…
He tried to pretend he wasn’t counting the hours since he’d left that note. But he was no good at that kind of lie. It had been thirteen hours and twenty-two minutes with no word from her. Granted, he’d managed a dreamless sleep for most of that time, and his body had needed it after fighting that fire wrung him dry. Ironic, that he always slept the best when he’d been battling a massive fire. Now, he and Smith were finishing up a talk at the local elementary school on fire safety.
“What are the three words you’re going to remember after today?” Smith asked the group of first graders, and Becker had to hand it to the guy. He could work a room like nobody’s business. He had the local six-year-olds eating out of the palms of his hands. Enrapt.
“Stop, drop, and roll,” the kids shouted in unison, and Smith gave them a rousing applause. “Now, who wants to see a fire truck?”
His friend led the group from the small classroom and to the truck stationed outside the elementary school. The kids happily scampered around the engine, with Becker and Smith showing them how everything worked, even plunking down plastic helmets on their heads if they wanted to pretend they were firemen too. Most of the boys did. That was normal; this was a job that a lot of kids said they wanted to grow up and do. But for the first time, there was a low voice in Becker’s head that wanted him to warn the kids to find another job.
Okay, so no one was signing up for duty at the ripe old age of six, but he almost wanted to tell them there’s a flip side to the job. That it can mean you’re man against the world. That it can mean you can’t have other things. Can’t want them. Shouldn’t want them.
“Fuck,” he muttered as he pushed a hand through his dark hair as soon as the demonstration was over, and the first graders had started to march back into their school. But a lone straggler overheard him and looked up.
Ah, hell.
“You okay, sir?” the little kid asked. The girl had sweet, wide eyes and rosy cheeks.
“Just fine. Just thinking about something. Why don’t you let me walk you back inside?”
The girl nodded, and then started chattering about the end of the school year, and how she was going to teach her family stop, drop, and roll. “I think everyone needs to know that. I’m glad you were here today, sir, as a community helper,” she said, repeating the words the teacher had used to introduce them.
“And I am glad to be here, too,” he said, smiling as he held open the door. The girl ran the rest of the way into the school, and Becker returned to the truck where Smith was waiting.
“Better watch your language in front of the kiddies,” Smith teased.
“Yeah, or they’ll figure out I’m an asshole, right?” he said.
Smith gave him a steady stare, turning serious. “What’s your deal, Beck? Never seen you so wound up before at one of these things. You usually keep your shit together. The warehouse get to you?”
“It’s nothing,” he muttered, staring out the window as Smith turned the key in the ignition. It had to be nothing. He’d opened his heart to her, and she hadn’t responded. She’d meant it then when she said being with him hurt too much. He’d hoped and wished that telling her how he felt, that laying his feelings on the line, would have sent her running back to his arms. But the issue had never been how they felt. The issue was whether she’d let herself feel for him. Her silence was her answer. She wouldn’t. Because of who he was.
“All righty. Well, that’s a whole lot of nothing that’s turning you into a whole lot of pissed off,” Smith said as they pulled away from the school to head back to the firehouse. He looked at Becker and screwed up his face in a pissy, annoyed imitation of what Becker must have looked like. “You’re all worked up about something, aren’t you?”
He scrubbed a hand over his jaw and shook his head. Not what he wanted to get into right now. He had to start pushing the thoughts of her far away, tucking them into that trunk in the back of his mind.
“Let me guess. I’m gonna use my crazy powers of deduction. But I’m willing to bet that my little lady’s best chickadee is the one who’s got you out of sorts.”
Becker turned to Smith and narrowed his eyes. “What?”
Smith nodded knowingly. “Ah, so I’m right?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Aww, that’s cute.”
“What’s cute?” Becker muttered.
“That you think that shit will work with me. Let me refresh your memory. Remember the night of the Spring Festival when I was all out of sorts about Jamie and I asked for your advice? You saw right through me, and you knew I was talking about her.”
“Yes,” Becker admitted grudgingly, remembering how he of all people had urged Smith to be direct with Jamie about how he felt.
“Besides, I’ve seen the two of you together, and you’ve got it bad for each other. So what’s the problem?”
Becker heaved a sigh. Smith was relentless, but the truth was he was wound tight again, and he might as well stop keeping every single painful thought and feeling to himself. He’d done that for the last year and he hadn’t started to feel human again until he finally talked about it with Megan. “The problem is many problems. I’m crazy about her and want her back, but she’s leaving town,” he said, starting with the list of roadblocks. “And she’s afraid of being with me—”
Smith cut him off before he could voice Megan’s deeper fears.
“Ah, now we’re getting somewhere,” Smith said as he turned onto the street with the firehouse, ready and eager to dispense advice, it seemed. “All right, here’s my best channeling of Dr. Phil advice. Go with her.”
He scrunched his eyebrows. “Go with her?”
Smith nodded vigorously as he pulled into the station. “Yep. If you love her, if you’re crazy for her, and the only thing standing in the way is her leaving town, then go with her.”
It wasn’t that simple, he wanted to say.
But then, maybe it was.
