing? “You know your dad and I were having problems—”

  “That’s just it. I didn’t. I thought things were fine. You guys never argued. You never fought. And then, bang, one day you tell me you’re splitting up, like it’s no big deal.”

  She fiddled with the centerpiece on the table. “Your father and I drifted apart. We didn’t fight, no, but we didn’t talk anymore, either. We didn’t laugh. We both deserved better than that.”

  Andrew’s hands fisted and he looked so much like a man, but also so much still like her little boy. “Are you going to marry Coach?”

  She jerked in surprise. “We’ve only been seeing each other a few weeks.”

  “That didn’t stop you from sleeping with him.”

  “No,” she said slowly. “But while I’ll be honest with you, I refuse to discuss my personal life in that detail. Suffice it to say, I care for Leo. What happened between us wasn’t wrong.” She truly believed that. What they’d shared was special and she wasn’t going to apologize for it. “But that doesn’t mean I want you to think you should be having sex.”

  He laughed harshly. “Right. Talk about a double standard.”

  “Maybe it is, but I’m going to give you my thoughts, anyway. Sex is a big responsibility and shouldn’t be taken lightly. You need to always respect the girls you take out.”

  “I’m not an animal. I know no means no.”

  “I’m glad to hear it. But if you do decide to have sex, you need to make sure you use protection, both for your own health and well-being and for hers.”

  He tipped his head back. “I’m in hell,” he muttered. “This day has been nothing but total hell and now I’m discussing my nonexistent sex life with my mother, which is only slightly worse than my knowing, for a fact now, that my mother’s sex life is very much existent.”

  She rolled her eyes. Honestly, sometimes dealing with her son frayed her last nerve. “I realize you know everything there is to know about sex and how to act like a gentleman, but I’m still your mother and it’s still my job to reiterate my beliefs and expectations of you. Now, I realize that once you leave my sight, once you walk out that door, you’re going to do what you want without any thought or care as to what I’d like you to do. But I can’t, in good conscience, not express my hopes for you and the values that are important to me.”

  “Yeah, whatever.” He opened the fridge again, grabbed a bottle of juice, shut the door and stomped up the stairs.

  Penelope slumped in her seat. That had gone...not quite as horribly as she’d expected. Not great, but not the worst conversation she’d had with her son.

  What that said about him—not to mention about her as a parent—she wasn’t sure she wanted to know.

  You need to put yourself first.

  Leo’s words echoed in her head. Put herself first. She was a mother. She had to put her child first. Had to focus on him. But a part of her, a small, resentful part, wished she didn’t have to. Wished she could focus on herself, on her own happiness, instead of trying, always trying, to make Andrew happy.

  Especially when it never seemed to work.

  * * *

  LEO WASN’T SURE what to expect Monday at football practice, but after the way things had ended with Penelope yesterday, and then a long shift at work, he was in no mood to put up with any bullshit.

  Too bad Drew seemed to have bullshit to spare.

  “Hustle up,” Leo called when Drew lagged behind getting to the team huddle. During the entire practice Drew had been sulky and sullen and a grade-A idiot. Leo didn’t know how Penelope put up with it. Wasn’t sure he would be able to much longer, and what did that say about any hope he had of continuing a relationship with her? He wasn’t the kid’s dad, wasn’t sure he wanted or was up to the responsibility of being part of a couple that included making sure a teenager reached adulthood as a compassionate, hardworking individual.

  “Let’s run Omaha,” Leo said of the next play he wanted them to practice. “Ready?”

  The boys lined up and Leo blew his whistle. The ball was snapped, the quarterback dropped back and sent a beauty of a pass to Drew.

  Who didn’t even try to catch it.

  “Drew, put some effort into it.” Leo blew his whistle again. “Let’s try it again, gentlemen.”

  They ran the play four more times. Four. More. Times. And each time Drew’s lack of effort was eclipsed only by the glower and sulky expression on his face.

  “Okay, let’s move on to something different,” Leo said.

  “Can we try a reverse?” Luke asked.

  “Sure. Knock yourselves out. Except you,” Leo told Drew when he tried to join the huddle. “You can hit the showers. Gakowski?” he called to the second string receiver. “You’re in for Freeman.”

  “What?” Drew asked, his face red. “Why?”

  “Because you obviously have better things to do than be here,” Leo said, keeping his cool. “You’re not even trying and you’re making it that much harder for everyone else, so hit the showers and we’ll see you tomorrow. If you can have a better attitude.”

  Leo walked away from him toward the rest of the team.

  “This is bullshit!”

  He sighed. Noted the wide-eyed expressions on the other kids’ faces at Drew’s outburst before he turned to the kid. “You think so?”

  Drew lifted his chin, his helmet in his hands. “Yeah. I do.”

  Leo nodded. “That’s your prerogative. Too bad it doesn’t matter what you think. What matters, here, on my football field, is what I think. You get me?” His words were all the more serious and dangerous for their quiet tone. “Now get out of my sight before I lose my temper.”