Because thirty minutes later, Travis strolled into the firehouse and clapped him on the shoulder. “Hey man, we need to talk.”
“Yeah?” He raised an eyebrow, curiosity digging deep into him. The last time they’d talked here at the firehouse, Travis had made it patently clear that their friendship was history if he hurt Megan. He’d done just that, hadn’t he? Becker braced himself for the final nail in the coffin.
“Yeah, because I’m about to take over the rest of your shift. My sister is waiting for you at your house, and I really think you need to go see her right now. Because you’re the best man in the world for her, and there’s nothing I want more than for her to be happy.”
Becker didn’t move. He was sure his boots were stuck to the concrete floor, and that his ears were playing tricks on him. Because there was no way Travis had said that. No fucking way. “You didn’t just say what I think you said, did you?”
Travis rolled his eyes. “Get the hell out of here.”
“No, seriously, Trav,” he said, pushing back. He needed to know for certain. “She’s still here?”
“Yes. I offered to bring her here to the firehouse to see you and talk to you, like in some goddamn chick movie where one of them shows up at the other’s workplace to profess their feelings in front of the world, but she said something about the two of you being anti-crowd. So there you go. She’s still here, at your house, and you have my blessing. Not that you ever needed it,” Travis grumbled. “Nor did she, because she’s a grown woman and not just my baby sister, and she’s chosen you. If you make her this goddamn happy that she’s chucked the biggest worry she ever had, then far be it from little old me to stand in the way.”
Becker laughed, maybe from the shock, maybe from the sheer volume of this double whammy of a surprise. “No. I didn’t need it, and she didn’t, either. But I’m damn glad to have it, bro.”
Travis clapped Becker on the back, and then moved it for a quick hug. “Now go,” Travis said, shooing him away. “I don’t come around o
ften and take other men’s shifts for grins. Go.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
She’d replayed those two little words from her mom—worth it—on the way down to San Francisco this morning with Travis, then in the hour she’d sat in the chair, gritting her teeth because it hurt, and all the way back to Hidden Oaks, straight into Becker’s driveway. Travis had kept her company this time, a marked contrast to the last time she’d been in that shop in the city.
Now she was waiting on his doorstep, the noontime sun shining brightly above. This time, she didn’t mind waiting for him under the blue sky of a summer day. She wouldn’t mind waiting in the rain, or the wind, or the dark of the night either. He was worth waiting for, even as the nerves skated across her skin, and the hummingbirds raced in circles in her belly. She didn’t know if he would take her back. She didn’t know if she’d lost her chance. But she knew she had to take the risk.
When he pulled up several minutes after Travis had left for the fire station, she practically wanted to run to his truck, yank open the door, and fling herself at him. Instead, she rose as he stepped out of his vehicle. Then they both stopped moving. There was a moment when they simply stood in place, she on the steps, he in the driveway, staring at each other. This was the moment—the real start or end to them.
She took the first step and began walking across his lawn, and in seconds he was walking toward her.
“Hi,” she said as she neared him. She kept her hands at her sides, even though she wanted to throw her arms around him and kiss him. But words needed to come first. She would assume nothing, even though he was here.
“Hi.”
She swallowed and started to talk, to say she was sorry, to say she loved him, to say all the things she’d realized in the last twenty-four hours, but he went first. “Megan, I’ll go with you to Portland.”
She blinked. That was the last thing in the world she’d thought she would hear. He loved Hidden Oaks. It had become the place where he belonged. “What? But you love it here.”
“I do. I never thought I’d get so attached to a town, especially when I was trying to escape everything, but this town has become my family—from the people I work with at the bar, to the woman who makes my coffee, to all the men at the firehouse. I came here to start over and somehow over the last year it worked; they’ve all snuck in on me and I’ll miss them like hell,” he said, stopping to reach for her and run his fingers through her hair.
She leaned into his hand, wanting to be close to him.
“But you,” he continued, looking at her with such reverence. “You gave me a purpose. You gave me myself back. I’m in love with you. Truly and deeply in love with you, and I never expected it to happen, but then I never expected you to happen. I never expected you to walk—or crash really—into my life and change nearly everything about what I want. And even though I can never give up the firehouse, I can give up this town that has become a home. I can give up my bar. I can give up my friends, but I can’t give up you,” he said, and her throat hitched, her eyes welling with tears. She reached for his hand, threading her fingers through his. She squeezed his hand, her way of telling him to keep going because he seemed to have more to say, and she wanted to hear it all. Every beautiful word.
“You are what’s most important to me, and I want you to have all the things you want in life, including your art and the tattoo shop that I know you’re going to have there someday, and your hopes and your dreams. And I hope and I dream that I can be a part of all that if you’ll have me, and I know that’s asking a lot. I can’t promise you that I won’t get hurt, but I can promise you I will do everything I can to come home to you. Wherever we are.”
We.
Her mind spun wildly as he put himself on the line for her and offered her something she’d never expected. Her heart rioted in her chest, dancing like a madwoman. She couldn’t hold back. She reached for him, looping a hand around his neck, lacing her fingers through his soft hair. Instantly, she felt him relax under her touch.