  But Drew, stubborn, defiant Drew, stepped closer, the physical threat in his body language clear. Leo raised his eyebrows and sent him a look that said, Boy, you wouldn’t be stupid enough to make the same mistake twice, would you?

  The kid backed down. Maybe he was smarter than he acted.

  “You’re just pissed at me because of yesterday,” Drew said with a sneer.

  Now it was Leo who closed the distance between them, lowered his voice and spoke directly into Drew’s ear. “Don’t go there.”

  “You run this team like a dictator,” Drew said as he backed up and raised his voice. “It doesn’t matter what we say or what we do. All that matters is what you say.”

  “You want to have your say?” Leo asked, still in that same quiet tone. “We’ll discuss this later. After practice.”

  He turned once again.

  “Later?” Drew called. “I want to discuss it now.”

  “Dude,” Luke said in a loud whisper. “Shu
t up.”

  “Go home,” Leo told him without even turning around.

  “Screw you!” Drew spat. “Oh, wait. That’s my mother’s job, isn’t it?”

  Everything went still and quiet. Leo didn’t so much as glance at the faces of the team or his assistant coaches, even knowing Pops was there and witnessing this didn’t matter. Furious, he stormed over to Drew, saw the flash of fear in the kid’s eyes, but got no satisfaction from it.

  “Leo.”

  Pops, saying his name, bringing him down from the ledge. Good thing or else he would have made a huge mistake and he couldn’t let this snot-nosed kid do that to him. “My office,” he told Drew. “Either you walk there on your own, or I drag you there by the scruff of your neck. You have two seconds to decide. One.”

  Drew snorted and crossed his arms as if it would take a bulldozer to move him.

  “Two.”

  Leo had barely gotten the word out when Drew started walking. Leo turned to the people watching, handed his whistle to Pops. “Could you run the practice until I get back?”

  Pops nodded. “Keep your head.”

  He would. He wouldn’t let Drew push him into doing something he’d later regret. He found the kid inside his office, standing as rigidly as a statue, his hair mussed, his pants dirty.

  Leo shut the door and went behind his desk. Sat down. “You have a problem with me? That’s fine. But you also have a responsibility to your teammates not to act like an idiot while on the field. I let you back on the team because you begged to be on and now I’m regretting that decision.”

  Drew just smirked.

  Leo leaned back. “You think you have a right to act that way?”

  “I’ve got a right to my feelings.”

  “Damn right you do. You can be pissed and unhappy, but that’s no excuse to have such a shitty attitude. Then again, that’s your thing, isn’t it? Giving your mother grief all the time, acting like an asshole. Yeah, you got a shitty deal when you were younger. It wasn’t fair you were so sick, and it’s not fair you could get sick again, but you can’t hide behind it forever.”

  Drew flushed angrily. “I’m not hiding from anything. And this has nothing to do with my being sick. I want to get past all that, but Mom won’t let me.”

  “Bullshit,” Leo said mildly. “You hide behind that illness, let Penelope take care of you like she always has, and then you act like a spoiled, selfish, resentful brat. You can’t have it both ways. You can’t take and take and take from someone and never give back. Look, there’s no shame in being afraid—”

  “I’m not afraid,” Drew said quickly. But his lower lip trembled.

  “But there is shame in using people and being selfish.”

  “What’s this, Coach?” he asked, saying the word coach the way most people say rat-fink bastard. “Playing daddy?”

  “I’m not your dad and don’t want to be,” he told him honestly. “But I was hoping we could, eventually, be friends. To tell you the truth, I’m not so sure that’s such a good idea now. I’m not so sure I want a friend like you.”

  Drew flinched, but the kid still had more resentment inside of him, because he stepped forward. “You’re nothing but a hypocrite. You tell me I’m using people, that I’m taking advantage of my mom? Right. What are you doing? I’m not the one using her. You are.”

  Anger simmered in Leo’s veins and he slowly got to his feet, kept his gaze on Drew’s, his voice low. “Your mom is a wonderful, bright, beautiful, caring woman. If you can’t see that, if you can’t appreciate her for the person she is and don’t understand why I enjoy being with her and appreciate her as well, then you’re an even bigger idiot than I thought.” Leo pressed his mouth together, knew what he had to do next even if he hated it. “Clean out your locker.”

  The kid’s head whipped up. “What?”

  “Your locker. Clean it out. Anything you don’t take will be thrown away at the end of practice.”

  “Why?” Drew cried, his face white.

  “You’re off the team.”

  The kid’s eyes about popped out of his head. “You can’t kick me off the team!”

  “Want to bet? I can do whatever I feel is necessary for the benefit of the team as a whole. And I think it’s better, for all of us, not to have you as a member. So pack up your stuff and go. And don’t even think about coming back.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  IT WASN’T FAIR.

  Anger zipped through Andrew’s body, making his blood hot, his heart beat too hard, too fast. He picked up his pace, his duffel bag bouncing against his back as he walked home. He was a block away from his house, hadn’t wanted to call his mom to get him, could barely even look at her after what he’d walked in on yesterday.

  Who the hell did Leo think he was, kicking him off the team? They needed him a hell of a lot more than he needed them, that was for sure. Asshole. And he wasn’t the only one. You’d think Andrew’s friends could have had his back, too, instead of standing there like sheep, blindly following orders.

  He walked around the rear of his house, dug his key from his pocket and inserted it into the lock.

  “Hey,” Gracie said breathlessly as she crossed the yard. As if she’d noticed he was home and had rushed over. She smiled. “Done with practice already?”

  “Yeah.” He didn’t usually hang out with Gracie in the afternoon, only at night when he snuck over to her room. Those visits were their little secret. He checked his phone. His mom wouldn’t be home for almost two hours and he really didn’t want to be alone. “You want to come in?”

  Her smile brightened. “Sure.”

  He let her in first, then shut the door and tossed his bag on the floor. Stuck his hands in his pockets only to take them out again. Hell. He was nervous. Which was dumb. It was just Gracie. And this wasn’t the first time he’d been alone with a girl in the house before. He and Estelle had hung out in his room for well over an hour. Almost as long as it had taken him to work up the nerve to kiss her.

  He’d kissed her and she’d brushed him off. But this time was different. Gracie already let him kiss her. Whenever he wanted. And she’d let him do other things, too, had let him put his hand under her shirt, touch her boobs through her bra. Yeah, this time was different. Maybe because he already knew Gracie liked him. Maybe because he was so edgy and amped up. He didn’t know.

  Didn’t care.

  “Want a drink or something?” he asked.

  “Sure. Whatever you have is fine.”

  “Except milk, right?” he asked.

  She looked at him as if he was some sort of genius for remembering she was a vegan. “Right.”

  He grabbed two bottles of juice. Would have given one to her so he could hold her hand but his palms were sweating. “Come on.”

  She followed him up the stairs to his room. He winced. For the first time, he wished he’d listened to his mom’s nagging about keeping it clean. He shoved clothes off his bed, then handed her a bottle. “I need to jump in the shower. You can watch TV or whatever.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  He grabbed clean shorts from his drawer and crossed to the bathroom, his palms still damp, his heart pounding. He liked seeing Gracie on his bed, her colorful clothes a bright contrast to his dark bedspread. He wanted to see her lying on it, he realized, but when he imagined it, he got hard.

  Shit.

  He took a cold shower, but as he did, he wondered if this wasn’t an opportunity in the making. He got out and dried off, and put on his shorts, but left his shirt off. Gracie liked him, he reminded himself. It was obvious in how happy she was every time she saw him. How she always seemed to be waiting for him to tap on her window.

  He just hoped she liked him enough.

  He went back into the room. Her eyes widened and her cheeks turned pink when she took in his bare chest. He’d worked hard to develop some muscle tone, and now had ridges and hard planes instead of a sunken chest and too-skinny arms.

  He sat next to her, drank deeply f
rom his bottle of juice, then set it down.

  And kissed her before he lost his nerve.

  She kissed him back, hesitantly at first, but then with more eagerness. He kissed her again and again until they were lying on his bed, side by side. He shoved her hair aside and kissed her neck, loving how soft her skin was. She tipped her head to the side and made a funny little sound, as if she liked what he was doing, her hands kneading his bare shoulders. Emboldened, he slid his hand under the hem of her shirt, skimmed his fingertips over the silky material of her bra, praying she couldn’t tell how badly he was shaking.

  She squirmed, started running her hands up and down his arms. It felt so good, having her touch him. Her letting him touch her. He reached behind her and unhooked her bra then cupped her breasts.

  She grabbed his wrists and tugged his hands away. “Andrew—”

  “It’s okay,” he whispered, his voice unsteady. He wanted, more than anything, to touch her there again. To brush aside the bra and maybe even kiss her there. Instead, he kissed her mouth, her chin. “I really like you, Gracie,” he told her, trailing his fingers over the skin of her stomach. It was so soft. So smooth. “I like you a lot.”

  She sighed, her body softened. “I like you, too, Andrew.”

  Good, that was good. He went back to kissing her until she relaxed again, then he moved his hand up, up some more until he tugged and she let him pull her shirt off. She was beautiful. Her hair a riot of curls, her skin so pale and creamy. Excitement battled with reason inside of him, but there was a girl on his bed wearing only her jeans and an undone bra, and she was kissing him, so excitement won out.

  They were both breathing hard, and she kept wiggling under him, but not like she wanted to get away from him. More like she really liked what he was doing, so he kept doing it. He gently rubbed his palms across the front of her bra and she made a sound in the back of her throat. It wasn’t enough, though. He wanted to touch her, more of her, skin to skin, wanted to kiss her, all over, wanted to see her naked.