“I want nothing more than to have you with me,” she said, her voice breaking as stupid tears of joy threatened to overwhelm her.
“You do?” he asked carefully.
“I do,” she said quickly. “Yes, I do. So much. And I’m sorry I ran. I’m sorry I freaked out. I was scared because I feel so much for you that I don’t know what to do with it. It’s more than I ever thought I would feel.” She held out her hands, as if she were surrendering. Maybe she was—surrendering to love. “This is a done deal. This thing I feel for you isn’t going to go away. Nothing is going to undo it.”
“Are you sure?” he asked with concern in his eyes, but he moved closer to her, running his hand along her hip, then around her waist. She loved the feel of his hand on her. She didn’t want to let go of him.
“Yes,” she said, fighting back the tears, even though they were good tears this time. They were tears that came from a heart that was cracking wide open, not one she was trying to protect. “I was scared, and I’m still scared, but I want to be scared with you, here or in Portland or wherever we are. My heart belongs to you, and that’s not going to change whether I stay by your side or run. Loving you plays on every fear I’ve had since I was young. But I’m a grown-up now, and even though it took me a day to come to my stupid senses, I’ve come to them. Because I’ve fallen for you, and not just the bar owner I met the first night, but the guy who fights his way in and out of burning buildings. That’s who you are and that’s the man I’m in love with.”
…
They’d both used the L-word in their letters to each other. But today, they were saying it in person. He was hearing it fall on his ears as she looked at him with tenderness and trust. He flashed back to the night they met, to how simple it had seemed then. Now it was simple, but only because when you look in the eyes of the woman who changes your heart, everything is simple.
Amazingly, beautifully simple and true in its own way. Not every woman was going to sign up for the roller coaster of loving a man like him. But she wasn’t just any woman. She was his.
He cupped her cheek in his hand, and she leaned into him instantly. He gently ran the back of his fingers across her soft skin. “I’m so in love with you,” he said, then brushed his lips against hers because he couldn’t wait any longer to kiss her.
Kissing her was like coming home. The feel of her lips was passion and certainty all at once. It was everything he’d never known he wanted, and everything he could never give up. He slanted his mouth to hers, and didn’t stop kissing her. His pulse raced, vibrations soaring through his body. Her lips tasted spectacular, and even though it had been only a day since she’d seen him, it felt like forever. She kissed him back as if it had been, as if she’d been waiting for his return.
Finally, they pulled apart.
“Should we get packing?” he said with a smile. He was ready. He’d go anywhere with her. “I’ve got a truck; I can give my two weeks and we can get out of town.”
Her brown eyes glinted playfully. “I’ve got that all figured out, and I’ll tell you everything in a minute. But there’s something I want to show you first.”
She started stripping again. Just like when he’d met her. She winced as she unbuttoned her shirt and pulled it off. She wore only a white tank top underneath. She turned slightly to show him her bare shoulder, which was no longer bare. It was marked up with new ink.
His lips quirked up at the sight of her new tattoo to match the owl. The raccoon she’d drawn was now permanent on her skin.
“You have a raccoon firefighter on your shoulder,” he said in disbelief.
“Do you like it?” she asked, her voice wavering.
“I love it.” He gazed at the drawing she’d made that was now a part of her body. He looked in her eyes. They were soft and sweet and full of everything he’d ever wanted. “Just like I love you.”
“It’s permanent,” she said, gesturing to her new ink. “Like how I feel for you.” Then she wrapped he
rself up in him, pressing herself against his chest, and the feel of her perfect body was both too much and never enough. He needed her now.
“Good. Now let’s get inside so I can have you again and then you can tell me your plans.”
…
Her hands were on his waist, pulling up his navy-blue T-shirt as he shut the door behind them. She couldn’t keep her hands off him. She was dying to share her plan, but she wanted him now. Talking would need to be tabled. Contact came first. “Let’s do it on the stairs,” she said. “I can’t wait.”
“Trust me, I plan on fucking you on my stairs, and in my shower, and on the couch, and bent over the counter, but right now I am taking you back to my bedroom, and I am making love to you, and you’re not going to want to leave again.”
He picked her up, sensitive to her tender tattooed flesh, and slung her over his shoulder. He took the stairs two at a time. It was a possessive move, and a protective one, and it said everything she’d ever need to know about him. He was fierce, and he was gentle, and he was all she wanted. He carried her back to his bed and laid her down.
“And now, where did we leave off?” He tapped his index finger against his chin as if he were deep in thought, then smiled wickedly. She loved that he smiled so much with her. That he’d gone from brooding to a little less brooding.
She knew she hadn’t turned him into a new man. He was still Becker. He still had that loner side and probably always would. But at least he’d started to move beyond what had chased him here in the first place. “Ah, I seem to remember. I’d turned you into a rag doll, but you were starting to get ready for another round.”
“I’m ready.” She skimmed off her jeans and reached for his belt buckle, pulling him close. She angled her hips into him, her body a magnet needing its opposite. He dipped his hand into her panties, groaning when he felt her dampness.
Melt For Him Page 18